Graduation Year

2024

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree

Ph.D.

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.)

Degree Granting Department

Business Administration

Major Professor

Uday Murthy, Ph.D.

Committee Member

Lisa Gaynor, Ph.D.

Committee Member

Kristina Demek, Ph.D.

Committee Member

Tammy Allen, Ph.D.

Keywords

COVID-19, Hierarchical Audit Team, Media Richness theory, Media Synchronicity Theory, Remote working

Abstract

In 2020, the coronavirus pandemic prompted governments to respond by implementing social distancing regulations and travel bans. Although these actions helped mitigate the spread of the virus, they also created unique challenges for businesses and their employees. Firms transitioned quickly from face-to-face work settings to remote work arrangements using video conferencing technologies (VCT). These technologies enable video calls with or without instant messaging (chat) to facilitate information exchange. For audit firms, group tasks that were previously performed in face-to-face settings had to be performed using VCT. A commonly performed group task in auditing is fraud brainstorming, which auditing standards require to be performed for audits of publicly held companies. It is customary for audit team members of all hierarchical levels in the firm to participate in the fraud brainstorming session. In this study, I examine the impact of alternative VCT configurations and audit teams composed of different hierarchical levels on fraud brainstorming teams’ performance. Teams demonstrated higher performance in both quality and quantity of ideas during video calls without chat compared to those with chat, though the difference lacked statistical significance. The interaction between hierarchical level and communication mode proved significant, notably affecting quantity ideas. Teams at a higher hierarchical level communicating via video calls without chat achieved the best performance among the studied conditions.

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