An Investigation into Gender Bias within the Accounting Industry in NZ

This report comprehensively examines the issue of gender bias within the accounting industry of New Zealand. It begins by defining key concepts such as accounting and gender bias, emphasizing the significance of the study in a nation with a growing female workforce. The report delves into the existing literature, exploring the causes and facets of gender bias, and providing comparisons with other countries. It also reviews the working environment to understand the impact of bias. The methodology section details the research design, approach, and data collection methods, including sample types and analysis techniques. The findings reveal the extent of gender bias in the NZ accounting industry, supported by data analysis. The report concludes by summarizing the key findings, acknowledging study limitations, and suggesting avenues for future research, with references to support the analysis.

Running head: Gender Bias in accounting industry of New Zealand
Gender Bias in Accounting Industry of
New Zealand

Gender Bias in accounting industry of New Zealand 1
Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................2
Concept of Accounting....................................................................................................................3
Definition of Gender Bias................................................................................................................3
Importance of this study...............................................................................................................4
Gender Bias in Accounting industry................................................................................................5
Gender bias in NZ Accounting Industry......................................................................................6
Literature Review............................................................................................................................6
Cause of Gender Bias......................................................................................................................7
Cause of Gender Bias in NZ Accounting Industry......................................................................8
Facets of Gender Bias................................................................................................................10
Comparison between some countries.........................................................................................11
Review of gender bias in working environment........................................................................13
Methodological Considerations.....................................................................................................19
Research design..........................................................................................................................20
Research approach.....................................................................................................................21
Data Collection and Data Analysis................................................................................................22
Data collection Method..............................................................................................................22
Sample Type..............................................................................................................................24
Data Analysis and Findings.......................................................................................................25
Conclusion.....................................................................................................................................44
Limitations of the Study................................................................................................................44
Future Scope..................................................................................................................................45
References......................................................................................................................................46

Gender Bias in accounting industry of New Zealand 2
Introduction
The most significant determinant of a nation's intensity is its human ability the aptitudes,
profitability, and training of its workforce. Today, New Zealand is a power in the worldwide
economy, which draws keen interest from other countries for their ability to boost uptheir
economy in these tiring times. One of the key driving factors behind this is thehighly skilled
women of New Zealand (Ye et al., 2010). As indicated by World Economic Forum, in numerous
reports and articles women currently represents the greater part of the school and college
graduates and in many developing economies, gender gaps in advanced education are becoming
nonexistent drastically. Women are progressively adoptingprofessional courses. They are
likewise progressively settling on professional courses like accounting as proved by the
expansion in the quantity of imminent women doing certified accounting courses from 24 to
38within the period of 2014 to 2018 (Yacus et al., 2019). New Zealand is likewise slated to
recruit more women this year, particularly in the retail, telecom, banking, sectors. Women
subsequently contribute asubstantial portion of the workforce accessible to organizations today.
After some time, accordingly, a country's aggressiveness depends fundamentally on whether and
how it uses its female ability (Hall & Rusher, 2013). A recent report derived that most of the
organization with the women employees on their top managerialteamsactually earn more revenue
than their counterparts where the representation of women is not relevant. As indicated by World
Economic Forum, there is additionally the positive relationship among the dimension of
competitiveness of nations and gender equality. In the long haul, in this manner, a country's
intensity depends altogether on interest in and use of female workforce. Furthermore, as diverse
pools of representatives become progressively basic to progress, the absence of women pioneers
is a noteworthy business chance (Shaw & Stanton, 2012). It is basic for associations to put
resources into selecting, creating, and propelling female ability to:
 Sustain development and keep up a focused edge by using all assets and human capital.
 Address the shortage in initiative ability.
 Leverage diversity in ability to affect the primary concern through diversity of thought,
thoughts, and advancement.
 Serve an undeniably female customer base.
As per Dalton &Ortegren (2011) in spite of being a little extent of the formal New Zealand work
power, the quantity of female specialists has become quicker lately than that of their male

Gender Bias in accounting industry of New Zealand 3
partners. Nonetheless, women keep on being adhered at the lesser or unwanted posts in the
accounting industry of New Zealand. Accounting firms in New Zealandhave not yet completely
perceived or used this portion of the workforce effectively.
Concept of Accounting
Accounting is the process through which certified personnel known as accountant tracks all the
financial activities of a company or organization. The accountants are taken to keep a record of
all monetary transactions of the company (Thébaud, 2015). Accounting is extremely crucial from
an operational point of view. In these recent timesalmost, all companies hire certified
accountants who help the business by not only keeping a record of all their transactions but also
provide data to the management team who can take informed decisions based on the data. In this
recent time most of the accounting work is done on computers and special software is available
which have been designed to ease the process of accounting and also eliminate the scope of any
error.
Definition of Gender Bias
Gender has been characterized as aninformally developed sense of men and women. This is the
social plan of thebiologicalgender, verbalized by the beginning of abilities, duties, and works
credited to men and women in the public arena and in an extensiveworking life as well
aspersonal life. It is a culture explicit meaning of womanliness and manliness and thusly differs
in reality (Pinar et al., 2011).
The idea of gender equality depends on giving equivalent chances to the two people that is,
staying away from segregation based on gender. In the 'Show on the Elimination of All Forms of
Discrimination against Women' which was embraced by the UN General Assembly in 2018,
segregation is characterized as 'any restriction, refusal or improvementwhich made based on the
genderthat has the enthusiasmor impact behind invalidating or hindering the exercise, pleasure,
or acknowledgmentby women, independent of their marital status on theground of the equality of
human rights, peopleas well as principal chances in the social, political, community, economical,
mutual or other area(Opoku & Williams, 2019).

Gender Bias in accounting industry of New Zealand 4
Gender Equality implies that men and women have equivalent condition for understanding their
complete human rights and for contribution, and profiting by, financial, political, and social
advancement. In this way, gender equality is also the equivalent esteeming by the society of the
differences and similarities of people, as well as the responsibilities that they play. Moreover, it
depends on men and women being completesubordinates in their home, locale and also their
populace. Law (2010) characterizes gender equality as tolerating and esteeming similarly the
contrasts among women and men and the assorted jobs they play in the public eye. Gender
equality incorporates the privilege to appear as something else. Gender equality implies talking
about how it is conceivable to go further, to alter the structure in the public eye that add to
keeping up the unable power networksbetween men and women, and to achieve a superior
equalization in the different female and male qualities and needs (Hensvik, 2014). It suggests a
genuine association among women and men and their common obligation in expelling irregular
characteristics out in the open and private life. It is an issue of utilizing the abilities, aptitudes
and gifts of every single native, of including the two women and men in structure society, taking
care of issues and setting up what's to come. Society, so as to create, is reliant on the usage of
every single human asset, and the two women and men must take part completely to meet the
various needs of society. Gender equality must be always battled for, secured and advanced - like
human rights (Jonnergård et al., 2010).
Importance of this study
To accomplish gender equality, gender equity is required at all dimensions to bring equality of
status between genders. As indicated by Kypri et al. (2011), Gender Equity is the procedure of
being reasonable for people. Gender equity approach gives equivalent chance to women and men
with the goal that they can have equivalent advantage. Perceiving that women for the most part
have unequal chance and face numerous hindrances; the advancement of gender equity
frequently includes giving exceptional measures to enable women to beat these imperatives. The
objective of gender equity is to make an equivalent field for women and men. Gender equity
prompts gender equality (Lonkani, 2019). To guarantee reasonableness, measures should
frequently be set up to adjust for the authentic and social weaknesses that keep women and men
from working on a dimension playing field. These measures allude to enrolling, work conditions,
to compensations, wages and installment strategies, professional preparing, vocation
advancement, to the entrance to basic leadership positions, ladylike portion in open life

Gender Bias in accounting industry of New Zealand 5
territories so as to improve their job in the general public, decreasing the true inequality among
people. For whatever length of time that reality produces disparities, positive activities are
important for diminishing the falsely made hole among women and men. Equity is a method
while Equality and impartial results are the outcomes.
Gender Bias in Accounting industry
As indicated by report of World Economic Forum (2016) Out of the example of 34 nations, New
Zealand is the nation with the least level of female workers (23%) in accounting industry,
however in practically all nations, there is an unmistakable example over the level of the
positions, such as middle level, entry level, board position, and senior management. Moreover,
Female representatives will in general be amassed in middle or entry level position which is the
most senior position, the lower level of women (Olivetti &Petrongolo, 2011). From the example
of the world's biggest businesses who addressed the overview, the normal number of women
holding the position of CEO-level is somewhat under 12%. In this way, New Zealand (12%),
Italy (12%), Turkey (13%), Norway (13%), and Finland (14%) show the most noteworthy level
of female CEOs, while the Switzerland, Netherlands,the United Kingdom, Belgium, the Czech
Republic, Greece, New Zealand, France,Canada, the United States, and Mexico have no female
CEOs amid the reacting organizations (Ongena& Popov, 2016). This demonstrates absence of
advancement of women in breaking the obstructions in to the upper positions of organizations. In
addition, a consciousness of the under representation of women in a top position within the
corporate world which has incited numerous partnerships to review their practices and policies.
International Labor Agency brought up that the general gender separation present in the work
showcase as far as word related sex-isolation adds to the low financial investment of women in
the work advertise. NSSO, 2018 business and joblessness information uncover unpredictability
of women's work. It is discovered that over the course of about two years, i.e., between 2000-05
and 2006-10, more than 11.6 million employments for women seem to have dissipated. This
generous fall in the quantity of women in agribusiness indicates the emergency of work for
women. Buckley et al. (2014) clarifies the above fall likewise indicates the degree of segregation
that exists in the work showcase. Women are hauled in and pushed out of the workforce
unpredictably relying upon a large group of elements, for example, wage differentials, male
business, and total family unit pay (Smith et al., 2014).

Gender Bias in accounting industry of New Zealand 6
Gender bias in NZ Accounting Industry
The daunting gender bias in New Zealand’saccounting industry presently blocks the pathway for
change of New Zealand women. Social and societal change implies a move far from customary
perspectives, generalizations and societal frames of mind, with contractingopportunities for New
Zealand women in the accounting industry is drawing huge interest from all over the world
which is a thing of worry for the New Zealand government (Sapungan et al., 2019). Although
certain accounting firms have a good representation of women but still, they are plagued with the
issue of gender bias at the top-level despite of all the efforts that this firms are making. The
elements of changes in the age-old hierarchical structure do very littleto rectify this issue and is
generally designed to think from a man’s point of view. This is a greater test for accounting
industry in New Zealand which is seeing quick development with the fast-economic growth
(Duff, 2011).
Accounting as an activity has been a part of New Zealand’s social structurefor a very long time.
Its structure has experienced gigantic change with the financial, political and technological
advancements (Flynn et al., 2015). The world has changed at a fairly quick pace and has come
nearer because of globalization and availability of technology. The recent technological
innovations have totally modified the methods for accounting industry (Whiting, 2012). In line
with this widespread growth accounting has failed extraordinary to provide equal rights to
women in terms of wages, job offers, promotions etc. It has failed to bring them to the front line
of the industry in contrast to numerous nations like UK, Germany etc. who have done
exceptionally well in this field. The logical investigations of gender issues in accounting industry
gives noteworthy indications of the elements included which has been discussed in details in the
rest of the paper (Eweje& Brunton, 2010).
Literature Review
Various researchers and experts have inspected the issue of gender bias and correspondence in
different corporate parts, yet research regarding gender bias in the accounting industry in New
Zealand has been constrained. There is developing examination identified with corporate world
that demonstrates some significant gender touchy issues in corporate part. Along with that, it is
additionally demonstrated in numerous examinations that obtuse treatment of these issues
prompts gender segregation and makes boundaries for the development of women to the senior

Gender Bias in accounting industry of New Zealand 7
administration positions. As stated by Rivera & Tilcsik (2019), gender bias is the partiality or
preference toward one gender over the other. In numerous countries, removing gender bias is the
base of numerous laws, with those that govern organization
Cause of Gender Bias
The following factors are found to be responsible for disturbing the quality and causing gender
bias in accounting industry by several studies conducted on the issue:
Shared Responsibility
It very well may be accepted that the accomplishment of the objectives of human rights, popular
government, financial autonomy and training in a setting of shared duties among women and
men to determine in adjusts, lead to a general public where the two women and men experience
prosperity out in the open and in private life. It is likewise a path to a more profound
comprehension and execution of vote-based system all things considered(Marco, 2012). It was
found that in case of accounting industry in New Zealand women were deprived of this sense of
responsibility and were rather given jobs which doesn’t require any special skill which highlights
the prelevant gender bias in the industry and is also a total waste of their skills and talent(Lee et
al., 2013).
Education
This is the primary focus for gender equality because it includes the behavior by which social
orders exchange standards, learning and aptitudes. It is vital that the training frameworks and all
components of these frameworks (educators, schools, reading material, look into establishments,
etc.) enable the two young ladies and young men, and take care in counterbalancing the current
gender progressive systems(Nicodemo& Ramos, 2012). Media experts can be an objective here
as well, as they have a ground-breaking position in the exchange and union of learning and
standards. This factor was found to be almost nonexistent as several reports have claimed that in
the field of education the gender bias is nonexistent in New Zealand.
Economic Independence
Another significant focus for gender equality is the person's financial freedom, which prompts
the verifying of equivalent pay, equivalent access to credit, equivalent conditions on the work
showcase and the dissemination of advantages that consider gender contrasts in private life. The
position that women and men have in the economy is from numerous points of view urgent to the

Gender Bias in accounting industry of New Zealand 8
perceived leverage between them(Mitchell et al., 2019). Connected to the requirement for the
person's monetary autonomy is the mean to accommodate family and working life for the two
people. As women are paid less than their counterparts in the accounting industry this factor was
found to be one of the predominant ones fueling gender bias in the industry (Khlif&Achek,
2017).
Democracy
Other than human rights, the advancement and improvement of agent majority rule government
is the most significant shaft. The tireless under-portrayal or at times nonattendance of women in
basic leadership at all dimensions and in all fields of life is a noteworthy issue, despite the fact
that there are extraordinary varieties in this regard between nations. Advancement of the
equivalent cooperation of women and men in political and open life and every single other social
status is a piece of the improvement of society (Mukherjee, 2013). It is significant for society all
in all that the two women and men take part in all choices taken in a general public, given their
different encounters throughout everyday life. Whenever women or men establish around 33%
(the minimum amount) of the individuals from a basic leadership body, they impact the plan and
there is a genuine probability for change. It is significant likewise those women turned out to be
unmistakable in societal occasions to a similar degree as men, and ever of state (Nadler &
Stockdale, 2012). Although New Zealand is democratic country it doesn’t have separated laws
which could safeguard the interests of the women workforce which results in women getting
deprived of opportunities which is a blatant failure of democracy (Lilley et al., 2019).
Human Rights
A significant target is the acknowledgment and full usage of women's rights as human rights.
This incorporates adequately regarding, ensuring and advancing the human privileges of the two
women and men and, by taking the essential measures, empowering the two women and men to
appreciate completely these rights (Niessen-Ruenzi&Ruenzi, 2018). It additionally implies
fighting impedances with women's freedom and nobility (battling brutality against and dealing in
women or constrained prostitution, advancing free decision in issues of proliferation and ways of
life, tending to the particular issues of vagrant and minority women).
Cause of Gender Bias in NZ Accounting Industry
Women are a to a great extent undiscovered asset that must be utilized adequately. Socio-social
variables keep on blocking gender fairness regarding access to, and utilization of, administrations

Gender Bias in accounting industry of New Zealand 9
and furthermore add to circumstances, for example, biased designation of work and unjust
compensation dispersion, limited time openings and dreadful air which lead in equity in each
circle of life and makes unfortunate and unsustainable condition (Prayag et al., 2019). Gender
dissimilarity exist as for access to, and control of, a scope of advantages including immediate
and beneficial resources, for example, land and credit lines, human capital resources including
training and wellbeing, and social capital resources, for example, interest at different dimensions,
legitimate rights and assurance. Absence of start-up capital and assets for any sort of salary age
venture forestall women and countries advancement (Domino et al., 2015). Without inspiring of
society and particularly of women in connection to the economy the destinations of country's
monetary strategies and arranging can never be accomplished. Genuine development and
liberation must be accomplished if there is a proactive upliftment of the majority from intense
neediness, joblessness, and financial backwardness. Economy of women can possibly flourish if
there is strong instruction strategy and strengthening of women who are the real power behind
most nations' economies (Saiz et al., 2012). It is fundamental that administrations internationally
comprehend that the job, women can play in the popularity based eventual fate of their nations
and put more endeavors for gender equity by incorporating women in the common
administration and private segment in huge numbers so as to drive their economies forward and
accomplish a maintainable equalization in all parts of their monetary and ecological and social
prosperity. Gender fairness suggests furnishing the two people with equivalent open doors in the
usage of their capacities to understand the fullest preferred position of their potential (Dobbin &
Jung, 2010).
Over the hundreds of years and crosswise over time, the job of women remains established into
time everlasting. It perpetually continues as before and in the meantime experiences numerous
changes. It takes hundreds of years for women' jobs to unfurl in various structures, shapes and
sizes and to move into new headings (Santero-Sanchez et al., 2015). The job of New Zealand
women has gone from being unadulterated to being profane, from being incomparable to being
oppressed additionally as endless appearances of temperance to bad habit. The job of New
Zealand women has experienced emotional and intense changes from period to time. Women
have dependably been looked down under the autocracy of men (Crewe & Wang, 2018). Since
the occasions prehistoric, worth of the work done or benefits rendered by women has not been
perceived.

Gender Bias in accounting industry of New Zealand 10
Facets of Gender Bias
Proof in regards to the significance of women' financial coordination despite and in spite of the
worldwide economy's reliance on learning ventures and information specialists, worldwide
nation level information demonstrates that there are errors between the openings for work and
wages accessible to women and those of their male partners. Kaiser & Wallace (2016) on an
investigation of New Zealand expressed that when women are not completely associated with the
workforce, just piece of the capable workforce is being used and, in this manner, financial assets
are squandered. Gender correspondence takes into consideration an increment in women in the
working segment, along these lines prompting an extension of the work power and an expansion
in monetary efficiency and as women support builds nation's GDP consequently goes high. His
investigation demonstrated that Women contributed around 30% of development and 30% of
GDP in New Zealand (Chilet-Rosell, 2014). This was extensively identical to the level of women
in the workforce. Brenner et al. (2012) sets up in his work that women support would expand in
general national efficiency, diminishes reliance on ostracize gifted specialists, increment family
livelihoods (and decrease state reliance) and help raise women' regard and feeling of
commitment to their nations.
Alemany et al. (2019) in his report on UK referenced that however women cooperation is
expanding in instruction, in governmental issues and in work environment yet a considerable lot
of the authoritative or social obstructions hindered substantive correspondence for women.
Indeed, even following quite a while of the Equal Pay Act, gender pay hole that has never at any
point verged on plunging into single figures. Women still do the vast majority of the unpaid
work that props our families and networks up.
In this way, higher decent variety is regularly supposed to improve the board's working by
increasingtheir checking limit, spreadingtheir entry to statistics on theirprobable customer base,
as well asimporving theiroriginality by duplicating perspectives (Armstrong et al., 2010). More
prominent decent variety infers that the board manager can be elected from a wider ability pool.
This has been affirmed by huge portion of existing writing that organizations with progressively
female executives perform better. Abraham (2019) demonstrate that the female proximity on the
governing body plays the better performance among Fortune 500 companies, essentially through
its consequences for the accounting job. Moreover, data from a case of U.S. organization

Gender Bias in accounting industry of New Zealand 11
presents comparable outcomes, yetthen positive effect is restricted to the organizations with
feeble administration. Along with that, the key channels are better board observing and higher
participation rates. In addition, others have discovered evidence of board gender decent variety
encouragingprolonged gender mixed variety in top managerialteam of the organization.
Sapungan et al. (2019) saw that powers of globalization are opening up new open doors for the
women as well as the developing extent of women at work is expanding amid the years. Authors
referenced the report of Grant Thornton International Business (IBR). Moreover, report featured
the percentage of women at top administration positions expanding from 22 percent in 2007 to
24 percent in 2009 and anticipated that women are relied upon to dwarf men in the executives
jobs by 2030 as a greater amount of women are getting unhitched male dimension degrees and
joining the board courses demonstrating an expansion to women' greatest advantage and
inclusion at hierarchical dimensions.
Pay gap male and female in New Zealand
In New Zealand, the gender pay gap is the variance in the average hourly wages of women and
men. The gender pay gap is 9.2 percent in NZ. This is an economic pointer used to measure pay
equality. Moreover, the gender pay gap is the authorized statistic issued every year by StatsNZ
sourced from the Household Labour Force Survey.
Comparison between some countries
Further, Francis & Prosser (2014) inspected the province of New Zealand as a contextual
analysis to uncover the status of ladies and talks about the explanations behind the shortage of
ladies on sheets. This investigation found that ladies are practically nonexistent in the meeting
rooms of New Zealand organizations. New Zealand held 102 openly organizations, however just
38 (37 percent) have in any event one lady on their sheets of executives and 63 percent of the
organizations overviewed have no women chiefs voice on their sheets. The absence of good
quantities of ladies sitting on sheets of chiefs is frustrating given the perspectives on assorted
variety and comprehensiveness upheld in the expert and scholastic writing. He examined the
impression of female chiefs in German put undertakings in China and found that in spite of high
regard; just couple of ladies was discovered working at higher administration levels. He likewise
examined that ladies are expanding in various division. In any case, the development rate is