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At Deloitte, there is an expectation that everyone will be provided with the same opportunities to reach their full potential, regardless of cultural differences. In particular we want to ensure that our culturally diverse talent can use their differing backgrounds and experiences to provide innovative solutions to our business. 
A Taste of Harmony is a fantastic celebration of cultural diversity which is an integral part of our firms’ culture. A Taste of Harmony is a perfect fit for our initiatives which are focused on creating a fair community for all people, while also providing opportunities for us to enjoy and celebrate our cultural diversity as a firm.
To us cultural diversity is about maximising people’s potential and capitalising on diversity rich perspectives and synergies that are a critical factor in business growth. This allows us as a culturally diverse firm to look at and analyse issues, problems and opportunities from a different perspective and encourage our people’s point of difference to innovate with new approaches, ideas and strategies.
Deloitte Australia is made up of people from many different backgrounds and cultures. We all learn and perform differently. Deloitte is committed to giving everyone in the firm, irrespective of background, religion or gender, the same opportunity to develop and grow to their full potential. We encourage everyone to share ideas, thoughts and opinions so that we can all learn from each other.
I was born in South Africa and raised in an Afrikaans family. I was schooled in Afrikaans and went to an Afrikaans university. I then joined Deloitte, a predominantly "English" firm in South Africa. Since then I have worked in the US before emigrating to Australia.
When I joined Deloitte the recruiting partner's decision to employ an Afrikaans speaker was not widely supported. Throughout the early stages of my career I had to deal with cultural prejudices and had to overcome many people’s expectations that I would be unable to adapt.
All our offices in Australia will be holding a morning tea or lunch to celebrate A Taste of Harmony which will be a fun way to celebrate the many diverse backgrounds represented at Deloitte. We will also be using 'story telling' as a method of communicating A Taste of Harmony around so that our people understand the riches of talent that we have within Deloitte