Global review 2019
How can we create long-term value for a better working world?
Chairman and CEO’s letter
FY19 – another year of strong growth
EY today is in a great place. Around the world we’re helping more clients, in more places, tackle a wider variety of their toughest challenges than ever before.
Over the past five years, more than 140 acquisitions in EY resulted in US$1.8b of revenue and 8,000 new colleagues.
And our purpose, Building a better working world, continues to inspire EY people to not only serve EY clients, but to also use our knowledge, skills and experiences to support the communities in which we live and work.
This year EY member firms invested nearly US$113m in projects dedicated to strengthening communities, and EY people contributed 745,000 hours of time to a variety of initiatives and value-in-kind projects.
Taken together, EY’s focus on clients, people and society contributed to another year of strong growth, with total headcount up to more than 284,000 people and combined global revenue up 8% to US$36.4b.
Transforming through technology
We’ve had an incredibly successful few years. But in a world that is changing faster than ever, what clients, people and other stakeholders want and need from us is changing, and we’re changing too.
We are transforming ourselves, and EY clients’ businesses, through technology and data.
Today, more than 45,000 people with technology backgrounds work at EY. We count AI scientists, mathematicians and cryptographers among EY teams as well as more than 20,000 data specialists.
Technology, along with data and innovation, is core to EY business – not a bolt-on – and integral to our growth.
Nearly 80% of revenue-generating technology in EY is on the cloud, meaning we can connect and work more efficiently than ever before. Each of our service lines continue to develop global, platform-based solutions that encompass big data, automation and analytics to better support the evolving needs of EY clients. We’re market-leaders in Robotic Process Automation and we’ve delivered ground-breaking blockchain projects for clients.
We will continue to use technology to transform traditional services and launch new offerings as we extract maximum value from our US$1 billion technology investment plan. At the same time we will continue to focus on innovation, collaborate with alliance partners and build out our ecosystem.
A new global strategy
Technology is not the only megatrend affecting EY business. Globalization, demographic shifts and environmental change are also transforming the business landscape and society.
That is why this year we took a fresh look at our global strategy and asked ourselves far-reaching questions such as: what new challenges and opportunities will clients, EY people and society face? And how should we shape EY business so that we can continue to help our stakeholders navigate these challenges and embrace those opportunities?
The answer is NextWave: our strategy and ambition to create long-term value for clients, people and society as the world’s most trusted, distinctive professional services organization.
For clients, creating long-term value is about helping them grow, optimize and protect value so they can address today’s challenges and move forward into the next wave of innovation and technological and social change.
For EY people, long-term value is about creating an exceptional experience for them, one that includes investing in new experiences and honing the leadership skills that EY clients need.
For society, long-term value is created through the work that EY people do every day – fostering confidence and trust in the world’s capital markets and broader business.
We also believe that businesses can do more to foster inclusive economic growth that benefits all stakeholders.
The new EY Ripples global corporate responsibility program will enable more EY people to apply their skills and knowledge to support the next generation workforce, help impact entrepreneurs scale their businesses, and drive environmental sustainability.
Trust
Trust is a critical element of our ambition. Building trust and confidence in business has always been the cornerstone of our purpose; with our NextWave ambition, we are unequivocally stating our goal to become the most trusted professional services organization.
To measure how we are doing against our ambition we use The Embankment Project’s Long-Term Value framework (pdf), which recognizes the importance of a wide range of stakeholders, and non-financial as well as financial metrics.
That means we define our success broadly; we measure our financial performance alongside the value we create for clients, for EY people and for society. In this Global Review we report a broad range of metrics to demonstrate how we do this.
Looking to the opportunities ahead
EY has been a successful organization for well over a century because we have always embraced and adapted to the changing world.
I’m incredibly proud of all that we have accomplished together over the past year. I’m even more excited about the opportunities ahead: creating long-term value for clients, EY people and society and, ultimately, Building a better working world.
Our values: who we are
At EY we live by a set of shared values that define who we are. They are the fundamental beliefs of the EY organization. They guide our actions and behavior. They influence the way we work with each other, and the way we serve clients and engage with the communities in which we live and work.
Every day, each one of us makes choices and decisions that directly affect the way we experience each other and the way clients and wider communities experience us. The EY values give us confidence that we are using the same principles to help us make these decisions throughout the organization.
Although a lot has been changing with EY, and will continue to change, our values remain the same. They are the foundation on which EY is built.
We are:
- People who demonstrate integrity, respect and teaming.
- People with energy, enthusiasm and the courage to lead.
- People who build relationships based on doing the right thing.
How we are creating long-term value for clients
We create long-term value for EY clients by helping them grow, optimize and protect value, so that they can not only address today’s challenges but also move forward into the next wave of innovation and technological and social change. To do that EY is committed to providing an exceptional experience to clients, bringing the whole of the EY organization to meet their needs.
How we are creating long-term value for people
Now more than ever we need extraordinary people from diverse backgrounds with curiosity and drive to help clients move forward into the next wave of disruption and innovation. We provide the scale, the technology, the culture, the challenges and the learning for EY people to personalize their careers as part of a truly transformational team.
Our commitment to diversity and inclusiveness
Read the EY Global Executive Diversity & Inclusion Statement
How we are creating long-term value for society
Despite the waves of change that is all around us, some things remain constant. We know that long-term value for society is created not just through what we do, but also how we do it. We also believe that business has a role to play to foster inclusive growth that benefits all stakeholders.
Discover more about EY Ripples
Facts and figures
The Embankment Project’s Long-Term Value framework is built on four value dimensions: consumer/client value, human/people value, social value and financial value. We have aligned the elements of our ambition to these categories. That means that we do not just define our success primarily by financial value; our own financial performance is measured alongside the value we create for clients, for EY people and for society.
