EY tackles COVID-19 and prepares for Next and Beyond

Now, Next, Beyond: The perfect framework for our COVID-19 present

In a wide-ranging discussion centered on COVID-19, EY’s global leaders detailed for TBR the firm’s views on the current situation, the immediate needs and opportunities ahead in 2020, and what the post-pandemic reality will be for EY and its clients — Now, Next and Beyond. As an EY framework for a couple of years, Now, Next, Beyond perfectly suits the current moment, when enterprises across the globe need assistance addressing immediate operational challenges, from supply chain to financing to human resource management. At the same time, EY’s clients have already begun planning for or taking the early first steps in implementing changes necessary to survive and grow in the near term, the next few quarters and years. And for EY, the deepest client partnerships are forged through transformations, in which EY serves as trusted partner.

Now: Know your business, know your environment, become resilient

In the Now, EY has brought clients multiple trackers — tools that provide enterprises immediate insights into their operations and expected near-term challenges — while helping to build greater resiliency over time. Even though the pandemic’s impacts vary widely by location and seemingly change daily, assessment and resiliency tools, in EY’s view, remain essential for most enterprises, partly because very few companies came into the pandemic with a data and technology strategy.

As part of the response to COVID-19, the firm rolled out its Enterprise Resilience Assessment Tool and overall COVID-19 Enterprise Resilience Framework to help clients understand the current state, map a route to resiliency and track progress. Extending beyond the enterprise, EY has developed a suite of trackers to help clients follow and understand the constantly changing impacts of the pandemic. EY’s Trade Tracker, for example, provides clients updates on government changes to trade rules, a kind of one-stop trade policy shop. Other tracker focus areas include tax policy, labor and employment law, and immigration. In TBR’s view, these tools — and EY’s emphasis on the big picture, not simply operational needs — underscore the broader value the firm brings to transformational engagements, which should benefit EY as clients move from COVID-19 response to post-pandemic strategy.

Next: Bringing technology to bear in a way EY has not done before

“As one EY professional explained, ‘When we solve a problem through applying tech, and thus creating an asset or tool, we want to productize and commercialize and globalize.’ Like a ship making course corrections while still navigating toward a desired destination, EY has adjusted its business model, folded asset-based consulting and managed services into traditional consulting, and committed to emerging technology.” — TBR special report Now. Next. Beyond.: EY’s road map for moving from current to future, May 2019

Turning to growth, EY’s leaders noted that clients increasingly speak to the firm about the need for technology at speed and innovation at scale, with humans at the center. For a firm with a relatively new foundation in technology at speed, EY provided TBR use cases and details around how the firm meets those clients’ technology demands.

Over three separate hourlong briefings with EY leaders in Europe, Asia and the Americas, TBR analysts heard details on the firm’s initial response to the COVID-19 pandemic as well as its strategies for serving clients in the post-pandemic world. While this special report contains information provided by EY as well as TBR’s analysis, a more complete assessment of the firm can be found in TBR’s recently published semiannual Management Consulting Benchmark.