For Professionals, Referring Partners & Cooperation Partners
Professional Information on the Program, Target Group, and Potential Collaboration
Tailored Pathways – Women into Employment and Training
A bridging programme for career orientation, skills development, and the sustainable participation of women in vocational training and the labour market.
Find Your Direction. Recognise Your Strengths. Build Your Future.
For women with refugee backgrounds, developing a career pathway can be a key step towards greater independence, security and participation in society. Career orientation and labour market integration are often closely linked to language skills, educational background, family responsibilities, childcare, residence-related matters, recognition of qualifications, psychosocial stability and individual circumstances.
Passgenau addresses this intersection directly. The project supports women in developing a realistic understanding of their career opportunities, recognising and showcasing their existing strengths and skills, building confidence in their own decisions, and preparing their next steps in a structured way.
The aim is to create a sustainable pathway to integration that goes beyond short-term placement and enables viable personal and professional futures. Both professional requirements and individual circumstances are taken into account equally.
Target Group and Typical Needs
Passgenau is aimed at women with refugee backgrounds in the Rhine-Main region who need support with career orientation, entering or re-entering the workforce, and developing a sustainable personal and professional future.
The programme is particularly suited to women who want to develop a realistic understanding of their career opportunities in Germany, return to work after periods of family responsibilities or longer interruptions, pursue a new career direction or further qualification, or need support with applications, job searches and interviews.
The programme can also support women who want to strengthen their language, digital, professional or employment-related skills, have questions about childcare, family matters, public authorities, residence status, work permits, recognition of qualifications, or asylum and residence-related issues, or are experiencing psychosocial challenges that affect their everyday lives, stability or career development.
Professional Approach
Passgenau takes a strengths-based, person-centred, women-specific, language-sensitive, social-pedagogical and labour market-oriented approach. The starting point is each participant’s individual circumstances, including her educational and employment background, existing skills, language proficiency, legal circumstances, family responsibilities, personal challenges, career goals, and the specific requirements of Germany’s education, vocational training and labour market systems.
Based on this, realistic pathways forward are developed and prepared step by step. The aim is not to move women prematurely into just any next step, but to build sustainable pathways through guidance, skills and strengths assessment, further qualification, empowerment, stabilisation and support during transitions.
The core of the approach lies in combining counselling, education, social-pedagogical support, empowerment and transition management. The programme supports women in recognising their own strengths, expanding their options, better understanding requirements, making informed decisions and taking concrete steps towards employment, vocational training, school, university, further qualification or continuing education.
At the same time, Passgenau recognises that labour market integration is closely linked to self-confidence, social stability, an understanding of relevant systems, language skills, digital competence, balancing family and work, and participation in society. The approach therefore focuses not only on placement, but on sustainable transitions, greater independence, and a viable long-term personal and professional future.
Areas of Development and Support
Passgenau focuses on key areas of development that are essential for sustainable integration into society, education and employment. Support is tailored to each participant’s individual starting point, educational and employment background, existing skills, and personal and legal circumstances.
Depending on individual needs, support may include career guidance, strengths and skills assessment, individual training and career pathway planning, application coaching, transition management, as well as professional, language, digital and employment-focused training opportunities.
In addition, support may include employment-oriented language training, exam preparation, basic computer and IT skills, social, intercultural and employment-related competencies, as well as social-pedagogical and psychosocial support for integration-related issues.
Multilingual and Language-Sensitive Support
Language barriers are a significant factor in the integration process. That is why counselling, guidance and support through Passgenau are language-sensitive and, depending on availability, provided in multiple languages. The aim is to ensure that important information is understood, requirements can be properly assessed and sustainable decisions can be made.
Available languages include German, English, Farsi/Dari, Pashto, Turkish and Arabic.
Preparing for and Supporting Successful Transitions
A career transition involves more than a successful application. For women with refugee backgrounds in particular, entering employment, vocational training, further qualification or continuing education can involve a range of simultaneous demands: professional language, workplace communication, digital processes, legal matters, mobility, childcare, family responsibilities, dealing with public authorities and personal challenges.
Passgenau therefore supports women not only with career guidance and placement, but also in preparing for and stabilising transitions. Career goals, training needs, existing skills and suitable pathways forward are brought together so that transitions do not happen by chance, but are professionally prepared and supported for the long term.
Impact and Objectives
Passgenau aims to strengthen women with refugee backgrounds in their professional, social and personal development. Participants should gain a better understanding of their opportunities, build on their existing skills, develop confidence, overcome barriers, gain greater confidence in navigating Germany’s education, vocational training and labour market systems, and develop realistic perspectives for the future.
Impact is reflected not only in successful placements. It is also evident when women become more confident and capable of taking action, recognise their own strengths, gain a better understanding of their rights and opportunities, articulate their goals more clearly, manage application processes more independently, strengthen their digital and language skills, gain greater stability in challenging circumstances, and take the next step towards greater independence and participation in society.
Project Information
Status: Ongoing Project
Project Start: 2021
Current Programme Period: 01/01/2026 – 12/31/2026
Target Group: Women with refugee backgrounds from the Rhine-Main region
Format: One-to-one counselling, coaching, group sessions, discussion groups, workshops, specialist modules and career-focused qualification support
Key Areas: Career guidance, strengths and skills assessment, training and career pathway planning, empowerment, social-pedagogical stabilisation, application coaching, transition management, language support, basic computer and IT skills, exam preparation and participation in society
Languages Available for Counselling: German, English, Farsi/Dari, Pashto, Turkish and Arabic
Funding Notice:
The project is funded through the Vocational Training and Qualification Budget of the State of Hesse. The Youth and Social Affairs Office of the City of Frankfurt am Main contributes co-financing.
