Hilton Worldwide has announced it aims to support at least one million young people ‘reach their full potential’ by 2019.
The initiative will focus on developing professional skills with mentorships, apprenticeships, and Hilton’s career awareness programme, Careers@HiltonLive. The group will also aim to employ apprentices across the group’s various divisions at more than 4000 owned, managed, and franchised hotels worldwide.
Hilton Worldwide president and CEO Christopher Nassetta said: “The talent gap is one of the most important issues facing businesses, governments and communities today, and it is a direct contributor to the youth unemployment rate. As one of the largest hospitality companies in the world, we are in a unique position to leverage our size, scale and expertise to close the gap and address this critical issue in a meaningful way.”
The group will focus the majority of its corporate social responsibility efforts on programmes and partners that connect, prepare, and employ young people around the world.
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As part of Hilton Worldwide’s global CSR strategy, ‘Travel with Purpose’, Hilton properties will host a month-long awareness campaign for hotels to connect with the youth visa job fairs, career guidance talks, and job shadowing to learn about careers in hospitality.
Hilton Worldwide will also be building relationships with more than 50 hospitality schools and universities around the world, and will offer professional development programmes to help train young hospitality professionals.
In 2013, Hilton Worldwide collaborated with the International Youth Foundation to build awareness and create opportunities for young people in the hospitality industry. The initiative was rolled out by hosting life skills training programmes in Saudi Arabia and South Africa, a global version will be rolled out in 2014.
Through the group’s Bright Blue Futures programme, team members will donate their time and expertise to help young people achieve stability, while the Teaching Kids to Care programme will connect team members to young people to teach them about sustainability.
According to research cited by Hilton Worldwide, more than 74 million young people are unemployed, and nearly 290 million are neither studying nor working. With travel and tourism considered the world’s single largest employer, the sector accounts for almost 10% of global employment, and is expected to generate 73 million new jobs by 2022.
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