Youth Empowerment Training – Machakos Edition

With a large number of youth not sure of what the future holds and having no clear plan of how to engage in income generating activities or how to seek and prepare for employment, IIE Kenya and Nascent Prospects embarked on a training programme targeting to train the youth on skills that would prepare them for employment or entrepreneurship.

Participants

We had a total of 49 youth in attendance, 28 male and 21 female. They were aged between 16 and 35 years.

Topics Covered

• Understanding individual personalities in relation to career choices.
• Setting of visions and goals. This included having each youth drawing a personal vision board.
• Career guidance, what employment, entrepreneurship and outreach entail.
• Identifying consumer needs and gaps within the marketplace.
• Expanding their market reach as entrepreneurs, value addition to already existing products.
• Youth and social environment, understanding the importance of youth as change agents within the family, community and country.
• The role of youth in governance and how to improve the community.

Reflections on the training sessions

• What do you do? Nothing!!

Out of the 49 participants, 29 were not involved in any economic activity. That is 59% of those in attendance.

According to the participants the general cause was that they lacked skills and capital to become entrepreneurs.  They also stated that there was a shortage of jobs in the market for them to get employed. Available jobs were for the few who were privileged who knew someone influential or had destiny helpers.

• Why not start a business at a small scale?

The youth felt that to succeed in business it would be ideal to open their businesses in the next town – Tala. They believed the community has the mentality that to get good quality products they need to travel all the way to Tala.

• Do you apply for jobs? No!!

The youth believe there is no need to apply for jobs if they do not have connections (Someone on the inside to push the application). Even when they have qualifications, they do not attempt.

Requests

We received various requests from the youth to support them in various ways. Some were interested in joining colleges while others were seeking to get employment. We were very clear that we did not have funding to pay anyone’s fees, nor did we have jobs to offer.

OUTCOMES TO OUR INITUAL QUESTIONS

• There is definitely a need for IIE-Kenya and NP to create a framework for youth trainings throughout the Lower Eastern Counties that will promote entrepreneurship and prepare the youth for the job market. From this small sample set we saw a lack of knowledge on goal setting, employability preparations e.g CV writing etc.
• Those venturing into entrepreneurship and those prospecting or seeking employment can be trained together. This is advisable in foundation topics. As these are interactive sessions, the input from different participants is eye opening as they learn from each other based on the different ways they view opportunities around them and the way they tackle challenges faced.

Closing

Two participants, a male and a female gave a vote of thanks. They emphasized the joy they felt as they had learnt a lot of lessons and they had definitely gotten an attitude change.

 The closing address was given by the church’s Senior Pastor, Pastor Ali who was very grateful for the training. He shared how he has a group of boys who he is keeping engaged through games, specifically football. The church also has a group of single mothers who are encouraged to be positive and work towards a brighter future. Pastor Ali invited us to return and train them on some skills. The participants were happy with the training and urged us to return and train them some more.