Employer Highlight: Accenture

Matt, Kevin, Stephanie, and Carlos
Bootcamp grads: Matt, Kevin, Stephanie, and Carlos
Accenture now employs 5 coding bootcamp grads: Matt, Kevin, Stephanie and Carlos. Since this blog was written, Accenture has hired TechHire Java Bootcamp Grad, David V.

Student success is our success. We’re proud to partner with more than 300 employer partners that hire our graduates.

As our students begin the job search, we always recommend they research individual companies and establish what kind of business they’d like to work with.

In this blog, we’ll take you behind the scenes at Accenture. Their team shares insights on what it takes to be successful as a software developer, skills they look for when recruiting and more.

Our partnership with Accenture began in 2017, and the company now employs five fantastic coding bootcamp grads. We’re excited to see this partnership strengthen, and hope these insights will help future bootcampers prepare for the job hunt.

Q&A With Accenture

How would you describe your organization and what does your team try to solve?

Accenture is a leading global professional services company. We use our global capabilities and digital experience to address a wide range of societal issues—and improve the way the world works and lives.

Outside of client work, Accenture people love to give back and donate their time. Last year, our employees spent approximately 240,000 hours volunteering through its global corporate citizenship initiative, Skills to Succeed, which helps transform lives by equipping people with the skills to get a job or start a business.

In your opinion, how does Grand Circus prepare students for careers in tech?

The United States has a computing-skills crisis that is holding back American companies and economic growth. Organizations like Grand Circus are essential in helping train people in the hottest programming languages that companies, like Accenture, need to help clients thrive in a digital world. In addition to the technical skills, we also value the soft skills Grand Circus reinforces to help their graduates be valuable members of the tech workforce.

What are you looking for when hiring programmers?

Accenture programmers are forward-thinking, well-rounded people with a record of outstanding academic performance and high learning agility. We’re looking for individuals who can work in an open and entrepreneurial way.

At Accenture, programmers are frequently at the center of designing and building robust systems. Some of the responsibilities include:

    • Brainstorming with clients to design next generation IT architectures including server-less and micro services implementations to meet their ever-changing business needs
    • Building Proof of Concepts for new or emerging technologies at a client site
    • Delivering solutions via an agile delivery methodology and leveraging DevOps to bring the solutions to life quickly for our clients
    • Building technical architectures and driving delivery excellence
    • Designing a common set of technology capabilities, across assessment, planning, design and implementation
    • Analyzing/documenting current processes and technologies, contributing through to the delivery/ integration of new solutions
    • Leveraging existing and newly developed programming skills to build portions of client applications

We look for people with the following characteristics:

    • Bachelor’s degree
    • Consistent track record of outstanding academic performance
    • Experience with one or more programming languages (Java, C#, JavaScript, etc.), modern web technologies (HTML5/CSS3, Angular.JS etc.) or similar technical proficiencies
    • Passion for technology and desire to learn by doing
    • Proven success in contributing to a team-oriented environment
    • Proven ability to work creatively and analytically in a problem-solving environment
    • Excellent leadership, communication (written and oral) and interpersonal skills

What advice would you give someone considering a career in tech?

A career in technology can be rewarding for people who are passionate about technology and a life-long process of learning and evolving. Someone considering a career in tech should get comfortable diving head-first into unknown things and enjoy the process of learning. Make it a point to set aside time to learn something new every month, even if it’s something simple.

More specifically, for someone without a background in tech or a computer science degree – what advice would you give them and what should they know going into tech?

Get as much hands-on experience as possible. Have extra-curricular activities that focus on self-learning and increasing your knowledge. That can mean attending conferences, building something by following online tutorials, participating in hackathons. Today’s technology landscape is exciting and ever changing but it also includes an abundance of resources that can enable a motivated individual to go from beginner to proficient quickly.

What resources would you recommend to new developers?

When it comes to software development, there are a significant number of online resources covering programming languages, frameworks, patterns, architecture and methodologies. The more pertinent question is where do we see increasing demand? Developer blogs from technology companies and vendors, such as Microsoft, Google and Amazon, are a very good source to stay current and learn about emerging technologies. At Accenture, we have an increasing need for front-end developers experienced in HTML5, CSS3 and JavaScript, including frameworks like Angular.

How do you support continued learning for your employees?

Constant learning is essential to building the right skills, which is why we make learning – from basic skills to industry-specific content—available to all our people. We also place enormous value on mentoring within the workplace. Each of our employees can be connected to a designated, more experienced employee who provides career coaching and guidance to help them manage their careers and professional development. Our new approach to performance management includes real-time, forward-looking conversations about setting priorities, growing strengths and creating opportunities tailored to each individual—and eliminates the annual ranking.

Is there anything else you’d like folks to know about your organization, becoming a programmer or Grand Circus?

The diversity of our people is part of what makes Accenture exceptional. We believe it makes us smarter, more competitive and more innovative—and is a key part of what makes Accenture a great place to work.

A big thank you to Accenture for their continued support and for taking the time to share insights on their business.