KPMG UK job cuts near 1,000 in 2026 as consulting slowdown reshapes workforce

KPMG UK is preparing to eliminate around 200 additional jobs from its advisory business, extending a year of workforce reductions even as the professional-services group reports higher profitability and continues investing heavily in artificial intelligence.

The proposed redundancies represent roughly 4% of KPMG UK’s advisory workforce and are expected to affect employees across several grades, with data and technology teams among the areas exposed. People working on artificial intelligence and cybersecurity assignments are included in the consultation, according to reports published on September 15. Employees whose positions are ultimately eliminated are expected to leave in October following the consultation process.

KPMG UK attributed the proposal to changing market conditions and unusually low employee attrition, which has left the firm with more capacity than it believes current client demand can support in parts of advisory. The development is particularly notable because it comes only months after earlier UK workforce-reduction programmes affecting audit, advisory and central support functions.

The new cuts also create an apparent contradiction. KPMG UK has spent considerable time promoting artificial intelligence as a central component of its future operating model and client proposition, yet some people working in artificial intelligence-related teams are now among those facing redundancy. That does not necessarily mean KPMG is retreating from artificial intelligence. Instead, the restructuring illustrates how professional-services firms can increase their technology investment while simultaneously requiring fewer people, different skills or a different mix of specialists to deliver that technology profitably.

Why is KPMG UK cutting another 200 advisory jobs?

The immediate problem is capacity.

Professional-services firms traditionally rely on relatively high employee turnover to adjust their workforces naturally when demand slows. Consultants leave for clients, competitors, investment firms, technology companies or other professional-services employers, allowing firms to reduce recruitment rather than conduct large redundancy programmes whenever utilisation weakens.

That mechanism has not been working as effectively in the current market. KPMG UK has said low levels of attrition are one reason it needs to consider direct headcount reductions. The Financial Times reported that the latest proposal is intended to align skills and capacity with demand across affected advisory businesses.

The issue becomes clearer when KPMG’s financial performance is separated by business line. KPMG UK/Swiss Group generated £3.6 billion of revenue in the financial year ended September 30, 2025, representing overall sales growth of 2%. Audit sales increased 5% and Tax and Legal grew 6%, but Advisory revenue fell 3% as difficult conditions persisted across consulting and deals markets.

That divergence matters. KPMG can be profitable and growing overall while still carrying excess employees inside an individual business whose revenue is shrinking.

Advisory businesses are especially sensitive to corporate confidence. Companies can postpone transformation programmes, transaction work, discretionary consulting projects and large technology engagements much more easily than they can avoid statutory audits or mandatory tax and regulatory work. When clients delay spending, utilisation falls quickly even if the broader economy remains relatively stable.

KPMG UK’s latest decision therefore appears less like a response to an organisation-wide financial crisis and more like an attempt to bring selected advisory teams back into line with the work currently available.

How many KPMG UK jobs have already been affected during 2026?

The September proposal follows several substantial workforce actions.

In March, nearly 600 KPMG UK employees were placed at risk across audit and advisory. Around 440 positions were expected to disappear from audit, primarily among assistant managers who were already qualified accountants, while further reductions were proposed in advisory and other areas. KPMG again cited unusually low employee attrition and the need to align staffing with market conditions.

Then in July, KPMG UK proposed reducing approximately 10% of its group corporate services workforce, potentially affecting around 200 positions. Those support functions included areas such as human resources, marketing, technology, procurement and corporate affairs. The firm linked that restructuring partly to integration of its UK and Swiss operations, elimination of duplicated activities, technology investment and increased offshore delivery.

Adding the newest advisory proposal means successive KPMG UK restructuring programmes have now placed close to 1,000 positions at risk or targeted them for reduction during 2026, although consultation processes mean the number of people who ultimately leave may differ from the initial proposals.

The broader headcount trend predates the latest announcements. KPMG UK’s workforce expanded significantly during and immediately after the pandemic as consulting demand accelerated, but the firm’s UK employee base has since moved lower as that exceptional demand faded and management tightened costs. Recent reporting puts UK headcount at roughly 15,800, compared with more than 17,000 at the pandemic-era peak.

What looked like temporary cost discipline is therefore becoming a multi-stage resizing of the organisation.

Why are artificial intelligence jobs being cut if KPMG says AI is central to its strategy?

This is the most interesting part of the restructuring.

KPMG UK/Swiss Group has repeatedly identified artificial intelligence as one of its most important strategic investments. Its 2025 annual results said embedding artificial intelligence into major services and training employees to use new technology were central to the group’s growth strategy. Advisory employees are already using AI agents as digital tools, while generative artificial intelligence is being deployed in tax and increasingly sophisticated AI capabilities are being incorporated into the KPMG Clara audit platform.

Yet employees working on artificial intelligence projects are included in the newest redundancy consultation. Cybersecurity specialists are also among affected teams.

Those two facts are not necessarily inconsistent.

Professional-services firms do not need every existing technology position simply because technology spending is increasing. Artificial intelligence can change which specialists are needed, how many employees are required to complete projects and where technical work is performed.

A consulting business may require fewer employees performing manual analysis while increasing demand for people capable of combining artificial intelligence tools with industry knowledge, client management, commercial judgment and regulatory expertise. It may also centralise technology development rather than maintaining similar capabilities across multiple teams.

KPMG’s own comments point towards this evolution. The firm has described artificial intelligence as something that should augment professional judgment and accelerate delivery rather than exist as a separate experimental capability. As AI tools become embedded throughout advisory, audit and tax, some specialist AI roles created during the initial technology-investment phase may no longer match the organisation KPMG expects to need at scale.

That makes the newest layoffs potentially more important than their absolute size. They show that being employed in an artificial intelligence-related function does not automatically protect a worker from technology-driven restructuring.

Is artificial intelligence itself replacing KPMG consultants?

The available evidence does not support describing all 200 proposed redundancies as direct artificial intelligence replacement.

KPMG has specifically pointed to market dynamics, weak demand in certain areas and low employee attrition when explaining the need for reductions. Advisory revenue had already fallen 3%, providing a clear commercial reason to reduce capacity independent of automation.

At the same time, artificial intelligence is changing the economics of professional services.

Tasks that historically required junior consultants or large analytical teams can increasingly be accelerated through generative artificial intelligence, automated data processing and specialist AI agents. Research, document review, preliminary analysis, data classification, presentation preparation and portions of software or cybersecurity work can all become less labour-intensive when technology is deployed effectively.

That does not remove the need for professional judgment. It can, however, reduce the number of hours required to produce a deliverable.

Professional-services firms ultimately sell expertise but traditionally monetise much of that expertise through employee time. If artificial intelligence reduces the number of billable hours necessary for a project, firms have to redesign pricing, staffing and career structures simultaneously.

The question confronting KPMG and its competitors is therefore broader than how many people an AI tool can replace. The real issue is how to maintain attractive margins when clients increasingly expect technology-driven productivity improvements to reduce both delivery time and consulting costs.

Why are job cuts continuing when KPMG’s profit increased 14%?

KPMG UK/Swiss Group reported profit before tax of £576 million for the 2025 financial year, an increase of 14% from the prior year on a pro forma basis. Average distributable profit per partner rose 11% to approximately £880,000.

Those results make the redundancy programme look counterintuitive at first glance. However, KPMG itself attributed the profit improvement partly to careful cost management in response to the economic cycle.

The higher profitability therefore does not contradict the workforce reductions. Cost controls have been one of the mechanisms supporting the improvement.

Professional-services partnerships also operate differently from conventional publicly traded companies. KPMG UK is not listed on a stock exchange, meaning there is no daily share-price reaction that can be used to measure investor sentiment toward the restructuring. Instead, profitability, partner distributions, client wins, employee utilisation and staff retention provide more useful indicators of how the strategy is performing.

For employees, the contrast between rising partner earnings and repeated redundancies is likely to remain sensitive. From management’s perspective, however, retaining excess capacity during an extended period of weak consulting demand could eventually undermine profitability and limit investment in technology and growth areas.

That tension will persist as long as advisory demand remains uneven.

How does KPMG’s own UK jobs data help explain its workforce decision?

There is an unusual irony in KPMG’s position because the firm co-produces one of the United Kingdom’s most closely watched labour-market surveys.

The September 2026 KPMG and Recruitment and Employment Confederation UK Report on Jobs offered some signs that hiring conditions were beginning to improve. Permanent placements increased slightly in August for the first time in nearly four years, while temporary billings continued to strengthen.

However, the same report showed that total vacancies declined for the 34th consecutive month. Candidate availability also continued rising sharply, with redundancies and limited job opportunities contributing to the increase in people looking for work.

That paints a labour market in which employment conditions may have stopped deteriorating as rapidly without yet returning to normal strength.

For consulting firms, the environment remains especially difficult because clients can respond to uncertainty by delaying discretionary professional-services spending. Even modest economic improvement may take time to translate into large consulting projects and transaction pipelines.

KPMG’s own workforce actions therefore broadly reflect the market conditions its recruitment research has been documenting: weak vacancies, elevated candidate availability and businesses remaining cautious about permanent staffing commitments.

Could low employee turnover become a permanent problem for professional-services firms?

Low attrition sounds positive because businesses normally spend considerable resources trying to retain employees. In professional services, however, some level of turnover is built into the economic model.

Big Four firms recruit large graduate classes, develop employees intensively and historically expect a meaningful percentage to leave voluntarily as they progress through their careers. That creates room for promotions while keeping the workforce pyramid appropriately shaped.

When employees stop leaving, that pyramid can become congested.

Fewer voluntary departures mean fewer positions open naturally. Promotion opportunities narrow, utilisation pressure increases and firms may find themselves with too many employees at specific grades relative to available work.

KPMG’s March audit restructuring illustrated that problem particularly clearly because qualified assistant managers, rather than only administrative staff, were targeted.

The September advisory cuts show that the same pressure has not disappeared.

Artificial intelligence could intensify the problem because it may reduce demand for the traditional large base of junior professionals that supports the partnership model. If one senior consultant using sophisticated AI tools can perform work that previously required several junior employees, firms may eventually require a narrower organisational pyramid.

That would affect not only employment but the way accountants and consultants acquire experience before becoming senior advisers.

What does the KPMG restructuring tell us about future AI employment?

The most important takeaway is that artificial intelligence investment and technology layoffs can happen at the same time.

Companies may spend more on AI while employing fewer AI specialists. They may automate work while recruiting different types of people. They may reduce junior staffing while paying premiums for experienced employees capable of supervising AI-driven processes and exercising professional judgment.

KPMG’s restructuring appears to contain several of these forces simultaneously.

The firm remains committed to embedding artificial intelligence throughout its operations, yet it is also reducing headcount in technology-intensive parts of advisory. It continues investing in employee skills while expanding offshore delivery and eliminating duplicated support positions. It is reporting higher overall profit while responding to a decline in advisory sales.

None of those developments alone explains the workforce strategy. Together, however, they suggest that KPMG is attempting to build a smaller and potentially more technology-leveraged operating model while waiting for stronger consulting demand to return.

What should KPMG employees and competitors watch next?

The first milestone is the completion of the current consultation process and confirmation of how many of the approximately 200 proposed positions are ultimately eliminated in October.

The second will be KPMG UK/Swiss Group’s next annual results. Advisory performance will provide an important test of whether the business has stabilised after the 3% decline recorded in 2025. If consulting revenue returns to growth, management may have greater flexibility to rebuild selected teams even while maintaining a leaner overall workforce.

Artificial intelligence hiring patterns will be equally important. If KPMG continues reducing conventional technology roles while recruiting specialists with stronger industry, commercial and AI-governance expertise, it would provide further evidence that the skills mix is changing rather than technology investment itself declining.

Competitors will be watching closely because KPMG is not confronting these pressures alone. The largest accounting and consulting firms are all trying to determine how much labour they will require once generative artificial intelligence becomes embedded in mainstream client delivery.

For KPMG UK, the September 2026 reduction is relatively modest compared with the organisation’s total workforce. What makes the development significant is the accumulation of cuts.

Audit positions, advisory roles and central support functions have all been affected during the year. Now employees working in areas as strategically important as artificial intelligence and cybersecurity are also exposed.

That suggests KPMG’s restructuring has moved beyond trimming isolated pockets of excess capacity. The firm is increasingly redesigning what its future workforce should look like.

The unresolved question is whether stronger advisory demand eventually allows headcount to recover, or whether artificial intelligence, offshore delivery and a permanently leaner operating model mean the professional-services workforce that emerges from this slowdown will simply require fewer people than the one that entered it.