My message to the African Youth as the world commemorate the International Youth Day 2019. Theme: “Transforming Education”

Let me start with a blunt statement “Unfortunately our (African) governments are not very intentional to heavily invest in developing your innovative skills to fit in the future of work. In short, you are on your own for now” Therefore, this message is directly to you.
The theme for this year is “Transforming Education” and you are at the centre of it all. I hope you are not waiting for one government, one international agency or NGO to come transform how you learn, get educated and acquire skills if so then you won’t catch up with the fast moving world.

It is your responsibility dear African youth to work hard and break the rules. The marketplace is in need of forward thinkers, trailblazers who seek to set the tone that the marketplace requires. Look around you, do you think the average educational system has been structured to enable you do this?

As you face your future, transform yourself into that young person who deal with the difficult demands of today, who seek for more because you are not even close to the level of success and fulfillment you want. Strive to grow your personality, competence and mindset beyond your locality, become world-class, lead and create lasting impact beyond yourself

Seek what will transform you, increase your results and become a high performer because the world you are in does not and will not celebrate young people who produce average results and barely perform. So stop waiting for the day the educational system will be transform before you can transform, get up and own your future, succeed beyond the standard norms not only in the short term consistently over the long term.
Intentionally find ways to transform yourself and become the person who seek out problems and fix them, who tackle the most difficult challenges, who thinks and talk differently and even dress differently.

And as you do all these also grow in your tech abilities, the future of anything we are doing in the world right now is digital. This has proven itself as we have seen computers doing jobs that were once performed by people. Transform yourself to learn what the future employees really need.

“There’s also a desperate need to give our youth the skills they really need for the jobs of today and the future”. This is so serious that you cannot keep hoping that someone somewhere will make decisions that will enable you transform your education. Many of you are reading this meanwhile you studied subjects in school that have no relevance to our current job market, you need to transform yourself, develop personal learning styles and relevant skills acquisition model.

Look, as an African young person, if you want to live a life and career with meaning, significance in this present and future world, you need next level capabilities. From today, begin to intentionally invest in the most effective talent development activities with the future of work in mind. According to a WEF, “an estimated 15 to 20 million increasingly well-educated young people are expected to join the African workforce every year for the next three decades.” However, there is great difference between learning in higher institutions in Africa and the skills required for the workforce. And you know how our governments are slow to transform anything, so it is left to you.

Let me take this opportunity and celebrate some private universities. training companies, youth capacity building NGOs for the amazing work they have been doing to contribute and provide marketable skills to young people across Africa.

Let me end with this by Erin Cummings “At the end of the day, you are solely responsible for your success and your failure. And the sooner you realize that, you accept that, and integrate that into your ethic, you will start being successful. As long as you blame others for the reason you aren’t where you want to be, you will always be a failure”.

Javnyuy has spoken in over 1065 youth events across Africa for the last 8 years reaching out to thousands of youths in the areas of enterprise development, essential skills development, corporate excellence & personal productivity. Read more here about him www.joybert.com