Grant Thornton has set out plans to build a leading early careers programme for the professional services sector. The firm is also introducing an overhaul of its trainee and school leaver programme, launching for its September 2027 intake.
Abigail Fisher, chief people officer at Grant Thornton, commented, “Our ambition to lead the market on starting pay is a very deliberate signal about who we are and where we’re going. It tells the very best candidates that we value their potential from day one, it tells our clients that we are investing in the future capability of our firm, and it tells the market that Grant Thornton is serious about being a long term leader in the profession. This redesign is about much more than attraction it’s about building a genuine pipeline to partnership and making sure today’s associates can become tomorrow’s leaders.”
Young entrants to the professional services space are facing the most difficult market for decades. With leading firms scaling back their intake – and many suggesting they will look to save money by using AI for the work once performed by juniors – opportunities to obtain the experience necessary to one day lead the sector are few and far between.
Grant Thornton’s new associate programme aims to change that, with the ambition of becoming the early careers destination of choice across the UK accountancy and professional services sector. The new programme, designed for the firm’s September 2027 intake, will span audit, tax and advisory and is built around a commitment to market-leading pay, a digitally focused curriculum and a clear pathway to partnership.
Following its landmark investment from private equity firm Cinven, Grant Thornton is entering what it says is a significant period of growth – which necessitates an expansion of its talent, that is contrary to many other of the country’s biggest consultancies. The firm has set out plans to recruit 160 new partners over the next two years. The redesigned associate programme represents the other end of that ambition: building the partner pipeline of 2040 and beyond from the ground up.
The programme is being designed around five core ambitions: to be the programme of choice for the very best students comparing their options; to give Grant Thornton the highest profile in the graduate and school leaver market; to deliver a genuinely digitally focused training experience built for the profession’s future rather than its past; to offer the highest starting salaries in the sector; and to develop people who are genuinely capable of reaching partnership.
Becky Eagle, an audit partner who played a key role in developing the new programme, “Students entering professional services today are ambitious, digitally fluent and highly selective. They’re looking for more than a qualification. They want a clear sense of progression, purpose and pace. This is the right moment for us to reset what an early careers programme can and should look like and to give people the confidence that choosing Grant Thornton is a decision that will still be paying off 15 or 20 years into their career.”
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