Summary
10.3 Human Resources at Accenture
Human Resources (HR) at Accenture is part of its Enterprise Workforce, deliver- ing HR services to employees of all workforces. Operating in an international en- vironment with complex company structures, Accenture HR is recognized as be- ing at the heart of Accenture’s business. HR provides critical expertise to integrate employee needs and business objectives, ensuring that Accenture has the people and organizational culture needed to deliver its business strategy.
10.3.1 Accenture HR Vision
HR is sought out as a strategic business partner, in all parts of the organization, with input on most business matters. HR professionals provide a valued perspec- tive on key business issues and business operations, ensure that HR strategy and business strategy are aligned, and facilitate and expedite change.
HR is a 'people' expert, abreast of the latest market and strategic HR trends, provider of leading edge thinking into Accenture’s business on 'people' issues and with a long-term vision for the HR aspects of its business. HR plays a lead role in organization development, including workforce strategy, and in monitoring and advising on culture and morale.
HR is a capability development expert, continuously increasing the skill level and knowledge capital of Accenture's people and with the ability to both rapidly fulfill current skill needs and anticipate, and meet, future needs for skills and pro- fessional development.
HR drives Accenture's employer positioning, which denotes the distinct place Accenture wants to occupy, as an employer, in the minds of Accenture employees and future talents, and which is understood and valued both externally and inter- nally.
The Accenture HR organization is well integrated, both internally and with the rest of the business. Clear structures and processes are in place for governance and stakeholder management, operating effectively throughout the organization.
Accenture has an efficient, cost-effective and outcome-focused HR Service De- livery Model that makes optimum use of outsourcing, in-sourcing and shared ser- vices. HR structure, processes and systems provide cost effective services. Simple and efficient HR systems and infrastructure enable the streamlining of HR's trans- actional role, and top quartile (market) performance in terms of operational effi- ciency.
Accenture has a strong HR career model, which emphasizes both deep HR skills and strong business acumen.
10.3.2 Accenture ASG HR Organization
In Austria, Switzerland and Germany (ASG), the Human Resources department consists of approx. 100 employees working in the Frankfurt, Zurich and Vienna offices.
Most functions are centrally performed in the Frankfurt office, however to ac- commodate differences, mainly legal in nature, in the three countries, local HR professionals in Vienna and Zurich handle country-specific matters.
The ASG HR department, delivering HR services from the employees’ first day until the handling of the termination, consists of two major HR divisions. One di- vision is performing all comprehensive tasks that apply to all employees. This group consists of the following subteams: Training and Personnel Development, Strategy and Compensation, HR Operations (including HR Systems and Temps Management) and Partner Matters. The other division takes care of HR delivery.
The structure of this division accommodates the workforce organization: Solutions Workforce HR, Services Workforce HR, Consulting Workforce HR and Enter- prise Workforce HR. The Consulting Workforce HR team is further subgrouped by Operating Group (Financial Services, Products, Resources, Post & Public Ser- vices, Communications & High Tech).
Fig. 10.2. High Level Orgchart Accenture ASG HR
As a growing and continuously developing organization, Accenture is con- stantly looking for a diverse range of professionals to have precise capabilities and to deliver solutions. Unlike most companies, Recruiting is not part of HR Opera- tions. Recruiting exists as a separate department within the HR organization with recruiting specialists to deliver first-rate recruiting results.
The recruiting department consists of two subteams, Channel Management and Recruiting operations. Channel Management is responsible for ensuring that there is a pool of enough qualified, available candidates for all workforces and levels. In order to achieve this task, they utilize a variety of different personnel marketing instruments and channels. The recruiting operations team takes care of potential candidates throughout the entire selection process: from the first application to the signing of a contract. Corresponding to the workforce segmentation, the recruiting operations team is organized in a way to recruit by workforce.
10.3.3 Accenture HR Particularities
The nature of Accenture’s business, especially for the consulting area, dictates how HR is structured and what functions it performs.
Scheduling
Scheduling is a function of HR delivery which is particular to a consulting busi- ness company. Effective resource allocation is crucial to the business, especially in consulting and outsourcing work. Excellence in scheduling is a success factor for HR in a consulting company with large projects and a broad range of skills.
Highly skilled individuals, supported by the latest technologies, ensure the right mix of people and skills on Accenture projects.
Support for Outsourcing Deals
All HR teams support outsourcing deals with their expertise in successfully run- ning Accenture operations. They partner with client teams in the early stages of an outsourcing deal to ensure successful transition and long term operation of busi- ness units within the Accenture framework. HR knowledge is critical to deal suc- cess, especially with given challenges stemming from German labor law. In- volvement in numerous deals allows HR to leverage its experience in each deal and provide valuable expertise regarding people matters.
HR Systems
A team of HR professionals is specifically working to manage and consolidate HR systems, ensuring the HR team is always operational and reporting requirements are met. All HR data is stored in a data warehouse that has been built by the ASG HR Systems team. The data warehouse is the basis for various HR services.
The HR teams have access to a locally developed internet-based front-end tool to draw reports from the data warehouse in a quick and efficient way. In order to
deliver state-of-the art reporting to the senior executives and decision-makers at Accenture, the HR data warehouse serves also as a basis for a unique business in- telligence reporting.
Training Services ASG
The responsibility of Training Services ASG is to provide professional develop- ment through the delivery of training and new hire integration.
The department develops strategies to identify capability development needs to meet the market requirements in ASG and ensures that the needs regarding tech- nical, industry and interpersonal development are addressed through comprehen- sive learning opportunities, taking the different backgrounds and career levels into consideration. To achieve this objective Accenture’s global training strategies have to be aligned with the local requirements. Strategies and offerings are con- stantly revised to ensure that skill development meets market requirements in a consistent way.
Furthermore, Training Services ASG ensures the smooth integration of all em- ployees starting with Accenture by offering Orientation seminars, welcome pack- ages, New Joiner WebPages and networking opportunities.
The expertise of Training Services ASG is often used in proposals, and Train- ing Services ASG designs and implements the training strategies of Accenture’s outsourcing deals.