Some speculated at the time of the IPO in 2001 that Accenture’s special culture and values wouldn’t be able to survive the transition to public ownership. The severe economic downturn that followed didn’t help the organization’s odds. But the partnership values and culture have retained a special meaning at Accenture.

The principles of it will never change—that is the emotional attachment, the ownership, the feeling of authority and accountability are the things we have to continue to hone and get right. Green was leading a town hall meeting at the St. Charles campus in the summer of 2004. There were about 800 employees in the auditorium, and one employee in the back of the room said, “I’ve been here three weeks. I think I understand some values, but what is this thing called stewardship?”

One of the core values: Stewardship

Stewardship is the first thing that partners talk about when they talk about what’s special about this place. It’s what they feel their obligations are in turn to our enterprise and our men and women, those here today and those yet to come. Tenacious support for clients and employees, coupled with high standards and a willingness to embrace change, were the values that each generation of Accenture “stewards” has handed down to the next. Green confirmed the importance of Accenture’s people, noting, “The company with the best people wins.” Accenture has changed dramatically in response to changing client needs, evolving markets and competitive challenges over the past half century. And a culture is in place to ensure the company will continue to change in the future to meet these and similar needs.

But some things about Accenture remain unchanged: Accenture has a passionate commitment to be the best, to do what it takes to satisfy client needs and to create opportunities for the next generation of Accenture people. And the values first articulated by the founding partners, that have guided generations of people to do the very best that they can in the interests of their clients, still thrive in the new Accenture.

In the space of a few years, the company had dramatically transformed itself at a speed that would have left more typical executives with a bad case of management whiplash from the arbitration decision, renaming, conversion to public ownership and IPO to the naming of Green as CEO and appointment of new Executive Leadership Team members, not to mention greatly expanding its outsourcing business. The executives agreed that it was time to take stock of how far they had come in such a short time, and how the company should position itself for the future. ?This is not just about sustaining, but extending our leadership, Green said.

Next generation of leaders

Accenture drew upon its traditions of stewardship and training and tasked its next generation of leaders to, in effect, write the next chapter of the company’s future. Many of the current company leaders had played just such a role in planning the firm’s future in the late 1990s under the auspices of the plan known as Horizon 2010. The leaders of tomorrow would assume a similar role in the latest planning process, dubbed Horizon 2012. Rising stars from Asia had been involved in Horizon 2012 from day one, because they are a large part of the future growth we need to embrace them in the evolving culture of Accenture.

We’re changing the game from providing advice and services to providing outcomes and results, helping organizations to become high-performance businesses. We are basing our successes on the successes of the clients we serve., Green said. The only thing Accenture employees can confidently predict about the future is that the needs of our clients will continue to change rapidly and we will have to be able to respond just as quickly and creatively. He added, I look back five years, I never would have guessed that this is what we would be doing. What we will be in five years, we haven’t even invented yet.