STEM Women Host Insight Event with Accenture

Apr 30, 2024 Events 4 minutes read

On Wednesday 23rd April, STEM Women hosted an exciting insight event with Accenture, a global professional services company that provides strategy and consulting services for a wide range of functions and industries.  38 handpicked students from Computer Science and other STEM-related disciplines received a fascinating insight into the professional services industry and heard about key tech trends at the exclusive event in Newcastle-Upon-Tyne.

A Warm Welcome

The teams at STEM Women and Accenture were on hand to welcome attendees to the event, which began with a relaxed networking lunch. STEM Women’s event host, Sophie Chadwick, outlined the agenda for the day. The Accenture team then offered a succession of presentations covering their industry and company culture, graduate career opportunities and the application process, before recent hires shared their insights in a Q&A.

An Introduction to Accenture

Accenture’s Technology Delivery Lead Senior Manager, Helen Weller gave an introduction to Accenture and inspired attendees by sharing her own career journey.

Tech Trends

Next, Erin Kinnee (User Exp Engineering Assoc Manager) spoke about Tech Trends, with highlights from Accenture’s Tech Vision research report. The report discusses the recent developments in tech and AI, how individuals and businesses alike can prepare for further changes, and what these ecosystems of AI agents will look like. Read more here.

Graduate Career Opportunities

Justyna Banaszak, Senior Tech Recruiter, then gave attendees a detailed overview of the graduate career opportunities available at Accenture, including their graduate programme (see details below), and shared fantastic tips and advice on applications.

Q&A with graduate analysts

The speaker session ended with an inspiring Q&A panel discussion as Goda Valaisaite, Isobel Walker, and Victoria Troiano shared their personal experiences of joining the Tech Transformation Graduate Programme as Analysts.  Attendees were able to ask questions and gain valuable insights throughout.

Networking

Following these inspiring insight talks, attendees were invited to network with the Accenture team, growing their professional network and forging new connections.

“Since we have adopted the digital first approach, we don’t get to meet with students in-person that often anymore, so it felt even more special to run this in-person event in collaboration with STEM Women. Fantastic to meet so many students who were willing to attend this event and learn about Accenture and our opportunities. It was a very successful event.”

– Justyna Banaszak, Accenture

 

The feedback from attendees also reflected the fantastic atmosphere on the day:

“I already started dreaming of being an Accenture employee even before the end of the event. Thank you so much!”
“It was such an impactful and insightful event. I loved the recruitment processes and Question and Answer parts.”
“Very interesting speakers and well organised.”

Accenture’s Goal: to Achieve Gender Balanced Workforce by 2025

This event was part of Accenture’s diversity initiatives supporting their goal, set out in 2017, to achieve a gender-balanced workforce, with 50 percent women and 50 percent men, by 2025.

Demonstrating its commitment to equality, this goal builds on earlier achievements including reaching their goal of 40% women new hires by 2017 (achieved a year early), promoting its largest percentage of women to the managing director level in 2016 (30 percent), and aiming to grow its percentage of women managing directors to 25 percent globally by 2020.

Accenture has also taken a number of steps to attract, retain, advance and sponsor women on its path to achieving a gender balanced workforce, including:

  • Sponsoring approximately 80% of the company’s most senior women to advance in their roles.
  • Setting and publishing clear, measurable targets to grow its number of women.
  • Launching initiatives that provide women with in-demand skills, such as the company’s Women in Technology programme.
  • Collaborating across business and government to further gender equality in the workplace, with commitments that include the White House Equal Pay Pledge, Paradigm for Parity, and Catalyst CEO Champions for Change.

Find out more about the importance of diversity at Accenture:

 

Apply for Accenture’s Graduate Programme This Autumn

Applications for Accenture’s graduate programme usually open in October and more information can be found here.

Interested in a bespoke event?

Are you an employer looking to host a bespoke event to help you target stand-out candidates? Get in touch with our team today to find out more by emailing info@stemwomen.com.

 

 

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