The Phenomenon of quiet quitting within a Big Four accounting firm
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2023-07-10
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en
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This research examines the phenomenon of quiet quitting within audit departments of a Big Four accounting firm. More specifically, it investigates the impact of personal characteristics (age, educational level, and gender) on quiet quitting using a questionnaire. The study proposes several hypotheses, suggesting that younger individuals, higher educated individuals, and mostly men are more likely to engage in quiet quitting. The study examines these hypotheses by considering seven mediators: job opportunities, organizational tenure, stress, role ambiguity, the importance of work-life balance, salary satisfaction, and perceived gender inequality. The results indicate that all hypotheses can be rejected. However, the findings reveal a positive and significant relationship between age and quiet quitting. This contradicts the initial hypothesis, which expected that age would negatively predict quiet quitting. Furthermore, respondents of the questionnaire expressed an average intention to quiet quit of 3.8 on the 7-point Likert scale. This value significantly deviates from the center value of 4 (neither agree nor disagree). It suggests that there is no clear preference for one over the other, but rather a nuanced tendency towards disagreement as opposed to agreement.
Keywords: quiet quitting; Big Four accounting firm; age; educational level; gender; questionnaire; 7-point Likert scale
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Faculteit der Managementwetenschappen