Empowering African youths through technology and leadership

If you are planning for a year, sow rice; if you are planning for a decade, plant trees; if you are planning for a lifetime, educate people —Chinese proverb

In most African countries, including Nigeria, business education spiced with technological training, is something that is privy to few people. For African youths to grow and be globally competitive, they need long-term entrepreneurial education and innovative investments. This is properly captured by Dr Akinwunmi Adesina, president of the African Development Bank, when he said, “It is time for Africa leaders to move from youth empowerment to youth investment.”

One of the few African youths that has taken it upon himself to solve the unemployment, leadership and entrepreneurial challenges among African youths, is Ridwan Rasheed, co-founder of IderaOS. With his non-profit organisation, ZeroToOne Foundation, that is increasingly becoming a pan-African force to reckon with, he and his team have been changing the bleak leadership and entrepreneurial narrative of Africa in their own ways.

By leveraging technology to  redefine  the  concept of leadership, employability and  entrepreneurship,  the Nigerian-based ZeroToOne Foundation is  changing  the  dismal  status  quo  by triggering  new  and  diverse  conversations  within  the  youth  cycle, enabling innovation and supporting new opportunities. Every year, since its inception in 2918, the foundation identifies and develops young people from several communities across Africa, empowering them with the right skills to lead personal and social change.

One of the ways Rasheed empowers youths is through the ZeroToOne High Impact Leadership Fellowship programme, which was inspired by his personal experience with poverty and unemployment. “I discovered that most of our current educational structures and curriculum are not preparing talented young people for opportunities that exist today and those of the future. The world’s needs are changing and our education is not changing with it,” he said.

The fellowship programme, which is a six-week online programme and is completely free, is open to undergraduates or recent graduates from African countries. To be considered for the fellowship, the applicant must have shown potential for innovation and leadership, and must be self-motivated.

Over 6000 applications from about 30 African countries applied in the last (third) edition of the fellowship, which ended early this year. “For better learning experience and follow-up, we had to screen the applications to 100. It is not about the numbers, but about how much impact we can make, which can be replicated across board,” Rasheed said.

He noted that the testimonies they have been receiving from the alumni/fellows of the programme are amazing. He further noted that even before the end of the programme, the fellows had started implementing what they learnt. “Some have their career development plans and are already taking actions in the direction of those plans, while others have their business plans and are ready to launch their small-scale business and also scale it, for those already in business,” he added.

Rasheed stated that during the programme, they employed a number of technological tools to ensure proper programme delivery and also to facilitate communication. Through back-end monitoring tools, they were able to monitor and track the engagement of the fellows and provide support where necessary.  “We also held live sessions where fellows had the opportunity to ask questions and gain clarity on confusing concepts,” he said.

According to Rasheed, the instructors and facilitators of the fellowship programme are professionals, industry experts and business gurus. “Our facilitators come from a range of organisations like Google, Facebook, PwC, Accenture, Vmware, civil society organisations and couple of others,” he said.

Asked what impact the programme will have on the lives and careers of the fellows, Rasheed stressed that the alumni are doing well in their various countries and careers. He further stressed that the programme is transformational—that it changes how one thinks, and then opens their eye to what they are lacking and how to develop it. It also gives one the opportunity to meet people from other parts of Africa.

He stated that they have hired a few alumni who now lead some of their programmes. “We have some of our alumni who were previously unemployed and have gone ahead to land really good jobs. So I am confident that the fellows that we just graduated will also have tremendous growth in their lives, careers and businesses,” he added.

In terms of follow-up to ensure that, after months or years, the fellows are still utilising the skills and knowledge they have acquired from the programme, Rasheed stated that they have put in place measures to reach out to their alumni on a quarterly basis and also to check up on their progress. “During the fellowship, our team was quite approachable and willing to help, and the fellows/alumni know they can reach out to us for support going forward,” he said.

As regards the challenges they encountered in organising the online programme and how they overcame them, he said the only thing is that they need to expand their capacity to take in more fellows. He stated that they are considering partnering with organisations who share similar goals with the foundation to fund their expansion and to fully digitise the fellowship. “Once we achieve this, we will be able to take in more fellows to reach our goal of empowering one million Africans by 2030,” he added.

About their plans for the 2021 fellowship programme, he stated that they have great plans and programmes lined up for this year’s edition of the fellowship. Among the programmes is an annual conference, career development workshop, and entrepreneurship development for students in tertiary institutions.

He noted that the next edition of the fellowship programme would take place within the first quarter of the year, adding that, “Information will be available on our website and social media platforms as we launch these programmes. Watch out for how much impact and great strides we will be making this year.”

During the 2019 Tony Elemelu Foundation Forum, Tony Elemelu stated that, “Poverty anywhere is a threat to everyone everywhere. It has to be dealt with by all structures—the government institutions, financial institutions and citizens.”

Without equivocation, Ridwan Rasheed—this innovative leader and entrepreneur—is one of the African citizens Elumelu had in mind when he made the aforementioned statement. With his humanitarian services and achievements, he has distinguished himself as a pan-Africanist whose work and impact are felt in many lives and countries.

Kingsley Alumona writes from Ibadan

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