Jane's UK National Three Peaks Challenge
Jane Cetinel is raising money for Talent Beyond Boundaries Inc
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I am proud to work for a company that doesn't just talk about making the world a better place, but is actively working to make this happen.
In February, IRESS became the first company in the world to hire a refugee through the charity Talent Beyond Boundries - a unique initiative that pairs talented individuals with international opportunities.
Tarek Mulla is a charismatic young man, and an experienced and talented software engineer. He joined our team in Melbourne, Australia, as a software engineer after impressing us with his personality and CV via remote video interview.
Nothing unusual there. But Tarek is also a Syrian refugee who’s seen the life he knew destroyed by the ongoing and brutal civil war in Syria.
Since fleeing Syria, he has spent the past several years in neighbouring Lebanon but given the conditions was unable to build a stable life there.
It’s shocking to realise that there are vast numbers of talented refugees just like Tarek who are stuck in places where they cannot legally work. While at the same time, companies around the globe are experiencing skill shortages - particularly businesses like ours in the IT sector who seek high quality engineers.
With talent shortages expected to affect the future of the world’s largest economies in the coming years, developing new and creative solutions to address these shortages is an economic imperative. It makes perfect sense that the global refugee population should be part of the solution.
By linking refugees with countries and companies that need their skills, Talent Beyond Boundaries (TBB) is forging a sustainable solution for refugees to rebuild their lives while boosting the global economy. This could be life changing for tens of thousands of refugees and their families, and fundamentally change how the world responds to refugee crises.
We began working with TBB ultimately because it’s the right thing and the smart thing to do. We cast a wide net locally when looking for people to join our team. Through the TBB program we’ve been able to include in that net an even wider pool of high quality potential candidates who go through the same recruitment and selection process as any other candidate would.