Accenture Leeds: Jobs based in city could be at risk as 19,000 roles to be axed in major cuts

The New York-listed group Accenture said the cuts – about 2.5% of its 738,000-strong employee base – will largely affect its corporate support teams rather than client-facing staff, with more than half going across departments such as human resources, IT, finance and marketing. The company confirmed the UK will be affected, but declined to provide a breakdown of cuts per country.

Accenture has about 11,000 workers in the UK and offices nationwide, including one in Leeds within Apsley House on Wellington Street. On the firm’s website it states: “Our Leeds hub has a range of roles such as cloud engineering, cybersecurity, data and intelligent operations.”

It is also closing offices globally as part of the plans to save around 1.5 billion US dollars (£1.2 billion), of which around 800 million US dollars (£651 million) will be delivered this year and the remainder in 2024.

The group said: “While we continue to hire, especially to support our strategic growth priorities, during the second quarter of fiscal 2023 we initiated actions to streamline our operations and transform our non-billable corporate functions to reduce costs.”

The job losses adds to a wider cull across the corporate and technology sectors, with Amazon, Facebook owner Meta, and Just Eat recently announcing more hefty cuts.

Accenture previously slashed jobs at the height of the pandemic in 2020, when up to 900 roles were axed.

The latest round of cuts come after the group reported a 5% rise in quarterly revenue and better-than-expected earnings.