‘Millennials are Digital Natives and Want a Hyper-personal Experience’

Millennials focus on the overall experience at workplace and to attract top talent, Accenture is focusing on hyperpersonalising employee experiences.

Ellyn Shook, chief human resources officer at Accenture, talks to ET on how her company is meeting expectations of the millennial workforce. Edited excerpts:

How are you attracting millennials? What are their expectations from an employer?
We have innovated our talent practices to cater to the millennial population in our workforce. Last year, we hired more than 90,000 millennials globally, and Gen Z are our interns. In India, millennials make up 95% of our workforce. It’s important to understand that millennials are digital natives, and want a hyper-personal experience. A prime example of how we are hyper-personalizing employee experiences is ‘performance achievement’. For instance, engagement is actioned where it matters most, at the team level – focused on needs that the team decides together. Also, in context of identifying strengths, partnering with Gallup, we have introduced a new self-assessment on strengths to our employees. To date, 240,000 employees have taken their strengths assessment, identifying their top personal strengths, which they then share with their teams. We are also hyperpersonalizing our approach to learning and development. The ‘chalk and talk’ method no longer works for our millennials. In India, to enable millennial employees to better understand our culture, we adopted a unique style to bring it alive: a four-member cappella group performed across 28 facilities in India singing about Accenture culture. We devised an online ethics and conduct game to bring home the importance of compliance and ethics, and we held a video skit contest across locations to highlight our core values. Also, millennials have the need for instant feedback.

What are the kind of innovations you are bringing into recruitment process from campuses in India?
We are digitizing our entire recruitment process. This includes all facets of campus recruitment, starting with providing access to the selected campuses and training & placement officers (TPOs), and uploading background data for candidates, document verification, etc. Our leadership and alumni play a significant role in our Campus Connect initiatives. We have very senior leadership aligned to the campuses we visit, and they have a responsibility to engage with students, provide relevant training and contribute to the institution in building a curriculum. We run competitions and hackfests. Accenture Innovation Jockeys competition for students in India is in its fifth consecutive year. Over the last four years of Innovation Jockeys, we have generated more than 9,300 concepts and inspired several innovative ideas on emerging technologies from students across various cities in India. This year, we are urging students to think about inclusive innovation and to develop pioneering ideas to tackle challenges society faces every day.

How do you continue to drive gender inclusion? Any recent initiatives?
New women hires across Accenture worldwide crossed the mark of 40% in August, a year earlier than it had targeted. Currently, Accenture worldwide has 41.1% (145,000) new women hires in Accenture worldwide. In 2016, we launched The Women in Technology programme to fast-track the careers of high performing women in our technology teams to the role of ‘technical architect’. This is a mentoring programme, in which each of our technology leaders spend 18 months serving as a mentor to two women who are at mid-career levels. More than 1,100 women are currently participating in the programme. About 202 are now certified and the programme is ongoing. In India, we have a programme designed to help women employees focus on their career goals through a series of eight learning modules. These are tailored to address a conscious investment towards career goals while navigating through changes in life. More than 2,100 women have benefited from the programme.