Two big congratulations!!!
A special birthday wish to a supervisor and mentor but also my colleague and friend, Prof Kirk Semple Kirk T. Semple the proud Scotsman!!
I celebrate you sir for the many amazing things you do but especially for your incredible passion for Africa.
A second super congratulations to the 232 professionals from 17 African countries who completed the one-month Flexylearn International Career Coaching Program (ICCP) yesterday.
Now that you have completed the Career Code, may you be bright and may you be bold as I wish you success and career gold!!!
Join me this Thursday, Friday and Saturday for three incredible webinars you don't want to miss - see flyers for details!!!!
#africa #coaching #leadership #career #educationabroad #university
Is it strange that I honestly cannot remember what I did during my two months industrial attachment at the Nigerian Institute of Oceanography and Marine Research Nigeria in the second year of my first degree. It was that eventful🤣🤣
If you are an engineering student, you get to serve tea and coffees and if you are a business student, you can print the reports. But to even get the chance to serve tea and coffees, you must be the niece or nephew of the brother of the Aunty to the CEO. Na who know man!!!This narrative must change!!!
Little wonder over 80% of employers agree that lack of work experiences and employability skills is the single largest challenge they face with graduate employees!!
Yet all African universities have something in common: they have between 100 and 2,000 SMEs within and around them within a 1 kilometre radius. Talk of the potential for consulting and work experiences through paid work or volunteering!!!
Based on this, I have launched the Student Work Experience and Enterprise Program (SWEEP) and it's amazing to see over 20 Universities show interest in the strategic partnerships for the pilot program. We are moving fast.
Please congratulate the eight Year-2 students of Igbinedion University Nigeria: Chibueze, Etuk, Blessing, Lazarus, Mary, David, Emmanuella and Angel for joining the FlexyLearn Student Consulting Team. Together, let’s give other fellow students the work experiences they need!!!
If you want to involve your university in the SWEEP Initiative, send an email to info@flexylearn.com
The SWEEP Initiative....getting rid of unemployability dirts blocking our economic growth😊😊😊
#students #internship #universities #university #summerinternship #consulting #research #business
Congratulations to me!!!
Yesterday I took the day off with family and we completed the 8 km walk of the Ingleton Waterfalls Trail in Yorkshire England.
By 6 km we were all shattered but the fact that we were doing it together made it a lot easier to complete the last 2 km. It also coincided with my work anniversary of three years as a board member of the most reputable theatre and arts organisation in Lancaster - The Dukes!!!
You don't have to do it all by yourself. Seek help, seek partnerships, seek mentorship, seek guidance wherever you can. It’s more difficult to succeed and impact others if you are in a bubble!!
I am now compiling a huge portfolio of career questions people want answers to for a career support platform. So, if you have any career questions whatsoever, please drop it in my DM and I will try and respond to them as much as possible.
#career #partnerships #people #jobs #university #professionaldevelopment
When you aspire and perspire to acquire a desire you admire and require. If it backfires don’t retire but be inspired to re-fire!!!
They have come again!!!!
Have you ever attended a talk and felt 'motivated' with a buzz to go out and conquer the world. Then after three days you felt 'motiva' and then after one week all you felt was 'moti'. By the second week, you can't even remember anything from the 'aspire to perspire'. Back to square 1.
I learnt very quickly never to allow the need to 'plan' to jeopardise the need to 'start' or the need to be 'motivated' to affect the need to be 'activated'. You see what I mean??? They have come again!!
So on all my training sessions, I obsessively give simple action points in a simple list to my audience by way of exercises or activities. So you learn by doing!!
For instance, after reading this 'try describing your current and future professional self in 50 words each!!!! Yes try it.
It's an activity I gave last week to the over 220 professionals from 17 African countries currently on my Flexylearn International Career Coaching Program (ICCP). You need to see the huge responses and today I shared with them the secret to describing it well. They are having so much fun!!!😊😊
Why action points though?? This is so that if tomorrow you forget 'aspire to perspire', all you need is to look at my list and do the next thing it says. 😊😊
#coaching #leadership #leadershipdevelopment #career #future #success #goals #universities
Yesterday I received incredible news!!
I have been invited to submit a chapter in a prestigious new International Handbook on Graduate Employability.
SAGE Publishing, one of the world's most reputable publishing firms have contracted a group of international editors to publish the SAGE Handbook of Graduate Employability. This will be the first book offering a global and inclusive scholarly account of the subject matter of graduate employability.
Of all the numerous abstract submissions received, my chapter abstract titled 'Decoding the international student employability dilemma' has been chosen to appear as a chapter in this global book.
Considering my career coach journey is less than 3 years, this is a testimony to what perseverance, a heart to teach and a compulsion to learn can do. It is an amazing opportunity for me to showcase the unique African perspective of graduate employability in a first of its kind global book.
I am thankful indeed and hope this encourages someone to keep at it for open doors is around the corner!!!
How many of our African professors are open to new learning??
I hear many people say that African government must changed the educational curriculum. That our curriculum is old and useless. While that could be true, it's not mostly about the curriculum but its presentation.
That someone has a PhD doesn't mean they can teach or impart knowledge. I taught a module on the LLM Oil and Gas Program at Strathmore University, one of Kenya's best universities. To teach the students about getting oil and gas licenses, I made them form mock companies in groups, then they prepared and made an oil license bid presentation to a panel of experts one of whom was a senior government official at the ministry of petroleum. I arranged it and it was so practical and real that at the end of the module, some of the students started their own oil and gas firms.
In a visual world where social collaboration is a skill, how many of our African professors can bring their curriculum to life.
Watch here a production of a short film to present an academic project on 'Stimulating Entrepreneurial Thinking in Scientists (SETS) sponsored by the British Council. I had to learn this skill and knowledge - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wrn1QxE-J-w
Instead of learning enterprise by theory and allowing practise where possible, it should be learning enterprise by practice and then supported by theory for enhancement.
Make education fun and accessible.
Happy Africa Day all😊😊😊
Be fruitful and multiply!
Currently I am teaching several professionals from 7 African countries a module on Careers Enhancement and Resilience Training (CERT) on the Zürich Elite Business School Real World Skills MBA Program.
I gave a call for free scholarship to 100 persons on my new 1 month International Career Coaching Program. After so many applications, we decided to give 130 slots from 12 African countries the opportunity. Program starts next week Monday May 24th and all winners will be contacted this week.
Last week I chaired an African Union Scientific Research and Innovation Council (ASRIC) committee to develop a strategy for engagement with Africans in the Diaspora to develop Africa then delivered a talk on Africa graduate employability to over 50 UK Universities on the British Universities International Liaison Association (BUILA).
Tomorrow, working with Lancaster University and five African institutions from three countries, we launch a new British Council funded online program for African academics and researchers on 'Stimulating Entrepreneurial Thinking in Scientists (SETS). It will be free to African universities to use for their staff and student development. See flyer for details and to join session tomorrow click link on profile!!
The mission is AFRICA!!
Try and figure out your life and career mission because only then can you be truly fruitful and multiply!!
I am grateful and thankful always for the opportunities to be a blessing. You can be a blessing too!
I am giving you 1,000 USD!!
Or would you prefer the contact of someone who would offer you a resource worth 100,000 USD?
In 4 yrs of my BSc in Zoology at Uniben, I never visited the Dept. of Business or English even though I loved business and writing. Can you imagine!! In my 3 years PhD at Lancaster University studying worms, I won multiple business fellowships in Cambridge, Stanford US, the EU, all from visiting the Management School a lot.
African Science lecturers and students need to be enterprising for innovation yet don’t know anything about entrepreneurship because it is not in a science curriculum!!
Do you know there is no regulation in any University that stops a science student from sitting in a business lecture and vice versa? It’s just the exams you can’t take. So I asked many business professors ‘if a science student came to ask to sit in your business lecture, what would you say? Surprisingly, all of them said ‘they would oblige’. One even said ‘that would be my best student because they are not supposed to yet want to be in my class and other students are probably cursing me for all I know’ 🤣🤣
Being entrepreneurial is not just about setting up a business, it’s also about knowing how to get the resources you need. Funded by the British Council...Continue in comments.
It has been an absolute pleasure to be funded by the British Council and working with Lancaster University and four African university partners to develop an online course on ‘Stimulating Entrepreneurial Thinking in Scientists (SETS Digital). We are launching this Thursday May 20th 11am UK time (See flyer and to participate click link on profile -