A global professional services company, headquartered in Dublin, with roughly 814,000 people worldwide. In the UK it runs degree apprenticeships and graduate schemes.
Accenture is one of the biggest professional services companies in the world. In plain terms, businesses and governments hire it to help them work out a plan, build the technology to carry it out, and sometimes run whole parts of their operations for them. Its own list of services includes technology (cloud, security, software), data and artificial intelligence, business strategy, supply chains, marketing and customer experience. Wikipedia lists management and IT consulting, systems integration, cloud computing, business process outsourcing and cybersecurity, with clients in 120 countries, and about 814,000 employees (2026).
Its story starts as the consulting division of Arthur Andersen in the early 1950s. It became Andersen Consulting in 1989, separated from Arthur Andersen after arbitration in 2000, and took the name Accenture on 1 January 2001, from 'accent on the future'. It is headquartered in Dublin, Ireland, and Julie Sweet has been chair and chief executive since 2019. Accenture's own US-facing company page says the business is organised into four groups: Strategy & Consulting, Interactive, Technology and Operations. A third-party careers profile says Accenture employs more than 10,000 people across its UK offices; it does not name the towns, but Accenture's apprenticeship listings name Manchester, Leeds and Newcastle, among other offices.
Accenture states its purpose as "to deliver on the promise of technology and human ingenuity". Its page describes using change to create new value for clients, employees and communities. Julie Sweet is quoted saying: "We care deeply about what we do and the impact we have with our clients and communities." These are the company's own words, not a measure of results.
Named parts of the business include Accenture Song (marketing, design and customer experience) and Industry X (technology for engineering and manufacturing). In the UK, Accenture works with public and private sector clients, including the tax authority HMRC, and has been a strategic partner of The Alan Turing Institute, the UK's national institute for data science and AI, since 2017.
For young people there are several routes. A third-party profile lists a consulting graduate programme of about 15 months, a Summer Vacation Scheme, industrial placements, a Master's Degree Apprenticeship and other apprenticeships. The 2026 Technology Degree Apprenticeship (Manchester) is a three-year BSc (Hons) in Applied Digital & Technology Solutions through BPP University, with one day a week of study and four days on client projects. Entry asked for 104 UCAS points or equivalent and five GCSEs including maths and English at grades 9 to 4, and no particular subjects. Applicants must already have the right to work in the UK. Pay was listed at £24,707 plus a £2,000 completion bonus (closed 31 December 2025). A Newcastle apprenticeship starting April 2027 lists £26,299 plus the same bonus, with no minimum academic requirement and a deadline of 15 July 2026 (both as at those listings). Apprentices are expected in their assigned office at least three days a week. Accenture describes its culture as inclusive and people-first; these are its own claims. Check Accenture's careers site for the next intake.
Website: www.accenture.com
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