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The small accounting practice, despite being the most numerous part of the profession by number of firms, remains largely under-researched. Part of the reason the small practice category remains elusive is that researchers find it difficult to precisely define the object to study, and yet, this may be precisely the reason for studying it. Envisaging how this category is “represented” in institutionalized settings, constitutes a rich agenda for future research as it allows the small practitioner world to be connected to the issue of intra-professional segmentation. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

This paper proposes reinvigorating research around Bucher and Strauss’ (1961) conceptualization of professions as “segments in movement”. At the same time as advocating a better investigation of the small practitioner segment itself, it suggests to take the latter as an example to further explore the vision of professions as segments “more or less delicately held together”. To this end, there is a potential for cross-fertilization between Bucher and Strauss’ research programme and a range of other theoretical frameworks.

The discussion points towards how small practice, as a segment whose history and characteristics reflect the different struggles that have led to the creation of the professional accounting body and marked its subsequent evolution, is far from insignificant. Segmenting the profession in categories related to “size” offers an opportunity to deal with an under-investigated aspect of professions’ sociology and history, which encapsulates its inherent diversity and hierarchy. Whilst the professional body may replicate the hierarchy that structures broader society, the meaning of small itself, within a hierarchy of organizations, is also a relative concept. It is politically charged, and must be delicately managed in order to maintain harmony within the polarized professional space.

The small practitioner has been much overlooked in the accounting literature, and the literature on the professions has overemphasized aspects of its cohesiveness. The authors contribute a revitalized agenda for researchers to explore the dynamics of heterogeneity and unity in the professional body, by focusing a lens on the small practice and extending the “segments in movements” premise beyond the functional division of professions.

Purpose: While COVID-19 has upended lives, it has also catalyzed innovation with potential to advance health delivery. Yet, we know little about how the delivery system, and primary care in particular, has responded and how this has impacted vulnerable patients. We aimed to understand the impact of COVID-19 on primary care practice sites and their vulnerable patients and to identify explanations for variation. Approach: We developed and administered a survey to practice managers and physician leaders from 173 primary care practice sites, October-November 2020. We report and graphically depict results from univariate analysis and examine potential explanations for variation in practices' process innovations in response to COVID-19 by assessing bivariate relationships between seven dependent variables and four independent variables. Findings: Among 96 (55.5%) respondents, primary care practice sites on average took more safety (8.5 of 12) than financial (2.5 of 17) precautions in response to COVID-19. Practice sites varied in their efforts to protect patients with vulnerabilities, providing care initially postponed, and experience with virtual visits. Financial risk, practice size, practitioner age, and emergency preparedness explained variation in primary care practices' process innovations. Many practice sites plan to sustain virtual visits, dependent mostly on patient and provider preference and continued reimbursement. Value: While findings indicate rapid and substantial innovation, conditions must enable primary care practice sites to build on and sustain innovations, to support care for vulnerable populations, including those with multiple chronic conditions and socio-economic barriers to health, and to prepare primary care for future emergencies.

The purpose of this paper is to contribute to the supply chain management literature by presenting the Australian practitioners’ perception of the role of relationship integration in developing supply chain agility and flexibility.

The research takes semi-structured, indepth interviews with ten operations and supply chain practitioners in the Australian manufacturing sector. A systematic qualitative data analysis approach grounded on cross-interview synthesis was used.

Findings contributed into understanding of the manufacturing companies’ implementation of relationship integration with respect to decision trade-offs involved in contract design. Moreover, the findings revealed the significant perceived importance and impact of relationship integration on supply chain agility and flexibility development. This was, however, found to be a function of things such as upstream or downstream focus and organisational size. These findings were expressed in terms of seven propositions.

Analysis of the interviews substantiates the criticality of informed allocation of resources to relationship-intensive activities and investments across the supply chain to develop agility and flexibility. International businesses can gain insights into Australian manufacturing businesses’ perception of relationship integration, which can be invaluable for strategic planning to develop agile and flexible supply chains with their Australian partners.

This paper takes an original approach to present operations and supply chain practitioners’ perception of manufacturing businesses’ use of relationship integration for supply chain agility and flexibility development.

The study investigates the perceptions of auditor independence (PAI) between auditors and users in Barbados.

A self‐administered questionnaire was adapted and modified from Beattie et al.'s study in the UK the sample included 66 auditors and 148 users. Factors relating to the size and closeness of Barbadian society, lengthy tenure and being a sole audit practitioner, small audit firm, provision of non‐audit services (NAS) among others, were investigated.

Economic dependence of auditor on the client, the provision of NAS, high competition, small firm size, being a sole practitioner, lengthy tenure and the size and closeness of Barbadian society were found to negatively affect PAI. Auditor independence was perceived to be enhanced by the existence of audit committees, rotation of audit partners, risks to auditor arising from poor quality, regulatory rights and requirements surrounding auditor change and an auditor's right to attend and be heard at the company's annual general meetings.

Owing to the relatively small sample size and small emerging market, these findings should be interpreted with caution.

This research serves to inform audit related policies and regulation on the potential threats to auditor independence.

This paper contributes to the limited body of research on auditor independence in small developing countries.

Conducting relevant research is a cornerstone of good academic practice. However, considering academics and practitioners’ divergent paradigms and social systems, it is challenging to undertake impactful research. Indeed, the research–practice gap remains an essential issue in human resource management research. There have been several calls for translating research for dissemination, making it more societally relevant, and beginning conversations and activities that move beyond the confines of the academic context. In fact, research on talent management (TM) has been accused of lagging in offering organizations vision and direction. Understanding the perceived causes and potential solutions for relevant problems is a real need to successfully narrow the TM research–practice gap. Thus, the purpose of this chapter is to offer an in-depth discussion on the research–practice gap in TM. To do so, we first identify the critical dimensions of research relevance that will help us to ground our discussion regarding the applicability of current academic TM research. By doing this, we seek to understand better what is happening with TM research, which should then help provide insights into how its practical impact can be improved.

The Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) issued a consultation document in November 1998, which set out a framework for the independent regulation of the accountancy profession. This framework broadly adopts the proposals put forward by the profession itself. In this paper, the focus is on audit regulation. The current regime is outlined and its structural weaknesses and procedural problems identified. The proposed reforms are described and critically evaluated. It is argued that the proposed reforms offer only a partial solution to regulatory concerns, since no changes are proposed to the existing regime either for registration, or for monitoring and discipline of the majority of audit cases. An expanded framework that rationalises current practices and provides a more comprehensive solution is suggested. A critical feature of the proposal is that a distinction is made between audits of small entities and audits of major listed companies, only the latter of which are of public interest. Each would have distinct licensing and monitoring procedures.

This study aims to investigate the extent to which the provision of non-audit services (NAS) by external auditors to audit clients affects auditors’ independence and the audit expectation gap in Nigeria.

The study adopts an interpretivist approach. In total, 30 semi-structured, face-to-face interviews were conducted to explore the views expressed by audit partners and pension fund managers in Nigeria; group responses were evaluated and presented separately. After transcribing the interview audio recordings, a thematic data analysis of the two groups’ responses was performed.

Interpretation of the interview responses indicates that the provision of NAS by audit firms to their audit clients is regarded by auditors as a matter of economic necessity. Nevertheless, it is also perceived as impeding auditors’ independence and increasing the gap between the auditor and public expectations.

This study contributes to the debate surrounding the need for an independent body to oversee auditing standard setting distinct from the current practice to enhance transparency.

A qualitative analysis of the nuanced responses obtained from the semi-structured interviews reveals starkly the perceived economic pressures on auditors to accept non-audit work. Moreover, it endorses the regulation to restrict non-audit work in support of a sustainable fee level for an independent audit.

This paper aims to provide guidance on how midstream social marketing can be used to understand and address wicked problems through adopting a collaborative systems integration approach conceptualised from a macromarketing perspective.

Rothschild’s motivation, opportunity and ability (MOA) framework is applied in this study to understand veterinarians as midstream microactors in the macrosystem of wicked animal welfare issues. Focus group and individual interview data from veterinarians were analysed through the lens of the MOA framework to understand veterinarians’ as midstream microactors within a systems continuum.

The MOA of veterinarians to engage downstream targets – cat owners – in behaviour change are identified. Fresh insights reveal the challenges and barriers to simply focusing on veterinarians as the key microactor required to address the wicked problem of cat overpopulation. Challenges identified include the cost of sterilisation to both owners and veterinary practices, alongside vying beliefs about the capacity of individual veterinarians to persuade owners about the benefits of sterilisation to improve animal welfare. Additionally, insight into veterinarians’ perceptions of upstream strategies to address the problem – in terms of marketing, education and law – expose further complications on where regulation and law enforcement can be integrated in future social marketing strategies to address the cat overpopulation problem.

The application of the MOA framework improves understanding of the concept and practice of midstream social marketing. It provides a practical and strategic tool that social marketers can apply when approaching behaviour change that leverages midstream actors as part of the social change solution.

Research and theorisation in this paper demonstrates an alternative pathway to address wicked problems via a collaborative systems integration approach conceptualised from a macromarketing perspective. Effective long-term change relies on understanding and coordinating a broad macrosystem of interconnected actors along a downstream, midstream and upstream continuum. This starts by understanding the microactions of individual actors within the macrosystem.

The purpose of this paper is to make available an artifact that helps entrepreneurs and managers to recognize the diversity of creative logics centered on resources that are already available to the organization, presenting it as a tool to support the expansion of the product and service portfolio and as an alternative to Research and Development strategies, which are difficult to implement in the context of small businesses.

Following the precepts of the Action Design Research (ADR) method, researchers and practitioners (teachers and consultants) collaborated in the development of the artifact. Successive versions of the artifact were tested in the field: in classrooms by the teachers and in small companies by the consultants.

In addition to the artifact itself, which is available on the Internet, the lessons learned from the design process of the artifact were formalized in meta-requirements and meta-designs, in accordance with the precepts of the design theory that served as the foundation of ADR. These meta-specifications facilitate the critical analysis and evolution of the proposed artifact, in addition to the conception and proposition of new artifacts for the same class of problem.

The dialogical nature of the ADR approach, with the development of the artifact through interactive cycles between design and use, based on the practitioners' experience of using it with the final beneficiaries, resulted in a functional artifact that is simple to use by those interested in discussing product and service innovation with small organizations. The artifact in the form of software is available to all at https://tentypescreation.com.

From business examples and comparisons with widespread creative tactics, such as copy and invention, eight other creative tactics centered on resources available in the organization are explored by the artifact, providing means for practitioners to discuss alternative ways for managers, entrepreneurs, and future entrepreneurs to face the challenge of product and service innovation in small businesses.