Omar Odeh on EY Consulting’s strategy, impact and defining milestones in the MENA region

Now in his 23rd year at EY, Omar Odeh serves as the firm’s MENA Consulting Leader, overseeing a regional team of more than 1,600 professionals across 11 countries. We sat down with Omar to discuss his career journey, how EY Consulting creates impact together with its clients, and some of the defining milestones from the past period.

Can you tell us about your career journey and how it has shaped your approach to leadership today?

I started my career as an intern in EY, and this is a foundation I hold in high regard. Early in my career, I learned that integrity is paramount, as every decision EY professionals make can impact investors, regulators, and society.

I also learned the importance of accountability, as there were multiple instances where we had to stand by our judgments, even under pressure, and the value of teamwork, as results are achieved by bringing diverse people together under tight deadlines. These experiences shaped my leadership by instilling the values of trust, accountability, and inclusiveness, which I carry with me to this day.

After several years, I transitioned into my role as the Financial Accounting Advisory Services (FAAS) Leader. In FAAS, I quickly realized that CFOs were becoming strategic partners to the CEO and the Board, expected to drive transformation, shape investment decisions, and provide insights that guide the future of the business. Their needs were evolving; they required not just accounting support, but a trusted advisor to help them reinvent finance.

This realization influenced my leadership. We expanded the practice beyond technical accounting, and into finance of the future, building capabilities in finance transformation, digital finance, finance data and analytics, transaction accounting, and more. This reinvention was not optional; it was our duty, as our clients and economies rely on us to equip finance leaders with the right tools and insights.

Leading this reinvention taught me how to anticipate client needs, build and scale multidisciplinary practices, and innovate and deliver new solutions.

Now, as the MENA Consulting Leader, I oversee more than 1,600 multidisciplinary professionals across 11 countries, applying those lessons at scale: how to lead with rigor, earn trust, and drive transformation for our clients and people.

In what ways is EY Consulting shaping its strategy and priorities to meet the MENA region’s evolving priorities?

The MENA region is going through transformational change, and this requires more focused support from consulting firms. Recognizing that, EY has recently elevated MENA to the status of a Super-Region, which means more global support, more investment, and more attention from the wider organization.

Practically, that translates into scaling our capacity across key sectors and industries, such as clean energy and utilities, tourism and hospitality, real estate and infrastructure, healthcare and life sciences, defense, sports, financial services and advanced manufacturing. We are doing this not only organically, but also through acquisitions that bring specialist expertise for our clients.

We are also strengthening our collaboration with alliance partners; working with the world’s leading technology and platform providers to co-create solutions that are relevant for MENA. Whether that it is cloud, AI, data, or sector-specific technologies, our alliances allow us to bring innovation at speed and scale, while tailoring it to the unique needs of clients in this region.

Equally important, we continue to invest heavily in our people. That means continuous learning programs and career development opportunities, so our teams stay ahead of our clients’ needs. Our people are a key differentiator, and their ability to combine global best practices with local insight is what ensures impact.

How has the consulting landscape in this region evolved over the past decade?

Over the past decade, the consulting landscape in MENA has changed profoundly. Ten years ago, much of the work was classic advisory, strategy design, cost reduction, and program management. Today, the expectation is very different: clients want consulting partners who can deliver outcomes end-to-end: design, build, and even operate.

That shift reflects how the region itself has evolved. Ambitious national visions have created demand for consulting at a scale and complexity we haven’t seen before. At the same time, technologies such as AI and advanced analytics have moved from optional to essential, and clients expect us to bring not only ideas but also platforms and alliances to help them scale.

Risk, compliance, and resilience continue to come to the forefront, particularly as digitization and regulation accelerate. And perhaps most importantly, leaders have realized that transformation is as much about people as it is about systems. For that reason, change leadership, culture, and workforce skills have become central to consulting offerings in this region.

In short, the landscape has shifted from advisory to integrated transformation. Today, firms like EY are expected to combine integrated capabilities to help organizations not just design solutions, but actually build and run them.

The Transformation Realized framework is core to EY’s consulting narrative. How does this come to life in this region?

The Transformation Realized framework is about moving beyond strategy on paper to delivering change that is tangible, measurable, and lasting. In this region, that resonates strongly because the scale of ambition is so high; from national visions and giga-projects to industry convergence.

We see it come to life in three ways:

First, by helping organizations turn bold strategies into execution: whether that’s a government building digital platforms, an energy company embedding sustainability, or a bank modernizing its core functions.

Second, by bringing the ecosystem needed to deliver at scale: alliances with global leaders such as Microsoft, SAP, and ServiceNow, combined with EY.ai and our managed services capabilities, allow us not just to design solutions but to help run them day-to-day.

And third, by ensuring transformation sticks through people, as culture, leadership, and workforce skills are as central as technology or process.

In practice, this means when a client in MENA commits to transformation, they are not just getting a roadmap; they are getting integrated support across technology, business, risk, and people; so that change is realized, scaled, and sustained.

That’s why the framework is so relevant for MENA: it matches the region’s ambition with delivery that helps make those ambitions real.

With technologies like AI, blockchain, and advanced analytics gaining momentum, how are clients integrating these into their operations?

In MENA today, organizations are moving from experimenting with technologies into embedding them in their core operations. The real shift is not about running pilots, but about scaling these technologies in a way that drives value, builds resilience, and earns trust.

We see governments using AI and data to deliver smarter services and to manage major infrastructure programs with more foresight. In energy and industrials, advanced analytics and digital platforms are helping companies run assets more efficiently. And in financial services, AI is starting to transform how finance and risk functions operate, making decision-making more predictive and compliance more proactive.

What makes this possible is not just the technology itself, but the ecosystem around it. That’s why our alliances with partners such as Microsoft, SAP, ServiceNow and others are very important, they give us the platforms to scale, and through our managed services solutions, we go beyond just designing solutions, but we help run them day-to-day.

And across all of this, AI is the common thread: it is becoming the engine that powers better customer experiences, more resilient operations, stronger risk management, and smarter finance.

The bigger picture is that these technologies are becoming the foundation for the region’s transformation, helping economies diversify, making industries more competitive, and enabling organizations to grow in a way that is both innovative and trusted.

What does the addition of BI Consulting into the EY fold mean for clients?

The addition of BI Consulting into the EY fold is really about scaling our capacity to help clients manage the human side of transformation. So much of what organizations are doing in MENA, whether it’s adopting AI, transforming operations, enhancing customer experience, or strengthening risk, depends on people: on leadership, on culture, and on how effectively change is absorbed.

That’s why our People Consulting offerings are core to our services, helping clients with organizational design, transformation leadership, and change management. This complements our technology, risk, and business consulting capabilities. For clients, that means more integrated support, as we can address not just the systems and processes, but also the leadership and workforce dimensions that ultimately determine whether a transformation succeeds.

This is exactly where the BI Consulting team adds value, expanding our capacity to support a greater number of clients with the depth they need.

As for whether there will be more inorganic growth in EY MENA consulting: the answer is yes. The region is moving fast, and clients expect consulting firms to scale capability quickly in multiple domains. While we continue to invest heavily in organic growth and alliances with global technology leaders, we also see targeted acquisitions as a way to accelerate depth where it matters most.

So, the acquisition of BI Consulting is not an isolated move; it is part of a broader strategy to make sure EY Consulting has the right capabilities, at the right scale, to support our clients.

EY also recently launched EY Studio+. How does it differ from traditional consulting models in the way it delivers value to clients in the MENA region?

We are proud to have launched EY Studio+ in the MENA region to create transformative experiences that move people and shape markets.

EY Studio+ is a globally integrated offering designed to help organizations reimagine customer, citizen, and employee experiences and unlock growth in an AI-driven economy. It offers an outcome-oriented approach – the EY Studio+ model prioritizes co-creation and sustainable capability transfer, ensuring clients gain long-term operational value, not just strategic advice.

This solution reflects how the region itself has evolved. Ambitious national visions have created demand for consulting at a scale and complexity we haven’t seen before. In parallel, technologies such as AI and advanced analytics have moved from optional to essential and clients expect us to bring not only ideas, but also platforms and alliances to help them scale.