Barriers to employment:
How employers can level the playing field

Structural hurdles make it harder for refugees to find work in Australia.

For the past 15 years the unemployment rate in Australia has not been higher than 6%, and the average labour force participation rate has been higher than 63%. In contrast, only 38% of refugees (accepted between 1 January 2000 and 9 August 2016) are employed, with 10% unemployed and 50% not in the labour force.

Employers who adjust their recruitment practices have an opportunity to tap into a pool of motivated and loyal workers, eager to build a new life for themselves and their families.

Hidden Talent webinar launch, panel discussion featuring ANZ Bank, The Bread and Butter Project, Kaleidoscope Mentoring Program, Glow Up Careers. 23 Nov 21 (90 mins).

LISTEN Overcoming the canvas ceiling - Refugee employment (podcast, 10 mins)

WATCH Overcoming the canvas ceiling - Promoting refugee employment (video, 2 mins)

READ

Harmony in the workplace: Delivering the Diversity Dividend - Myths and Misperceptions about Cultural Diversity (FECCA, 2013)

Employing people from a refugee background: How to bridge the gap between intention and action - employer insights (Dr Betina Szkudlarek, University of Sydney Business School, and the Crescent Foundation, 2022)

Unveiling the canvas ceiling: A Multidisciplinary Literature Review of Refugee Employment and Workforce Integration (Eun Su Lee, Dr Betina Szkudlarek, Duc Cuong Nguyen, Luciara Nardon, International Journal of Management Reviews, 2020)

A new arrival might have many years of experience in the workforce, but none of it in Australia. There are ways to tap into the maturity and interpersonal skills that work experience gives a candidate.

Recruiters can:

• Look for what the candidate’s overseas work experience and qualifications shows about their capabilities, transferable skills, and potential.

• Offer refugees the opportunity to work for a probationary period, and evaluate them on their ability to do the actual job, not their ability to succeed in a recruitment process.

People have limited networks and the ways to find work are unfamiliar.

Recruiters can:

• Work with refugee employment services that can act as a broker.

• Establish specialised recruitment pathways that are more accessible to refugee job seekers.

• Participate in jobs expos where you can meet refugee job seekers.

The process of having overseas trade, professional and tertiary qualifications is cumbersome and costly.

Recruiters can:

• Look at what the candidate’s overseas qualification shows about their knowledge, expertise and interest in your industry.

• Offer refugees the opportunity to gain work experience in your industry as a stepping stone towards re-qualifying in their field of expertise.

One of the best ways to improve your English is to learn it on the job, with supportive colleagues to practice with.

Employers can:

• Identify job vacancies where skills can be taught, and safe practices can be communicated to people with lower levels of English proficiency, by using interpreters or translations.

• Offer opportunities to learn and practice English in the workplace, with vocabulary relevant to your industry.

Make your recruitment processes free from bias and factors like name discrimination

Employers can:

• Give recruiters the tools to recognise and counter their own unconscious and conscious biases.

• Ensure recruitment procedures encourage diversity of thought when hiring decisions are made.

• Consider processes that de-identify applicants to some extent.