Speaking up in the Big 4: facilitators and inhibitors of employee voice in unethical situations in tax

Tax practitioners are uniquely placed to influence the tax compliance behavior of their clients. While credited with assisting clients in meeting their various payment and filing responsibilities, they also often stand accused of undermining the integrity of tax systems by designing highly contrived structures that allow their clients to avoid taxation. When strictly legal, this activity is still frequently labelled as unethical by governments and civil society. Moreover, some accounting firms have been prosecuted for not complying with tax legislation. This study seeks potential remedies for this concern by drawing on the concept of employee voice to examine the factors that influence tax practitioners from speaking up when they encounter unethical behavior at work. Interviews were conducted with Irish tax practitioners across all levels of seniority in Big 4 accounting firms. The findings reveal that the voice decision in tax is the product of powerful professional level factors and, to a lesser extent, a series of organizational level ones. We conclude that professional bodies, as well as management at the Big 4 firms themselves, need to take steps to re-emphasize to their members the importance of always reporting suspected unethical behavior in the workplace.