Accenture Publishes 2017 Corporate Citizenship Report

Company’s achievements include surpassing 2020 carbon target and advancing Skills to Succeed initiative to equip people with skills for digital economy 

Accenture (NYSE: ACN) released its 2017 Corporate Citizenship Report, which details the company’s goals and progress toward helping improve the way the world works and lives.
 
“Our digital, increasingly connected world provides the opportunity for businesses, governments and nonprofits to collaborate like never before and find new ways to help people flourish in this new era,” said Pierre Nanterme, Accenture’s chairman and CEO. “Working with our partners – and combining human ingenuity with groundbreaking technologies – our 442,000 people around the world turn ideas into innovations that create positive, lasting impact.”

Accenture’s 2017 report celebrates a year of milestones. For example, the company:

• Took steps toward minimizing its environmental footprint, surpassing its goal to reduce per-employee carbon emissions by 50 percent three years ahead of schedule.
• Set goals to increase the number of women in its ranks, including a commitment to achieve a gender-balanced workforce by 2025.
• Continued to collaborate with nonprofit partners through its Skills to Succeed initiative to equip people globally with skills to gain employment or build a business. By the end of 2017, Accenture had equipped 2.2 million people with these skills — well on the way to its goal of equipping 3 million people by 2020.

The report also highlights how Accenture is:

• Addressing complex societal problems. To solve challenges associated with individuals without officially recognized identities, Accenture is partnering with Microsoft on ID2020, a project using blockchain and biometric technologies to enable these 1.1 billion individuals to access and share their data electronically.
• Helping people gain skills for the digital economy, with a continued focus on apprenticeships. In the U.S., the company expanded its apprenticeship program to provide under-represented groups greater access to digital economy jobs. For example, Accenture Federal Services launched an innovative public-private partnership with the City of San Antonio, Texas, and nonprofit partners to help participants — many without a college degree — acquire the training and skills needed for entry-level jobs.
• Shaping responsible businesses around the world. Accenture’s Diverse Supplier Development Program matches the company’s senior executives with diverse supplier “protégé” companies to help them grow their businesses. By the end of Accenture’s 2017 fiscal year, on Aug. 31, 2017, 133 diverse suppliers had graduated or were in the process of completing the program.

“By merging human insight, skill and creativity with technology, we can solve complex challenges, improve the lives of millions of people around the world and help build a more equal society,” said Jill Huntley, Accenture’s managing director of global corporate citizenship. “Solutions grounded in emerging technology, such as artificial intelligence and virtual reality, are enabling companies to innovate in ways we never thought possible and to see new opportunities to make a real difference in the world around them.”
 
Accenture has been included on FORTUNE’s Change the World list for the past two years and has been recognized as one of the World’s Most Ethical Companies by the Ethisphere Institute for more than 10 years. To read Accenture’s 2017 Corporate Citizenship report and to discover more about the company’s commitment to corporate citizenship, visit: accenture.com/corporatecitizenship.
 

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Contacts:
 
Samuel Hyland
Accenture
+1 917 452 5184
samuel.hyland@accenture.com
 
Mark Radvanyi
Accenture
+44 7770 704884
mark.radvanyi@accenture.com

Read the Report