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Global challenges remain to transpire; it is an undisputable sign of the times. For this reason, Deloitte has been adamant this past year in confirming its commitment to helping others and making a consistent impact that matters. With ingenuity and resilience our teams have worked diligently to support shaping better futures in the evolving and dynamic work environment of today.

Our people

While much has changed over the past year, Deloitte does not waver from our commitment to support and inspire our people.

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For over 10 years, the Deloitte Chief Information Officer (CIO) Program has globally showcased Deloitte's commitment to serving our clients by enabling CIOs to stay ahead of the curve whilst facing new challenges and growing demand.

In May, we officially launched Deloitte's flagship Middle East NextGen CIO program in Riyadh. The program included 6 aspiring CIOs from key industry sectors, namely public, private, TMT, and FSI clients in the region. The main aim of the program was to help our clients develop their next generation of leading CIOs.

This exciting leadership development program has been designed exclusively for aspiring CIOs and focuses on building the qualities essential to all facets of the role, such as transitioning to become a CIO, CIO-CFO relationship, digital transformation, cyber security, and managing relationships with the board. The program managed to enlighten participants with an in-depth CIO's perspective on how their journey has evolved over the span of 30 years. One of our NextGen CIO program participants stated: "We all have faced similar challenges in our organizations. However, this program has transformed our understanding of how we can evolve to be better leaders of the future."

The program was designed to run for several days with 10+ intense in-person sessions followed by insight sessions focusing on Deloitte's flagship publications. The program speakers included Deloitte leaders as well as leading senior speakers including board members, CEOs, and CIOs who shared their experiences with C-suite executives and management roles. The sessions enhanced the participants' knowledge and understanding of some of the key elements required to fulfill and execute the role of a CIO in today's evolving and dynamic work environment.

The NextGen CIO program continues to contribute to the success stories of this region by bringing together larger groups of aspiring CIOs who will enable our clients to rise and serve their organizations better.

Empowering youth with the skills they need to succeed and thrive in a challenging world just makes sense. This is why Deloitte Middle East joined forces with UNICEF this past year to empower less privileged youth, university students, dropouts, and/or unemployed graduates, with digital upskilling through a coding bootcamp called Future Coders. Because in the end, we know that education can transform weakness into strength, and essentially, boost confidence and the power to flourish in an ever-competitive world.

With the increase in demand for coding and web development services across the region, as well as globally, this bootcamp was designed to address this need by boosting this demographic's employability through coding and soft skill training. The bootcamps are delivered in person and online aiming to address the current challenges imposed by the economic crisis in Lebanon; the online aspect aids in tackling high transportation costs so students from all around the country can benefit from this valuable opportunity.

Deloitte Middle East, in collaboration with UNICEF, encouraged 130 young women and men in Lebanon between the ages of 18-25 (of which 50% were female) to join the Future Coders career program over the duration of 6 months. Upon program completion, the graduates are able to acquire 10 foundations of computer science courses, up to 6 intensive full-stack web development bootcamp courses, and soft skills mentoring, aiming to increase their chance for job opportunities and potential careers in the Lebanese market and abroad. This will not only allow them to earn a potentially higher income and enable them to thrive on all levels, but also strengthen their resilience in the local deteriorating socio-economic conditions. UNICEF will be delivering the results along with SE Factory, which has been running coding bootcamp programs to empower low-income youth through digital upskilling by building both coding skills and soft skills to boost their chances for employment. This program is in line with Deloitte global WorldClass ambition to empower 100 million futures by 2030. The intention is to fully prepare young Lebanese people for a world of opportunities by equipping them with the armour they need to survive in modern society. Investing in this demographic is a positive way to reach out and help in creating futures that matter. At Deloitte, we know that investing in education and skills is always the answer.

Here at Deloitte, investing in the next generation has always been a priority of ours. And since existing educational institutions – schools, colleges, and universities – are struggling to equip young people with the skills needed for the evolving economy and careers that span different digital eras, we at Deloitte decided to design, develop, and launch a solution to bring the future of work into today.

Our pioneering BrightStart program marked the start of our exciting journey to "reinvent" how we invest in young Saudi talent. Ambitious and innovative high-school graduates were asked to join our business as apprentices for a four-year program and immerse themselves within the digital ecosystem delivered by our world-class consultancy service line in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

This unique earn-while-you-learn opportunity allows high-achieving high-school graduates to acquire outstanding professional training by working on real-world projects 3 to 4 days each week, all while pursuing a bachelor's degree. In this way, the program reimagines the education to employment pathway and combines the best of both worlds: a degree and real-world experience!

Since its launch in 2020, the firm has employed three cohorts of BrightStart, totaling 49 apprenticeships across our five consulting portfolios. Many apprentices have obtained internationally-recognized professional qualifications from industry leaders, such as AWS and SAP. It's successes like these that clarify why the program is increasingly gaining external recognition from reputable entities, such as the Misk Foundation and the Saudi British Joint Business Council.

Moreover, as an organization committed to diversity and inclusion, we at Deloitte make a considerable effort to ensure this opportunity is open to the broadest cross-section of Saudi youth as possible. This is reflected by the fact that 58% of our latest acceptances are female and 54% come from cities and villages outside of the country's capital, Riyadh.

Overall, we see our BrightStart program as a powerful way to contribute meaningfully to KSA's Vision 2030 agenda and we are excited to see where this journey of youth investment will take our firm and the wider future of work and talent ecosystem in Saudi.

When the news broke out about the catastrophic floods in Pakistan, resulting in millions of people displaced and homes and major infrastructure destroyed, Deloitte was ready to provide support and assistance to this humanitarian crisis at hand.

Consequently, Deloitte donated to the Pakistan Humanitarian Crisis through UNICEF, a donation that will impact 5,000 children.

Deloitte's contribution was directed towards education relief in the form of recreational/ educational kits, which essentially help to support psychosocial activities for children who are always the most vulnerable and require the utmost support in such humanitarian crises.

A child's right to education is highly at risk during emergency situations and the transitional phase thereafter. In the end, education isn't simply a basic human right, it is an instrumental strategy to support recovery. The re-establishment of education not only protects a child's fundamental right to education, but also plays a vital role in normalizing their environment, which in turn aids them to overcome the psychosocial impact of such disasters.

These educational kits, supported by Deloitte, were designed to enable UNICEF and its implementation partners to immediately create activities for children in Pakistan who have been devastatingly affected. These educational and recreational activities were created for both children and adolescents; they involve games and sport activities to support the release of energy and anxiety through physical play. They also promote the development of important life-skills such as teamwork, cooperation, negotiation, empathy, and anger and stress management in addition to the building of networks and trusting relationships.

Internal initiatives by Deloitte Middle East professionals across the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, and Qatar have also been part of the Pakistan Floods Relief support campaigns. Clothing, linens, and shoes were gathered internally, and professionals donated these items on their own behalf for this worthy
cause.