women accountants: is the grass greener outside the profession?

The British Accounting Review xxx (2013) 1–16

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The British Accounting Review

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Women accountants: Is the grass greener outside theprofession?

Elizabeth Gammie a,*, Rosalind Whiting b

aDepartment of Accounting and Finance, Aberdeen Business School, Robert Gordon University, Aberdeen AB10 7QE, United KingdombDepartment of Accountancy and Finance, University of Otago, Dunedin 9054, New Zealand

a r t i c l e i n f o

Article history:Received 22 February 2010Received in revised form 11 July 2012Accepted 16 July 2012

Keywords:GenderProfessional accountancy firmsIndustryWorking environmentTurnover of staff

* Corresponding author. Tel.: þ44 1224263810.E-mail address: [email protected] (E. Gammie

0890-8389/$ – see front matter � 2013 Elsevier Ltdhttp://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.bar.2013.03.005

Please cite this article in press as: GammieThe British Accounting Review (2013), http:

a b s t r a c t

Studies of professional accountancy firms have indicated a complex process of internalsocialisation which shapes the professional and organisational identities of the charteredaccountants working within them. These processes have acted as a mechanism forexcluding women, hindering their progress and facilitating their exit. Previous evidencesuggests that women leave professional accountancy firms in order to accommodate moreflexibility, experience less pressure, achieve consistency of hours and hence attain a betterwork/life balance.In this paper we seek to examine whether the gendered work practices of professionalaccountancy firms influence female choice to seek alternative employment outside theprofessional accountancy firm environment. Specifically the paper seeks to answer tworesearch questions (1) why and when do women leave professional accountancy firms? (2)is the working environment outside professional accountancy firms less gendered?Data was collected by means of a postal questionnaire distributed in 2005 to women whohad qualified in the years 1990–1995 (n ¼ 1022). Responses were received from 370women, of whom 100 were employed with professional accountancy firms and 270employed within industry. In depth interviews were also conducted with 7 partners inprofessional accountancy firms and 6 women who had left the professional accountancyenvironment to pursue employment elsewhere.Whilst there was evidence that professional accountancy firms continue to reflectgendered working norms practices, rather than compound the dominant view, this studysuggests that the primary reason women leave professional accountancy firms is to seekmore interesting work as opposed to obtaining more flexibility in their working lives. Inaddition, the experiences of the women, the working patterns, and rates of progressionwere similar irrespective of employment type.

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1. Introduction

Professional accountancyfirms are characterisedby several factors thatmean that career stagnation ordeparture of someoftheir accountants is inevitable. Firstly thehierarchical ‘pyramid-shaped’management structurewithin thesefirmsnecessitatesdeparture of some employees during their careers (Nazzari & Marley-Wallace, 2007). Secondly, the requirement of “appro-priate”professional behaviour inhibits the navigation of standardised career paths for someorganisationalmembers (Dambrin& Lambert, 2008; Grey, 1998). Of interest is the effect the requirement for this type of behaviour has on female accountants.

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E. Gammie, R. Whiting / The British Accounting Review xxx (2013) 1–162

As the accountancy profession becomes increasingly feminised (Ciancanelli, Gallhofer, Humphrey, & Kirkham, 1990; ICAS,2006; POB, 2011) it is imperative for professional accountancy firms that they retain, develop and progress their femaleaccountants (Wooten, 2002). Otherwise, it is likely that professional accountancy firms will experience a serious deficiency ofpractising accountants with the requisite knowledge required by clients (Lewis, 2007; Johnson, Lowe, & Reckers, 2008;Outram, 2008; Whiting, 2008b) as women show their dissatisfaction by leaving professional practice.

Much of the extant literature has focused on the inability of these professional accountancy firms to promote women tothe higher levels of their organisational structures (e.g. Fisher, 2006; Gammie, Gammie, Matson, & Duncan, 2007). Expla-nations indicate that “professionally acceptable” work practices, such as very long and inflexible working hours and over-riding client service are inherently gendered (Gammie et al., 2007; Lightbody, 2008;Windsor & Auyeung, 2006) and so hinderor exclude women from reaching partnership.

In addition, the literature suggests that these gendered working practices significantly influence women’s decisions toleave professional accountancy practice. Previous research has found that women move into other environments in order toescape the demanding work culture and facilitate a better work/life balance (Anderson-Gough, Grey, & Robson, 2001;Haythornthwaite, 2003). In particular womenwith children choose to seek alternative employment which is more conduciveto the dual work/family role that women continue to play in the current society (Dambrin & Lambert, 2008).

The contribution of this paper is to examine whether the gendered work practices of professional accountancy firmsinfluence female choice to seek alternative employment outside the professional accountancy firm environment. Specifically,the paper seeks to answer two research questions: (1) why and when do women leave professional accountancy firms? (2) isthe environment outside this arena less gendered than that of the professional accountancy firm?

The paper will set the context in which the study was undertaken (Section 2) before reviewing the relevant literature(Section 3) and outlining the method adopted for the study (Section 4). The results (Section 5) will then be presented andanalysed before conclusions are drawn (Section 6).

2. The context of the study

There are six professional accountancy bodies that operate in the UK.1 Professional accountancy firms in the UK, however,tend to train their recruits with ICAS, ICAEW or ICAI dependent on the location of the office.2 Whilst the training regimesbetween these bodies are relatively similar (Karreman, 2007) the women in this study all qualified with ICAS.

A typical career path for an ICAS qualified individual would be to obtain a degree prior to joining a professionalaccountancy firm3 as a junior trainee (Gammie & Kirkham, 2008). Promotion to senior trainee would follow from successfulcompletion of the early examination hurdles4 and trainees would subsequently be promoted to accountant on admission tomembership.5 Thereafter, subsequent promotion to manager, senior manager and director6 would be based on standardsuccess factors such as a good work ethic, high productivity, diligence and technical expertise (Anderson, Johnson, & Reckers,1994; Whiting, 2008a; Whiting & Vugt, 2006). However, in order to progress to the partnership table other more subjectivecriteria such as relationship building with staff and clients, ability to generate new business, cross sell consultancy servicesand add value to clients are also considered (Burrowes, 2006; Cowan, 2007; Kumra & Vinnicombe, 2008; Wyatt, 2004).Promotion to partner usually occurs when an individual reaches their early to mid thirties (Gammie et al., 2007).

The traditional activities of an accountant employed within a professional accountancy firm were audit and accountancyservices. Since the 1980s an increasing emphasis on profit and commercial gain has seen a dramatic expansion in the scope ofactivities performed (Suddaby, Gendron, & Lam, 2009), to include such activities as management consulting (Suddaby,Cooper, & Greenwood, 2007). This expansion has also been accompanied by a more litigious environment (Topping, 2008),more bureaucratic control, less individual discretion and increased compartmentalisation and routinisation of work (Jeacle,2008). This increased routinisation has not favoured women as there is evidence to suggest that women get marginalised andsegregated into the more routine functions of the profession (Hooks, 1996, Whiting, 2008a).

The accounting profession has a long history, however, of embedding professional accountancy firm trained accountantsinto other organizational settings (Suddaby et al., 2009). Therefore many qualified accountants leave professional accoun-tancy practice some time after qualification. For example, there were more ICAS members employed at the end of 2010 inindustry and commerce (41% of the total membership) thanwere employed in public practice (29% of the total membership)7

(POB, 2011). However, there is no available data on the timing of departure or sector breakdown by gender. ICAS publishes

1 The Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (ICAEW), the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Scotland (ICAS), the Institute ofChartered Accountants in Ireland (ICAI), the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA), the Chartered Institute of Public Finance Accountants(CIPFA) and the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (CIMA).

2 Although some firms, irrespective of geographical office location (e.g. Ernst and Young) train most recruits through ICAS (ICAS, 2008).3 Whilst it is possible to train outside a professional accountancy office through the Training Outwith Public Practice Scheme (TOPPS), it is only un-

dertaken rarely (e.g. 3% in March 2009).4 For example, the Test of Competence examinations and the Test of Professional Skills.5 Admission to membership is dependent on passing the Test of Professional Expertise, ethics training and completion of an Achievement Log.6 Whilst promotion practices will differ dependent on different firms, promotion to manager usually happens within 1–3 years after qualifying. Pro-

motion to senior manager usually happens within 3–5 years after qualifying.7 The rest of the membership was made up as follows: 3% public sector, 19% retired and 8% ‘other’.

Please cite this article in press as: Gammie, E., & Whiting, R., Women accountants: Is the grass greener outside the profession?,The British Accounting Review (2013), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.bar.2013.03.005

E. Gammie, R. Whiting / The British Accounting Review xxx (2013) 1–16 3

annual data on females by sector, but there is no available data onwhen either sex leave their training provider subsequent toqualification (ICAS, 2008).

3. The literature

Historically womenwere excluded from the professional echelons of the accounting profession (Kirkham,1992; Roberts &Coutts, 1992; Westcott & Seiler, 1986) being marginalised into secretarial, clerical and book-keeping roles (McKeen &Richardson, 1998) on the grounds that they were intellectually unfit for an accounting role (Lehman, 1992). However, thisintellectual exclusion was challenged as women increasingly participated in education and subsequently outperformed men(Broadbent and Kirkham, 2008; HESA, 2002; JCGQ, 2002). Women were now equipped with the competencies to achieve acareer in an occupation traditionally dominated by men (Bussey & Bandura, 1999) as they could pass the examinations (Grey,1998) and demonstrate the appropriate technical ability (Hanlon, 1998).

Since the 1970s, increasing numbers of women have entered the accountancy profession (Ciancanelli et al., 1990). Thisgrowth continued until 2002 before stabilising and almost reaching parity with men (POB, 2011). The student gendercomposition has led to an increasingly feminised membership whereby the proportion of female members of the six UKbased bodies has increased from 26% in 2002 (22% for ICAS) to 34% in 2010 (30% for ICAS) (POB, 2008, 2011). However, themarginalisation of women has simply evolved, from a horizontal segregation (the rejection of women from outside theprofession), to a vertical segregation where women are restricted from reaching the upper echelons of their employingorganisation8 (Dambrin & Lambert, 2008).

Towhat is this segregation attributed?The literature highlights the socialisation and identityconstructionprocesses thatoccurin professional accountancy organisations and shape the accountants’ professional identity (Anderson-Gough, Grey, & Robson,2005; Dirthsmith, Heian, & Covaleski, 1997; Grey, 1998). A sense of professional identity emanates from two sources, one beingthepossessionof a specialist technical bodyof knowledgewherewomendowell (Broadbent&Kirkham,2008) and the second, theinternalisation of a set of practices, values and behaviours that demonstrate that you are a “professional” (Empson, 2004). Thesepractices (inter alia demanding timemanagement regimes, reverence of and over-riding availability to client, eagerness, temporalcommitment, quasi-compulsory social interaction) are establishedwithin the professional organisations by the dominant powergroup and influenced by the values of commercialisation (Anderson-Gough et al., 2005; Empson, 2004; Grey, 1998; Kornberger,Carter, & Ross-Smith, 2010) and are not gender-neutral (Anderson-Gough et al., 2005; Gammie et al., 2007).

From initial training the temporal commitment in terms of working hours and client service is significant. Accountantsmust adjust their schedules to the needs of clients (Pasewark & Viator, 2006). The further up the career ladder you progressthe temporal commitment increases (Gammie et al., 2007). Partners will regularly work 60 h a week and this is before anyadditional work related social activities (Gammie et al., 2007). Hence the acquisition of time commitment knowledge is a keyelement in a trainees’ subsequent decision to remain with their training firm or seek employment and pursue a careerelsewhere (Anderson-Gough et al., 2005). Indeed, ‘Qualified staff made plain their dissatisfaction with the temporal norms oftheir firms and the point to which they might give an account of their future departure from the firm as related to the inflexibility ofworking arrangements’ (Anderson-Gough et al., 2005, p85).

This is particularly relevant forwomen (Witz,1992).Whilst adherence to themale breadwinner/female full-time carer familystructure is becoming increasingly rare (McPherson, 2005; Risman & Johnson-Sumerford, 1998) and traditional roles are beingdeconstructed (Guest, 2002;Whiting, 2008b) womenmaintain stereotypes relating to the gendered division of household andfamily caring roles (Barker &Monks,1998;Whiting, 2008a).Women are thereforemore likely thanmen to require some sort offlexibility in their working arrangements in order to accommodate an appropriate work/life balance (Guest, 2002).

The potential value of flexible work patterns within professional accountancy firms, such as retention of key staff, improvedmorale, increased loyalty and commitment (Dfee, 2000;DTI, 2003; Taylor,1998) has been identified (Almer, Cohen, & Single, 2003;AICPA, 2006; ICAA, 2006; Lewis, Smithson, Cooper, & Dyer, 2001; Silverstone, 1990). Multinational accounting firms introducedflexible and part-time working policies in the mid 1990s (Almer & Kaplan, 2002; Almer et al., 2003; Nazzari & Marley-Wallace,2007) and have consistently supported efforts to create a more inclusive professional culture that accommodates the 21st cen-tury workforce (Broadbent & Kirkham, 2008; Dambrin & Lambert, 2008: Johnson et al., 2008; Whiting, 2008b). However, theutilisation of alternativework arrangements is still regarded in a negative light for career progression as flexibleworking practicesare inconflictwith thesociallyconstructedprofessionalnormsofclient serviceandvisible longhours (Anderson-Goughetal., 2005;Cooper & Robson, 2006; Kornberger et al., 2010). Thus it is not sufficient tomerely introduceflexibleworking initiatives unless theculture within the organisation is simultaneously altered in order that it is truly acceptable to take advantage of such companyprogrammes (McKeen & Bujaki, 1994; Johnson et al., 2008). Whilst such policies may exist, women who take career breaks andengage inflexibleworkingpractices are likely to incuramismatchwith the values andnorms of the organisation and consequentlycompromise their career progression (Almer et al., 2003; Bernardi, 1998; Frank & Lowe, 2003; Johnson et al., 2008; Mavin, 2000).

Individuals who aremisalignedwith these required organisational practices may lack cohesive binding to the organisation(Golden, 1992) and hence are likely to seek alternative employment, (i.e. ‘one either fits in or gets out’ (Grey, 1998, p582)).Women therefore often favoured a move to an environment outside professional accounting practice due to the perceived

8 The accountancy profession is not unique in this regard, only 12.5% of directors at FTSE100 level are female (Bawden, 2011), 18% of partners in legalforms (Aldridge, 2010) and 8% of surgeons (Boseley, 2009).



greater flexibility of their working week (Gammie & Gammie, 1997; Gammie et al., 2007; Gatland, 2000). Dambrin andLambert (2008) concluded that professional accountancy firms ‘suffer from resource wastage because they cannot, or willnot manage flexibility’ (p502). However there is some suggestion that working environments outside the professionalaccountancy firm may not necessarily support a more amenable work/life balance (McKeen & Bujaki, 1998).

This paper therefore sets out to examine whether gendered working practices prevalent within professional accountancyfirms have a significant influence on the decision taken by women to depart from that arena. The paper also seeks to considerwhether the working practices encountered by women who have sought employment elsewhere are less gendered.

4. Method

Data was collected through a postal questionnaire distributed in 2005 to female ICAS members who had qualified in theyears 1990–1995 (n¼ 1022) and hencewere likely to be in their early to late 30s.9 Follow up questionnaires were sent out twoweeks after the initial mailing to non-respondents.

This group of womenwere selected as it was perceived that they would have progressed sufficiently in their working livesto have potentially reached the top of their organisations (Gammie et al., 2007) andwere likely to have embarked on personalrelationships and potentially motherhood. Hence, it was perceived that these womenwould have made career choices basedon their professional and personal experiences.

A questionnaire was utilised to elicit information from as many women as possible within this particular age range, inorder to (1) gain an overall picture of women’s career movements and (2) to compare the experiences of the women’sworking practices between those working within and those working outside the profession.

Although acknowledging the arbitrariness of an age limitation, any respondents who were aged 40 or over at the time ofthe data collection were excluded on the grounds that these ‘older’ women would have been exposed to a more ‘traditional’society and thus were likely to have been socially conditioned to adopt a more ‘traditional’ attitude to their role within boththe working and family environment (Altman & Simpson, 2000; Gammie et al., 2007).

Responses were received from 462 women aged under 40. After the exclusion of self-employed women (n¼ 38) and thosenot in paid employment (n ¼ 54), the sample size was 370 members of which 27%10 were employed with professionalaccountancy firms and 73% were employed outside.

In addition, 7 interviews were conducted with partners from a variety of firms as follows: 1 female partner from a Big 4firm, 2 male and 2 female partners from large firms (>10 partners) and 1 female partner and 1 male partner from mediumfirms (4–10 partners).

Finally, 6 interviews were conductedwith womenwho had left their professional accounting firms the details of which arecontained in Table 1.

The average duration of the interviews with the partners was 73 min (range 40–90 min), whilst the interviews with thefemales who had left their professional accountancy firm (the leavers) lasted on average 33 min (range 27–41 min). Theinterviews were all semi-structured in nature and guided by an interview protocol developed prior to commencement of theinterviewing process.11 The interviews were all tape-recorded with the interviewees’ permission and transcribed verbatim.Descriptive and pattern coding schema were used to analyse the transcripts.

This triangular approach firstly sets the context in which the female accountant in a professional accountancy firmoperates by giving voice to partners of both sexes. It then gives voice to a wider population of female chartered accountants(the questionnaire data) who have either chosen to remain within the professional accountancy firm environment or whohave moved to employment outside (Hammond & Sikka, 1996) before unravelling the rationale for certain behaviour byundertaking an in depth analysis of individual experiences of women (as advocated by Haynes (2008a,b)) who have left theprofessional accounting firm environment.

In the questionnaire and leaver interviews, the women provided information on events that happened in the past, so it isrecognised that they may selectively remember such events and interpret themwith reference to the intervening events andthe values that they hold at the time of the data collection. Also all respondents may be influenced by a desire to providesocially acceptable answers. Accordingly, the inherent limitations of the results are acknowledged.

It is also recognised that the experiences or actions of menwho have trainedwith professional accountancy firms and havesubsequently left this environmenthavenot been considered. This is a limitationof this study, however the focusof this paper isto consider and give voice to the female experience, whichmay ormay not replicate the experience of theirmale counterparts.

9 If women had followed a standard qualification path i.e. school education (18 years old on leaving) followed by university (3 or 4 years) and a 3 yeartraining contract, then the qualification age is around 24. Data collection in 2005 was 10–15 years after qualification in 1990–1995 so the participants wereexpected to be in the age range of 35–39.10 Whist the total female membership statistics in 2006 reveal that 35% of women (of all ages) were employed within professional accountancy firms(ICAS, 2006), this figure is skewed in favour of professional accountancy firms as the vast majority of members qualify within these firms and the largerbody of newly qualified female members will have had a limited opportunity in terms of time to move outside professional practice. It is therefore likelythat the response is broadly representative of the female membership population although non-response bias is a possibility and the findings should beconsidered in this light.11 A copy of the interview protocols used for both the partner interviews and the female leavers may be obtained from the corresponding author uponrequest.


Table 1Profiles of interviewees.

Name22 Size of firm Role at timeof departure

Family status at timeof departure

Time between qualifyingand departure

New environment Family status at timeof interview

Kalinda Big 4 Audit Single no children <6 months Industry Married 2 childrenSheila Big 4 Audit Single no children 2 yrs 6 months Education Single no childrenMary MediumiBig 4 Tax Single no children 2 years Unemployed Married 3 childrenAvril Large Audit and tax Married no children 1 year Industry Married 2 childrenLouise Big 4 Audit Married no children 3 yrs Industry Married no childrenKirsten Large Audit and charities Single no children 1 year 18 months Industry Single no children


5. Results and analysis

5.1. Employment details of the questionnaire respondents

Of the womenwho were employed within a professional accountancy firm, 44% were employed by one of the ‘Big 4’, 24%were employed by small firms (1–3 partners), 20% were employed by medium sized firms (4–10 partners) and 12% by largefirms (>10 partners). The split of women across the functional areas was: audit and assurance (31%), general practice (30%),tax (21%), corporate finance (10%) and other (8%). Slightly less than half of the women (48%) employed in this environmentwere employed on a part-time basis although this varied quite dramatically depending on the functional area as follows: auditand assurance (24%) general practice (40.7%), tax (70%), corporate finance (75%) and other (83.35). A smaller percentage ofwomen (37%) utilised flexible hours and the variation across functional areas was less pronounced although audit andassurance was the environment with the lowest uptake at 22.2%.

Whilst care needs to be exercised with these figures as there are small numbers of women employed within certaincategories12 (e.g. corporate finance and other) audit and assurance stands out as an environment which is not conducive toalternative working arrangements.

The most popular employment category for the women employed outside professional accountancy practice was theprivate sector with 50.9% employed within this category. Financial services accounted for 25.7% of the women, the publicsector 13.4%, education 5.2% and other 4.8%. Just over a third of women (37.2%) employed in these environments wereemployed on a part-time basis, but this varied depending on sector as follows: private (32.8%), financial services (38.3%),public sector (37.1%), education (46.1%) and other (69.2%). In contrast to the women who were employed within professionalaccountancy firms a greater number of women favoured flexible hours over part-time working (47.4%).

Most of thewomen employed by professional accountancy firms had progressed to relativelymore senior positions withintheir firms, with 17.2%13 reaching Partnership, 11.1% reaching Director, 39.4% Senior Manager, 22.2% Manager and 10.1% Ac-countant. Similar progress was evident for the women employed outside professional accountancy practice, with 14.6% of thewomen reaching the position of Executive, 41% Senior Manager, 27.6% Middle Manager, 8.2% Junior Manager and 8.6% other.

Whilst it is difficult to draw comparisons between the two types of employment due to terminology, there are similaritiesbetween the different levels across organisational type. It appears that there is no evidence to suggest that women workingoutside professional practice have fared better in the promotion stakes than their professional accountancy practice col-leagues. Thus the ‘glass ceiling’ is apparent in both environments.

The different mix of part-time and flexible working arrangements by environment,14 and professional firm functional areais an interesting result that requires further study. It may be that professional accountancy firms are more accommodating inoffering part-timework or women in professional accountancy firms are forced into a part-time role in order to accommodatetheir outside of work commitments. This is of particular relevance in light of the literature which highlights the negativityattached to pursuing such practices (e.g. Frank & Lowe, 2003).

5.2. Background details of the questionnaire respondents15

Average age of the two groups of women was similar at 35.3 years for those in professional accountancy firms and 35.2years for those employed outside. The marital status of the two groups of women (Fig. 1) also showed no significant dif-ferences (Pearson chi-square), with the most common marital status in both groups being “married”. Average age of firstmarriagewas also not significantly different between the two groups (t-test) with 26.4 years for the women employed withinprofessional accountancy offices and 27.1 years for the women employed outside.

12 Precluding statistical analysis for those categories.13 Whilst this statistic looks quite promising in terms of other gender studies which have revealedmuch lower percentages of women reaching partnershippositions (e.g. Fisher, 2006), those studies focused on larger firms where the gender disparity tends to be greatest (Gammie et al., 2007).14 In the professional accountancy firm environment 48% of women utilised part-time working and 37% utilised flexible working, whereas in the ‘outside’environment 37.2% were employed part-time and 47.4% utilised flexible working.15 The background details collected from the women are historical whereas the employment position was current in 2005. Therefore it is recognised thatsome of the background events such as age of marriage or birth of first child could have taken place in a different employment category to that currentlyreported.


Marital Status

01020304050607080

Single

Co-habitin

g

Married

Separa

ted

Employed withinprofessionalaccountancyfirm

Employedoutwithprofessionalaccountancyfirm

Fig. 1. Marital status (expressed as a percentage).


Data on children also indicated a similarity between the two groups of women. Whilst a slightly higher percentage ofwomen employedwithin professional accountancy firms had children (65%) in comparison to those employed outside (57.8%)this difference was not significant. Likewise, the average age for the birth of the first child at 30.6 for the women employedwithin professional accountancy firms was only slightly younger than the 31.0 recorded for the women employed outside.Both groups had an average of 1.8 children per respondent.

Both groups’ members took an average of 25.3 weeks for their first maternity leave. This consistency was also evident forthe length of maternity leave for the second child at 26.6 weeks for the women currently employed in professionalaccountancy firms and 26.2 weeks for those women employed outside. In addition, career breaks were not prevalent in eitheremployment category with only 10.8% of women employed within and 9.1% of women employed outside professionalaccountancy firms utilising this option.

Thus, there were no significant differences in terms of family background dependent on type of employment. Thissuggests that the women have neither sought employment outside the professional accounting firm environment norremained within the profession in order to accommodate a particular family circumstance. This will be explored later in thepaper.

5.3. The professional accountancy firm environment

The literature review highlighted the gendered working practices associated with professional accountancy firms in termsof the temporal commitment and availability to clients. The interviews with partners concurred with this literature.

All the partners reported working in the office for a minimum of 45 h but more regularly between 50 and 60 h a week.Typical comments included:

PleasThe B

‘I probably spend 50 hours in the office, or maybe 45-50 hours.’ (male partner, large firm)

‘In the office 8am till 6pm; that would be the minimum.’ (male partner, medium firm)

The only exception to this was one female part-time partner who indicated that she worked a 40 h week:

‘I’m in the office for 8 hours anyway, so I think I work particularly hard for being part-time’ (female part-time partner, largefirm).

The female leavers also had averaged 50 h per week in their professional accounting firms excluding additional weekendwork. This temporal commitment was generally accepted, however, and was not regarded as a detrimental life issue asevidenced by the following quotations:

‘crazy hours .. I am sure I was probably doing 12 hours a day at least..I enjoyed it at the time.it was always quite a sociableoffice..we were part of a good team and we always kind of helped each other out..it was just what people did, that was theculture you know it was good working with people you know, the same age, same mentality’ (Kalinda, Big 4)

‘probably about 8 till 6 five days a week.weekend work as well to get things finished off.it was just normal that what wedid and everyone was in the same boat.the hours didn’t bother me’ (Avril, large firm)

Only one interviewee expressed her dissatisfaction with her workload:

‘frequently till around 7 half 7 at night and often at the weekends as well..frustrating’ (Louise, Big 4)

However, all these leavers were childless at the time of their departure and therefore the women had not had to deal withthe difficulties of balancing a family and work. This was articulated by Mary who stated:

e cite this article in press as: Gammie, E., & Whiting, R., Women accountants: Is the grass greener outside the profession?,ritish Accounting Review (2013), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.bar.2013.03.005


PleasThe B

‘work-life balance wasn’t a really big thing for me ‘cause I was quite young, single, no kids, kinda used to working the longerhours, weekends and nights’ (Mary, medium firm)

The influence of motherhoodwill be discussed later in the paper.Whilst the potential for flexibility within the professionalaccountancy firm environment was raised, this was still couched in terms of a significant workload. For example, one of thepartners commented:

‘In the early days the partners probably worked much later than 6pm ish, whereas most of them now choose to get away at6pm because of family commitments. What’s probably changed is that people are starting to come in earlier in the morningsso that they can get away sharp at night. This place is buzzing at 7.30am.I think people are willing to change their day togive the same contribution in hours but to a timetable that suits them’ (part-time female partner, large firm).

Another female partner expressed a similar sentiment:

‘It’s getting the work done, not exactly when you do it. I know quite a fewwomenwhowill come in first thing in the morning,they will work till maybe 3 o’clock, they will then have 3-4 hours off so they can go and pick up the kids, make tea, reading,bedtime and then log in again at 8 o’clock and work until 10 o’clock. Not much of a life but that’s how they work it..As longas you are around at work enough then that’s fine’ (female partner, Big 4)

However, one of the leavers also pointed out that the flexibility was dependent on the type of work that you were engagedin at the time:

‘Core hours were half past 9 till half past 3 and you could work the remaining hours before or after, kind of at your will-.although it depended on what you were working on at the time, if you were office based then that worked well but if youwere working at a client or had meetings then we kinda couldn’t flex quite so much’ (Kirsten, large firm)

Additional business networking commitments were mentioned by 6 out of the 7 partners and this took place at least onceper week but which also tended to vary dependent on the entertaining season as illustrated by the following comment:

‘At this time of year, there will be something on every week which involves the weekend and youwould get home at 10/11pm.There would also be some corporate entertaining at least once a week.’ (male partner, large firm)

The one partner who did not partake regularly with business networking was a female partner from amedium firmwhereit was accepted by both herself and her fellow partners that her shyness precluded her engagement in this type of activity.

Business networking was not mentioned by any of the women apart from Louise who had remained the longest with herprofessional accountancy firm at 3 years post qualifying. Her concern was not with the time commitment but her discomfortin undertaking such activities:

‘you have to have a personality of being quite outgoing and sort of ready to “schmooze” and do all the social aspects.andmypersonality doesn’t fit with that’ (Louise, Big 4)

Therefore, it appears that the temporal commitment in networkingwith clients and potential clients is not prevalent in theearlier career stages and did not impact on the working week of the leavers.

The reverence of and over-riding availability to clients was highlighted by all seven partners, although not individually fortwo of the female partners who were not in client facing roles,

‘if you are a client facing partner, your client facing relationships are all part of your productivity because you can’t do itwithout good client relationships , it’s absolutely crucial.our partnership document says in there something like if you go offon annual leave, you have to make sure that your clients are being properly looked after before you go. So even before thepoor guys go off on leave they’ve got to make sure that they have delegated and briefed, informed, communicated and theytake their Blackberries with them. Their professional lives will rise or fall depending on how they look after their clients’(female partner, large firm)

The increasing accessibility afforded by the current technology has also added to the client expectation as illustrated by thefollowing comment:

‘I think clients are more demanding possibly because of communication by email and such like, people expect an instantresponse. I think the immediacy of correspondence definitely ups the pressure’ (female partner, large firm)

Whilst the leavers generally did not mention the pressures exerted by clients in terms of their own workload there wasrecognition that the partners were the interface between the clients and the office and that there was a responsibility tomeetthe partners’ demands. The only leaver who mentioned client demands directly was Mary, who was employed in the taxdepartment, and who had been contacted during her annual leave:

‘I do actually remember having a week off and still getting phone calls about things that needed to be done or clients that hadbeen in touch or whatever.... I suppose at the time it kinda made you feel a wee bit important but it just never went away,work was just a massive, a massive part of your life’ (Mary, medium firm)

Potential litigation also impacts on the level of commitment as explained by one rather disgruntled partner:


16 Hig17 The18 It mfrom th


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‘you’ve got 3,000 clients, some of whom are extremely demanding. You’ve got an ever increasing legislative burden whereyou spend half your time getting people to sign forms, to cover your arse in case they try to sue you. I get really frustrated atthat’ (male partner, large firm)

There was also recognition that the changing nature of the work from the traditional accounting role to encompassmanagement consulting activities (Suddaby et al., 2007; Wyatt, 2004) has resulted in increased stress and commitment. Thiswas evidenced by comments such as:

‘definitely the nature of the work has changed and the type of clients..I don’t think it’s really easy any more, if you werechurning out year end accounts for clients every year then life would be quite easy’ (female part-time partner, largefirm)

However, none of the leavers mentioned either of these areas presumably because they were shielded from these chal-lenges from the layers of staff above them in their respective organisations.

Thus, the interview evidence confirms the existence of a cultural norm of an extended working week. However, many ofthe client challenges and demands in terms of networking, instant accessibility and extended scope of work with theassociated risks were generally restricted to the partners. The leavers in general neither articulated these challenges interms of their own roles nor identified these as challenges for them in the future had they remained within their pro-fessional accountancy firm. There was also a general acceptance from the leavers regarding the temporal commitment andtherefore it did not appear that this was a driver for departure. So why do women leave the professional accountancy firmenvironment?

5.4. When and why do women leave the profession?

The most popular time for the questionnaire respondents to leave their professional accountancy office training providerwas at the stage of accountant (34.7%). 27.2% left immediately on qualification, 26.9% after reaching the stage of Manager, 9.7%at the Senior Manager level and only 1.5% at Director level. Thus women tend to leave their professional accountancy officesimmediately on qualification and in the following 2–3 year period, when they are in their early to mid 20s, preceding both theaverage age of the sample for marriage (27.1) and motherhood (31).

This was also the case for the six female interviewees who had all left their professional accountancy training firmwithinthree years of qualifying. At the time of departure four of the womenwere single and twoweremarried, however, none of thewomen were mothers and had family responsibilities.

Reasons for departing from professional firms, further analysed into type of current employment, are displayed in Table 2.The most influential reason (highlighted in bold) for women to leave professional accountancy firms was to seek moreinteresting work, irrespective of employment category. The second most influential reason was to obtain a better workingenvironment, followed by career progression and salary. The least influential reason was to obtain more flexibility. However,when the sub-categories of employment type were further analysed, the desire for more flexibility was rated as the secondmost influential reason for departure for the womenwho were employed in the public sector, education or ‘other’ areas. Thiswould suggest that whilst the principal reason for leaving professional accountancy practice was related to the type of workundertaken in a professional accountancy firm, women who were seeking more flexibility gravitated towards sectors ofemployment renowned for flexibility, namely education and public sector.

The limited influence of the need for more flexibility suggests that the temporal socialisation that trainees receive duringtheir training contract (Anderson-Gough et al., 2005) has not been a causal factor for exit. However, is this because thewomenin this study had not yet reached a stage in their lives when traditionally theywould be expected to adopt the gendered role of‘housewife’ and mother and hence require some degree of flexibility in order to achieve an acceptable work/life balance(Dambrin & Lambert, 2008)?

Further work was therefore undertaken to examine whether the career stage at which the women left their professionalfirm influenced their reason for departure. The results (see Table 3) are relatively stable irrespective of grade at departurewiththe exception of those women who departed at Director grade. As, however, there were only 2 women who fell into thiscategory it is not appropriate to draw any conclusions from this.

Excluding those women who left at Director level, the principal reason for exiting the professional accounting firmenvironment was in order to seek more interesting work. The quest for more flexibility was ranked in 4th place by those wholeft at Manager level and the least influential at all other levels. Therefore, even when women have reached a stage in theircareers16 and lives17 when they may want some additional flexibility to accommodate a family, Table 3 highlights the pre-dominant reason for leaving was still to seek more interesting work.

Further analysis was then undertaken to consider whether the influence of certain factors on why women left theirprofessional firms was dependent onmotherhood status.18 This analysis utilised a subset of responses fromwomenwhowere

her levels typically mean longer working hours (Gammie et al., 2007).se women started their families in their early 30s when they were likely to have progressed to senior manager level.ust be noted that the women who were mothers were mothers at the time of the data collection and not necessarily at the time of their departuree professional accountancy firm environment.


Table 2Influences on departure from professional accountancy firms in which the women qualified analysed by employment type (%).

Reason for leaving Most influential Least influential Total Mean

1 2 3 4 5

More interesting work 64.6 17.7 12.1 4.0 1.6 100 1.6Employment type22

Private sector 72.2 14.3 10.3 0.8 2.4 100Financial services 58.7 19.0 14.3 6.3 1.7 100Public sector 48.5 22.9 14.3 14.3 0 100Education 46.2 38.4 15.4 0 0 100Other 80.0 10.0 10.0 0 0 100Better working environment 17.1 26.3 20.6 19.3 16.7 100 2.9Employment typePrivate sector 13.6 21.4 20.5 23.1 21.4 100Financial services 25.0 25.0 23.2 16.1 10.7 100Public sector 19.4 41.9 16.1 12.9 9.7 100Education 15.4 23.1 30.8 23.1 7.6 100Other 10.0 50.0 10.0 0 30.0 100Career progression 9.9 24.2 30.0 19.3 16.6 100 3.1Employment typePrivate sector 9.6 28.7 33.0 13.0 15.7 100Financial services 13.8 24.1 29.3 22.4 10.4 100Public sector 6.7 6.7 23.3 30.0 33.3 100Education 8.3 16.7 16.6 50.0 8.3 100Other 0 28.6 42.8 0 28.6 100Better salary 7.8 20.1 24.2 23.7 24.2 100 3.4Employment typePrivate sector 9.8 21.4 25.9 26.8 16.1 100Financial services 5.5 23.6 20.0 20.0 30.9 100Public sector 6.5 16.1 25.8 16.1 35.5 100Education 8.3 0 25 25 41.7 100Other 0 20.0 20.0 37.5 12.5 100More flexibility 10.2 12.8 14.6 28.3 34.1 100 3.6Employment typePrivate sector 4.3 13.8 10.3 31.9 39.7 100Financial services 7.4 9.3 14.8 29.6 38.9 100Public sector 25.0 15.6 18.8 25.0 15.6 100Education 23.1 23.1 15.4 0 38.4 100Other 30.0 0 40.0 30.0 0 100


mothers at the time of the questionnaire completion and who had reached the level of either senior manager or director bythe time of their departure19 (see Table 4).

Table 4 demonstrates that whilst women irrespective of their (future) motherhood status cited that the principal reason(highlighted in bold) for leaving was to seek more interesting work, the influences then diverged dependent on theirmotherhood status at the time of the questionnaire completion. Mothers rated their desire for flexibility as more influential(2nd) in their decision to leave than women without children (5th).20 The women who were mothers and had reached theaverage child bearing age at the time of their departure, also ranked flexibility as their 2nd most influential reason. Thereforewhilst the over-riding reason for all women was to seek more interesting work, the desire for flexibility by women withchildren or womenwho subsequently had childrenwasmore prevalent than in the cases where thewomenwere notmothersand continued to remain childless. Therefore there is some evidence that motherhood or potential motherhood enhances therequirement for flexibility but this is still not the over-riding factor for departure from professional practice. This is also thecase for women who had reached the average child bearing age before they left their professional accountancy firm.

Size of firm also had no statistically significant effect on the respondents’ responses (chi-square test). Therefore, irre-spective of firm type and the different types of work available within these environments, the work activities on offer were akey driver for departure.

Four of the leaver interviewees also indicated the desire for more interesting work was their main reason for departure.Two of the women highlighted that they had never intended staying with their training provider long after qualifying withcomments such as:

19 As tproxy f20 Sign

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‘I didn’t have any long term plans to stay with the firm.I always saw it as a place where I would get my qualifications andthen I always planned to move on, I probably stayed longer actually than I, I originally planned to’ (Sheila, left after 2 ½years)

hese women are likely to have reached the average child bearing age for their first child by the time of their departure we are using this subset as aor motherhood at the time of the departure.ificantly different (Pearson Chi-square).


Table 3Influences on the departure from professional accountancy training firms categorised by grade of departure (expressed both by mean score and rank).

Reason for leaving Director Senior manager Manager Accountant On qualifying

More interesting work 2.7 (3rd) 1.7 (1st) 1.7 (1st) 1.6 (1st) 1.5 (1st)Better working environment 1.7 (1st¼) 2.9 (2nd) 2.4 (2nd) 3.1 (2nd) 3.2 (3rd¼)Career progression 3.5 (5th) 3.1 (3rd) 3.0 (3rd) 3.2 (3rd) 2.7 (2nd)Better salary 3.0 (4th) 3.3 (4th) 3.8 (5th) 3.3 (4th) 3.2 (3rd¼)More flexibility 1.7 (1st¼) 3.8 (5th) 3.2 (4th) 3.6 (5th) 4.0 (5th)

Table 4Influen

Reaso

MoreMothMothNo chMothBetteMothMothNo chMothCareeMothMothNo chMothBetteMothMothNo chMothMoreMothMothNo chMoth

*¼signi


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‘I had always wanted to be an industry type person. I hadn’t really ever seen myself as an audit type so my longer term careeraspirations were to be out in industry’ (Kalinda, left within 6 months)

Whereas, the other twowomen, who cited the type of work as themost influential reason for departure, indicated that thiswas due to the area of work in which they were employed. Both were employed in audit with one wanting to move intocorporate work and the other into tax.

There was a possibility that had appropriate openings within other areas of interest been available these women mighthave remained. Indeed, Avril actually returned to her professional accountancy firm to take up a tax position after spendingsome time in industry which she did not particularly enjoy.

Therewere, however, in most cases a myriad of interconnecting reasons, some of which were more influential than others,which facilitated or accelerated the departure.

For Avril, it was the travel and time away from home, which exacerbated the discontent with her audit role:

‘It was more the travelling that was the final straw for me I think, just after being away for weeks on end and then to be toldon the Friday that you were coming back to go away again on the Monday’ (Avril, left after 1 year)

For Kalinda, it was changes to the office client base following a regional firm take-over which accelerated her departure:

‘the [xxx] office was at that time heading in a different direction and I wasn’t particularly interested in where they weregoing.my longer term career aspirations were to eventually be out in industry so I guess that just came a little bit quicker’(Kalinda, left within 6 months)

Kirsten also indicated that procedural changes taking place within the firm consolidated her desire to depart.Only twowomen did not cite the type of work theywere doing as themost influential reason for departure. Louise found it

difficult to unpack and prioritise the reasons, indicating that it was simply the mixture:

ces on the departure from professional accountancy firms analysed by motherhood status (%).

n for leaving Most influential Least influential Total Mean Chi-Square

1 2 3 4 5

interesting work 64.6 17.7 12.1 4.0 1.6 100 1.6erhood status 2.86622

er 62.7 (1st) 19.0 11.3 5.6 1.4 100ildren 67.0 (1st) 16.0 13.2 1.9 1.9 100ers at senior manager or director level 50.0 (1st) 25.0 12.5 12.5 – 100r working environment 17.1 26.3 20.6 19.3 16.7 100 2.9erhood status 3.805er 14.0 (3rd) 24.8 24.0 20.1 17.1 100ildren 21.2 (2nd) 28.2 16.2 18.2 16.2 100ers at senior manager or director level 11.1 (4th) 33.4 22.2 33.3 – 100r progression 9.9 24.2 30.0 19.3 16.6 100 3.1erhood status 2.222er 9.7 (4th) 21.0 33.1 20.1 16.1 100ildren 10.1 (3rd) 28.3 26.2 18.2 17.2 100ers at senior manager or director level 25.0 (3rd) 12.5 12.5 12.5 37.5 100r salary 7.8 20.1 24.2 23.7 24.2 100 3.4erhood status 1.995er 8.2 (5th) 23.0 22.1 22.1 24.6 100ildren 7.2 (4th) 16.5 26.8 25.8 23.7 100ers at senior manager or director level – (5th) 14.3 57.1 14.3 14.3 100flexibility 10.2 12.8 14.6 28.3 34.1 100 3.6erhood status 11.606*er 15.6 (2nd) 13.3 10.9 27.4 32.8 100ildren 3.0 (5th) 12.2 19.4 29.6 35.8 100ers at senior manager or director level 33.4 (2nd) 11.1 - 22.2 33.4 100

ficant at the 5% level.


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‘I was doing quite a lot of hours and I did have quite a lot of responsibility at that point but at the time that I left there wasquite a lot of change going on.I was nowworking for someone else whowas transferred up from the Glasgow office, I didn’treally get on as well with him. I was kinda coming to the realisation that.some of the things you were suggesting (toclients) were never put into practice and you’d come up with the same things year-on-year and nothing’s happening..sothat was frustrating, and I also felt a little bit like, you have to have a personality of being quite outgoing and sort of ready to“schmooze” and do all the social aspects of it to really get promoted and to work your way to partner and my personalitydoesn’t fit with that’ (Louise, left after 3 years)

Mary, on the other hand, who had been able towork in the area that shewas interested in, namely tax, indicated that officepolitics was the main driver for her departure:

‘office politics to be completely honest. I was just really miserable ...there was an awful lot of chiefs and not many Indi-ans..people had worked their way up the ranks and maybe thought they were a wee bit more important than they actuallywere...there was loads of bitchiness in the department’ (Mary, left 1 year after qualifying)

She then moved to a tax role within a Big 4 firm in another city but this move was not deemed a success as there appearedto be insufficient work to keep her occupied:

‘office politics again from the total other side.I almost felt like there wasn’t a proper job..and it almost kind of got to thepoint where you were dreading Mondays again because you were going in and it was like “right, what am I going to do to fillmy week”’

The office situation became so unbearable for Mary that she left without another job to go to.Whilst it should be reiterated that none of the leavers weremothers at their point of departure, no interviewees expressed

a desire for more flexibility. Indeed, Mary whowas subsequently employed in education following a period of unemploymentwas at pains to point out

‘I didn’t move to get flexibility it was all, it was always about the job for me’ (Mary, education)

In terms of future career planning around potential motherhood four out of the six leavers stated that they had notconsidered this, as articulated by the following comment:

‘it hadn’t even entered on my radar at the time’ (Mary, education)

Louise on the other hand, who was married at the time of her departure indicated that:

‘I think it had crossed my mind and I think it would be extremely difficult to keep up on top of a workload like that (in theprofessional accountancy firm) and have family at the same time, but (her emphasis) having said that there were othermanagers there that had children and did part-time and juggled the child care with management’ (Louise Big 4, industry)

Therefore whilst she had thought about motherhood this was not an influencing factor in her decision to leave.Kirsten was the only interviewee who indicated that potential motherhood was an influencing factor, albeit a very minor

one:

‘it was on the peripherals of the reasons because I know that the maternity leave from (names firm in industry) is enhan-ced..at (names professional accountancy firm) it is the standard maternity leave, it is the standard letter of the law..it was astanding joke that you didn’t get anything that wasn’t necessary out of them really’ (Kirsten, left after 18 months)

Therefore, her focus was on maternity leave rather than achieving more flexibility to her working day.The evidence from this study, therefore, rather than compound the dominant view in the literature that women leave

professional accountancy practice in order to gain more work flexibility suggests that the principal factor for the majority ofwomen to leave their professional accountancy practice (64.6% of the questionnaire responses and themajority of the leavers)was to seek more interesting work.

Therefore despite accountancy firms engaging in wider activities and moving away from the core practices of audit andaccountancy (Suddaby et al., 2007, 2009), many aspects of which are well recognised to involve an element of tedium21

(Jeacle, 2008) there is evidence that women leave their professional accountancy firms in order to experience work thatwas of more interest to them. The lack of engagement with the type of work undertaken within the professional firm istherefore the key driver for departure, although there was evidence from the leavers that other factors, particularly theworking environment (as evidenced by office politics, travelling to audit clients, challenges of office personnel) also facilitatedthe move.

There was no evidence, however, from the leavers that they were dissatisfied with the temporal norms of their firms, or alack of flexibility and its potential impact on motherhood. In fact many of these women had long since left the professionalaccountancy firm because of the lack of satisfyingwork, beforemotherhood and flexibility in hours might become an issue forthem.

repetitive nature of professional office work was mentioned by all leaver interviewees.



As the literature has previously suggested that women get marginalised and segregated into the more routine functions ofthe profession, this phenomenon was further explored with the interviewees. Whilst four out of the six women wereemployed in the audit function, two women had specialised in tax. However, both women indicated that the change infunctional area was related to their preferences rather than as a mechanism for segregating them into ‘women’s work’:

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‘I had enjoyed tax at uni and I hadn’t realised that it was an option to actually do your training in the tax department..so Isaid that I’d love to transfer to tax’ (Mary, tax in medium firm)

In fact Kalinda articulated the reverse:

‘I guess at the time I was one of the stronger ones in the office, so I was given all the bigger clients and I quite enjoyed that’(Kalinda, audit in Big 4)

Therefore, this study suggests that the main rationale for departure is not related to a gendered environment, as haspreviously been implied in the literature.

5.5. The comparative working practice experience

5.5.1. The temporal commitmentThe literature and interview data highlight the long hours associated with employment in the professional accountancy

firm environment, so the questionnaire responses were further investigated to see whether working hours were less onerousoutside the profession. The average hours worked per week for those womenwho were employed full-time and part-time22

are detailed in Figs. 2 and 3.The majority of women, employed full-time, irrespective of employment sector worked in excess of 40 h per week, with

19.1% of women employed outside the profession working more than 50 h per week in comparison to only 13% of theiraccountancy firm based colleagues. This difference was, however, not statistically significant.

Whilst it was possible towork a shorter part-timeweek of 10 h or less outside the profession (7.4% of women employed onthis basis), the shortest working week for women employed within professional accountancy practices was at least 11 h.However, the majority of women employed on a part-time basis within both categories of employment worked between 21and 30 h. Once again there were no statistical differences dependent on employment sector.

Thus, there is no evidence from this study that women employed either full-time or part-time within professionalaccountancy practices work more hours than their equivalent female employees working outside the profession.

Theworking experiences of the leavers in their newenvironments varied from organisation to organisation. Therewas stillevidence of a 40 h plus working week with little flexibility.

‘The core hours are half past 8 till 5.you can take a flex day a month, restricted if you have got holidays in that month.butcore hours are seen to be core hours, you’re kind of there half 8 till 5.but you’re expected to work an extra half hour a day toget your flex day’ (Kirsten, industry)

Whereas, other interviewees indicated that their new environment did offer more flexibility whilst not necessarilyreducing their hours:

‘more flexibility in terms if you were away for a two week stint working in say France or somewhere like that you would begiven time to catch up, if you’d worked over the weekend you were then given the time back, whereas that was quite newcompared to the profession because if you worked overtime (in the profession) you didn’t necessarily get it back..industryhours are a bit more flexible as well, because you’re not at clients you don’t necessarily have to be there..you could go inmuchearlier or in much later so your working day could be quite different.’ (Kalinda, industry)

‘Iworkbetter hours, I rarelyhave toworkat theweekendhere,maybe occasionallyamonth end if it’s not goingverywell butnot,not very often.we are supposed to do a 37.5 hourweek here and can take a Fridayafternoon off as long as you have done yourhours in theory and you don’t have anything really important that is outstanding then you get to go at 1’ (Louise, industry)

Interestingly, the environment associated with the most flexibility (education), had presented additional out of hoursrequirements for Sheila:

‘I probably thought there would be less overtime, I possibly do more out of hours stuff now’ (Sheila, education)

Thus, whilst this study provides further evidence to support the long hours culture in professional accountancy firmsreported in previous studies this was also the case for the women employed in industry, as previously found by McKeen andBujaki (1998). Therefore if women choose tomove into industry in order to achieve a better life/work balance the reality of theworking experience is unlikely to be different from that encountered from within the profession. Thus, the temporalcommitment of an accounting role does not necessarily change from one environment to another, however there is evidencethat a career outside an accounting firm offers the potential for more flexibility.

t-timers accounted for 48% of the women employed within professional accountancy firms and 37.2% of the women employed outside.


Average hours worked per week in

full-time employment

0102030405060

21-30

hours

31-40

hours

41-50

hours

51-60

hours

>60 ho

urs

Employed withinthe profession

Employedoutwith theprofession

Fig. 2. Average hours worked per week in full-time employment (expressed as a percentage of women).


The leavers also expressed a more relaxed atmosphere principally because they were not governed by time sheets andbilling clients for chargeable work as evidenced by the following quotation:

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‘having to account for every point one of an hour, I remember that...when you’re in the profession you are being clockedall the time, you know you’re time is being clocked, whereas in industry it’s not, it’s very much, as long as you deliverwhat you’re expected to deliver it doesn’t matter whether you do it at home or in the office’ (Kalinda, Big 4 and thenindustry)

However, this more relaxed environment in terms of productive or chargeable work presented its own challenges withinthe new environment.

‘I think because of the timesheet culture that you get in practice versus not really a timesheet culture at all in industry, there’san awful lot of people (in industry)probably get away with doing an awful lot less work than I think they could be doing and Idon’t think that it is policed very well.I think that there’s dead weight in my team ..but I think coming in from practicegoing in there I’m not willing to be “not busy”..I mean I know that you wouldn’t have got away with it in my old job (in anaccounting firm)’ (Kirsten, industry)

Indeed the lack of engaging work in this industry role was the causal factor for Avril to return to her professional ac-counting firm and take up a tax position that she had coveted prior to her departure from her training firm.

All of the leavers indicated that their new environments were less hierarchical, and this was couched in positive terms.Kalinda enjoyed the extra responsibility:

‘I know my work would be reviewed by some pretty senior management within the company.there weren’t many levels orlayers of checks and balances between me and the Senior management so I knew my work had to be of a high standard’(Kalinda, industry)

Whereas, for Mary she appreciated the autonomy associated with her new role:

Average hours worked per week in

part-time employment

01020304050607080

10 ho

urs or le

ss

11-20

hours

21-30

hours

31-40

hours

41-50

hours

21-60

hours

Employed withinthe profession

Employedoutwith theprofession

Fig. 3. Average hours worked per week in part-time employment (expressed as a percentage of women).



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‘what makes me happy about coming in here is the fact that you’ve been given your work to do and then you’re just left to doit and trusted to get on with it as opposed to “when will you be finished?” and “when are you giving me this?”’ (Mary,medium firm – Big 4 – unemployment – education)

However, not all of the new environments were well received by the leavers. For example, Kirsten mentioned disharmonyamongst the employees within her area.

Whilst the professional accountancy firm environment is relatively homogeneous, particularly within firms of similarsizes, theworking arena outside of this environment offers awide scope of different experience. But in general the demandingtime management regime associated with professional accounting practice was not so prevalent in environments outside ofthis arena.

6. Conclusion

Many gender theorists argue that men build protective organisational processes and structures within professionalaccountancy firms as a mechanism for excluding women and hindering their progress, particularly to partnership. Genderedwork practices, such as very long hours, constant availability to clients and the failure to value those using flexible workingpractices are common themes for criticism.

The evidence from this study suggests that the professional accountancy firm environment continues to engagewith thesepractices. Themajority of women employed full-timeworked in excess of a 40 hweek, the leavers articulated aworking weekof 50 h and this increased to 60 h for the partners. Whilst, nearly half of the women were employed on a part-time basis(47.8%) this type of working was clearly more conducive in areas such as tax (70% of womenworking in this areaworked part-time) as opposed to audit and assurance (only 24% of women working this area were employed on a part-time basis).

Whilst therewas some scope for flexibility (highlighted by the partners, the leavers and the fact that 37% of women availedthemselves of flexible working), this was largely dictated by client activity and still necessitated a long working week. Theaccessibility required by clients was clearly articulated by the partners and this has been exacerbated by technological de-velopments. Whilst the ultimate responsibility to the client by the office rests predominately with the partner, the clientdemands cascade down through the firm.

However, is this gendered working environment the driving force behind women leaving their professional accountancyfirm?

Previous research on the gendered working norms of professional accountancy firms has suggested that women exit thisenvironment in order to facilitate a more amenable working week. Organisational commitment is characterised by an in-dividual’s alignment with their employing organisation’s values, norms and behaviours which is developed through asocialisation and professional identity construction process. A significant part of this socialisation centres on the temporalculture that operates within professional accountancy firms. Where the temporal norms are not aligned with the individual’slife requirements an exit strategy is put in place. Hence the gendered working practices prevalent within professionalaccountancy firms may encourage women to seek employment elsewhere. Indeed, previous work in this field has suggestedthat women leave professional accountancy firms and move into a different working environment in order to accommodatemore flexibility, experience less pressure, achieve consistency of hours and hence attain a better work/life balance (Anderson-Gough et al., 2005).

The evidence presented here, however, suggests that the principal reason for departure was in order to seek moreinteresting work (65% of the sample and four out of the six leavers cited this as the most influential reason). This may accountfor why the majority of questionnaire respondents who had left their professional accountancy firm and all of the leavers haddeparted within 3 years of qualifying, as they simply did not enjoy what they were doing. Further research could look atwhether men left for the same reasons and with the same alacrity.

The quest for a better working environment was ranked by the questionnaire respondents as the second most influentialreason. These working environment issues, such as office politics and the travel associated with getting to audit clients, alsoencouraged, in the majority of cases, the desire for the leavers to move. Only one of the leavers expressed her dissatisfactionabout the temporal commitment required in the professional accountancy firm environment.

The quest to obtain more flexibility was ranked as the least influential reason and this was also borne out by the leavers.Could this apparent lack of concern about the flexibility of working arrangements be related to the life stage of the individualat the point of departure? Questionnaire respondents who had left professional accountancy practice did so relatively quicklyafter qualifying (within 3 years), so they were likely to be unaffected by discord between the demands of a gendered malework environment and the domestic gendered roles of housewife and mother. None of the leavers were mothers at the timeof their departure. However, there was no evidence from the leavers that they had negatively evaluated the professionalaccountancy firm environment in terms of potential motherhood and this was not an influencing factor in their decision toleave. Even when women departed at a later career stage (Senior Manager or above), when they were more likely to be insome form of relationship perhaps with children, the quest for more interesting work was still cited as the most influentialreason for departure. Whilst the desire for flexibility did increase with having children, this influencing factor was still faroutweighed by the desire for more interesting work.

This study also found that once the women had left professional accountancy practice they experienced very similarworking practices irrespective of their working environment. There was no evidence from the questionnaire data to suggest



that women working outside the professional accountancy firm environment had progressed in any greater numbers to thehigher echelons of their organisations in comparison to their counterparts employed within professional accountancy offices.Thus, there was evidence of disparity at the top for both working environments. The women who responded to the ques-tionnaire also experienced similarly longworkingweeks irrespective of their employment sector, with themajority of womenin both environments working longer than a 40 h week. Whilst the leavers’ experience differed according to their individualemployment, there was still evidence of a 40 plus hour working week, albeit with some additional flexibility, although thiswas not universal. There was, however, evidence of a more relaxed working environment, as accounting for chargeable hoursand client billing were no longer necessary.

Thus the evidence presented in this paper suggests that the grass is not greener outside the professional practice firmand that women do not seek out pastures new in order to escape the gendered working environment prevalent inprofessional accountancy firms. However the emphasis on leaving in order to undertake more interesting work couldsuggest that more mundane work was given to women, but this was not supported by the leaver interviewees. Theinfluence of time commitment which has previously been identified as a key element in a trainee’s decision to remain orleave their professional accountancy firm (Anderson-Gough et al., 2001, 2005) was not evident in this study.

However, despite the fact that the female respondents to the questionnaire had reached a stage in their careers where theycould have reached themost senior organisational levels, only 17.2% of women in professional accountancy firms and 14.6% ofwomen outside this environment had achieved this. This would suggest that both professional firms and the organisationsoutside this arena display gendered characteristics which conspire to prevent women progressing to the top. Female ac-countants working in a different environment would therefore appear to face the same issues as their professionalaccountancy firm colleagues. The gender criticisms commonly levelled at professional accountancy firms may therefore beequally valid for commercial environments. This suggests something about working life for women in general or somethingspecific about accounting roles that warrants further work.

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women accountants: is the grass greener outside the profession?

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