Company name : KPMG LUXEMBOURG S.À R.L
Activity sector : Administrative services and support activities
Company category : Large company
Description of the action
Holding workshops for refugees and children from local schools, together with KPMG employees, to learn skills important in today’s workforce, beginning with basic programming languages and logic.
Establishing a weekly “KPMG Coffee” program, where staff help refugee youth with French and homework.
Holding training sessions where employees learn how to interact with refugees in Luxembourg and about integration challenges.
Context
At KPMG, we believe that education and lifelong learning are crucial for building strong communities and economies and for promoting diversity. We champion a diverse pool of internal and external talent and empower individuals to advance their education and careers so as to unlock their potential. As a firm, we have over 60 nationalities and hundreds of new joiners each year. The diversity of our workforce is one of its most important strengths, bringing communities and experiences together from all around the world.
For most refugees, learning a new language is the biggest challenge to finding a job, creating a network, and feeling at home. This is why, as part of our commitment to education and diversity, our initiative focuses on languages.
Objectives
To collaborate with local organizations during Codeweek.EU to hold activities that help minority groups build up skills relevant in today’s workforce.
To hold regular “KPMG Coffee” sessions, as well as quarterly awareness trainings for KPMG staff, to help participating refugees with their French.
To encourage refugeeintegration by offering a platform where refugees can talk about their aspirations and experiences to KPMG staff.
Approach
These activities are held regularly, through collaboration between different organizations in Luxembourg that address the challenges of underrepresented groups. In addition to helping young refugees, they aim to enable our staff to become active corporate citizens who help reduce inequality in today’s workforce.
Impact
60 KPMG employees and 10 refugees have taken part in this initiative so far, and have shown that people from very different generations and backgrounds can learn from one another. Topics like ageism, sexism, and discrimination have been addressed.
We have established a network of support: our staff gave over 240 hours in 2018 helping refugees withintegration challenges through French language roundtables. All participating staff were additionally sensitized to refugee needs through training sessions.
