The College of Health Sciences in collaboration with Lead-It Africa, a personal development consultancy firm, has held a two-day career development workshop for selected final-year students in the College of Health Sciences (CoHS) of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST), Kumasi.
The Provost of CoHS, Professor Christian Agyare in his opening remarks said KNUST gives world-class training to students to enable them to become the best. However, his office recognising the need for other employable skills in a competitive world organised and fully funded the workshop for selected final-year students in the College.
According to the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Lead-It Africa, Mr. Herman Yobo Addae, the workshop dubbed ready-4-life is to help the graduating class transition from school life to work life. The workshop, therefore, is designed to equip the students with the skills and behaviours needed for a successful career life. Mr. Addae noted that the hands-on nature of the workshop makes it more practical and packed with activities to enable the participants to discover what they will be experiencing in real life and the targeted outcomes are to help them to be more ready and productive for the world of work.
The Lead-It Africa CEO said because of the current global economy and job market trends, there is a foundational session on entrepreneurship to enable those interested in self-employment to start their own businesses.
The topics treated during the Workshop according to Mr. Addae included Personal Effectiveness, Branding and Personal Development, Planning, Attributes for Success in the Workplace, Entrepreneurship, Skills for Entrepreneurship, and Dealing with Failure as Entrepreneurs.
Mr. Addae also sided with the view that there exists a gap between academia and industry as most students’ behaviours and skills do not match what employers look for. Therefore, the training seeks to bridge that gap by focusing on equipping participants with the necessary skills and behaviours to make students ready for the job market.
Chairperson of the Workshop Committee, Dr. Newman Osafo, said the workshop focused on final-year students from all the academic programmes in the College. He said in as much as the College is well known for producing the best products for the health sector, the Office of the Provost found it necessary to help orient students’ minds to life after school to have an easy way in their transition.
Dr. Osafo said formerly, employment was guaranteed after school but is currently competitive and difficult, so the workshop is timely to equip students with soft skills necessary for work life. He continued that though they get experience in their clinical practice, life goes beyond the clinical experience, and it will enable KNUST graduates to gain a competitive advantage over other graduates from other institutions.
A Participating Student, Eunice Anima Kyeremateng, thanked the Provost and faculty for organising the workshop for the final-year students. According to her, such a Workshop should be organised for all final-year students in the University. Miss Anima said the topics, activities, exercises, and interactions were relevant to them and made the sessions more insightful and fun.