Description
Our colleague, friend and great source of inspiration
Jan-Erik Gro¨ jer left us on October the 5th
2007
Obituary
Jan-Erik Gro¨ jer: An appreciation
Our colleague, friend and great source of inspi-
ration Jan-Erik Gro¨ jer left us on October the 5th
2007.
Probably no contemporary Swedish researcher
in accounting has in?uenced so many people: stu-
dents, research colleagues, managers, profession-
als, and policymakers included. Why? Because
Jan-Erik addressed them all.
Thousands of Swedish students in accounting
and other academic subjects have either read his
introduction to accounting theory (Gro¨ jer, 2002;
the ?rst edition dates back to 1979 and the latest,
the ?fth, to 2002) or listened to his stimulating lec-
tures. Thousands of managers, specialists and poli-
cymakers have either heard him creatively and
often provocatively re?ect upon the role of account-
ing in organisations as well as in society at large.
In numerous projects, and without compromis-
ing with his academic freedom, he intellectually
inspired managers in private and public organisa-
tions. Nor was he afraid of moving between acade-
mia and practice. Hundreds of researchers from
accounting and other disciplines also have experi-
enced his intellectual sharpness in either discus-
sions with him or when reading his books and
articles. For Jan-Erik, the academic ivory tower
criticized in Nowotny, Scott, and Gibbons (2001)
made no sense. When Nowotny et al. started their
critique of an isolated academia by stating that
‘‘n the past half-century society . . . has begun
to speak back to science” (ibid., p. 1), Jan-Erik
was already involved in a fruitful dialogue. From
this perspective, accounting research is always
the start of a new endeavour and never the end.
As a result, Jan-Erik described research as ‘an
essential part of education’.
The doctoral thesis on social accounting (Gro¨ jer
& Stark, 1978b) which he co-authored with Agneta
Stark, made a pioneering contribution to expand-
ing the boundaries of accounting. Not only did
the thesis get reviews in the daily as well as in the
business press, it also sold out (which is a rare
achievement for a doctoral thesis in accounting).
Jan-Erik and Agneta introduced their research to
an international audience by publishing in Account-
ing, Organizations & Society (Gro¨ jer & Stark, 1977)
and in Revista internacional de econom? ´ a y empresa
(Gro¨ jer & Stark, 1978a). The opening sentence in
the AOS paper indicates the path that Jan-Erik’s re-
search (and that of many other Swedish accounting
researchers) would take: ‘‘Accounting is, or ought
to be, a re?ection of prevailing social values and
culture” (Gro¨ jer & Stark, 1977, p. 349).
In 1983 Jan-Erik published a book on ‘‘the con-
cept of performance” (Gro¨ jer, 1983). This interest
and that of understanding how ?rms and public
sector organizations produce value led to his
exploration of company valuation from an em-
ployee perspective. It also led him to initiate what
could be labelled as a popular national movement
in accounting addressing human resource costing
and accounting in Sweden. Jan-Erik then turned
to practice and tried to develop methods for
visualizing human resources in accounting. His
aim was to change working life, to improve the
working environment and to initiate a debate on
doi:10.1016/j.aos.2008.01.004
www.elsevier.com/locate/aos
Available online at www.sciencedirect.com
Accounting, Organizations and Society 33 (2008) 677–679
how human resources contribute to the perfor-
mance and value of the organization (Gro¨ jer,
1990, 1993 Gro¨ jer & Johanson, 1984, 1991a,
1991b). The interest within Sweden was tremen-
dous and in 1991 the government proposed a man-
datory obligation to publish a special human
resource report based on a new idea of a human
resource pro?t and loss account.
1
At the end of the 1990’s Jan-Erik returned to re-
search (Gro¨ jer, 1997; Gro¨ jer & Johanson, 1997),
even helping to set the research agenda for the
Swedish presidency in the European Union (Gro¨ jer
& Johanson, 2001a, 2001b). Jan-Erik’s attention
was now directed towards accounting for intangi-
bles in general, i.e. going beyond human resources.
Two European projects with the acronyms Meri-
tum and E
*
Know-Net, respectively, were set up
in cooperation with seven other universities. Jan-
Erik was one of the intellectual leaders of these pro-
jects, emphasising the importance of intangibles for
innovation and company performance as well as
the consequences for management and ?nancial
accounting (Catasu´ s, Gro¨jer, Ho¨ gberg, & Johre´n,
2002, 2007; Catasu´ s & Gro¨ jer, 2003, 2006). Jan-
Erik’s article on classi?cation (Gro¨jer, 2001) be-
came a very important contribution not only to
the project and but also to many readers of AOS.
In close relation to the Meitum project, Jan Erik
was involved in a number of other activities, all
of them having the aim of inviting people to partic-
ipate in the development of accounting.
Jan-Erik’s work was located in the interface be-
tween accounting, ?nancial control, and human
behaviour. His aspiration was to develop account-
ing and ?nancial control as strategic and operative
tools. When examining Jan-Erik’s work, two issues
stand out: actuality (as in prevailing values) and
the focus on the social aspects of accounting (Aho-
nen & Gro¨ jer, 2005), themes that he shared with
many readers of AOS. Jan-Erik was continuously
questioning everything that was taken for granted.
By using his intellectual capability he energized
people around him and with an entrepreneurial
mind he continuously started new accounting re-
lated projects in cooperation with others. The
ambition was to move the accounting borders.
After being employed by Stockholm University
for three decades (except for short-term positions
at Karlstad University and Bergen), in 2002 he
moved to the Uppsala University to become pro-
fessor of accounting and ?nance. Immediately he
started two new accounting projects. One which
targeted accounting (especially for intangibles)
and capital market relations involved a number
of young doctoral students. The second project
which was named the Swedish Auditing Academy
was and is an extensive project addressing auditing
research and education in close cooperation be-
tween the universities in Uppsala and Stockholm
and the big auditing ?rms. The idea is to promote
a sustainable interest in auditing research.
Jan-Erik’s capacity for work was enormous. At
the end of the 1980s and the beginning of the 1990s
he was simultaneously Dean of the Stockholm
School of Business, teacher, researcher, and con-
sultant, always challenging the borders of account-
ing. He did so with an intellectual sharpness that
could be provocative for many people whereas
others found his reasoning extremely convincing
and energizing. He was an excellent teacher all
through his life, always mobilising his audience.
Even in small meetings after work he always af-
fected the interest of the people in the room. The
most outstanding quality, however, was his pas-
sion and support for his PhD-students. During
the ?rst meeting with the to-be-doctor he was
known to say: ‘‘I fully believe in your capacity. If
that changes, you will be the ?rst to know”. Jan-
Erik was tall and with his strong voice and inspir-
ing jargon always in the centre of any discussion.
Towards the end he was deadly ill but he did not
retire from work until the very last days.
We miss him. There is no one that can replace
him.
Thank you Jan-Erik
References
Ahonen, G., & Gro¨ jer, J.-E. (2005). Social accounting in the
nordic countries: From social accounting towards account-
ing in a social context. In S.zz Jo¨ nsson & J.zz Mourtisen
1
There was no new law because of the ongoing accounting
harmonisation as a consequence of Sweden joining the Euro-
pean Union.
678 Obituary / Accounting, Organizations and Society 33 (2008) 677–679
(Eds.), Accounting in Scandinavia: The northern lights.
Malmo¨ /Copenhagen: Liber and Copenhagen Business
School Press.
Catasu´ s, B., Gro¨ jer, J.-E., Ho¨ gberg, O-., & Johre´n, A. (2002).
Boken om nyckeltal. Lund: Liber.
Catasu´ s, B., Ersson, S., Gro¨ jer, J.-E., & Wallentin, F.Y. (2007).
What gets measured gets. . . on indicating, mobilizing and
acting. Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, 20(4),
505–521.
Catasu´ s, B., & Gro¨ jer, J.-E. (2003). Intangibles and credit
decisions: Results from an experiment. European Accounting
Review, 12(2), 327–355.
Catasu´ s, B., & Gro¨ jer, J.-E. (2006). Indicators: On visualizing,
classifying and dramatizing. Journal of Intellectual Capital,
7(2), 187–203.
Gro¨ jer, J.-E., 1983. Resultatbegreppet. Stockholm, Brevskolan
(distr.): Arbetslivscentrum.
Gro¨ jer, J.-E. (1990). Det personalekonomiska bokslutet. Stock-
holm: Labora Press.
Gro¨ jer, J.-E. (1993). Redovisa ansta¨ llda pa? balansra¨ kningen!.
Stockholm: Labora Press.
Gro¨ jer, J.-E. (2001). Intangibles and accounting classi?cations-
in search of a classi?cation strategy. Accounting, Organiza-
tions and Society, 26(7), 695–713.
Gro¨ jer, J.-E. (2002). Grundla¨ ggande redovisningsteori (introduc-
tion to accounting theory). Lund: Studentlitteratur.
Gro¨ jer, J.-E., & Johanson, U. (1984). Resultatorienterad PA:
Ekonomi fo¨ r personalansvariga. Stockholm: Liber.
Gro¨ jer, J.-E., & Johanson, U. (1991a). Human resource costing
and accounting. Stockholm: Arbetarskyddsna¨mnden.
Gro¨ jer, J.-E., & Johanson, U. (1991b). Personalekonomisk
redovisning och kalkylering. Stockholm: Joint Industrial
Safety Council.
Gro¨ jer, J.-E., Johanson, U., 2001a. Human resource costing
and accounting: Time for reporting regulation: Work Life
2000. Scienti?c reports from the workshops. A European
Presidency Conference (pp. 117–126). Stockholm: Swedish
Work Life Institute.
Gro¨ jer, J.-E., Johanson, U., 2001b. Voluntary guidelines on the
disclosure of intangibles: A bridge over troubled water:
Work Life 2000. Scienti?c reports from the workshops. A
European Presidency Conference (pp. 127–137). Stockholm:
Swedish Work Life Institute.
Gro¨ jer, J.-E., & Stark, A. (1977). Social accounting: A Swedish
attempt. Accounting, Organizations and Society, 2(4),
349–385.
Gro¨ jer, J.-E., & Stark, A. (1978a). Contabilidad social: Una
tentativa sueca. Revista internacional de econom? ´ a y empresa,
25(Enero–Abril), 21–32.
Gro¨ jer, J.-E., & Stark, A. (1978b). Social redovisning: Social
accounting. Stockholm: SNS.
Gro¨ jer, J.E. (1997). Employee artefacts on the balance sheet: A
model illustration and implications. Journal of Human
Resource Costing and Accounting, 2(1), 27–53.
Gro¨ jer, J.E., & Johanson, U. (1997). Current development in
human resource costing and accounting: Reality present,
researchers absent. Accounting, Auditing & Accountability
Journal, 11(4), 495–505.
Nowotny, H., Scott, P., & Gibbons, M. (2001). Re-thinking
science: Knowledge and the public in an age of uncertainty.
Cambridge: Polity Press.
Bino Catasu´s
Stockholm University, School of Business,
Stockholm 106 90, Sweden
Tel.: +46 8 162000
E-mail address: [email protected]
Ulf Johanson
Ma¨ lardalen University, Box 833,
Va¨ stera? s 72123, Sweden
Tel.: +46 21 101429
E-mail address: [email protected]
Obituary / Accounting, Organizations and Society 33 (2008) 677–679 679
doc_824436823.pdf
Our colleague, friend and great source of inspiration
Jan-Erik Gro¨ jer left us on October the 5th
2007
Obituary
Jan-Erik Gro¨ jer: An appreciation
Our colleague, friend and great source of inspi-
ration Jan-Erik Gro¨ jer left us on October the 5th
2007.
Probably no contemporary Swedish researcher
in accounting has in?uenced so many people: stu-
dents, research colleagues, managers, profession-
als, and policymakers included. Why? Because
Jan-Erik addressed them all.
Thousands of Swedish students in accounting
and other academic subjects have either read his
introduction to accounting theory (Gro¨ jer, 2002;
the ?rst edition dates back to 1979 and the latest,
the ?fth, to 2002) or listened to his stimulating lec-
tures. Thousands of managers, specialists and poli-
cymakers have either heard him creatively and
often provocatively re?ect upon the role of account-
ing in organisations as well as in society at large.
In numerous projects, and without compromis-
ing with his academic freedom, he intellectually
inspired managers in private and public organisa-
tions. Nor was he afraid of moving between acade-
mia and practice. Hundreds of researchers from
accounting and other disciplines also have experi-
enced his intellectual sharpness in either discus-
sions with him or when reading his books and
articles. For Jan-Erik, the academic ivory tower
criticized in Nowotny, Scott, and Gibbons (2001)
made no sense. When Nowotny et al. started their
critique of an isolated academia by stating that
‘‘n the past half-century society . . . has begun
to speak back to science” (ibid., p. 1), Jan-Erik
was already involved in a fruitful dialogue. From
this perspective, accounting research is always
the start of a new endeavour and never the end.
As a result, Jan-Erik described research as ‘an
essential part of education’.
The doctoral thesis on social accounting (Gro¨ jer
& Stark, 1978b) which he co-authored with Agneta
Stark, made a pioneering contribution to expand-
ing the boundaries of accounting. Not only did
the thesis get reviews in the daily as well as in the
business press, it also sold out (which is a rare
achievement for a doctoral thesis in accounting).
Jan-Erik and Agneta introduced their research to
an international audience by publishing in Account-
ing, Organizations & Society (Gro¨ jer & Stark, 1977)
and in Revista internacional de econom? ´ a y empresa
(Gro¨ jer & Stark, 1978a). The opening sentence in
the AOS paper indicates the path that Jan-Erik’s re-
search (and that of many other Swedish accounting
researchers) would take: ‘‘Accounting is, or ought
to be, a re?ection of prevailing social values and
culture” (Gro¨ jer & Stark, 1977, p. 349).
In 1983 Jan-Erik published a book on ‘‘the con-
cept of performance” (Gro¨ jer, 1983). This interest
and that of understanding how ?rms and public
sector organizations produce value led to his
exploration of company valuation from an em-
ployee perspective. It also led him to initiate what
could be labelled as a popular national movement
in accounting addressing human resource costing
and accounting in Sweden. Jan-Erik then turned
to practice and tried to develop methods for
visualizing human resources in accounting. His
aim was to change working life, to improve the
working environment and to initiate a debate on
doi:10.1016/j.aos.2008.01.004
www.elsevier.com/locate/aos
Available online at www.sciencedirect.com
Accounting, Organizations and Society 33 (2008) 677–679
how human resources contribute to the perfor-
mance and value of the organization (Gro¨ jer,
1990, 1993 Gro¨ jer & Johanson, 1984, 1991a,
1991b). The interest within Sweden was tremen-
dous and in 1991 the government proposed a man-
datory obligation to publish a special human
resource report based on a new idea of a human
resource pro?t and loss account.
1
At the end of the 1990’s Jan-Erik returned to re-
search (Gro¨ jer, 1997; Gro¨ jer & Johanson, 1997),
even helping to set the research agenda for the
Swedish presidency in the European Union (Gro¨ jer
& Johanson, 2001a, 2001b). Jan-Erik’s attention
was now directed towards accounting for intangi-
bles in general, i.e. going beyond human resources.
Two European projects with the acronyms Meri-
tum and E
*
Know-Net, respectively, were set up
in cooperation with seven other universities. Jan-
Erik was one of the intellectual leaders of these pro-
jects, emphasising the importance of intangibles for
innovation and company performance as well as
the consequences for management and ?nancial
accounting (Catasu´ s, Gro¨jer, Ho¨ gberg, & Johre´n,
2002, 2007; Catasu´ s & Gro¨ jer, 2003, 2006). Jan-
Erik’s article on classi?cation (Gro¨jer, 2001) be-
came a very important contribution not only to
the project and but also to many readers of AOS.
In close relation to the Meitum project, Jan Erik
was involved in a number of other activities, all
of them having the aim of inviting people to partic-
ipate in the development of accounting.
Jan-Erik’s work was located in the interface be-
tween accounting, ?nancial control, and human
behaviour. His aspiration was to develop account-
ing and ?nancial control as strategic and operative
tools. When examining Jan-Erik’s work, two issues
stand out: actuality (as in prevailing values) and
the focus on the social aspects of accounting (Aho-
nen & Gro¨ jer, 2005), themes that he shared with
many readers of AOS. Jan-Erik was continuously
questioning everything that was taken for granted.
By using his intellectual capability he energized
people around him and with an entrepreneurial
mind he continuously started new accounting re-
lated projects in cooperation with others. The
ambition was to move the accounting borders.
After being employed by Stockholm University
for three decades (except for short-term positions
at Karlstad University and Bergen), in 2002 he
moved to the Uppsala University to become pro-
fessor of accounting and ?nance. Immediately he
started two new accounting projects. One which
targeted accounting (especially for intangibles)
and capital market relations involved a number
of young doctoral students. The second project
which was named the Swedish Auditing Academy
was and is an extensive project addressing auditing
research and education in close cooperation be-
tween the universities in Uppsala and Stockholm
and the big auditing ?rms. The idea is to promote
a sustainable interest in auditing research.
Jan-Erik’s capacity for work was enormous. At
the end of the 1980s and the beginning of the 1990s
he was simultaneously Dean of the Stockholm
School of Business, teacher, researcher, and con-
sultant, always challenging the borders of account-
ing. He did so with an intellectual sharpness that
could be provocative for many people whereas
others found his reasoning extremely convincing
and energizing. He was an excellent teacher all
through his life, always mobilising his audience.
Even in small meetings after work he always af-
fected the interest of the people in the room. The
most outstanding quality, however, was his pas-
sion and support for his PhD-students. During
the ?rst meeting with the to-be-doctor he was
known to say: ‘‘I fully believe in your capacity. If
that changes, you will be the ?rst to know”. Jan-
Erik was tall and with his strong voice and inspir-
ing jargon always in the centre of any discussion.
Towards the end he was deadly ill but he did not
retire from work until the very last days.
We miss him. There is no one that can replace
him.
Thank you Jan-Erik
References
Ahonen, G., & Gro¨ jer, J.-E. (2005). Social accounting in the
nordic countries: From social accounting towards account-
ing in a social context. In S.zz Jo¨ nsson & J.zz Mourtisen
1
There was no new law because of the ongoing accounting
harmonisation as a consequence of Sweden joining the Euro-
pean Union.
678 Obituary / Accounting, Organizations and Society 33 (2008) 677–679
(Eds.), Accounting in Scandinavia: The northern lights.
Malmo¨ /Copenhagen: Liber and Copenhagen Business
School Press.
Catasu´ s, B., Gro¨ jer, J.-E., Ho¨ gberg, O-., & Johre´n, A. (2002).
Boken om nyckeltal. Lund: Liber.
Catasu´ s, B., Ersson, S., Gro¨ jer, J.-E., & Wallentin, F.Y. (2007).
What gets measured gets. . . on indicating, mobilizing and
acting. Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, 20(4),
505–521.
Catasu´ s, B., & Gro¨ jer, J.-E. (2003). Intangibles and credit
decisions: Results from an experiment. European Accounting
Review, 12(2), 327–355.
Catasu´ s, B., & Gro¨ jer, J.-E. (2006). Indicators: On visualizing,
classifying and dramatizing. Journal of Intellectual Capital,
7(2), 187–203.
Gro¨ jer, J.-E., 1983. Resultatbegreppet. Stockholm, Brevskolan
(distr.): Arbetslivscentrum.
Gro¨ jer, J.-E. (1990). Det personalekonomiska bokslutet. Stock-
holm: Labora Press.
Gro¨ jer, J.-E. (1993). Redovisa ansta¨ llda pa? balansra¨ kningen!.
Stockholm: Labora Press.
Gro¨ jer, J.-E. (2001). Intangibles and accounting classi?cations-
in search of a classi?cation strategy. Accounting, Organiza-
tions and Society, 26(7), 695–713.
Gro¨ jer, J.-E. (2002). Grundla¨ ggande redovisningsteori (introduc-
tion to accounting theory). Lund: Studentlitteratur.
Gro¨ jer, J.-E., & Johanson, U. (1984). Resultatorienterad PA:
Ekonomi fo¨ r personalansvariga. Stockholm: Liber.
Gro¨ jer, J.-E., & Johanson, U. (1991a). Human resource costing
and accounting. Stockholm: Arbetarskyddsna¨mnden.
Gro¨ jer, J.-E., & Johanson, U. (1991b). Personalekonomisk
redovisning och kalkylering. Stockholm: Joint Industrial
Safety Council.
Gro¨ jer, J.-E., Johanson, U., 2001a. Human resource costing
and accounting: Time for reporting regulation: Work Life
2000. Scienti?c reports from the workshops. A European
Presidency Conference (pp. 117–126). Stockholm: Swedish
Work Life Institute.
Gro¨ jer, J.-E., Johanson, U., 2001b. Voluntary guidelines on the
disclosure of intangibles: A bridge over troubled water:
Work Life 2000. Scienti?c reports from the workshops. A
European Presidency Conference (pp. 127–137). Stockholm:
Swedish Work Life Institute.
Gro¨ jer, J.-E., & Stark, A. (1977). Social accounting: A Swedish
attempt. Accounting, Organizations and Society, 2(4),
349–385.
Gro¨ jer, J.-E., & Stark, A. (1978a). Contabilidad social: Una
tentativa sueca. Revista internacional de econom? ´ a y empresa,
25(Enero–Abril), 21–32.
Gro¨ jer, J.-E., & Stark, A. (1978b). Social redovisning: Social
accounting. Stockholm: SNS.
Gro¨ jer, J.E. (1997). Employee artefacts on the balance sheet: A
model illustration and implications. Journal of Human
Resource Costing and Accounting, 2(1), 27–53.
Gro¨ jer, J.E., & Johanson, U. (1997). Current development in
human resource costing and accounting: Reality present,
researchers absent. Accounting, Auditing & Accountability
Journal, 11(4), 495–505.
Nowotny, H., Scott, P., & Gibbons, M. (2001). Re-thinking
science: Knowledge and the public in an age of uncertainty.
Cambridge: Polity Press.
Bino Catasu´s
Stockholm University, School of Business,
Stockholm 106 90, Sweden
Tel.: +46 8 162000
E-mail address: [email protected]
Ulf Johanson
Ma¨ lardalen University, Box 833,
Va¨ stera? s 72123, Sweden
Tel.: +46 21 101429
E-mail address: [email protected]
Obituary / Accounting, Organizations and Society 33 (2008) 677–679 679
doc_824436823.pdf