Employers nowadays seek people with personal attributes such as creativity skills, problem-solving skills, teamwork skills, and personal improvement among others. In its commitment to enhance the capacity of job seekers and entrepreneurs to obtain and or to create work, the Centre for Information Technology and Development (CITAD) under Job Placement Information Services (JOPIS) unit on Thursday, 16th November, 2023 conducted a one-day training program on Entrepreneurship Openings and Job Application Process. The training program was part of the celebration of this year’s Global Entrepreneurship Week (GEW 23). The Global Entrepreneurship Week (GEW) is a global effort to address the problems of entrepreneurs and entrepreneurship. Each November, CITAD joins global communities in celebration of the innovators and job creators who launch startups that bring ideas to life, drive economic growth and expand human welfare. In his opening remarks, CITAD’s Human Resource Officer Malam Ibrahim Nuhu who represented the Executive Director of the organization at the program said that CITAD has initiatives that aimed to create jobs for youth especially young girls and other sector that face barriers and neglected by the society. He said that empowering young minds with skills and entrepreneurship opportunities is a great way of addressing poverty, unemployment and contribute to the bid of wealth creation.
Earlier, in his welcome remarks, Malam Sagiru Ado Abubakar briefed the participants about the activities of Job Placement Information Service (JOPIS) unit of CITAD. He explained that since its inception, the unit has impacted the lives of young people across the country. The main objective of the unit according to the unit coordinator is to help individuals to secure jobs, loans or grants from either governments initiatives, institutions, Industries, foundations and wealthy individuals to start their own businesses and become self-reliant. He then shared inspiring stories of young individuals CITAD supported through JOPIS engagement. He said that there are boundless of job opportunities but our people failed to secure due to lack of awareness, complex nature of application, zero skillset, fear of rejection and perceived lack of requirement. He lastly demonstrated job application processes and urged participants even if they don’t meet particular job requirements to draw attention of others. Suhail Sani Abdullahi, Technical officer of CITAD presented skills needed for workforce. He said the skills can vary based on the industry, job role, and the rapidly evolving nature of work. He shared soft skills such as communication skills, problem solving and critical thinking, teamwork and collaboration, interpersonal skills as basic requirement for workforce. He added that skills such as digital literacy, programming language, graphic design, machine operation could be hard skulls that have required even if someone possess Master Degree in particular relevant area.
Malam Garba Alhassan, CITAD Finance Officer provided practical training on plenty of entrepreneurship support sources for the aspiring entrepreneurs. He then urged them to develop entrepreneurial mindset especially with modern digital technology to become self-reliant. Hamza Ibrahim who served as master of the ceremony (MC) at the program drew attention of the participants on the remote jobs where people can work from home and earn money.
During session on questions and comments, participants have asked many questions and made comments and suggestions. Some of them appreciated CITAD for organizing the workshop while others observed that the next time a workshop like that will be organized, they want developing a cover letter, winning CV, employment interview techniques and business proposal writing be included as many participants especially who undergo Lenovo training in partnership with CITAD have sound business ideas but to carefully develop a proposal for them is a problem.
