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This paper investigates gender differences in reported job satisfaction and career choices revealed by a postal survey of accountants from the Queensland Division of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in Australia. Of particular interest are levels of satisfaction with remuneration and promotion. Two moderating factors of career age and firm size are also considered. Consistent with prior research, female accountants reported dissatisfaction with their opportunities for promotion. However, unlike prior research there was no evidence of a gender effect in remuneration levels, and in reported satisfaction with remuneration. Nor were there differences in satisfaction across age bands, and public accounting firms of different size. The link between satisfaction levels of female accountants and their career choices of leaving their current employer, moving to parttime employment, or leaving the accounting profession was also investigated. Consistent with a large body of organisational and accounting research, low levels of job satisfaction were associated with higher turnover intentions for female accountants.

nvestigates the career progression of young female Certified Public Accountants in Ireland. Focuses on generation X accountants. A total of 12 male and 12 female accountants were interviewed. All were under the age of 30 and qualified as within the past five years. Aims to examine: whether the young generation of female accountants has encountered the “glass ceiling”; if there is a tendency for male dominance in professional accountancy practices or in industry; whether gender affects one’s ability to network socially; and the ability of the young accountants to balance their home and work lives. This study is particularly relevant, as previous research studies conducted with accountants have focused on older generations. The results of the study show that young female accountants encounter obstacles in their careers because of their gender. The female accountants in this study suggest that male dominance will persist in accountancy practices. Our findings also suggest that an important challenge for managers today is managing generation Xers, who work to live and do not live to work. Finally, the research findings from this study contribute primarily to the extant research on women in the accountancy profession. Also contributes to the corpus of knowledge on women in management, career development, and the development and management of generation X.

The purpose of this study is to explore the struggle for entry and career success of the early pioneer women accountants in Great Britain and its former colonies the USA, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.

A career crafting matrix guides the analysis of historical information available on five pioneer women accountants in order to understand their success in gaining entry into the profession and their subsequent careers.

Despite an exclusionary environment, career crafting efforts coupled with family and organizational support enabled these women to become one of the first female accountants in their respective countries. Their struggles were not personal but much broader—seeking social, political, economic and professional empowerment for women.

This is the first paper to utilize the career crafting matrix developed from current female accountants' careers to explore careers of pioneering female accountants. It adds to the limited literature on women actors in accounting and may provide insight into approaching current forms of difference and discrimination.

The results of this study suggest that self‐reported leadership styles of female accountants differ somewhat from the leadership styles reported by male accountants. Females are more likely than males to indicate that they use an interactive style of management called transformational leadership. This leadership style was found to be correlated with several management skills associated with success. Female accountants reported somewhat higher perceived effectiveness on two of these management skills: coaching and developing and communicating. The findings also suggest that female accountants receive more developmental opportunities than do their male colleagues.

The overarching aim of this chapter is to explore the existing status of mentoring in accounting firms in India and Malaysia, to understand whether or not mentoring is gendered in these country contexts, and to investigate the impact of the size of the firm and country context on mentoring. The mentoring framework is used as a theoretical lens to understand the orientation of principals and partners towards the existing and future mentoring support and activities of micro-sized, small-sized, medium-sized, and family-owned accounting firms operating in both India and Malaysia. Data obtained from 40 in-depth interviews (n = 20 in India and n = 20 in Malaysia) are analyzed using qualitative data analysis software NVivo12. The findings obtained from the study indicate that mentoring support exists informally in accounting firms, mentoring support offered and mentoring activities undertaken are gendered, and the nature, extent and type of mentoring offered in accounting firms varies according to the size of the firm in both countries. The chapter presents important practical, theoretical and methodological implications of the study for avoiding gendered mentoring practices in accounting firms.

Investigates the impact of locus of control and gender on the experiences and practices of accounting professionals. Also considers the impact of role overload, inter‐role conflict, and coping behaviour on these attitudes. Suggests that a complex set of forces creates differences in the extent to which an individual encounters, and is successfully able to contend with, both role overload and inter‐role conflict. Gender differences were observed in the accountants′ expressions of housekeeper role overload, volunteer role overload, and inter‐role conflict between work and spouse. Locus of control differences were present in the perceived conflict between work and self. Locus of control and gender interacted to produce differences in accountants′ expressions of overload and leisurite role overload expressed less satisfaction with their current positions and greater intentions to search for alternative opportunities. Suggests that the accounting environment may still be inhospitable for certain women attempting to realize multiple work and family obligations.

Prior research has shown that a work environment that facilitates work-life balance not only benefits the personal lives of employees but also leads to better job performance and ethical decision-making. Allocation of time between career and personal life is an age-old challenge for working people. Work-life balance refers to the manner in which people distribute time between their jobs and other activities, such as family, personal pursuits, and community involvement. This study compares the work-life balance perspectives of current and future accountants. Three research questions are examined. The first relates to the importance accountants place on work-life balance. The second concerns how work-life balance perspectives of current practitioners compare to future accountants. The third considers how gender differences affect work-life balance perspectives. Data for analysis was obtained via a survey of current accounting practitioners and of future accountants (students near graduation). Findings indicate that both current and future accountants believe that a healthy work-life balance is connected to work satisfaction, work performance, and ethical decision-making.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the changes in gender‐biased employment practices that it is perceived have occurred in New Zealand accountancy workplaces over the last 30 years, using Oliver's model of deinstitutionalization.

Sequential interviewing was carried out with 69 experienced chartered accountants and three human resource managers, and at a later date with nine young female accountants.

Evidence is presented of perceived political, functional and social pressures cumulatively contributing to deinstitutionalization of overt gender‐biased employment practices, with social and legislative changes being the most influential. Deinstitutionalization appears incomplete as some more subtle gender‐biased practices still remain in New Zealand's accountancy workplaces, relating particularly to senior‐level positions.

This study adds to understanding of how professions evolve. The purposeful bias in the sample selection, the small size of two of the interviewee groups, and the diversity in the interviewees' workplaces are recognized limitations.

Identification of further cultural change is required to deinstitutionalize the more subtle gender‐biased practices in accountancy organizations. This could help to avoid a serious deficiency of senior chartered accountants in practice in the future.

This paper represents one of a limited number of empirical applications of the deinstitutionalization model to organizational change and is the first to address the issue of gender‐biased practices in a profession. The use of sequential interviewing of different age groups, in order to identify and corroborate perceptions of organizational change is a novel approach.

This study aims to examine both male and female accountants’ perceptions of female career progression in the Accounting Profession in Ireland. This study is set in the context of a steady rise in the total proportion of female members across the seven accountancy bodies worldwide and the recent acknowledged failure of larger accountancy firms to promote women to senior levels in equal measure compared to male colleagues.

A quantitative study (with a qualitative component) was undertaken to gather the opinions and perceptions of Irish accounting professionals on their career progression, gender-related barriers and obstacles, the “glass ceiling”, networking and flexible work arrangements. The sample of respondents reflected the diversity of accounting disciplines and gender divide in the wider population.

Evidence of a divergence between the perception and the reality of the lived experience of female accountants, across the gender divide, was found. While respondents believe they have not experienced gender-related barriers in their career progression, it is clear that both genders believe that women succeed in this profession by adapting to masculine occupational values and norms.

These findings contribute to the extant literature on career progression of women and augment the female management and career development literature. The inclusion of the perception and comparison of male colleagues is of particular interest.

Despite popular portrayals of women's current success in public accounting, labour force statistics indicate that few women actually advance to partnership level positions. Accounting research on the scarcity of female partners tends to approach this issue from a person‐centred perspective and to focus on the characteristics of women as an explanation for their occupational status. Demonstrates that a situation‐centred perspective provides a useful contribution in understanding the scarcity of women partners. The findings are based on a survey of 188 male and 184 female accountants.