City University of Macau’s Academic Research Quarterly Seminar 2025 was held on the afternoon of April 3, 2025 at the conference room G2213, Golden Dragon Campus. This seminar is organized by the Research Management Office, with this particular lecture organized by the Faculty of Finance, which invited Professor Albert Tsang, who is currently the Chair Professor of the Department of Accounting in the School of Business of Southern University of Science and Technology, as the keynote speaker. The theme of the seminar was “How to Find Research Inspiration and Successful Publication in Accounting, Finance and Management Subjects”. The seminar was hosted by Associate Professor Li Weiping and a souvenir was presented by Professor Zhou Yonghong, Director of the PhD Program of Faculty of Finance.

Prof. Tsang is currently Chair Professor of Accounting, Head of the Department of Accounting and PhD Supervisor at the School of Business of Southern University of Science and Technology. He is an expert selected for the National Major Talent Project and a financial consultant of the 14th Standing Committee of the Guangdong Provincial People's Congress. He is the founder of CSR/ESG research in the field of accounting, and the recipient of the American Accounting Association (AAA) “Outstanding Contribution to Accounting Literature Award”, the highest honor in the international accounting field. His research areas include ESG/Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), multinational listings, voluntary disclosure, and international accounting. He has accumulated over 10,000 citations in his academic publications and is ranked in the top 1% of cited articles globally, with two of his articles on CSR disclosure ranking 1st and 9th in citations since 2010 in the global accounting field. Two of his articles on CSR disclosure were ranked 1st and 9th in the world in terms of citations in the accounting field since 2010, and one of his articles in the Journal of Financial Economics, one of the world's leading financial journals, was accepted in 24 days from submission, which is the fastest time ever for Chinese accounting scholars to be accepted by a top international journal. Prof. Tsang is currently the Editor-in-Chief, Associate Editor-in-Chief, Editorial Board Member of many international journals, and a reviewer for more than 60 international academic journals. He is the Editor-in-Chief of Accounting Horizons, Associate Editor of The British Accounting Review and Associate Editor of Journal of Accounting, Auditing and Finance.

During the seminar, Prof. Tsang shared his experience on how to find inspiration for research topics, and unselfishly shared his own treasure map of scientific research, his inspiration map and his three-tier structure of empirical research diagram. He shared the main elements of empirical research in a humorous way with illustrations, and through the three-layer structure of empirical research diagram, he gave examples to explain what variables can be researched, so that students can break the obstacles of their own cognitive thinking. He also guided students to look for the underlying meaning and rationality of the proxy variables in the new variables, and combines different theories as the activation elements to reasonably promote the sustainability research part to deepen the cultivation.

During the Q&A session, students and faculty members asked Prof. Tsang for advice on the difficulties they encountered in their research. He encouraged the students to play to their strengths, identify their own strengths and suggested that they could find partners with different strengths to complement each other's strengths. The Faculty of Finance would like to express its sincere gratitude to Prof. Tsang for his wonderful sharing, which not only serves as an inspirational light for the students on the road of scientific research, but also as a life mentor for the students. Through this seminar, students expressed that they have benefited a lot from the seminar, and gained valuable inspiration and enlightenment for their research, and they are determined to develop their own research treasure map as their goal.