By Enock Akonnor enockakonnor2013@gmail.com
A capacity building event of the No Business as Usual-Youth Empowerment Center (NBU-YEC) project dubbed “Career Day 2.0” was held successfully on Saturday 29th April 2023.
It aimed at equipping participants with knowledge on what employers require from job seekers and characteristic traits they need to possess to sustain jobs they acquire.
Career Day 2.0 targetted youth aged between 18-35 with diverse educational background especially trainees on the employability track as well as young people from other parts of Kumasi who are interested in starting their own business.
Successful entrepreneurs were brought on board as resource persons to interacted with the participants.
They offered them insights on what job opportunities exists in the Banking sector for graduates, Senior High School graduates as well as entry points into the sector.
Participants were also empowered on how to approach the budding private schools in their area to find job.
Career Day 2.0 also served as an opportunity for the audience to meet possible mentors who will provide continuous support in their career journeys.
Resources persons for the event were Mr. Joseph Antwi-Boama
(Banking Head, Access Bank, PLC),
Mrs. Evelyn Deladem Ansi ( Founder, Nurturing Dreams Ghana) and
Mr. Abdul Rashid Mohammed Emba ( Head Teacher, New Generation International School).
Stating the reason behind the event Madam Roberta Aryeetey, Coordinator, NBU-YEC project said in a concept note copied to the media that “Landing on a decent, well-paying job after school has become a herculean task for many tertiary level
graduates irrespective of the course studied.
This is beginning to make many Senior High School graduates
lose interest in furthering their education because of the rise in the number of unemployed graduates,
while a lot of young people are being pushed to look into the direction of entrepreneurship and acquisition
of handy skills. While these latter options are good ones, some youth do it out of idleness or boredom and
not necessarily passion to really start a business hence they end up with less focus or no determination
to make their businesses succeed, giving up at the least chance.
Though granted that jobs are hard to come by, it is also a slowly creeping in idea that young people are
not equipped to sustain the few jobs that they are able to acquire.
In some cases, the expectations of both
youth and the employers are not clear leading to a lack of satisfaction among parties.”
Mr. Joseph Antwi-Boama (Banking Head, Acess Bank, PLC) said at the event that employers have gone beyond the academic qualifications and are now looking at the soft skills a job seeker possesses.
He urged that employees should critically go beyond the academic qualification by enriching themselves with soft skills and values that can add up to the growth of an organisation.
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