CEO Today UK Awards 2021

49 CEO TODAY UNITED KINGDOM AWARDS 2021 Consultancy Ecorys is an international research company specialising in consultancy, communications, and programme management services. We have operated in the UK for more than 40 years and can trace our European origins back to 1929. Today, we operate across Europe, Africa, Asia, the Caribbean and Latin America, and employ more than 600 full time staff and thousands of associates. Our mission is to help our diverse range of clients from the public, private and charity sectors to make a positive impact on society by tackling the key issues that affect communities around the world, working at all stages of the policy cycle. Our teams of researchers, policy experts, programme managers and communications specialists provide expert advice, support, and implementation capability to deliver genuine and sustained change in the areas that we work. These include a range of sectors, such as health, education, youth, equality and diversity, sport, culture, economic and regional regeneration, the environment, climate change, public finance, and tax. We provide an integrated service offering, drawing on research, ex-ante policy advice, and ex-post evaluations. We run large-scale grant and communications programmes, and provide technical assistance and support in developing countries, as well as digital services in specialised policy areas. Our deep understanding of public policy means we can develop targeted communications programmes specifically designed to influence behaviour amongst a target audience. Our practical solutions are crafted to make a real difference – however small or large – to the world we live in. We are a values-based organisation that cares about its people, clients, beneficiaries, and the world in which we operate. We have an active Corporate Social Responsibility programme and donate part of our profits to our charity partners. We also support and encourage our staff to volunteer their time to support good causes. Like everyone, we found 2020 to be a challenging year. We adapted to working remotely relatively quickly (and have enjoyed not having to commute into the office), but we miss our colleagues. Our work has changed, too. We’ve moved all our training and capacity building work online, and have adapted our service offering to take COVID-19 into account. This has provided an exciting challenge for all of our staff. Our work over the past year has included supporting clients to assess the impact of COVID-19 on the mental health and social wellbeing of young people. We are undertaking our own transnational research into how schools have helped children to cope with their changing digital lives. We are also assessing its impact on the sports sector, both economically and in terms of participation. In Africa, we are assessing how the pandemic is impacting early warning and conflict prevention mechanisms across the continent, and how interventions can be adapted to compensate. We are excited at the prospect of continuing to help our clients deliver their policy objectives in 2021. We are currently supporting the launch of the new UK Government-funded Turing Scheme, which we will be implementing with the British Council to replace the European Union-funded Erasmus Plus programme (which we managed together from 2014). Company Profile