Academic reputation is rarely built by standing still. For Gies College of Business – perennially ranked as one of the top accounting programs in the world, with a faculty celebrated globally for their research impact – maintaining that standing requires actively creating the spaces where the discipline’s next chapters are written.
"Part of leading in Accountancy involves making sure that cutting-edge research is regularly presented at our institution," said Mark Peecher, Arthur R. Wyatt Chair in Accountancy and executive associate dean of faculty and research at Gies Business. “When everyone knows that we offer one of the biggest stages to present their research, it makes them eager to submit their highest quality papers to us."
Across any given year, the Department of Accountancy hosts a rolling portfolio of symposia, research conferences, and doctoral consortiums. From audit and tax to financial and managerial accounting, these gatherings bring together the sharpest minds to debate ideas while they are still in motion.
Cultivating a forward-thinking mindset
Gies Business hosts these events to create platforms for rigorous, real-time engagement during the developmental phase of research. By the time an article makes its way into print, it can easily be three to five years behind the frontier of the field. Gies Business symposia serve as a real-time corrective move to offset that lag.
“It’s really important for our doctoral students and our newer untenured professors – and all of us really – to see what the top scholars in our field are thinking,” said Peecher (right). “We learn from not only the top six or so papers accepted for the conference, but also from the dozens of other thoughtful papers submitted.”
Gies Business’ commitment to research spans the entire disciplinary spectrum. It includes legacy symposia like the Symposium on Audit Research (founded in 1974) and the Tax Symposium, as well as global partnerships like The International Journal of Accounting (TIJA). The College also drives regional collaborations, such as the Midwest Accounting Research Conference, last held on campus in July 2026.
Co-chairing the Midwest conference requires careful choreography, balancing institutional representation with broad thematic breadth.
"We try to make the topics as diverse as possible so we can attract a broad audience,” said Dan Zhou, Gies Business associate professor of accountancy. “Five universities select research presenters that we match with a discussant from the other five universities."
Michael Donohoe, Irwin Jecha Distinguished Professor in Accountancy and head of the Department of Accountancy, explained that bringing scholars together provides a rare opportunity to stress-test ideas before they face formal peer review.
"This creates opportunities to challenge assumptions, sharpen research designs, identify more important questions, and connect work to the issues facing the profession," said Donohoe. “It also allows us to help develop the next generation of scholars by putting junior faculty and doctoral students into meaningful dialogue with established researchers.”
In tax research, Gies Business takes that collaboration a step further by bridging the gap between theory and practice. The department's tax symposium features a unique dual-discussant model in which every paper is assigned one academic and one practitioner discussant.
"The academic discussant can engage deeply with the research contribution and design, while the practitioner brings a different lens to the underlying problem, institutional setting, and potential real-world implications," said Donohoe.
That direct line to the profession is a hallmark of the department's audit events as well. Peecher highlights how veteran practitioners – including Gies Business alumni who rose to leadership at many of the world’s top accounting firms – contribute to debates in front of rooms filled mostly with academics.
“When professionals do this, our faculty’s ability to conduct practice-relevant scholarly research goes way up,” said Peecher. “Plus, when they hear about the latest academic research, they too can take that back to their organizations.”
Investing early in the next generation of scholars
Beyond producing papers, maintaining a world-class accountancy program requires a long-term investment in developing talent. Gies Business approaches this through dedicated, multi-year touchpoints designed to support researchers at the earliest stages of their careers – such as the Arthur R. Wyatt Young Scholars Research Symposium in financial accounting and the Lillian and Morrie Moss Emerging Management Accounting Scholars Symposium.
For Associate Professor of Accountancy Kim Mendoza (top right), co-chair of both the Wyatt Young Scholars and the Symposium on Audit Research, these gatherings play a vital role in putting Gies Business at the center of the conversation.
"To keep our long tradition in accountancy going, it’s essential to create a space that’s not too insular – where people can discuss research with faculty around the world, so we keep that conversation going with scholars everywhere,” said Mendoza.
Rather than putting out a broad, open call for papers, event chair Christie Hayne (bottom right) and the managerial accounting faculty take a highly curated approach.
"Our goal is to support emerging scholars in management accounting at this important phase of their careers," said Hayne, associate professor of accountancy at Gies Business. "We choose based on rising stars and prominent juniors, but we also are very deliberate about diversifying the invitee’s method – qualitative, lab experiment, archival, analytical, field experiment – so that we have a range of topics and methods."
For junior faculty, presenting at these symposiums isn't just about getting feedback; it's a vital stepping-stone in professional visibility.
"Hosting these events shows how deeply Gies values research and active engagement," said Mendoza. "It sends a clear signal across the entire field that we are deeply invested in moving the discipline forward."
Creating an intimate, nurturing environment
For all the big-picture strategy, the true character of these events often comes down to scale. Unlike massive, impersonal national conventions where attendees often need to choose between concurrent presentations, Gies’ symposia are intentionally kept intimate – hovering around 70 to 90 participants.
For MJ Kim, who earned her PhD from Gies Business and is now a faculty member at the University of Wisconsin, these events often take on a "rock star" vibe.
"You know how you idolize somebody and then you see them in person? It’s surreal,” said Kim.
Because the attendee list is tightly managed for these type of events – reserving core slots for junior presenters, their discussants, our faculty, and a select group of doctoral students – the room feels collaborative rather than intimidating. When Kim returned years later as a presenting scholar to debut her work on CEO incentives and sales targets, she found that same welcoming environment.
"The audience is full of people who want to help," said Kim. "It's not an environment where people are there to ask questions that will kill your paper. All the commentary centers on giving you feedback to help better position your paper."
Never resting on legacy
As one of the nation’s first accountancy programs, Gies Business has been at the forefront of accountancy education for more than 100 years. The College granted the nation’s first PhD in accounting in 1936 and hosted the first international conference of accounting education in 1961.
Ultimately, hosting these gatherings is not about resting on a historical legacy. Leadership and faculty agree that it’s about actively generating the intellectual friction that moves accounting forward. By bringing together diverse methodologies, connecting academia with practice, and opening doors for the next generation, Gies Business ensures that its top-ranked status is something proven and earned with every hosted event.
The College’s undergraduate and graduate accountancy program are ranked No. 1 by US News and its faculty rank No. 1 in the two primary rankings of accounting research scholarship by Brigham Young University.
"For a department with Illinois' history in accounting research and doctoral education, continuing to create those forums is an important way of carrying that tradition forward rather than simply relying on it," said Donohoe.