EY’s Rob Heron: Derry ‘really attractive area’ for recruitment as it announces 1,000 new jobs

Mr. Heron was speaking as the ‘Big 4’ consultancy made the announcement, confirming it will establish a hub in the North West.

"It's a thousand new jobs over the next five years to take our headcount to 1,900 here in NI. What is really important to us is that these are opportunities for a broad spectrum of people.

"We are going to be bringing in apprentices straight from school and indeed we have got some of those already from Derry which we are very excited about.

“We will be taking in new graduates as well, experienced hires, but also those who want to reskill and those who maybe want to enter the workplace after a period of absence, particularly using the Department for Economy's Assured Skills Academy. So that is one aspect to it.

"The other aspect to us is making sure we access talent right across NI so the regional aspect is really important to us.

“And when we look at the talent that is out there and look at our current talent profile and think about what it might be, the north west is a really attractive area for us and we want to make sure that we are a really attractive employer up there,” Mr. Heron said.

He told the ‘Journal’ the firm is working to identify a location for its North West hub.

“We have a hybrid working policy which means it is much more dynamic and flexible where we work now but what can be better for our clients and for our people than to have an actual hub in the North West to make sure we are one of the most attractive employers?

“It is only one of the things we are doing. We are continuing to build relationships with schools right across NI and further education colleges.

"We are going to make sure we run some of our assured skills programmes outside Belfast as well with the North West being a prime location to be decided but it's likely where we are going to go with one of them.”

The ‘Journal’ asked Mr. Heron how many of the 1,000 jobs would be based in Derry.

He said the company is working through targets and will be making a further announcement about its plans for the North West.

"We have already got great talent from that region. I think we can get significant amounts of more talent up there,” he said.

EY is recruiting across cyber security, data analytics, cloud computing, AI, risk, tax, audit and business consultancy. Mr. Heron said the average salary will be £33,000. The investment is worth over £80m to the NI economy.

“It's not just jobs, it’s exciting new skills for the NI economy,” he said, remarking that 100 roles are already being advertised on its website.

"We’re up and running. We are ready to go. We have the infrastructure in place in NI to make it happen.

“[The roles] are open to everybody right across NI. We already have talent from right across the six counties of NI and quite a few from the NW, which I'm really pleased about.”

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