Right across the professional sector the battle for talent is a fierce one, and accountancy firms have to fight hard to land the best graduate entrants as well as seasoned accountants. Fortunately, the firms have a great deal to offer their prospective employees and partners, with a huge breadth of career opportunities and commercial experience.

In a hotly fought contest, KPMG is this year’s winner of the award for Employer of the Year. The firm makes no bones about the fact that it wants to be the best career choice for talented people. It believes that the recently announced merger between the UK firm and the KPMG practice in Germany will make it an even more attractive destination for ambitious individuals.

The culture of an organisation is always strongly influenced by the person at the top, and CEO John Griffith-Jones wants a workplace in which everyone feels they can contribute to the debate.

He believes that the future of KPMG depends on the recruitment of high-calibre employees, and he also wants to persuade them that the firm is a place where they can further their career long-term.

Speaking to Accountancy Age in September, he said: ‘You have got to run a place which is genuinely the best place for them to work.

‘It’s like bottling wine. You get a good vintage, and once you have got it, no one else can get it.

‘We do want to do well on the people front. We are very proud of our people tradition.’

It seems as though many readers who voted for KPMG as Employer of the Year are already persuaded. One described the firm as offering a progressive and dynamic environment, and an employer that cared about its employees. Employees are proud of the firm and ‘strive for a common goal of excellence’.

Another reader praised the firm for investing in employees’ personal development and also commended its accommodation of flexible working practices. Yet another said the firm’s leadership approach was ‘forward-thinking, en trepreneurial and meritocratic’.

‘Open and fair communication between all levels of the company,’ declared another.

BEST BIG EMPLOYER

KPMG also came out on top within the ‘best big company to work for’ in the Sunday Times Best Companies survey. KPMG came first among organisations with more than 5,000 employees.

CEO John Griffith-Jones said: ‘At KPMG we are really trying to be the best choice of employer for our people, without whom we could not begin to achieve our aim of being the very best choice for our clients.’