Gies Faculty Profile – Clara (Xiaoling) Chen

If you need proof that accounting is hardly a narrow and confining field, you haven’t met Clara Chen. The Lillian and Morrie Moss Distinguished Professor in Accountancy at the Gies College of Business, Chen is stretching the boundaries of her field, far beyond debits and credits.

She is currently studying how management control systems can be designed to level the playing field and reduce inequality. Chen is researching the impact of adding more women to a board of directors on organizational outcomes.

She also has found that when companies provide clear and narrow salary ranges in job postings, they not only encourage more women to apply for positions but also boost the confidence of candidates in negotiating fair salaries.

Chen is a familiar face to Gies iMBA students who take the core managerial accounting course. She joined Gies in 2016, after completing her PhD in accounting from the University of Southern California where she also earned her master’s of accounting in 1999.

Title:  Lillian and Morrie Moss Distinguished Professor in Accountancy

At current institution since what year? 2006

Education: PhD (USC)

Professional bio, highlighted awards/achievements:

Clara Xiaoling Chen is the Lillian and Morrie Moss Distinguished Professor of Accountancy in the Department of Accountancy at the Gies College of Business at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. She joined the Department of Accountancy at Gies College of Business in 2006.

Her research focuses on management accounting and management control systems, especially the design of performance measurement and incentive systems in organizations. She has published in top accounting journals and has received numerous awards including Outstanding Dissertation Award, Best Paper Award, and Notable Contribution to the Management Accounting Literature Award from the American Accounting Association. She has served as an Associate Editor of Contemporary Accounting Research and currently serves on the editorial boards of top accounting journals including The Accounting Review and Accounting, Organizations and Society. She has been invited as plenary speakers at major international conferences.

Professor Chen earned a B.A. in English from Peking University in 1997, a Master’s of Accounting from USC in 1999, and a Ph.D. in Accounting from USC in 2006.

List of courses you currently teach: iMBA/iMSA ACCY 503 Managerial Accounting

TELL US ABOUT LIFE AS A BUSINESS SCHOOL PROFESSOR

I knew I wanted to be a business school professor … when I took a course in management control system in the Master’s of Accounting (MAcc) program at USC.

What are your major research interests? Management accounting and management control systems, especially the design of performance measurement and incentive systems in organizations.

What are you currently studying? I’m currently studying how management control systems can be designed to level the playing field and reduce inequality. For example, some of my current projects examine the effect of including more female directors on the board of directors on organizational outcomes. I also have a paper showing that, when companies provide clear and narrow salary ranges in job postings, it not only encourages more women to apply for positions but also boosts their confidence in negotiating fair salaries.

What is the most significant discovery you’ve made from your research? Collectively, my research highlights the importance of incorporating social motives and psychological factors into economics-based models. In particular, my studies suggest that people’s motivation is driven by factors beyond money, including reciprocity, fairness, social norms, the feeling of solidarity with group members, and the meaning of work. Therefore, organizations have to take these factors into consideration when they design compensation and incentive systems for employees.

If I weren’t a business school professor… I might be a professor in a different discipline (e.g. psychology, literature, or history).

What do you think makes you stand out as a professor? As a researcher, I embrace interdisciplinary research and utilize multiple research methods to address relevant and important research questions. In teaching, I try to integrate insights from research and encourage students to apply managerial accounting concepts to their real-world decisions.

One word that describes my first time teaching:  Nervous

Here’s what I wish someone would’ve told me about being a business school professor:  How many rejections I was going to get from academic journals and how important it is to be resilient and embrace constructive feedback.

Professor I most admire and why: Professor Robert Kaplan (Emeritus, Harvard Business School), who is dedicated to researching and identifying leading-edge management accounting tools with major practical implications, e.g. Activity-Based Costing. Recently, Professor Kaplan has been applying Activity-Based costing to carbon accounting and helping companies figure out an accurate measure of carbon emissions along the entire supply chain. His research has major real-world impact and helps address the grand challenges we are facing currently.

TEACHING GIES STUDENTS

What do you enjoy most about teaching business students? In the last two years, I’ve been teaching iMBA students from all over the world. All of these students have real-world work experiences inside of an organization, and I love seeing them apply their own insights from their real-world work experiences in diverse settings to my managerial accounting course.

What is most challenging? When I was teaching undergraduate students, who typically did not have real-world work experiences, it was a bit challenging to get them to understand the ambiguity and complexities in real-world situations.

In one word, describe your favorite type of student: Curious

In one word, describe your least favorite type of student: Arrogant

When it comes to grading, I think students would describe me as… Fair

LIFE OUTSIDE OF THE CLASSROOM

What are your hobbies? Reading, hiking, painting, traveling, movies

Favorite book(s): A Room of One’s Own by Virginia Woolf; Dream of the Red Chamber (Hong Lou Meng) by Xueqin Cao; The Second Sex by Simone de Beauvoir, Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell; Story of Your Life by Ted Chiang; The “Neapolitan novels” by Elena Ferrante

What is currently your favorite movie and/or show and what is it about the film or program that you enjoy so much? A show I really enjoyed watching recently is the Japanese TV drama “Brush Up Life (2023)”. It’s a story about a 33-year-old woman who gets to begin her life all over again. It’s a very insightful and thought-provoking story with a great sense of humor.

What is your favorite type of music or artist(s) and why? My favorite type of artist creates works that resonate with me at a deep level and inspire new ways to see the world.

THOUGHTS AND REFLECTIONS

If I had my way, the business school of the future would have much more of this… (1) data analytics curriculum that helps students develop an analytical mindset; and (2) opportunities for students to be exposed to different companies, industries, and cultures.

In my opinion, companies and organizations today need to do a better job at… balancing profit maximization with ESG-related goals including sustainability, equality, and employee well-being.

I’m grateful for…  working in an inclusive, collaborative, and innovative culture at Gies; opportunity to teach students from all over the world; supportive family and great friends; a curious mind and love for helping and serving others.