You Belong

The Challenge

One in four employees feel like they don’t belong at their workplace.* This impacts performance, creates feelings of isolation and increases turnover.

With acknowledgement of social injustices at the centre of public attention in recent years, it’s accelerated diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) efforts – with 60% of companies now having a DEI strategy.** But is inclusion enough? DEI has been part of EY’s history since inception, and the next step in their journey was creating an environment of belonging. Their purpose of Building a better working world is our purpose and this was an opportunity to show how we’re doing just that and to highlight the meaningful progress we’re driving every day.

The Plan
Through powerful, human stories, EY created You Belong – a signature brand initiative that brings social equity, DEI, their people and culture of belonging to the forefront.

Past, present and future employees were the primary audience, aligned to EY’s people-first culture and focus on talent acquisition. So, to engage a younger workforce (average age: 34), we helped create a platform to share the authentic stories of the EY team, hoping viewers would see themselves in the shared moments. The secondary audience included current and prospective clients with the goal of raising awareness, inspiring change and positioning EY as a DEI role model.

The Campaign

Connecting hearts and minds, the business-to-human campaign launched with a hero video on belonging in the workplace, followed by monthly stories tied to DEI observances. The magic was in the spokespeople and unconventional topics covered including surviving breast cancer, surrogacy, adult-diagnosed ADHD and building a career post-military.

To maximize visibility and impact, the strategy was underpinned by a 12-month activation plan beginning in June 2022, and appearing across channels.

Together, each element contributed to engaging audiences and demonstrating that belonging doesn’t happen by chance – it’s a feeling we create together.

The Impact

The $400K campaign is already exceeding targets with five months to go. Impact to-date:

Perceptions: 6 employer brand awards won, including 2023 Best Diversity Employer and Best Workplace for Women – most ever in seven months
Visibility: 11M+ impressions (target: 7M over 12 months), 3.7K web visits
EY employees:
- 90% feel free to be themselves (+2% from 2021)
- +492% in membership across 8 diversity EY Professional Networks in 2022
Revenue: Trusted to support client DEI efforts, including National Bank of Canada (neurodivergent recruitment) and BNP Paribas (workplace inclusion)

With this success, EY Global is now replicating the concept worldwide and we couldn’t be prouder to export the best of Canada while accelerating social change.

* Forbes 2022 Article
** HBR 2022 Article