‘Bridging academic training with industrial skills’

Combining academic training with industrial skills has once again been emphasized as a major yardstick needed for capacity development among youths in the country.

Speaking during the launching of a book titled, ‘corporate misfit’, the author, Segun Akiode, said to deal with the growing concern among employers of labour and recruiters about the state of employability of fresh graduates in Nigeria, there is need for jobseekers to believe in themselves and be more skillful rather than wait for white collar jobs.

‘’In Nigeria, The World Bank reported that about 50 million Nigerian youths are unemployed. The National Bureau of Statistics in 2014 estimated the number of jobless youths in the country to be no fewer than 5.3 million, with about 1.8 million graduates entering the labour market every year’’, he said.

According to him, unemployment in the country can be brought to the barest minimum, if youths can embrace the entrepreneurship spirit  and be self reliance.

‘’Employers of labour need to hire regularly but they continue to complain that there is a scarcity of qualitative talent in the labour market’’.
In the world today, there is an intense demand on the government to do more in the area of job creation, as unemployment statistics remain scary.

Unemployability is a human resources cum business term derived from the word ‘unemployable’ which means the inability to find or (to be) unfit for a job”, Akiode said..

Explaining the concept behind the book, he said it will address issues such as ways needed to acquire more knowledge, attitude and skills gap among fresh graduates whom are presently tagged ‘Corporate Misfits’.
“Without good direction, people lose their way; the more wise counsel you follow, the better your chances”

This book offers fresh graduates and job seekers that come in contact with it wise counsel to make better career choices and help them not to lose their way.

The central theme is that ‘mind preparation is more important than the physical aspect of job search’ and that “it is better to be wise than strong; as intelligence outranks muscle any day. Strategic planning is key to warfare; to win you need a lot of good counsel”