By Business & Finance 
Indeed, the job site with 350M+ unique visitors every month, has announced a partnership with Community Foundation Ireland and a €217,000 fund to support job seekers facing barriers.
Working with Community Foundation Ireland, Indeed has established a ‘Donor-Advised Fund’ through which it is funding six organisations working directly with job seekers. These organisations – who work with refugees, lone parents, people with disabilities and the long-term unemployed, among others – provide services and programmes that support these groups on their journey to employment.
Indeed surveyed over 500 job seekers facing barriers in Ireland including lone parents, people with disabilities, refugees and asylum seekers, ethnic minorities, the long term unemployed, people with a criminal record and older people. The research found these job seekers need support overcoming practical challenges such as a lack of computer skills (63%), not having a good professional or support network (64%), not knowing where to find job opportunities (63%), and not feeling confident about how to apply for jobs or write a CV (63%).
Partner organisations
The six partner organisations include the Irish Red Cross, An Cosán, Fastrack into IT, Jobcare, the Open Doors Initiative and One Family. Through them, the fund is enabling a number of initiatives aimed at equipping participants with the skills and support they need to access the jobs market. Many Indeed employees also volunteer for the ‘Indeed Job Squad’, hosting regular training sessions to help jobseekers facing barriers with their job search.
Launching the new fund, Indeed’s Vice President of Global Strategy & Operations, Daniel Corcoran, said:
“At Indeed, our mission has always been to help all people get jobs, and supporting job seekers who face additional barriers in the job market is a crucial part of that. As home to our International HQ for the past decade, Ireland has played a key role in enabling us to pursue that mission. That’s why we’ve established this partnership with Community Foundation Ireland to support some of the most vulnerable job seekers across the country on their journey to employment.”
Denise Charlton, Chief Executive, Community Foundation Ireland, added:
“We are delighted to welcome Indeed as a partner on our mission of Equality for All in Thriving Communities. The fund will allow extremely targeted actions and supports to improve employment outcomes for people facing disadvantage in different ways. And the need is great. Lone parents and people with disabilities have been among the hardest hit with the recent cost of living crisis, for example. These programmes will bring down barriers to work which stand in the way of many people in our communities.”
Tailored to suit the needs of beneficiaries, programmes range from English language classes equipping Afghan refugees with the necessary language skills to gain employment, to structured support and guidance for people who are long-term unemployed as they conduct their job search.
Latifa – a qualified lawyer who came to Ireland from Afghanistan in 2021 and lives in Dublin with her nine-year-old son – is among those benefiting from an Irish Red Cross programme focussed on supporting the needs of Afghan refugees in the greater Dublin area.
“After the Taliban took over, it was a very difficult time. I had to leave my son, I lost my country, and, when I arrived in Ireland, I couldn’t speak the language. The environment here is very different. I had no network and I couldn’t understand people. For the first two years, I was like a blind person,” she said.
Through the Red Cross, Latifa is now taking English language classes to improve her English with a view to pursuing an MA in Peace Studies at Maynooth University. “With the Red Cross, it’s the first time I’ve had help with classes,” she added.
Alison, who lost her job of eight years during the pandemic, recently regained employment after completing two courses provided by Jobcare, enabled by the Indeed fund.
“I was on the reception team at a well-known financial institution. When the pandemic hit, nobody was coming into the office and we were made redundant. Covid restrictions meant I couldn’t see friends and family and, with more and more people going remote, I could see that the work environment was changing dramatically. This fueled a lot of depression and anxiety,” she explained.
After several months, Alison was introduced to Jobcare, however, and says she hasn’t looked back since: “It’s full of professional people who have found themselves in the same situation as me. The programmes help with refining your CV and honing your interview skills. Basically they give you your confidence back and a network that can help support you.”
“A lot of people still experience ageism when applying for jobs, unfortunately. And for people with a criminal conviction who are trying to get back into the workforce it can be very hard. But there are a lot of services out there that can help,” she added.
The Indeed-backed programmes will run through to mid 2024 and are among a number of initiatives aimed at delivering on Indeed’s commitment to transform hiring globally by 2030. This includes a commitment to help over 30 million people facing barriers get hired, by improving the job-search experience and increasing access to opportunity.
