EY acquires behavioural change specialist Tao Leadership
EY has bolstered its behavioural change capabilities, with the buying of Tao Leadership. The Big Four firm has confirmed a 100% share purchase of the UK based consultancy.
During a digital transformation it is often easy for companies to neglect the human side of their business. However, by failing to up-skill employees, or change the collective mind-set when adopting new technology, many transformations fail to get the most out of new ways of working.
To help clients understand the importance of cultural change, in combination with transformation programmes, EY has spend 2021 building its organisational change offering. Earlier in the year, the Big Four firm purchased Lane4, and adding to this the company has announced a deal for another UK consultancy.
Founded in 2013, Tao Leadership is an advisory firm that offers people analytics and behaviour change programmes to help clients with their organisational transformations. The firm uses network science, behavioural analytics, and psychology to inform these efforts in understanding and changing behaviours and culture, to build for commercial success.
Tricia Nelson, Managing Partner for People Advisory Services, UK & Ireland, EY commented, “The acquisition of Tao is a strategic investment that brings additional skills and key technology to complement and enhance our existing EY culture and change approaches and tools. It will strengthen the EY position as a leading organisation providing fast paced, large-scale organisational transformation and culture change.”
The acquisition will further accelerate the growth of EY People Advisory Services, by strengthening the transformational leadership and culture change capabilities. EY People Advisory Services teams include more than 15,000 people in 120 countries around the world and help global businesses manage their people and workforce transformation needs. According to Nelson, this represents “an exciting period of ambitious growth and development for EY People Advisory Services,” and “demonstrates the EY vision, commitment, and dedication to exceeding EY clients’ expectations across the world.”
With regards to Tao, meanwhile, the move offers an opportunity to reach clients around the world, due to EY’s global reach. According to the firm’s Founder, its combination of technology, social science research and coaching is an “incredibly effective methodology,” which provides a unique opportunity for its clients, as they drive change organically, from the ground up.
Haider Imam added, “Tao’s market-leading tools provide behavioural analytics, wide-ranging insights and data-rich visualisations to power even the most complex change programs. Tao’s approach is focused on accelerating outcomes and engineered to provide tangible business value and return on investment while putting people at the centre of the change journey.”
