TY  - JOUR
U1  - Wissenschaftlicher Artikel
A1  - Rieg, Robert
A1  - Meier, Jan-Hendrik
A1  - Finckh, Carmen
T1  - Beware of the watchdog! Role communication in job advertisements for management accountants
JF  - Journal of applied accounting research
N2  - Purpose
Job advertisements are important means of communicating role expectations for management accountants to the labor market. They provide information about which roles are sought and expected. However, which roles are communicated in job advertisements is unknown so far.

Design/methodology/approach
With a text-mining approach on a large sample of 889 job ads, the authors extract information on roles, type of firm and hierarchical position of the management accountant sought.

Findings
The results indicate an apparent mix of different role types with a strong focus on a classic watchdog role. However, the business partner role is more often sought for leadership positions or in family businesses and small- and medium-sized enterprises (SME).

Research limitations/implications
The main limitation is the lack of an agreed-upon measurement instrument for roles in job offers. The study results imply that corporate practice is not as theory-driven as is postulated and communicated in the management accounting community. This indicates the existence of a research-practice gap and tensions between different actors in the management accounting field.

Practical implications
The results challenge the current role discussion of professional organizations for management accountants as business partners.

Originality/value
The authors contribute the first study, which explicitly analyzes the communication of roles in job offers for management accountants. It indicates a discrepancy between scholarly discussion on roles and management accountants' work from an employer's perspective.
KW  - business partner
KW  - controller
KW  - job offers
KW  - management accountant
KW  - roles
KW  - text mining
Y1  - 2023
SN  - 0967-5426
SS  - 0967-5426
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1108/JAAR-07-2022-0188
DO  - https://doi.org/10.1108/JAAR-07-2022-0188
VL  - 24
IS  - 5
SP  - 889
EP  - 909
S1  - 21
PB  - Emerald
CY  - Bingley
ER  -