PURCHASE, N.Y., Jan. 16, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- PepsiCo, Inc.
(NASDAQ: PEP), The PepsiCo Foundation, the
philanthropic arm of one of the world's leading food and beverage
companies and nonprofit organization, the International Youth
Foundation (IYF), today announced the launch
of their Passport to Success®
Traveler program — an online, mobile-friendly
training course for students to learn and practice life
skills. Referred to by many names—soft skills, social-emotional
skills, essential skills, 21st century skills, power skills,
non-cognitive skills, work readiness skills—life skills include
self-confidence, responsibility, teamwork, and communication, and
they are necessary to enabling young people to succeed
at home, in school and on the job.
Life skills are increasingly essential to company
and employee success in today's rapidly changing,
globalized economy. According
to LinkedIn's latest Global Talent Trends
Report, 92 percent of talent
professionals surveyed said soft skills matter as
much or more than hard skills in the hiring process. Passport
to Success® Traveler addresses this skills need head-on by focusing
on areas of development that international experts agree are
critical, such as preparing youth to be able to manage conflict and
adept at critical and creative thinking.
Developed with a $2.5
million investment from The PepsiCo Foundation, Passport
to Success® Traveler is a mobile-first, game-based learning,
digital version of IYF's existing, printed soft skills
curriculum that is already used in classrooms
and workshops around the globe. Currently available in
American English and British English, Spanish, and Hinglish (a
blend of Hindi and English languages in Hindi with Roman
characters), with an Arabic version launching later in the year,
the 18-unit, 10-hour online curriculum is designed for
16-24-year-olds and features a range of lessons that include: how
to secure a job, manage personal finances, and master
social-emotional skills, including conflict management and
teamwork. The curriculum is designed with guidance from native
speakers to be culturally relevant and appropriate to each
market.
While these skills are increasingly important for success in the
workplace, a report from UNESCO in 2019 found that young women
and girls are more likely than young men to be excluded from
education; further, according to the International Labour
Organization, women and girls often lack access to vocational
education and skills training. A 2019 International Youth
Foundation and PepsiCo study conducted by the International
Center for Research on Women found that soft skills programs that
work for young women tend to encourage holistic youth development,
offer gender-smart programming and address societal norms that can
prevent women from succeeding in the workplace.
To support young women, Passport to Success® Traveler was
designed to be gender-smart and features scenarios with women
serving in positions of authority and in non-traditional
professional roles. In addition, the curriculum targets the
societal barriers impeding gender equality specific to each country
in which it will be offered. It emphasizes holistic youth
development, focusing on teaching skills that benefit young people
in all areas of life, to empower girls and young women toward
continuing education, sustainable livelihoods and workforce
success. The PepsiCo Foundation and IYF are working with
non-governmental organizations and nonprofits, public education
organizations, and communicating directly with young people to help
one million young women and girls access the curriculum by
2025.
"PepsiCo is proud to partner with the International Youth
Foundation to support this curriculum and help young women gain the
skills they need to enter today's workforce and be successful,"
said Blair Bennett, PepsiCo Senior
Vice President of Global Talent Acquisition. "At PepsiCo, we are
committed to raising the bar on talent and diversity and Passport
to Success® Traveler is one way for us to help create inclusive
environments and economic opportunity for young people around the
world."
"At IYF, we know that whatever the future of work holds, young
people—and especially young women—will guide its growth and
trajectory for decades to come," said Susan
Reichle, President & CEO of the International Youth
Foundation. "We also know diversity—and the innovation a diverse
workforce engenders—will be essential to the success of
organizations and corporations across sectors. That's why we
created Passport to Success® Traveler to help young women and men
unlock their potential."
The PepsiCo Foundation has invested nearly $9 million with IYF since 2014. In
addition to Passport to Success® Traveler, The PepsiCo
Foundation is working with IYF in Mexico to improve the work readiness skills of
female students in the country's public technical high school
system and supporting IYF's work in South
Africa to prepare young women for the workforce by
integrating life skills training into the country's college
system.
The PepsiCo Foundation's partnership with
IYF supports PepsiCo's goal to invest
$100 million by 2025 in initiatives
to provide 12.5 million women and girls around the world with
essential resources for workforce readiness and in programs that
empower women in the food system and farming.
The Passport to Success® Traveler curriculum is
available here. Media assets about this work are
available for download at https://pepsi.co/media.
About IYF
The International Youth Foundation® (IYF®) stands by, for, and with
young people. Founded in 1990 through a generous grant from the
W.K. Kellogg Foundation, IYF is a global nonprofit with programs
directly benefiting 7.7 million young people and operations
spanning 100 countries so far. We believe that educated, employed,
engaged young people possess the power to solve the world's
toughest problems, and we focus our youth
development efforts on three linked objectives: unlocking
agency, driving economic opportunity, and making systems more
inclusive. To learn more about the International Youth Foundation,
please join us at iyfnet.org.
About PepsiCo
PepsiCo products are enjoyed by consumers more than one billion
times a day in more than 200 countries and territories around the
world. PepsiCo generated more than $64
billion in net revenue in 2018, driven by a complementary
food and beverage portfolio that includes Frito-Lay, Gatorade,
Pepsi-Cola, Quaker and Tropicana. PepsiCo's product portfolio
includes a wide range of enjoyable foods and beverages, including
22 brands that generate more than $1
billion each in estimated annual retail sales.
Guiding PepsiCo is our vision to Be the Global Leader in
Convenient Foods and Beverages by Winning with Purpose. "Winning
with Purpose" reflects our ambition to win sustainably in the
marketplace and embed purpose into all aspects of the business. For
more information, visit www.pepsico.com.
About PepsiCo Foundation
Established in 1962, The PepsiCo Foundation works with nonprofit
partners and invests in the essential elements of a sustainable
food system – helping alleviate hunger, manage water and waste
responsibly, and support women as champions of nutrition from farm
to family.
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SOURCE PepsiCo, Inc.