Nanou: As someone who’s benefitted from Breaking Barriers’ support, I’m very pleased to meet its founder! Could you tell me what led you to set up Breaking Barriers in the first place?
Matt: It’s great to meet you too, Nanou! So, while I was doing a Master’s degree in International Development at the London School of Economics, I did a research project on the integration outcomes of refugees in the UK. This led me to understand how little support was available to help refugees integrate into society once they had been granted asylum status, and this provided the foundations for why Breaking Barriers needed to exist.
Speaking to refugee communities, it was clear how much demand there was for work experience alongside advice and training. And I became increasingly interested in the active role businesses could play in helping refugees access work. I began talking to individuals and NGOs across the refugee sector and realised that nobody was specialising in working with companies in this way. So, I decided I needed to try to do this myself.
Nanou: Looking back, a decade later, how do you feel the voice and lived experience of refugees and migrants has continued to shape Breaking Barriers’ development?
Matt: The perspectives and needs of refugees have always been at the heart of Breaking Barriers. Right from the early days, when I was working from my parents’ kitchen table. I was helping refugees face-to-face, one-to-one, and the support I provided was inevitably shaped by their experiences and goals.
As Breaking Barriers grew, we created an Ambassador Council to make sure we understood each client’s needs and got their feedback. This continued to shape the services we offered.
One great example is how our approach changed following the COVID pandemic. Like many organisations, we had to adapt how we worked with our clients during lockdown. But, crucially, we got feedback that many clients preferred receiving support online. This led to the creation of the hybrid model Breaking Barriers has now. Individual advice sessions and workshops with corporate partners may be run in person or online. This has increased the number of people Breaking Barriers can support, and its impact for refugees across the UK.
Nanou: Looking back, what moment or achievement are you most proud of in Breaking Barriers’ journey?
Matt: I think it has to be early on, when I helped my first client to get a work placement at a law firm called Mishcon de Reya. I was so happy for them. This was also proof that my idea of building relationships with companies and helping them to see the benefits of hiring refugees, really could work.
Another highlight was the launch of our partnership with IKEA in 2017. We teamed up with the retailer to improve employment prospects for refugees living in the UK through a pilot Customer Service Course programme in their Tottenham, Croydon, Wembley and Greenwich stores.
This includes IKEA offering permanent jobs for Breaking Barriers clients. More than 150 refugees have received support from the partnership between Breaking Barriers and IKEA, with 29 gaining permanent jobs. The success of the pilot scheme cemented IKEA’s global commitment to hire refugees in all its operating countries and has since been replicated many times over. For a young, start-up organisation to be partnering up with a global retailer on the scale of IKEA was an incredible experience and one that we learnt so much from.
Nanou: I imagine your whole experience of starting and growing an organisation like this was full of learning. But if you could have given yourself one piece of advice when you first started Breaking Barriers, what would it be?
Matt: I’m not actually sure I’d want to give my 2015 self any advice. Because, if I’d known then what I know now, I may never have started! At first, it was a huge struggle to get anyone to believe in my vision of bringing refugees and businesses together to create employment opportunities. I was working by myself, without a track record, and trying to secure funding was so hard. I had to swallow rejection after rejection and keep on going until someone finally gave me a chance to prove my approach could work. Then I had to convince some of London’s biggest companies that hiring refugees would be good for them. But perhaps that means the advice I’d give myself would be “don’t take ‘no’ for an answer”.
Nanou: After all the time you spent helping refugees to access work, and immersed in Breaking Barriers’ mission, what does meaningful employment mean to you?
Matt: For me, meaningful employment is where a person’s skills and interests align. I have always been entrepreneurial from a young age, and I always wanted to start and run my own business. In my early twenties, I became intellectually fascinated by the topic of migration and, specifically, forced displacement. Setting up Breaking Barriers allowed me to combine my entrepreneurialism with my passion for a subject I had a deep intellectual interest in.
Ciara Devlin, Breaking Barriers CEO
Nanou: The theme for this year’s Refugee Week was ‘Community as a Superpower’, and I shared my thoughts on the importance of community in a blog for Breaking Barriers. But why do you think community so important to refugees?
Ciara: For all of us, having a community is important. Whether that’s our relatives, friends, neighbours, colleagues or our work networks. Community is about human connection, security, stability and resilience in the face of life’s challenges.
Most of the time, when refugees are forced to flee their homes, they leave everything behind – their house, belongings, traditions, language, work, and everyone they know. And they come to a new country where everything is different and, for most, they don’t know anyone. It is a very lonely and isolating experience.
So, for refugees, finding a community is incredibly important. It doesn’t just help to overcome isolation and trauma. It helps to build cultural understanding, language, confidence and a sense of belonging. It also helps to open doors, including doors to networks and job opportunities.
Nanou: In my role as a Lived Experience Consultant, I’ve been involved in many projects at Breaking Barriers – from reviewing organisational policies to devising communications. I strongly believe my firsthand experience of the immigration system can drive empathy and impact. But how do you feel that feedback from Breaking Barrier’s clients has change the way services are designed and delivered?
Ciara: One of Breaking Barriers’ values, and arguably our most important one, is being ‘mission led’. This means that we put people with lived experience of seeking sanctuary or forced migration to the UK at the heart of our work and mission.
And our Lived Experience Strategy helps us to go beyond that. To be more effective as a charity, we consult people with lived experience to produce our solutions and strategies. Their contributions help us adapt to evolving challenges and remain responsive to the needs of our clients.
And of course, there is our brilliant panel of Lived Experience Consultants, like you. Many of whom are, or have been, clients. The Lived Experience Panel (LEP) was established in July 2023, and has contributed at all levels to the organisation. Last year alone, it provided 450 hours of consultancy support. A key project was advising and inputting on our sector-leading integration of RefuAid’s Language and Re-accreditation Programmes. This integration has allowed us to extend our reach to clients nationally, improving our employment support and expertise, and creating clearer streams of support for refugees.
More widely the LEP’s contribution has improved the way we work, for example the consultants have provided feedback on policies and documents to ensure that information is accessible and jargon-free. And earlier this year, the LEP’s contribution helped senior leaders draft Breaking Barriers’ new Theory of Change – an important document that will form the backbone of the organisation’s new strategy.
Nanou: Where would you like to see BB’s Lived Experience Panel in the long run?
Ciara: Our Lived Experience Strategy sets out how the views and experiences of our community of clients shape the way we work. In the long-run, I want to see us take this even further and have lived experience embedded at a leadership and governance level. And I want to see more people with lived experience progressing into .
Nanou: I spend much of my time campaigning for dignity and justice for people who face hostile immigration policies. So, I’m interested to know how you think these policies affect refugees’ employment prospects, and what else you believe needs to change to create fairer opportunities for refugees and people from a forced migration background?
Ciara: Many changes are needed to create equitable employment practices, and this is why it is so important that employers do not turn their backs on DEI initiatives. These initiatives recognise that not everyone is starting from the same place, and that companies must acknowledge and adjust practices in order to address the imbalances.
Equitable hiring and workplace systems are incredibly important for refugees because of the many barriers to employment they face, including language, unfamiliarity with job application processes and with the UK workplace culture.
These barriers are exacerbated by rules that stop asylum seekers from working until their application is processed, unless they are among the rare few who are eligible for employment on the Shortage Occupation List. As you know, some people wait years to receive a response to their application. This is a long time to live in limbo, unable to work, facing financial insecurity and all the while the gap on their CV widens, making re-entry into work even harder.
This is why Breaking Barriers is a member of the Lift the Ban coalition – a campaign urging the government to allow asylum seekers to work after six months of submitting their asylum application. This change would help create a fairer system for people from a forced migration background.
Nanou: Where do you envision Breaking Barriers 10 years from now and what are the biggest opportunities and challenges you foresee?
Ciara: In terms of opportunities and challenges, an exciting one with potential is AI. Adopting AI is critical and opens up many opportunities for the way we work, how we deliver our services and even how our clients engage with employers and apply for jobs. This is something that the team at Breaking Barriers has started to think about, and we look forward to growing our knowledge and expertise in this area.
Another challenge, and a more difficult one to address, is the current socio-economic climate. This includes the negative rhetoric we regularly see in the media and hear from politicians about refugees and asylum seekers, the dismantling of DEI initiatives that aim to bring equity to many underrepresented communities and increasing funding challenges that have been exacerbated by cuts to international aid.
However, alongside these challenges are many opportunities to make a difference by building our network of like-minded businesses and organisations. This includes getting involved with sector-led advocacy campaigns, such as the one run by the Lift the Ban coalition and connecting with companies that have a genuine commitment to supporting refugees. This collaborative approach is one of our fundamental values and is mutually beneficial for all involved.
It would be wonderful to imagine that, by 2035, Breaking Barriers is no longer needed — because refugees face a more level playing field when it comes to finding meaningful employment. While that remains an aspiration, the reality today is very different. My vision for Breaking Barriers is for us to be supporting many more refugees, in more communities across the UK, to achieve their career aspirations and rebuild their lives. And for businesses to increasingly recognise and understand that employing refugees isn’t just the right thing to do morally — it also makes strong business sense. The UK economy stands to benefit greatly from the diverse skills, perspectives, and experience they bring.
