- KPMG is the fastest-growing Big Four accounting firm in the US, and employ over 40,000 people there.
- The company's US CEO Paul Knopp says he's looking for tech-oriented talent with a growth mindset.
- "The world is going to be driven by data and analytics moving forward," he told Insider in Davos.
KPMG is one of the top consulting firms in the world, and the company's US division employs over 40,000 people. It's also looking to hire thousands more.
"We are certainly looking for candidates that are technology-forward and understand that the world is going to be driven by data and analytics moving forward," KPMG US Chair and CEO Paul Knopp told Insider in an interview at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland on Monday.
In addition, Knopp said that top candidates possess a learning and growth mindset, with a willingness to be up-skilled for emerging roles as client needs change over time.
"The nature of our services is such we may need to occasionally retrain somebody to do somethings totally different than what they historically have done," Knopp said.
One of the top focus areas for the company right now is cybersecurity.
"There's a huge demand for cyber that's not going to go away," Knopp said. "It's been even made stronger by the threats around cybercrime coming out of what's happening in Eastern Europe with the Russia-Ukraine crisis."
More broadly, as digital ecosystems are increasingly connected, cyber attacks can reach an ever wider sphere of impact. Securing those ecosystems is a major priority for firms like KPMG.
Knopp also said that employers like KPMG will need to do a better job of listening to the perspectives of younger workers who are bringing different experiences into the workforce.
Millennial and Gen Z employees have a different set of priorities around company culture and work-life balance that older generations would be wise to engage with, he added. By listening more closely, business leaders can find common ground on how to create fulfilling careers while at the same time meeting the needs of clients.
Leaders who disregard that advice do so at their own peril, he warned.
"The workforce can migrate somewhere else so easily now. They can interview online or virtually, they can onboard virtually," Knopp said. "Employers have to keep that in mind."