Claire joined Accenture as a Consultant in 2002. Prior to this she has worked for United Biscuits and DA consulting. I started off employment with United Biscuits (McVities/KP) on their graduate training scheme in Business Systems. I stayed with them for two years implementing SAP as a client to Anderson Consulting. I completed multiple manufacturing SAP roll-outs before moving to DA Consulting Group. There I worked in SAP training and change management for nearly two years which involved working with major clients such as Unilever. I wanted to move forward with my career and work in a large consultancy – and Accenture felt like the right choice. Of the consulting companies I worked with when with DA Consulting Group, Accenture was the most structured in it’s approach, with the best people. Salary has never been a factor for me – opportunities, people, and career progression have always been key. Accenture made me feel very welcome and comfortable in my new career. I joined as an Experienced Hire Consultant and had three days training. I then completed a week of work shadowing at Sainsbury’s to understand about Accenture project environments. Immediately afterwards I was posted to Danone in Liverpool (more biscuits – Jacobs), where I was part of a completely international team from Germany, France, Czech etc. I was made to feel part of the team immediately. I have received excellent training throughout my career at Accenture, including being invited to attend the ‘Developing as a Leader & Entrepreneur Course’ for women. This is a course to develop and retain senior women in the organisation – my course included 30 women from Accenture globally. I had a slight concern in joining a company at my level, but this has been eradicated as I have progressed from consultant to senior manager in four years. Accelerated promotion paths are there if you prove your worth at your level. Working here is what I expected although sometimes I work harder than I had anticipated. We stay until the work is done and people who work for Accenture take a pride in that – one of the reasons I love working for the company! The best thing for me about working for Accenture is that it takes care of you on a personal level – I’ve had sick family and Accenture has allowed me to put my family first. In contrast with where my husband / sister work, I have been treated completely differently. The people who I work with at Accenture always surprise me. Some of the people I have been privileged enough to work with are brilliant. Being given the opportunity to simply observe some of the Senior Executives in action is amazing! In addition, we have some of the brightest new graduates and analysts together with some of the biggest brains in SAP. The only downside would be that we like to work hard! A recent project I have worked on was for EDF Energy. I managed a SAP Deployment to the EDF Energy Development Branch. The duration of the project was 8 months, implementing a full suite of Core R/3 functionality. My role was Accenture Project Manager, managing the application, technology, business change and stakeholder management from Blueprint through to Deployment and Service Introduction. The team I worked with were excellent, the SAP Delivery (design, build, test and deploy) was completed to a very high standard. I was proud to be part of such an excellent team! My tips to anyone thinking of changing careers to consultancy is that SAP consulting requires more from you as an individual than SAP contracting or working as a business/IT user. You need to be mobile and up for the challenge of integrating fully with a client and giving your all!