Saori Matsubara

1 INTRODUCTION The workplace provides a context in which individuals actively search for, construct, and experience ideas about themselves (Alvesson & Willmott, 2002). In the accounting workplace, individuals are subject to intense socialization, with Big 4 accounting firms suggested to function as reinventive institutions (Scott, 2011). Such institutions fundamentally aim to alter employees' professional identity into “corporate clones” of the firm (Covaleski et al., 1998, p. 294).

Summary: As individuals become professionals, they accumulate cultural, social and economic capital valued within their field. Our study, recently published in the Journal of Management Studies, investigates the significance of this capital accumulation to how partners from professional service firms (PSFs) experience transitions out of the field upon retirement.