The rapid use and development of information and communication technology capabilities in the public sector has revolutionized the mechanism that government agencies use to collect, process, and disseminate data. Electronic government is one of the strategic initiatives that many government agencies have considered adopting to offer efficient web-based services and operations. Although there have been efforts to examine the implementation process of technological innovations in financial and business reporting, many government agencies are about to face a bigger challenge in developing or adopting current technologies to assess their usefulness for non-financial sustainability reporting. The Extensible Business Reporting Language, XBRL, has been adopted by the U.S. Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) to process financial data in the quarterly call reports filed by banks. Using Rogers’ well-established theory of innovation adoption process, this paper discusses the FDIC’s XBRL implementation process and investigates the roles and experiences of the agency’s stakeholders. A case study research methodology, supported by semi-structured interviews, is used to explore each phase of the implementation process. The findings reveal that the process was facilitated by stakeholder engagement, technical support, and the agency’s strategic decision-making process. This paper contributes to the literature by examining the applications, benefits, and challenges of using XBRL technology to process non-financial sustainability data, which is still an under-researched area. Therefore, the implications for using the technology in non-financial reporting will be insightful for future regulatory adopters and their stakeholders including filer banks, software vendors, and various users of financial and non-financial information.

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the learning outcomes of students enrolled in an introductory financial accounting course through their experience of playing the Monopoly™ board game and map those outcomes to a selected number of individual competency types addressed in the AICPA Core Competency Framework.Design/methodology/approach: A longitudinal qualitative analysis was performed to analyze self-reported learning outcomes collected from undergraduate students enrolled in an introductory financial accounting course. Content analysis and participant observations were utilized to inform the analysis process and derive research findings.Findings: The findings reveal a connection between the learning outcomes and a selected number of individual competency types addressed in the AICPA Framework. The findings also reemphasize the importance of utilizing some of the basic functions and features of Excel to augment foundational financial accounting knowledge and enhance professional skills.Originality/value: Although the use of board games in accounting education was examined in prior research, this paper provides an empirical evidence on the alignment of self-reported learning outcomes of a popular board game to a notable profession-driven framework. In addition to bridging a potential gap between the accounting education and profession, this study informs academics as to the implications of engaging students in a class activity that applies basic financial accounting and computer knowledge.

This paper examines the effect of C-suite executive religiosity on the disclosure tone ambiguity of corporate annual reports. The paper utilizes executive-level religiosity, disclosure tone, and financial data from a sample of 2515 publicly listed U.S. corporations. It applies fixed-effect regression analysis to show that the presence of religious executives within the C-suite team reduces the disclosure tone ambiguity of annual reports, as evidenced by a reduction in the number of negative and uncertain words within corporate annual reports. Subsample analyses show that religious CEOs and CFOs in the C-suite primarily drive the main findings, which is consistent with their heightened control over corporate annual report preparation processes post-SOX. The main finding holds across multiple robustness tests and suggests that the individual religiosity of C-suite executives can be an important determinant of a company’s disclosure tone-related choices. By utilizing the measure of executive-level religiosity, this study directly addresses recent calls for further research to examine additional personal and psychological factors beyond executive-level narcissism and political ideology that can influence top management personnel’s corporate disclosure tone-related choices. This study contributes to the literature by examining the influence of individual executive-level religiosity on the tonal sentiment of corporate communications, as represented by corporate annual reports.

Supervisory banking institutions are often daunted by the volume and complexity of the data received on a regular basis from filer banks. Chief technology officers and data strategists face challenges as they strive to implement a technology that could facilitate the data collection and processing to produce secure, timely and reliable information for decision making purpose. Technology selection might be a concern for adopting government agencies, but the methodology of developing and implementing technologies could present a bigger challenge. This is due to the fact that government agencies may not adapt easily to new technologies in a timely fashion or accommodate further developments to their current systems while operating under strict budget. To strengthen its bank supervisory role and develop its bank examination applications, the FDIC decided to adopt The Rational Unified Process System Methodology, known as the RUP®. The chapter examines how the FDIC followed the RUP® to develop an existing bank examination tool application to support its risk assessment process.