{"title":"风格问题审计事务所和审计合伙人在关键审计事项报告中的作用","authors":"Linette M. Rousseau, Karla M. Zehms","doi":"10.1111/1911-3846.12902","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<p>We examine the relative importance of audit firm versus partner decision styles in key audit matter (KAM) reporting. Standard setters intended KAMs to increase the usefulness of the audit report by requiring the partner-led engagement team to disclose engagement-specific information about the most significant judgments they made during the audit. However, stakeholders expressed widespread concern that audit firms' longstanding efforts toward standardization would result in generic KAMs at the audit firm level and provide partners little opportunity or incentive for engagement-specific reporting. We evaluate this high-stakes tension between standard setters' goals for audit reporting and auditors' deep-rooted practices by leveraging data from the United Kingdom, which has required partner identification since 2009 and expanded audit reports since 2013. We find that clients sharing the same partner receive KAMs that are 10% more textually similar than clients with different partners. In contrast, clients sharing the same audit firm receive KAMs that are just 2% more textually similar than clients with different audit firms. This implies that partner decision styles are more important in influencing KAM outcomes than audit firm styles. Collectively, our results suggest that partners make unique KAM reporting judgments, countering concerns that audit firms' efforts toward standardization will yield boilerplate KAMs. This evidence extends the literature on expanded audit reporting and partner decision styles and provides valuable insights into a contemporary issue in audit regulation with broader implications for understanding dynamics within the profession.</p>","PeriodicalId":10595,"journal":{"name":"Contemporary Accounting Research","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":3.2000,"publicationDate":"2023-08-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":"{\"title\":\"It's a matter of style: The role of audit firms and audit partners in key audit matter reporting\",\"authors\":\"Linette M. Rousseau, Karla M. 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We find that clients sharing the same partner receive KAMs that are 10% more textually similar than clients with different partners. In contrast, clients sharing the same audit firm receive KAMs that are just 2% more textually similar than clients with different audit firms. This implies that partner decision styles are more important in influencing KAM outcomes than audit firm styles. Collectively, our results suggest that partners make unique KAM reporting judgments, countering concerns that audit firms' efforts toward standardization will yield boilerplate KAMs. This evidence extends the literature on expanded audit reporting and partner decision styles and provides valuable insights into a contemporary issue in audit regulation with broader implications for understanding dynamics within the profession.</p>\",\"PeriodicalId\":10595,\"journal\":{\"name\":\"Contemporary Accounting Research\",\"volume\":null,\"pages\":null},\"PeriodicalIF\":3.2000,\"publicationDate\":\"2023-08-26\",\"publicationTypes\":\"Journal Article\",\"fieldsOfStudy\":null,\"isOpenAccess\":false,\"openAccessPdf\":\"\",\"citationCount\":\"0\",\"resultStr\":null,\"platform\":\"Semanticscholar\",\"paperid\":null,\"PeriodicalName\":\"Contemporary Accounting Research\",\"FirstCategoryId\":\"91\",\"ListUrlMain\":\"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1911-3846.12902\",\"RegionNum\":3,\"RegionCategory\":\"管理学\",\"ArticlePicture\":[],\"TitleCN\":null,\"AbstractTextCN\":null,\"PMCID\":null,\"EPubDate\":\"\",\"PubModel\":\"\",\"JCR\":\"Q1\",\"JCRName\":\"BUSINESS, FINANCE\",\"Score\":null,\"Total\":0}","platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Contemporary Accounting Research","FirstCategoryId":"91","ListUrlMain":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1911-3846.12902","RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"BUSINESS, FINANCE","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
摘要
我们研究了关键审计事项(KAM)报告中审计公司与合伙人决策风格的相对重要性。标准制定者希望通过要求合伙人领导的业务团队披露他们在审计过程中做出的最重要判断的具体信息,来提高关键审计事项报告的有用性。然而,利益相关者普遍担心,审计公司长期以来为实现标准化所做的努力会导致在审计公司层面出现通用的 KAM,从而使合伙人几乎没有机会或动力来进行特定业务报告。我们利用英国的数据,评估了标准制定者的审计报告目标与审计师根深蒂固的做法之间的紧张关系,英国自 2009 年起要求合伙人身份识别,并自 2013 年起扩大审计报告范围。我们发现,与合伙人不同的客户相比,合伙人相同的客户收到的 KAMs 在文字上要相似 10%。相比之下,同一家审计公司的客户收到的 KAMs 文字相似度仅比不同审计公司的客户高 2%。这意味着,在影响 KAM 结果方面,合伙人的决策风格比审计公司的风格更为重要。总之,我们的研究结果表明,合伙人会对 KAM 报告做出独特的判断,这反驳了人们对审计公司努力实现标准化将产生模板化 KAM 的担忧。这些证据扩展了有关扩展审计报告和合伙人决策风格的文献,为审计监管中的一个当代问题提供了有价值的见解,对理解行业内的动态具有更广泛的影响。
It's a matter of style: The role of audit firms and audit partners in key audit matter reporting
We examine the relative importance of audit firm versus partner decision styles in key audit matter (KAM) reporting. Standard setters intended KAMs to increase the usefulness of the audit report by requiring the partner-led engagement team to disclose engagement-specific information about the most significant judgments they made during the audit. However, stakeholders expressed widespread concern that audit firms' longstanding efforts toward standardization would result in generic KAMs at the audit firm level and provide partners little opportunity or incentive for engagement-specific reporting. We evaluate this high-stakes tension between standard setters' goals for audit reporting and auditors' deep-rooted practices by leveraging data from the United Kingdom, which has required partner identification since 2009 and expanded audit reports since 2013. We find that clients sharing the same partner receive KAMs that are 10% more textually similar than clients with different partners. In contrast, clients sharing the same audit firm receive KAMs that are just 2% more textually similar than clients with different audit firms. This implies that partner decision styles are more important in influencing KAM outcomes than audit firm styles. Collectively, our results suggest that partners make unique KAM reporting judgments, countering concerns that audit firms' efforts toward standardization will yield boilerplate KAMs. This evidence extends the literature on expanded audit reporting and partner decision styles and provides valuable insights into a contemporary issue in audit regulation with broader implications for understanding dynamics within the profession.
期刊介绍:
Contemporary Accounting Research (CAR) is the premiere research journal of the Canadian Academic Accounting Association, which publishes leading- edge research that contributes to our understanding of all aspects of accounting"s role within organizations, markets or society. Canadian based, increasingly global in scope, CAR seeks to reflect the geographical and intellectual diversity in accounting research. To accomplish this, CAR will continue to publish in its traditional areas of excellence, while seeking to more fully represent other research streams in its pages, so as to continue and expand its tradition of excellence.