In the consulting industry, few names loom as large as Accenture, which operates at the intersection between information technology and business with specialties in security and systems migrations.
The company, which employs a staff of nearly 400,000 across 200 cities that services roughly 75 percent of companies on the Fortune 500 list, reported $32.9 billion in annual revenues for 2016. Accenture is headquartered in Dublin but most of the action reportedly takes place in Chicago and New York.
Bluntly, if consulting is the name of the game, then Accenture is one of the major teams MBAs want to play for, along with McKinsey, Bain and Boston Consulting Group. For eight consecutive years, the multinational strategy consulting firm was named one of Fortune’s top 100 companies to work for. And recently, LinkedIn users chose Accenture 12th overall on its list of most InDemand Employers.
Why MBAs Love Accenture
Accenture’s knack for developing tech-powered strategies that turn ideas into actions is renowned. MBAs clamor for a sweet spot at a firm that lives at the cutting edge of business and technology. According to Business Because, Accenture typically hires approximately 64,000 employees in a fiscal year and boasts ties to INSEAD, Wharton and Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business.
According to Management Consulted, post-MBA salaries at Accenture hover around a base salary of $140-145,000 with a $25,000 signing bonus, an $8,000 relocation check and a performance bonus up to $44,000. Interns typically clock $31 per hour, plus overtime and a signing bonus.
Accenture consults clients in virtually every industry, from entertainment to aerospace, but the company currently emphasizes projects in insurance, consumer goods, retail, banking, energy and health care. Consultants relish the opportunity to work on intersectional projects in overlapping industries:
Life at Accenture
The company hires typically start out as consultants, strategists, or analysts in its Consulting, Strategy or Digital divisions and then work their way up the ranks to positions in management.
Employees in the Consulting division focus on delivering “innovative, tailor-made solutions” to issues specific to Accenture clients’ industries. Strategy employees help clients “stay ahead of the curve” by illustrating “how technology will impact their industries.” Digital employees “harness analytics, interactive marketing and mobility services to improve the user experience for millions of end users.”
You can read more about day-to-day life at Accenture here.
Landing The Job
Accenture’s North American Senior Managing Director Ravi Chanmugam explained in an interview what kind of MBA the company targets.
Chanmugam believes Accenture appeals to people who “want to have an impact on business and society and understand disruption” since he believes disruption is where Accenture lives.
“We want people who have that curiosity about, ‘What will driverless cars do to the property and casualty industry?’ Or, ‘How could you make money off of telemedicine?’ We’re looking for someone who has curiosity and passion for how IT, technology and digital are going to change the way businesses interact with customers and how they’ll change how businesses run themselves.”
The ideal candidate, according to Chanmugam, is “someone who started a business or worked in a small business or developed a new concept or idea.” Accenture seeks out practical, rather than theoretical types, Chanmugam explains: “Clients today do not want a folder with insights and recommendations. In today’s world you need to take the ideas to the next level, build prototypes, test your recommendations.”