Amazon, Marriott and other companies promise to take on thousands of refugees in Europe
Just ahead of World Refugee Day on Tuesday, more than 40 companies say they will hire, employ or train a total of 250,000 refugees, of which 13,680 will be employed directly by those companies.
London: Multinationals including Amazon, Marriott and Hilton pledged on Monday to employ more than 13,000 refugees in Europe over the next three years, including Ukrainian women who have fled war with Russia.
Just ahead of World Refugee Day on Tuesday, more than 40 companies say they will hire, employ or train a total of 250,000 refugees, of which 13,680 will be employed directly by those companies.
“Each issue is a story of an individual family who left everything behind, sought safety, sought protection and wanted to rebuild as quickly as possible,” said Kelly Clements, UN Deputy High Commissioner for Refugees. “So the commitments that companies are going to make on Monday are absolutely essential.”
She says 110 million people have been displaced worldwide, with an estimated 12 million from Ukraine, nearly half of whom live in Europe following the continent’s largest refugee influx since World War II.
The recruitment drive in Europe was organized by the Tent Partnership for Refugees, a non-profit organization founded by Chobani CEO Hamdi Ulukaya that connects businesses and refugees, and is unveiled at a rally in Paris. The group’s first summit in the US last year led to pledges to take in 22,725 refugees.
In the new round, Amazon leads the pack, promising to take on at least 5,000 refugees in Europe over the next three years, followed by Marriott and Hilton with 1,500 each, Starbucks and ISS with 1,000 each, and smaller pledges from brands like Adidas , Starbucks, L’Oréal, PepsiCo and Hyatt.
“This is good for us as a company because the ability to add diversity to our workforce will continue to make us a stronger company,” said Ofori Agboka, Amazon vice president overseeing human resources. “Diversity brings innovation, creativity, other insights.”
He said the vast majority of hourly jobs will be in fulfillment and warehousing centers and in transportation and delivery.
Amazon announced 27,000 job cuts earlier this year, part of a wave of layoffs after tech companies ramped up their workforces during the COVID-19 pandemic. Those layoffs mainly related to salaried office jobs, Agboka said.
Daria Sedihi-Volchenko fled Kiev last year and now works in Warsaw, Poland, as a senior program manager for an Amazon Web Services program that provides free technical training to Ukrainians. She says about 40% of the program participants have no technical background.
“I’ve been through the same path many of our students… are going through,” she said. “I had to learn, and I took a commitment on my interview. I said, ‘Okay, if we can agree and I can start working for you, I promise I will learn Polish and I promise I will learn technical skills.’”
A year ago, Sedihi-Volchenko woke up from explosions of the Russian invasion.
“I was terrified. I was so scared for Ukraine, for the nation, for the future, for my own life,” she said. “But that was also a shocking moment when I understood that everything in my life is changing. “
She started living in basements, but left when Russian troops approached Kiev. She drove 40 hours to reach Moldova, thankful she “didn’t hit a single landmine and didn’t shoot anyone in my car”.
She went to Poland to look for work and started an IT trajectory after working as a project manager for ministries and as an economist in Ukraine.
Businesses hope refugees can fill staffing needs after the economy recovers from the pandemic. Unemployment in Europe is the lowest since the introduction of the euro in 1999.
“We are seeing record levels of demand for our properties in many markets here in Europe,” said Anthony Capuano, CEO of Marriott International. “And so we’re aggressively hiring to make sure we can accommodate our guests as demand increases.”
Marriott jobs will largely be hourly positions such as housekeepers, kitchen staff and receptionists.
European countries have welcomed Ukrainians, and while Clements applauded opening schools, workplaces and other opportunities to them, she said the same should be offered to others fleeing conflict and crises in places like Syria, Sudan and Afghanistan .
Sedihi-Volchenko knows the challenges refugees face, even though some companies offer help with language skills, advice and training. Job postings can be hard to decipher, and like them, they can have trouble securing a stable internet connection or work clothes.
“It is important to give a refugee time to learn the language, but the person can go to work, because if you bring experience in IT systems or finance or project management or any other area, of course you understand that it’s not so much about the language. You understand the flow of work,” she said.