Accenture chief Julia Sweet lays out conditions for promotion, warns of job loss: ‘If you want to get promoted…'

As companies around the world increasingly integrate artificial intelligence into their daily operations, consulting firm Accenture is making AI proficiency a prerequisite for moving up the career ladder, indicating that those unwilling to adapt may not have a place at the company.

In a recent episode of the “Rapid Response” podcast, Accenture chief Julie Sweet said employees must adopt the company's AI tools to move up its ranks. “If you want to get promoted, you’ve got to do the things that we do in order to operate Accenture,” she noted.

In September last year, the company unveiled a “six-month optimization program” with an investment of $865 million. The initiative aims to realign its workforce and operations for rising demand in digital and AI services.

Accenture's aggressive AI push

The large-scale reskilling effort is part of Accenture’s three-year, $3 billion plan announced in 2023 to embed AI first across its operations. A key target of the programme is to double the company’s AI talent to 80,000 professionals through hiring, acquisitions, and training. The consultancy currently employs more than 770,000 employees worldwide, according to Fortune.

“These are the new tools to operate a company,” she said, adding that the shift did not happen overnight. “We didn’t go from zero to ‘you won’t get promoted’ in a month.

Instead, the transition has unfolded over a three-year period, during which the company focused on familiarising employees with the technology, making sure it’s user-friendly, and building the right digital workbench. Once all that was ensured, then it said, "Hey, this is Accenture and how we operate."

Sweet explains why AI skills are important

According to Sweet, integrating AI into the workplace is a natural progression in the evolution of technology at work. The Accenture CEO compared the current push to learn AI tools with the time when computers first became an important part in offices.

“No one would have said that requiring someone to use a computer is coercion,” Sweet said. “It’s how the companies were going to get work done. Today, AI at Accenture is how we do work.”

She also had an advice for companies. “I think we’re a good lesson in something that I’m advising CEOs all about: In order to capture the opportunity with AI, you really have to be willing to rewire your company,” Sweet noted.

However, she acknowledged that the transition has not been easy at Accenture as well. Employees initially faced hurdles in adapting to the new tools, she said, adding that embracing the shift required changes in both the workforce and the company's traditional ways of doing business.

“For our people and our clients, it was hard,” Sweet said. “How do you have the courage to do that? That’s where you have the humility, but also this idea of embracing change and innovation.”