Itaú Unibanco : Recruiting diversity

Job listings symbolise opportunities of equality.

The Site

Itaú Unibanco, a Brazil-based financial services group, identifies posts within its current vacancies listing that target candidates with disabilities.

Itaú Unibanco has an area of its careers section devoted to information for people with disabilities (Pessoas com Deficiéncia). The page indicates that the bank has a hiring programme for this group as part of a commitment to diversity and equal opportunities and includes the standard range of buttons that lead to services on the bank’s external recruitment site.

The Jobs (Vagas) button leads to a table of current vacancies showing job titles with opening date and a summary description. Several are marked by a blue-and-white wheelchair symbol, though few of them indicate in the job title that they are specific to people with disabilities. The job descriptions related to these appear similarly inclusive.

The Takeaway

Itaú Unibanco would not be alone in running a positive discrimination recruitment programme and declaring itself an equal opportunities-minded employer. It may just be unique, though, in the level of visibility it gives within its online jobs service to the programme and its ‘equal opportunity’ vacancies.

While the site’s central listing is not searchable other than by scrolling, Itaú’s use of the universally-recognisable blue-and-white sign for a disabled people’s facility introduces a category not normally identified however sophisticated the job search engine. If the marking of posts whose titles do not indicate they are programme-specific is a way of encouraging those with a disability to apply, then the bank really is reinforcing its claims as an equal opportunities employer.

First published on 06 April, 2010