Suchergebnisse

This paper investigates the change in accounting quality when firms shift from a revenue-oriented historical cost accounting regime as Norwegian GAAP (NGAAP) to a balance-oriented fair value accounting regime as International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS). Previous studies have demonstrated mixed effects on the accounting quality upon IFRS adoption. One possible reason is that the investigated domestic GAAP to a large extent has been adjusted to IFRS prior to IFRS adoption. This is not the case in NGAAP where IFRS adoption led to significant changes in the recognition and measurement rules. To investigate the change in accounting quality, the paper makes use of a panel design with 640 firm-year obserations from 2001 up to the financial crisis year 2008, including four years of pre-IFRS NGAAP observations and four years of IFRS-observations. The paper employs four commonly used approaches to investigate accounting quality: test of value relevance of net earnings and book values, accrual quality of net earnings, incidence of small positive net earnings and test of timely loss recognition. The paper demonstrates that the adoption of IFRS increases the relevance accounting information has for valuation purposes. IFRS requires recognition of intangible assets and off-balance sheet liabilities not allowed under NGAAP. Moreover, IFRS allows the use of fair value to a larger extent than NGAAP. The paper also demonstrates that NGAAP leads to timelier recognition of losses than IFRS. This supports the notion that historical cost accounting, which is the basic accounting principle under NGAAP, provides more conservative accounting numbers. Overall, this suggests that IFRS provides information more useful for valuation purposes, but to a lesser extent stewardship purposes which generally favours conservatism. NGAAP on the other hand, provides information less relevant for valuation purposes, but more relevant for stewardship purposes.

Forsiktig regnskapsrapportering har lenge vært et bærende element i all regnskapsproduksjon. Slik rapportering resulterer i gjennomgående lav verdsetting av egenkapital. Det er særlig tre regnskapsmessige løsninger som gir lav egenkapital: 1) Strengere krav til innregning av urealiserte inntekter enn urealiserte tap, 2) ingen eller begrenset mulighet for innregning av betingede eiendeler (eksempelvis rettslig, omtvistede erstatningskrav) og egenutviklede immaterielle eiendeler (eksempelvis egenutviklet merkevare) og 3) krav om lav (høy) verdsetting av eiendeler (forpliktelser) ved måleusikkerhet. Forsiktig regnskapsrapportering kan derfor anta ulike former. Denne artikkelen forsøker å klargjøre hva som kjennetegner forsiktig regnskapsrapportering og hvilket rasjonale som kan ligge bak slik rapportering.

Management fashion theory is a growing research area in management studies. The focus of this management fashion literature is to understand why some management concepts spread quickly and widely, while others do not. However, doing research on fashionable management concepts is a difficult task, and many commentators have pointed out the limitations of the research methods used in extant research. A consequence of these difficulties is that the theory has many understudied areas and 'blind spots'. This paper aims at providing a review of the research methods typically used in management fashion research, and assessing the strengths and weaknesses of various approaches. Based on this review, the paper suggests research strategies that can be used to illuminate the blind spots of the management fashion theory. The paper distinguishes between research strategies at four analytical levels: the managerial level, the intra-organizational level, the field-level and the cross-national level.

The Balanced Scorecard (BSC) has over the last two and a half decades received much attention as a management model for both private and public sector organizations. However, the BSC concept's use and application in local governments and municipalities remains relatively understudied. This is particularly the case for the Norwegian context. Therefore, the aim of this article is to conduct a descriptive analysis of the diffusion and implementation of the BSC in the Norwegian municipality sector. The article draws on two sources of data: (1) an electronic survey sent to all 428 municipalities in Norway, yielding a response rate of 26%, and (2) follow-up interviews with representatives from 15 municipalities. In the empirical analysis, the article first provides an overall overview of patterns related to the diffusion and implementation of the BSC in the Norwegian municipality sector. With respect to BSC diffusion and implementation, the data show that the BSC is still widely used among Norwegian municipalities and has not yet entered a clear downturn phase. With respect to adoption and implementation, a more fine-grained analysis of five categories of respondents (non-adopters, planners, implementers, current users, ex-users) is also carried out, focusing on the motives, perceptions and applications of the concept. The analysis reveals considerable variation when it comes to perceptions and experiences associated with BSC adoption and implementation.