This was originally posted on swombat.com in June 2011.
I regularly get asked about my time in Accenture, and my transition into entrepreneurship, both by people who are trying to decide whether to apply to go there after university, and by people who are currently working there. Here’s an attempt to answer some of those questions in one place.
Background and overview
First, some background. I joined Accenture in 2003 as a Junior Software Engineer, on the basis of my mad Java skills (certified by Sun) and the undeniable fact that I didn’t have three heads.
I’d like to say the interview process was gruelling and that I succeeded where many failed, but to be honest, I think at the time they were hiring anyone that could write two lines of Java to grow the newly created Solutions Workforce (engineering people, basically), so I don’t remember the interview process being particularly hard at that stage.
On my first or second day, I sat in an induction presentation where they told us that the Solutions Workforce was designed so that “it’s ok to stay at the same level for 10 years if you want to, it doesn’t have the ‘up or out’ pressure of the Consulting Workforce”. From that horrifying moment onwards, I knew I had to get the hell out of the Solutions Workforce into Consulting.
Transition to Consulting
There was no process allowing people to do so, so it took me about a year to bypass the un-process (which included having to go through a whole new round of much harder interviews) and transform from a Software Engineer (I got promoted in the meantime) into an Analyst (which earned me some £10k a year more than other Software Engineers).
This was, largely, a very good move. I learned a lot in Consulting. I had always been a good programmer, but now I was able to take on all sorts of non-programming roles and round off my non-technical skills: client management, people management, planning, recruiting, processes, performance reviews, and all sorts of other “softer” tasks that I really wanted to learn how to do well. I’ve always liked being a generalist, and I’ve always liked pressure, and Consulting suited both those tendencies very well.
At the same time, something really bothered me about my work. It felt pointless. One project I did (whose output was basically a PPT and Word document outlining the successes and failures of a client project), which took two and a half months, had, as its only apparent purpose, the promotion of the person who had led the project. Accenture was paid (quite well) so that I would sit there and produce a piece of paper that justified this person’s promotion.
To me, that didn’t seem like a good use of the precious few years we have on this Earth. In fact, the feeling that I was wasting my time was really killing me inside (I’m not exaggerating).
The height of absurdity was reached, I believe, when I was asked to prepare the proposal for the preparation of a plan to produce a proof of concept for a module of a tool the client was implementing. Long before that, though, I had started to look for other things to do. Wherever I looked in the corporate world, though, I found more of the same (usually more of something even less good). As far as the corporate world went, Accenture was not so bad.
About two years into my four-year corporate journey, I started looking for other jobs, but found nothing I liked. Another year passed before I started considering the idea of starting my own business. From that point on I was looking for a partner to start it with (I knew I didn’t have the knowledge or skills to do it all by myself yet). Soon, my best friend approached me with a product idea. It was all I’d been waiting for, so we got started. Nine months of hard work and no sleep later, I handed in my resignation, and finally ended my stint in the corporate world.
Hindsight
Do I regret my time in Accenture? No. Not at all.
I think I should probably have planned my time there better, and exited sooner, but all in all, it wasn’t a bad experience. I learned a lot, both in terms of skills and self-knowledge. Accenture has some truly exceptional people working there, and they tend to be fairly accessible, so if you’re the kind of person who naturally strives to get advice, who reaches out to your network for assistance, you will get plenty of coaching from people at all levels.
Most of the managers I worked with, directly or indirectly, were excellent (some less so), and I learned a lot from them both. One of the most crucial things I learned in Accenture was how to hold back my habit of being blunt and direct with everyone. I learned to be smoother and far more effective. That’s a valuable thing to learn. I also gained a lot of confidence in my abilities to pick up and absorb new things and become productive quickly – something that I knew I could do with technologies, but which I saw I could now do with almost all subject areas.
So, in hindsight, would I do it again? I’m not sure. I was far from ready to join the startup world before I joined Accenture – but then, I was just as far from ready when I left Accenture, and in the end I’ve done alright, I think. You’re never ready to take that leap. You might think you’re ready, but you’re not, really. It’s impossible to say what my life would have been like if I’d joined a startup instead of Accenture, or if I’d simply tried to launch my own business.
I was already toying with some entrepreneurial ideas with a friend in Geneva before leaving for Accenture. Perhaps life could have gone differently.
Conclusion
My advice to people who are hesitating between startups and a company like Accenture is: don’t worry too much about it.
Big, prestigious corporations have their share of benefits. Accenture is probably not a bad choice amongst the selection of corporate masters. If you’ve got the bug for entrepreneurship, chances are a few years in a large corporation won’t distract you from it (and they might even strengthen your resolve). If you feel like you can start a business right away, you can try that too.
But don’t stress about it. You’re not making the most important decision in your life. There’ll be many chances to adjust the shot if you decide corporate life is not for you. Many entrepreneurs get started later in life, after having held steady jobs for decades.
If it’s in your blood, it’s in your blood.
Thoughts from 2017
Not much to add to this article. It’s still a sensible look back at those years in Accenture, that seem rather more distant now (this year, I reached the “10 years since I quit my last regular job at Accenture” milestone).