SEATTLE — Technology allows the world to connect in new ways that were never thought to be possible. Now, the partnership of refugees and technology can make asylum countries feel more like a home instead of a temporary haven.

As Europe handles the biggest influx of immigrants in decades, many countries are struggling with effective integration, including providing refugees with adequate employment. By placing refugees who are valuable in the technology field into positions where they can apply their skill sets, they are able to integrate into society more easily while simultaneously providing needed technological resources to their new home country. Some countries have turned to recruiting agencies and training programs to better facilitate this transition.

The role of integration is crucial to a successful relationship between refugees and host countries. Displaced people arrive in European countries with a desire for employment so that they can give back and contribute to their new homes. Unemployed refugees in these countries live on the welfare of the government, creating a financial burden and wasting the talents and skill sets that they may bring.

Germany seeks to use the influx of immigrants to offset its own shrinking population. Chancellor Angela Merkel established a requirement for new immigrants to take mandatory German language classes. Despite this attempt at integration, language proficiency can take up to 18 months, leaving many refugees unable to successfully apply for a job without the needed language skills. Meanwhile, 43,000 jobs in Germany’s technology sector went unfilled in 2016 despite the arrival of 1.1 million immigrants. The inability to hire immigrants due to the language barrier, as seen by the number of unfilled jobs, ignores the talents of these incoming immigrants.

The inability to successfully place immigrants into jobs that match with their skill sets has prompted recruiting and training agencies across Europe to fill the void, with many being created by refugees themselves. MigrantHire, a technology recruiting company in Berlin, was created by Hussein Shaker, an IT specialist from Aleppo, Syria. His company operates with the idea that more refugees know English better than German and seeks to match refugees in the technology industry with companies that conduct business primarily in English, like Soundcloud and Mercedes-Benz. Even though MigrantHire has not officially launched, it has already produced two success stories and has the lofty goal of matching 10,000 refugees in the technology field in 2017.

Sync Accelerator is similar to Migrant Hire in concept and results. The Swedish recruiting agency works to help refugees and technology come together by matching prospective employees with appropriate jobs in the information and communications technology field. So far it has produced three success stories, mostly due to corporate trends of preferring free labor through internships.

The untapped market and the ability to invest in the next generation inspired some groups to teach specific skills for the technology industry. In Germany, a volunteer-run organization called Refugees on Rails teaches refugees how to code. Through their lessons, they can cultivate friendships, foster a sense of community, learn new languages, and learn marketable skills for work. The overarching goal is to provide proof to other European countries of the societal benefits that refugees and technology can produce.

In Finland, companies in the technology industry have followed suit with this model, notably Nord Software. The software development company gave support to the training initiative Integrify, a competitive program that works to integrate refugees into Finnish society by teaching them how to code through rigorous hands-on training.

The non-profit group TechFugees also provides hands-on training to integrate refugees and technology. Aided by the efforts of volunteers, it offers conferences, workshops, training modules, and hackathons for developers. It also created a Newcomer Bootcamp in Helsinki to teach refugees how to create, grow, and maintain small businesses. Startup Refugees, an organization in Finland that works to cultivate and ensure the success of startups, reported that 80 percent of refugees with whom it comes into contact have aspirations to start their own businesses.

An analysis of the Fortune 500, a list of the largest companies in the United States, further reiterates the entrepreneurial spirit of refugees and immigrants. Of the 500 companies on the list, more than 200 were started by immigrants or children of immigrants. The most notable company among this list is Apple, a company founded by Steve Jobs, himself the son of a Syrian refugee. The next big corporation that commands a presence on the global stage just might be the brainchild of a student from Aleppo who just happened to end up in Helsinki.

– Jeffery Silvey

Photo: Flickr