‘The Irish economy showed amazing resilience in 2023’
SEAMUS HAND
ACTIVITY Our clients continued to look to KPMG for support and advice during 2023 and overall demand for our services increased against a slightly more uncertain landscape. Business leaders today face lots of different challenges and the pace of change has never been as great. While this environment can be difficult to navigate, it also presents lots of opportunities for clients who are resilient and ambitious. At KPMG we are fortunate to partner with many such clients, and this has driven consistent demand for our services over the last year.
Demand for the traditional offerings in our business, including audit and tax, was particularly strong last year, demonstrating the importance of a multi-disciplinary strategy for our firm. We also continue to invest in new services, with technology and artificial intelligence playing an increasing role in all parts of our business, as well as those of our clients.
OPERATIONS The way in which people work is changing, particularly with the introduction of hybrid working. We must continuously evolve how we operate, so that our people get the very best experience working for KPMG and in turn that they can bring their best selves to help our clients with the challenges they face. This is a particularly relevant and exciting topic for us as we design our new headquarters on Harcourt Street in Dublin, which will provide a focal point for our people to come together in the most innovative, sustainable and interactive office in the city.
AI AI, and particularly GenAI, is at the forefront of every business leader’s agenda today, with all companies working hard to understand how it can enable greater success in the future. We have been making significant investment in our AI capabilities over the last number of years, both in terms of the technology itself but also the behavioural changes needed to implement it. We are working closely with our technology partners, including our global partnership with
Microsoft, to design tools that can best meet the needs of our clients and our business.
OUTLOOK I think the Irish economy showed amazing resilience in 2023 when faced with an unusual mixture of challenges, and in particular given the impact on certain key sectors for the economy. Today, our clients are more optimistic about the future, and this is already translating into confidence about economic performance in 2024, and even more so looking out over a two to three year horizon.
While many challenges remain, particularly in terms of geopolitical risk, there is a belief that inflation is being dealt with, and that should provide for a more stable outlook including with respect to the interest rate environment. We are ready to support our clients as this optimism hopefully becomes the reality.