Monday, September 24, 2007

Latest Sign That Accounting Is 'Sexy'

The Big Four's no-holds-barred efforts to appeal to new college graduates are paying off. That's music to the ears of HR departments and managers of CPA firms as they scramble to add and retain staff.

Accounting firms snagged the top three places in Business Week's second annual ranking of the "Best Places to Launch a Career." In a lengthy accompanying story, the magazine credits the Big Four's urgent focus on figuring out what today's twentysomething generation wants from a workplace, and giving it to them:

They are among the first to rethink how to recruit college grads, keep them happy on the job, or just keep them at all.
Deloitte & Touche, which placed first among 95 large employers covered, asked employees to submit short videos about what it's like to work there. The best– including a rap video – will be used in Deloitte's campus recruiting programs.

The campus recruiting Web site of runner-up PricewaterhouseCoopers includes a "faux sitcom" performed by real employees. It shows a young female associate enduring awkward interactions with older co-workers, followed by each party explaining what went on from their perspective. Third-ranked Ernst & Young uses Facebook to let prospective employees talk freely with real ones. (The remaining Big Four firm, KPMG, placed 11th.)

Business Week based its ranking on separate surveys of college career services directors, the employers they picked as the best, and college students. The number of employers examined nearly doubled from 2006 and many top picks (including PwC) were newcomers, making year-to-year comparison difficult. But the rise of the Big Four CPA firms is unmistakable. The 2006 favorites were Walt Disney, which fell to seventh this year, and Lockheed Martin, which came in ninth.

"This year accountants became sexy," Business Week proclaims. The article goes on to say:

The employers that did best in our ranking recognize that they have to accommodate this new generation. Many of them are trying to appeal to Gen Y by making themselves more transparent, flexible, responsive, even nurturing.
The Best Places to Launch a Career [Business Week]

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