PMI Social Impact Award 2025 Winners
- On-the-spot interviews – and in many cases, immediate job offers.
- Wrap-around support, such as childcare, translators, and emotional wellbeing services.
- Help with CV writing and interview coaching.
- Volunteer teams speaking multiple languages, sign-language interpreters, and fully accessible venues.
Worldspan Wins PMI Social Impact Award for Project Sunflower
We are thrilled to announce that Worldspan has been honoured with the Project Management Institute (PMI) Social Impact Award 2025 in recognition of our work on Project Sunflower, delivered in partnership with Indeed.
At the PMI Awards ceremony in Phoenix, Arizona, our Managing Director, Sophie Morris, accepted the award on behalf of our team. This recognition is a powerful validation of how events – when designed and executed with empathy, precision, and purpose – can create real social change.
What's more, Project Sunflower was also named finalist for the prestigious PMI Project of the Year where Worldspan and Indeed were shortlisted to the top three projects out of more than 200 global entries.
Bringing Job Opportunities to Those Who Need Them Most
When the war in Ukraine escalated, Indeed invited us to support an urgent and ambitious mission: to help displaced refugees access work through large-scale hiring fairs. What started as two pilot events in Poland swiftly evolved into a six-city European programme, spanning Paris, Berlin, London, Amsterdam, Milan and Dublin.
We centred the experience around candidate care, offering far more than a traditional job fair. Every event included:
Real Impact, Measurable Results
Over the course of the six events, Project Sunflower supported 6,939 refugees, of whom 4,274 participated in interviews, and 426 left the event with job offers. More than 1,100 CVs were created on-site, and over 240 employers attended, offering a wide range of vacancies.
Indeed’s ongoing commitment is equally inspiring: they’ve pledged to support 15,000 refugees over the next three years. Together with our NGO partners – including UNHCR and the Tent Partnership for Refugees – we’re building on the momentum to help even more individuals find meaningful work.
"Project Sunflower is a beautiful illustration of how purpose-driven project management can shape the future at scale. At PMI, we love seeing our profession and principles leveraged to create meaningful impact around the world, and we are thrilled to champion the work of Worldspan, Indeed, and this truly inspiring initiative. Project Sunflower demonstrates the agility, adaptability, and rigor that project professionals bring to solving real-world challenges" Project Management Institute.
A Truly Collaborative Effort
Success for Project Sunflower was grounded in collaboration: we coordinated with Indeed, local NGOs, governments, and a network of volunteers across all six cities. Our project management structure blended local autonomy with central oversight, enabling us to adapt quickly while maintaining alignment on the project’s core mission.
Sophie Morris reflects on the journey:
“Receiving the PMI Social Impact Award for Project Sunflower is a shining moment for our team. This wasn’t just about putting on events — it was about transforming lives. Working side by side with Indeed and our partners, we harnessed the power of events to make a real difference.”
What This Means for Worldspan
This award reinforces Worldspan’s belief in the potential of events to drive social change. It’s a reminder that our expertise in logistics, creative production, and stakeholder engagement can be scaled not just for business outcomes, but for purpose-driven impact.
We’re deeply grateful to Indeed, UNHCR, the Tent Partnership for Refugees, local governments, and everyone who supported Project Sunflower. And we couldn’t be prouder of the Worldspan team – your compassion, dedication, and professionalism made this possible.