Thesis in Accounting and Financial Management

Course Directors: Carl Henning Christner, Henrik Nilsson

The Master thesis part of the Master program aims to further enhance knowledge within some area of Accounting, Valuation and Financial Management of the student’s choice. Students are encouraged and expected to progress from the knowledge level reached during the first master specialization year.

The Master thesis shall be an independent piece of work, typically based on both analytical and empirical (qualitative or quantitative) efforts. Topics may be derived from the academic literature or from practical problems in companies, financial institutions, non-profit organizations or the public sector. The outcome shall be presented in the form of a traditional academic piece of work.

The thesis work can take place either in the spring or in the fall. It starts at the beginning of the semester and ends at the end of the semester. The Master thesis shall be presented and defended at a seminar at the end of the semester (either fall or spring). Students must also act as opponents on another master thesis.

Master thesis students shall work in pairs.

Students will regularly meet with their tutor. There will be set milestones and a time plan for the thesis process to ensure that the thesis work progresses satisfactory. The milestones and the time plan will be agreed on with the tutor in the beginning of the thesis work.

Quantitative and/or qualitative methodology lectures and workshops will be offered. In addition, library guidance will be provided.

Course administrator: Christina.Ekelin@hhs.se

After finishing the Master thesis the student shall be able to independently plan, conduct, report, present and critically discuss a scholarly study.

To commence writing the Master thesis the student must have passed at least 37.5 ECTS credits of mandatory courses and core electives within their program.

In both, the qualitative and quantitative crash course sessions we will use exemplary research papers to illustrate and discuss important aspects of conducting research. Please carefully read the following papers for these sessions:

Qualitative research: To be decided

(Recommended read on coding qualitative data: Skjott Linneberg, M. and Korsgaard, S. (2019), "Coding qualitative data: a synthesis guiding the novice", Qualitative Research Journal, Vol. 19 No. 3, pp. 259-270.)

Quantitative research: Cheng, Q., Lee, J., & Shevlin, T. (2016). Internal governance and real earnings management. The Accounting Review, 91(4), 1051-1085.

Find the course schedule in TimeEdit

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