Antecedents and Consequences of Gender Inequality in the Australian Accounting Profession

This thesis investigates the status of gender inequality in the Australian accounting profession and provides empirical evidence of the factors affecting gender inequality and its subsequent impact on accountants’ work-related attitudes and job performance of both men and women accountants. The thesis also considers how the quality of performance appraisal systems (PASs) and collegiality mediate the association between the perception of gender inequality with accountants’ work-related attitudes and job performance. An online survey was used to collect data from 81 men and 87 women professional accountants. The thesis employs the “thesis by publication” format and comprises of three academic papers.  Paper One explores women accountants’ progression in the Australian accounting profession and further investigates the potential factors affecting gender inequality, questioning whether these factors are pertinent to women accountants only, or men accountants experience the inequality too. The investigation reveals that there is a marginal presence of gender inequality in the profession. Interestingly, the results suggest no significant differences between men and women accountants’ perception of gender inequality. From the analysis, supervisor support has emerged as one of the key factors affecting both men and women accountants’ perception of gender inequality; however, women accountants perceive less gender inequality compared to men accountants with the presence of supervisor support. Thus, the study highlights the importance of supervisor support, especially for women, in the profession.  Paper Two examines the influence of perception of gender inequality on the quality of PASs (fairness, communication, trust and clarity) and the subsequent impact on accountants’ work-related attitudes (employee organisational commitment, job satisfaction and turnover intentions). The results indicate a negative association between the perception of gender inequality with fairness, communication, and trust. The results suggest that when accountants perceive inequality, it leads to reciprocate the same with the perception of poor quality of PASs. Further analysis reveals that all the four dimensions of the PAS were significantly associated with at least one of the work-related attitudes. Specifically, trust was found to be associated with all three work-related attitudes. Moreover, trust fully mediates the association between perception of gender inequality with organisational commitment and job satisfaction while partially mediating the association between perception of gender inequality and turnover intentions. Thus, the study highlights the importance of perception of gender inequality and the significant role of the overall quality of PASs, specifically trust, in enhancing the accountants’ work-related attitudes.  Paper Three examines the influence of perception of gender inequality on collegiality and its consequent impact on the accountants’ work-related attitudes (employee organisational commitment and job stress) and job performance. The results indicate that perception of gender inequality is negatively associated with collegiality. Further analysis reveals that strong collegial relations among accountants contribute to enhanced organisational commitment and job performance. The results also show that collegiality fully mediates the relationship between perceived gender inequality and organisational commitment and job performance. Thus, the study contributes to the literature by highlighting the importance of perception of gender inequality and the significant role of collegiality in enhancing work-related attitudes and job performance.