Johan Graaf

Johan Graaf is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Accounting, which he joined in late 2016. He defended his PhD dissertation “The Pursuit of Relevance” at Stockholm University in October 2016 and has since then been conducting research and teaching at SSE.

Johan conducts interdisciplinary accounting research with mainly qualitative methods and a perspective of accounting as social and institutional practice. Empirically, he has specialized in the sell-side equity advice industry and has through ethnographic research investigated how equity analysts and equity brokers form investment recommendation from accounting information. In addition, Johan is currently joining a research project with colleagues in SSE which targets management control practices in public organizations.

Johan also has a broad teaching experience on topics such as financial reporting, management control, financial analysis, finance and research methods. He is currently teaching group accounting and supervising bachelor theses at SSE. 

Research interests

Accounting as social and institutional practice

The use of accounting for equity investments

The organization of sell-side equity advisors

Current teaching

Group accounting and working capital (course 332 - Redovisning och finansiering)

Bachelor thesis supervision (course 639 - Examensarbete i Accounting and Financial Management)

Previous teaching includes responsibilities as head of course, lecturing (60-600 students), holding seminars, calculation exercises, and supervising theses in a total of 17 courses at three different universities. These courses have covered a broad array of topics in accounting, finance and research methods, on both bachelor, master and PhD level.

Research publications

Graaf, J. (2016) “The pursuit of relevance: Exploring the Relationships between Accounting and Users” PhD Dissertation, Stockholm Business School, Stockholm University

Graaf, J. (2013). Colouring the numbers–on the role of intellectual capital in financial reporting. Journal of Intellectual Capital, 14(3), 376-394.

Educational publications

Almqvist, R., Graaf, J., Jannesson, E., Parment, A. & Skoog, M. (2016) “Boken om Ekonomistyrning”, Studentlitteratur, Stockholm.

Almqvist, R., Graaf, J., & Parment, A. (2016) “Boken om Ekonomistyrning: Övningsbok med lösningar”, Studentlitteratur, Stockholm.