Deloitte Central Europe releases its Impact Report for 2018

Key highlights:

• Helping clients cope with growing business complexity to achieve sustainable business excellence

• Enabling people to optimise their performance and potential in a fast-changing working environment

• Empowering colleagues to follow their passion and conscience in contributing across many sectors of society

Zagreb, 5 February 2019 - Deloitte Central Europe’s Impact Report for 2018 is published today. It highlights many of the wide-ranging activities the firm undertook between 1 June 2017 and 31 May 2018 with the aim of fulfilling its overriding purpose – to make a sustainable positive impact that matters on its clients, its own people and its local, national and international communities.

The backdrop to these activities was provided by commercial performance which saw Deloitte Central Europe once again achieve its highest-ever revenues. These totalled EUR 396 million, up from EUR 361 million 12 months before.

But commercial returns are only one aspect of how the firm defines its success. As Alastair Teare, CEO of Deloitte Central, explains, “The word ‘impact’ is important to us. It helps us define the difference we make to society, by moving beyond our roles as auditors and advisors. It allows us to take our experience, energy and expertise into other areas, where we can help people of all backgrounds benefit from new thinking and new technologies.

“Every day we challenge ourselves to identify the issues that are most important for our clients, our people, and for society as a whole. Then we ask ourselves how we can make an impact that matters on those issues.”

The report is separated into three main sections, each crammed with case studies and stories that bring to life many of the year’s most important initiatives and key successes.

In ‘Serving clients with distinction’, the Report describes how Deloitte helped its clients across the region during the year, often enabling them to counter and even exploit disruptive forces affecting all areas of business in an increasingly complex environment. In one particularly powerful story, it describes how enabling a company that was on the verge of business failure to identify and move into an entirely new market has made it more successful than ever.

In ‘Inspiring our talented professionals to deliver outstanding value’, the Report shows how investing in people’s talent through sector-leading development, mentoring and learning programmes is helping them make a difference for their clients, their colleagues and their communities. The chapter contains stories about many initiatives, including a mentoring programme that benefits the mentors as well as their protégés, a highly innovative recruitment campaign to attract cyber-security trainees, initiatives to promote opportunities for female managers and a new wellbeing scheme developed by colleagues across the region.

And, in ‘Contributing to society as a role model for positive change’, the Report showcases initiatives that illustrate how true leadership is about setting a positive example, encouraging businesses and citizens to take more responsibility for the challenges faced in their communities and by society at large. Stories selected for this year’s report cover several initiatives to help young people prepare for the world of work, organising special events for underprivileged children, providing support for charities and NGOs, and an ongoing focus on continuously improving the firm’s sustainability performance.

Sustainability in all its forms is a key element of our purpose and our strategy. Therefore, we’ve used the Global Reporting Standards (GRI Standards) to inform and guide the preparation on our new report. We’ve included the GRI Content Index at the end of the Report, and we are now using our reported results to set stretching but attainable improvement targets for the years ahead.

Throughout the report, there are many further examples of how Deloitte people have exceeded what is required of them to make a positive impact on their clients, their colleagues and their communities. Naturally, a publication covering the activities over more than 6,000 people across 18 countries can only scratch the surface of what was achieved during the last financial year. However, it provides an illustration of the firm’s commitment to providing leadership across Central Europe in important areas other than revenue alone.