Question-and-Answer Session
Operator
(Operator instructions) Our first question is from Tobey Sommer of SunTrust Robinson Humphrey. Your line is open.
Julie Howard
Hi, Tobey.
Tobey Sommer – SunTrust Robinson Humphrey
Thank you, good afternoon.
William Goodyear
Hi, Tobey.
Tobey Sommer – SunTrust Robinson Humphrey
First I would like to ask you on the attrition side, nice to see some moderation there. Could you refresh my memory as to what the attrition had been running at the last couple quarters?
Julie Howard
Yes. It hasn’t been a significant change. We’ve run on a 21% to 22% range, 22% I think we’ve averaged for the last several quarters and so, you know, because we use an annualized attrition number rolling past 12 months, it takes a little while to continue to move that down, but we were pleased to see that down.
William Goodyear
Three quarters, Tobey, I think in a row, where it’s ticked down a bit.
Julie Howard
Yes, it has. In three quarters, we’ve ticked down each of those quarters, but we’ll start to see some progress there.
Tobey Sommer – SunTrust Robinson Humphrey
Great and, if you dissect that a little bit and look at the folks that are really bringing in the business for you, have you seen a comparable improvement among that smaller group?
Julie Howard
Of the folks that are bringing in the business for us? Yes, I mean I would say just overall, we’ve seen a nice downward trend in utilization. Remember, that group has a much, much lower attrition rate than, as you might recall from prior conversations, our attrition rate is driven by our junior professionals.
Tobey Sommer – SunTrust Robinson Humphrey
Right. Right.
Julie Howard
And that’s where you see most of the churn, and then some of that, as I’ve said before, I think is to be expected and consistent with kind of the generation, but in the senior levels, we don’t run nearly at high that level.
Tobey Sommer – SunTrust Robinson Humphrey
Okay and then I noticed that you were able to add some people, it looks like towards the end of the year, and kind of consistent with prior conversations we’ve had, I wanted to see if the hiring environment is getting even better for you to bring in seasoned people as well as junior consultants.
William Goodyear
Tobey, I’ll jump in and speak on behalf of all of us, that we have a number of conversations going. I’ve been part of some of them, and as had Julie and Bill and Sharon and Jeff, but I think collectively, we’ve got as many senior conversations going at various parts of the firm as I can remember, certainly in the last two, or couple of years, maybe three years.
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