SQM: A Global Company Seeking Opportunities for All

With more than 10 thousand direct and indirect employees in Chile and locations around the world, SQM promotes an internal culture of inclusiveness that favors diversity, non-discrimination and respectful treatment among every team member that makes up this mining company with five business lines for industries that are strategic for human development: technology, health and food.

In terms of advances in inclusiveness, today SQM has a Diversity and Workplace Inclusiveness Policy that covers all levels of the organization and seeks to generate equality and opportunities for all. It employs people of different ages, 30 nationalities, men and women from communities near its operations, and workers with disabilities. For all employees, it looks to create the opportunities and conditions necessary for each team member to develop personally and professionally.

Bárbara Blumell, Deputy Manager of People at SQM, remarked: “This policy fosters equal opportunity, valuing and evaluating people based on merit and performance. In this spirit, we have improved our selection processes to facilitate meritocracy, attracting diverse, talented people to the organization that are open to developing their soft and technical skills.”

The executive added, “We are looking to form heterogeneous teams and expand the female workforce at all levels throughout the organization. Today women represent 16.4% of our workforce, which is double the national average for the mining industry. This is a significant step forward that makes us proud and drives us to continue making progress in the same direction.”

Disability is one of the main pillars of our inclusiveness policy. This is why SQM is working on adapting its workplace conditions and spaces to facilitate the gradual incorporation of people with disabilities. “The initiatives we have fostered within SQM are aligned with the Inclusiveness Law, which mandates that 1% of a company’s employees be persons with disabilities. Beyond this legal obligation, we are moved as a company to create spaces for people with disabilities to join the workforce, generating equality of rights and responsibilities,” concluded Blumell.

Antofagasta Inclusiveness Fair

 SQM was among 20 companies participating in this initiative, a gathering place for promoting wellbeing and job opportunities for persons with disabilities.

At the inclusiveness event, SQM offered seven job openings for people with disabilities, and SQM’s People team gave a workshop on employability designed to develop participants’ soft skills for job interviews.

At the activity, which attracted over one thousand visitors, Pablo Pisani, Director of Communications, Sustainability and Public Affairs at SQM, explained that: “Three years ago, we began to do corporate work on inclusiveness, which has enabled us to comply with the law today, since SQM employs 54 persons with disabilities, surpassing the required 1%.”

The mining company is also working with several institutions on the social integration of people with physical and intellectual disabilities and people diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). One example is its joint work with Fundación Teaustimo through the “Carreteando por el Desierto” (Partying Through the Desert) program. This initiative enabled us to provide education and health professionals in María Elena with tools and good practices to help screen children for ASD at an early age. The program also has an on-site phase to train those closest to a person with autism in order to improve their quality of life.