Don, experts charge students on soft skills

Graduating with first or second class upper without adequate soft skills from any institution does not guarantee any employment for graduates in Nigeria or in any part of the world.

Dr. Olusoji George, senior lecturer, Faculty of Business Administration, University of Lagos (UNILAG), said this during a soft-skill training programme organised for 110 first and second class graduating students of UNILAG.

According to Dr. George, many Nigerian universities do not have the provision for soft skills for their students and this is really making some of the nation’s best products unemployable.

Sponsored by ESSON Exploration and Production Nigeria Limited in conjunction with the Foundation for Leadership and Education Development and J. Soji-George & CO, the programme aimed at equipping the graduating students of the school with necessary soft skills before entering labour market.

Olusoji noted that acquiring soft skill knowledge would not only enable graduates from Nigeria to compete favourably with their peers across the globe, but would also reduce to its barest level youth unemployment.

Delivering a lecture on Personal Branding, Dr. Tayo Otubanjo of Lagos Business School charged the students to work on individual branding.

Speaking on corporate etiquette, social and dinning etiquette, Mrs. Bukola Egwuenu founder of Poise and Savvy, said: “If this skills are imbibed, it will not only make Nigerian graduates eligible for job recruitment in Nigeria, but also globally.

She said students should not only be built as scholars, but also study to fit into any environment whether corporate or social.
She stressed that etiquette is about how individual communicates, positions self; the confidence exhumes and how he or she carry herself.