CGI is one of the largest IT and consulting firms in the world, and its employees or ‘partners’ are shareholders from day one. To reflect this, CGI wanted a campaign to show it was “Unconditionally Inclusive”, that CGI partners are seen and supported whatever their background or identity. Although most partners knew that the company was strong on DEI, the video needed to establish connections that were not just shared, but felt.

Telling partners ‘Don’t Hold Back’, they were asked to tell their stories directly. The star of the video is Adam, who is neurodivergent and experiences challenges during a job interview. The viewer sees his interior thoughts, doubts, self-encouragement and distractions and how these run alongside the external conversations. By showing what goes on behind the scenes for Adam, this shows that employees do not need to hold themselves back in the workplace.

The campaign has since been supported with more real-life stories from CGI partners and has generated substantial engagement on organic social media. Visits to the DEI landing page went up by 888% and the video was viewed more than 13,600 times. Many people who had not engaged with the company LinkedIn page in six months engaged and interacted with the video.