EY Value Realized FY23: Finland

Foreword from our Country Managing Partner

I am pleased to present to you our annual report for the fiscal year covering 1 July 2022 to 30 June 2023 (FY23) — EY Value Realized: Finland. This report reflects the measurable, positive long-term value that we bring to our clients, people and society. In this report, we highlight our commitment to transparency, sustainability and improvement in our operations while showcasing how we’re building a better working world.

Our global purpose-led strategy called NextWave has been the catalyst for our transformation agenda to create longterm value for EY clients, people, and society and make our measuring and reporting more transparent.

The financial year of EY Finland was strong, and the business continued on a profitable growth track. The Assurance business grew strongly due to significant customer wins, and investments in growth in other businesses areas continued.

By the end of FY23, our overall revenue was EUR187 million (up by 14 percent from FY22) and we employed 1,172 people (an 11 percent increase from FY22). I’m honored to say that our people and teams are making a stellar effort in enabling EY Finland’s success, and bigger teams are a strong base for developing our business further.

Increased focus on wellbeing, diversity, equity, and inclusion as well as on designing a workplace of the future

EY Finland has a comprehensive approach to managing employee health, safety, and wellbeing. We structure our activities according to the Global Wellbeing Strategy, which promotes employees' emotional, physical, financial, and social wellbeing. In FY23, EY Finland boosted its Health and Safety Committee membership and set up a steering group for leading our wellbeing activities.

EY’s flexible hybrid working model allows employees to choose to work remotely, at the office, or at client sites. To ensure employees' working environments are conducive to productive and ergonomically optimal work, EY Finland supports the wellbeing of our employees through a wide range of benefits. In FY23, we also arranged training aimed at team leaders and other supervisors on how to support 5 their employees' wellbeing. We support social wellbeing by funding over 20 employee-led EY Clubs that gather people together around topics of mutual interest.

EY Finland works continuously to combat discrimination and to foster fairness. We invest in diversity, equity, and inclusion training and we measure the impact of our efforts with an internally developed DE&I tool.

In FY23, we have maintained gender balance in the total working population and in managerial and leadership roles and our ratio of men and women across most ranks is 50/50. However, we continue our efforts in increasing women in our partner pipeline through promotions, recruitment and various initiatives.

We were also happy to officially partner with Helsinki Pride for the fifth consecutive year to support human rights and equality. Our Pride-themed events and learning sessions, including a Nordic- level Rainbow Week, lasted for the entire month of June and culminated in our Pride Afterwork event.

We also want to encourage our people’s personal development by offering them the chance to increase and improve their skills both through completing in-house EY Badges and enrolling in the virtual Tech MBA and Masters in Sustainability programs accredited by Hult International Business School. In FY23, we invested more than 1.2m EUR in education in EY Finland alone (this is in addition to our substantial global investments in training) and our people completed more than 56,000 learning hours. This resulted in an increase in the amount of EY Badges completed by our people, and we had an additional Tech MBA graduate in Finland. Congratulations to all!

We hold sustainability and prosperity close to heart

Our operations are very much defined by our devotion to our carbon ambition. Following the footsteps of the global firm, EY Finland continues its work to deliver EY’s global commitment to greenhouse gas emission reductions in line with the Paris Agreement 1.5ºC goal.

EY Global reduced greenhouse gas emissions by 43% against a 2019 baseline, while growing by 40% over the same period and remains on track to reach net zero in 2025. EY aims to reduce its Nordic region's total emissions by 40% in FY25 from 14,849 tCO2e emitted in FY19. Business travel, which is responsible for 65% of EY Finland's total carbon footprint, remains a challenge and the company will prioritize travel that adds the highest value and continue utilizing virtual technologies and hybrid working models. This report also highlights EY's climate-related risks and opportunities, including our commitment to becoming a catalyst for climate action.

We want to be our clients’ best partner on their sustainability transformation journey, from taking strategic choices to executing them. This requires deep sustainability expertise coupled with a strategic yet action-oriented approach. To provide this, we have launched EY Sustainability which offers our clients sustainable business and environmental, social and government (ESG) services geared towards value creation. Since its induction, EY Sustainability has offered a one-stop, all-encompassing point of contact for clients interested in making sustainability a growth platform and source of innovation.

Last fiscal year was a success also in terms of sustainability acknowledgments. Independent research company Verdantix named EY as a leader in the latest 2023 Green Quadrant for Climate Change Consulting Services. In June 2023, EY Finland was also awarded the EcoVadis Silver level rating for our corporate sustainability practices being among the toprated companies globally.

Along with our own people, we care for the society around us and want to harness our skills to help create economic and social prosperity through areas such as employment, community engagement, investments, innovation of services and taxes. Our social responsibility program, EY Ripples, encourages our people to actively participate in various local and global initiatives and devote up to 15 working hours a year to make a difference. The EY Ripples program has had over 543 EY participants in Finland since FY20. This is estimated to positively impact 400,000 lives — a truly wonderful and significant achievement that we want to surpass year after year.

Looking forward to a great future

All in all, this FY23 report is a testament to how we are constantly improving our operations at EY Finland and making sure that we continue to create long-term value for all. The results from the past fiscal year will serve as baselines and starting-off points to further increase our positive effects on our clients, our staff, our business, and the society around us.

Our operations are very much defined by the notion that we have a unique position to support our clients in their journey to conducting more sustainable and smarter business. We will continue on this path to make sure that we prioritize sustainability and ESG factors in everything we do, starting from our own operations and extending to the way we serve and help our clients.

I want to thank our people, clients, and other stakeholders for yet another exciting and successful fiscal year. With the next one already ongoing, I believe we can intensify our collaboration to create even more innovations and solutions towards a better working world.