On 29 October 2025, Kim Alina Schulz presented her research at the PARSEC Brown-Bag Event with the research question “Who Works in the Tax Department? Examining the Impact of Workforce Diversity on Departmental Performance”. In her presentation, she showed how diversity in tax departments is related to tax performance and risk of companies.
While previous studies have mostly focussed on board members or top management teams, this project is the first to examine the internal composition of tax departments. A distinction is made between demographic diversity and cognitive diversity.
The research team, consisting of Kim Alina Schulz, Henning Giese and Harald Armberger, deduces from their findings that diversity in functional teams harbours not only social but also economic potential. Future analyses should take into account sector-specific adjustments to tax rates and income shifts, among other things.
