Accenture Reviews in United Kingdom

Pros

Global reach, technology support and provision, people

Cons

Struggle to find appropriate projects and gather industry skills

Pros

Good perks when working offsite.
Good Brand name to have in your CV.

Cons

Pay less when compared to peers.
Internal politics.
No choice for employees regarding the projects they want to work on.

Advice to Senior Management

Stop being too commercial and care for your employees, they are the ones who are generating money for the company.

Pros

Exposure to a number of high profile clients, companies and industries. Opportunities to take on responsibilities and ownership of high quality deliverables. After work socials and team events are regular and help keep spirits high.

Cons

Promotion approach can be unfair and level of competition between peers on the same level is disheartening. Impression that management does not approve of leave even in exceptional circumstances.

Advice to Senior Management

Respect people who work in your teams and show them appreciation for good pieces of work, even after it is submitted. Make time for your team and don't cancel meetings unless absolutely necessary.

Pros

Varied mix of top global clients, seeing how they work (or don't) "under the bonnet", which would equal a lifetime in permie jobs at end-clients.
Good structured methodology & training.
Good set of work-related online tools.
Great for younger people with a travel bug.
Great mixture of roles across the lifecycle (rather than static/easily stereotyped in a traditional employer).
Can work anywhere with good online, single sign-on connectivity to most systems.
Can either be a generic consultant or a specialist (though can be difficult to swap between the two).
Good pension management & contributions.

Cons

Having to often live out of a suitcase for long periods of time, away from home Mon-Fri.
Often having little choice as to which client and where you work next (and for how long).
Being thrown in deep end often (is also a pro at times but not when happens all the time), which can put you in a difficult position with your high day rate & clients expecting specialists.
**Although appraisal/promotional laddering uses many metrics & checks-and-balances, it still fundamentally comes down to who is representing you and how much presence they have in meetings (and "squeaky wheel" people who get recognition/promoted).
**Often long hours and maybe doing 2-3 people's jobs => high stress.
**Could be so much quicker/easier if people knew advanced MS Office as this toolset used 98% of time; many just don't know how to do basics of structured information for others' consumption, let alone to process it in a repeatable, automated way.
Internal role board can make company seem like a glorified recruitment agency.
**Too much hands-on IT dev/test work is off-shore, meaning that it's now hard for new recruits to get experience & creating an on-shore skills gap (& gradually making off-shore resources more valuable & expensive).
"Jack of all trades, master of none" can make it hard when leaving Accenture in current market to get a role in an end-client (not so much another consultancy) who want "extensive experience" in something niche or other.

Advice to Senior Management

See "Cons", especially those marked with "**".

Pros

Good and competent people, good processes

Cons

Less pay compared to industry

Advice to Senior Management

Better compensation package

Pros

Excellent training ground in project management, thought leadership and professionalism. Great people to work with and interesting clients. Option to travel

Cons

Long hours. Expected to travel anywhere. Lots of talk about managing the work life balance but often not put into practice.

Advice to Senior Management

Manage the work life balance in particular travel requirements, flexible working, working from home, part time hours. Don't just talk about it.

Pros

learned loads in a very short time, good training opportunities. responsibility is given very quickly, very international, great people to work with

Cons

lack of work life balance - expect to work long hours, performance management system is not transparent and not based on performance but based on how well you can network, salary low comparedto the hours you do

Advice to Senior Management

,,,

Pros

The work at Accenture ideally prepares a fresh-faced graduate to get some *real* experience with some of the Big names in the Industry - which certainly looks good on a CV. The work you do is actual contracted work that a client has paid good money for - so unlike some in-house software projects, there is an implicit guarantee that your work will be used.

The culture to outperform your peers contributes as a key motivator to constantly evaluate oneself and be more retrospective as to how one can improve and be more valuable to the company - as this translates to the performance appraisal, promotion and rewards scheme. So. complacency is not something that is given much encouragement (which is another good thing).

You get to work with some senior people who have to deliver and add value to the customers requirements. So, with this kind of pressure, those whom you work with give you an insight as to how to plan, structure and deliver value to the client - without compromising on quality

There are some renowned experts - either technical or business minded. From a technical perspective, you get to see how some experts make technical and architectural decisions - which form a valuable learning experience.

Cons

Contrary to the published website literature, project managers always have the right to override HR policies.

Business requirements and promotion eligibility criteria fluctuate - and is hard to ascertain what exactly guarantees a promotion; you can do everything that is needed, and still not get it - as there was no business need to increase the level of promotees at the next level.

Long working hours is almost standard. Very few projects have a 9-5 working schedule.

Advice to Senior Management

Ensure that HR policies cannot be superseded

Pros

Very smart people and strong networking

Cons

Working hours are very long

Advice to Senior Management

Help people to have a better work life balance

Pros

The level of project work and client base is incredible.

Cons

Can be merciless regarding client locations and work-life balance

Advice to Senior Management

We often sell work without concern for the individuals who will be leading the campaign; I know the expertise is there but its not always utilised.