BDO has been through many mergers and acquisitions over the last 100 years; from Lixar to Deloitte FRS and Interis.

BDO announced a merger with Interis Consulting Inc. in 2013. The Interis team joined BDO's existing assurance, accounting, tax, and advisory practice, bringing experience in planning and performance, transformation, and compliance services. The merger significantly grew our team and range of expertise, adding over 100 partners and professionals.

In 2016, BDO expanded on its comprehensive consumer financial recovery practices by acquiring Deloitte’s consumer insolvency practice. The expanded team made BDO one of the largest teams of professionals delivering consumer insolvency services in Canada. The combined practices increased BDO’s geographic spread, providing services in Quebec and Newfoundland and Labrador, while expanding on our presence in Saskatchewan.

In 2020, BDO acquired Lixar, an Artificial Intelligence (AI) and data company, to help accelerate AI and data-driven solutions in Canada and globally. Together, they assist clients with action-based outcomes, relevant insights, increased efficiency, and real-time results. The expansion of AI and data expertise has supported BDO’s digital transformation, allowing us to readily respond to the ever-changing market.

10 BDO milestones through the years

For 2022, BDO Canada was ranked among Canada’s Top 100 Employers. Each year, the top 100 employers across Canada are chosen across all industries and company sizes based on an evaluation of extensive criteria looking at all aspects of what it means to work there.

Excelling in areas like flexibility, firm culture, COVID-19 response, talent experience, work-life balance, support and resources, wellness, personal time, learning, and career development—we’re proud to celebrate the collective accomplishments of our people, partners, and firm as a whole. This recognition is a milestone we’re thrilled to add to our collection of awards for both experienced and student talent experiences.

Our BDO National Office in Toronto was created by international architects at Lemay and won a 2019 Grands Prix du Design. The workplace was designed and adapted to meet generational needs—addressing how individual professionals work most comfortably and efficiently, especially when it comes to flexibility and mobility.

Through this office space, we strive to foster learning and empowerment with a new centre of excellence for teaching, refresher training, collaboration, and knowledge transfer. The office space also allows employees and their clients to learn, grow, and collaborate both physically and virtually—a huge win during the work-from-home boom. In the photos you can see the office has a variety of meeting rooms, collaboration desks, stand-up desks, and even phone booths. The national office laid the foundation for the look and feel for all our new offices going forward.

BDO is committed to creating an inclusive and equitable environment where people can be themselves and thrive at work. There has been a large growth in partners that identify as women, minorities, diversity in our C-suite, and various employee community groups. We also formed the National Inclusion Equity and Diversity Council in 2018 with Patricia Gonsalves becoming the first Chief Inclusion, Equity and Diversity Office followed by Giselle Bodkin in 2021.

A&A Managing Partner, Daphna Smuckler recalls her first Partner Annual General Meeting (AGM) likely having less than 10% female partners, but today partners who identify as women make up 27% of the partnership. Furthermore, 61% of the firm overall identify as women.

Throughout 2021, we launched various events to raise awareness across diverse groups including Indigenous communities, LGBTQ2S+, and women’s leadership. As an active member of the Canadian Centre for Diversity and Inclusion (CCDI), we offer training to our people that aligns with industry standards.

From new digital tools to a more connected office, the firm has seen many changes in technology. In 2020, we launched the Global Portal. This is a collaborative digital hub that enables us to share information in real time with both clients as well as the company’s global member firm network. The portal not only enhances communications but improves the client experience.

We partnered with Workday in 2018 to implement a suite of tools from the financial management and human capital management software vendor to further grow our business internally and externally. Workday is vital for the internal infrastructure and provides tools to support both employees and clients.

Of course, employees transitioned from column paper, red pens, and green pens to become digital and continue to adopt new technologies as the business evolves.

As needs in the market increase, BDO is expanding with it, offering more services and expertise for our clients. In 2021, we launched our Value Creation practice to help companies improve, turnaround, and increase performance.

As the Cannabis industry exploded in growth, we recognized the need for client services and added it to our industry program. Cannabis accounting and transaction services need to support business growth while ensuring regulatory compliance across the supply chain.

More than ever, organizations, investors, and customers are embracing environmental, social, and governance (ESG) considerations as key components of success. It seemed natural for BDO to begin offering ESG services—and now our practice identifies, tracks, and measures ESG initiatives, providing the ability for conformance and constant improvement.

BDO has always been at the forefront of changing our workplace culture to meet the demands of the future, accommodating flexible working arrangements. In 2018, the firm moved to one personal time off (PTO) allocation where employees don’t have to select whether their time off is for vacation, sickness, or personal.

We invested in technology so employees could meet collaboratively in the office, virtually from home, or elsewhere. To make our virtual offices feel connected we began firm-wide social committee groups based on various interests including reading, running, music, gaming, cooking, and more.

Two mergers in January 2011 contributed to building our presence in major markets in Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland, bringing BDO coast-to-coast. BFM Chartered Accountants and Advisors, with whom BDO had been associated with since 2000, represented us in PEI with locations in Charlottetown and Summerside. The merger with BFM resulted in five new partners and 40 team members.

Belanger Clarke Follett & McGettigan helped expand BDO to Newfoundland, serving clients in six locations, including St. John’s, Corner Brook, Lewisporte, Clarenville, Marystown, and Catalina. Three partners and 28 team members joined the firm. We expanded in Edmonton and Northern Alberta due to a merger with Bill McCulloch and Associates Inc., Daye & Company, and Lorraine Kellogg—welcoming seven partners and 45 employees.

In 2011, we launched our industry program to support the firm’s focus on strategically building our profile in the marketplace. We built on existing specializations while leveraging firm-wide resources. We planned a phased launch of the various industry groups, prioritized by investments in revenues and market opportunity.

The program spans 12 industries, 33 subsectors, and is represented in markets across Canada. Our industry experience gives us a unique perspective that combines service-related requirements with sector-specific applicability. Additionally, our industry section launched on bdo.ca in May 2011.

In an effort to propel innovation and transformation, we created the Digital Office—a team of partners, technologists, and subject matter experts that encourage digital practices across BDO. The Digital Office supports initiatives that empower three pillars: Automation, Prediction and Growth. To help drive the program, BDO appointed Rafi Majeed as the firm’s first-ever Chief Digital Officer in 2019.