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EACH year, over 100 Ph.D. candidates complete their degrees in accountancy and embark on careers as assistant professors (Hasselback 1995). But in applied disciplines such as accounting, many recent Ph.D.s are less successful as assistant professors than they might be because they do not understand the rules and customs of academe (Schoenfeld and Magnan 1992; Whicker et al. 1993). New assistant professors of accountancy risk failing to be promoted, not because they lack skill or motivation, but because they are unfamiliar with "the system," i.e., the rules and customs of universities. Anyone who knows an unsuccessful tenure candidate can attest to their bitterness. Given that only about 44 percent of the promotion-to-associate-professor cases in accounting are successful (Schroeder and Saftner 1989), learning the rules and customs of universities and accountancy departments seems a small cost when compared with the loss of self-esteem experienced by many unsuccessful tenure candidates.
WHAT IS TENURE?
Tenure is "the status of holding one's position on a permanent basis" as the result of fulfilling a set of specified requirements (Webster's New World Dictionary). To assistant professors, tenure generally represents job security, a merit award and a career motivator (Whicker et al. 1993). Assistant professors correctly perceive that achieving tenure means that they have performed at or above the expectations of their colleagues and university administrators with respect to research, teaching and service, and that they can only be fired for extremely inappropriate behavior.
Universities, deans and department heads see tenure as a multimillion dollar investment and a protection of academic freedom. To university administrators, tenure decisions are wagers that an assistant professor's past record shows sufficient promise of excellence that the administrators are willing to bet thirty years of future salary on the candidate's long-term potential to enhance the stature of the university (Schoenfeld and Magnan 1992). Tenure also prevents the dismissal of university faculty who hold unpopular or controversial views and allows faculty the opportunity to explore new, controversial or risky projects without fear of dismissal.
At most universities, the stated criteria for tenure are excellence, generally in research, teaching and service (Whicker et al. 1993; Saftner 1988).(1) Some universities explicitly state that research, teaching and service will receive equal weight in promotion, although actual promotion cases may reflect unequal...