If the Arab Spring and Summer upheavals had at their roots a political disequilibrium and socio-economic inequality quagmire, the Arab Fall and Winter aftermath will surely be about beginning a thought process that revolves around creating new sustainable institutions of nation-building.
A question being asked far and near is to what extent can and should these institutions be concerned with job creation given the youthful regional demographic profile with the new job creation requirements implied, and to what extent can they succeed at it. If a recent 2011 Bayt.com survey is indicative, the vast majority of regional jobseekers, at 47.1% of those polled, hold the government accountable for unemployment in their countries, while 7.3% blame the private sector, 5.2% the education sector and 6.3% say it’s the responsibility of individuals themselves.
Respondents were also asked to what extent they thought the government held responsibility for job creation. The vast majority (71%) felt the government was ‘’largely’’ or even ‘’exclusively’’ responsible. Respondents were also asked how the government could best improve employment in their countries; 10% said create more jobs in the public sector, 8.1% said improve the education sector, 5.6% said foster a better environment for business, 4.7% said improve labour laws, 17.1% said stop corruption and 3.7% said develop better transparency and legal guidelines.
Nearly half (48.1%) said all of the above. But given recent history being written in the region where the individual is author and protagonist and against a backdrop of slow but imminent economic change, isn’t it pertinent to ask to what extent individuals themselves can also take immediate responsibility for their own careers and livelihoods. Several key pointers in this regard emerge from recent Bayt.com polls, surveys and employer feedback:
• Retraining and emphasis on lifelong learning:
The needs of the regional workplace are constantly being redefined especially as whole economies are shifting focus and gaining traction and if regional professionals are not rapidly reinventing themselves in response to those changes they risk their skillsets becoming redundant and their professional pedigrees becoming defunct. A recent Bayt.com poll showed cost considerations were perceived to be a huge impediment to further learning; however the rapidly increasing availability of free or low-cost online training courses as well as specialized learning institutions across the region should put a damper on that liability.
• Investing in soft skills to augment traditional emphasis on purely technical education: Sound technical skills and solid educational qualifications are as crucial as ever, however, repeated Bayt.com surveys and polls show regional employers are looking at communication skills and interpersonal skills in some cases even more than technical skills and degrees in making their hiring decisions. The future may belong to those who not only ‘’can do’’ but to those who ‘’can do’’ pleasantly and with good communication, team skills, leadership skills and graceful aplomb.
• Flexibility is king: A CV gap-filler that shows dynamism and ambition and work ethos is almost always preferable to a CV gap. Whether that means volunteering for a favorite cause while seeking employment, settling for a non-paying internship, taking a career side-step or even paycut to get your foot in the door of a new industry/career path or taking up new coursework or hobbies or research, the best way to a more fulfilling and promising career path is to actually be rigorously out there meeting new people, trying new tasks, learning new skills and proving your mettle.
• Networking pays: When in doubt, cast your net wide and network. Regional universities are in throngs developing career centers to aid their students and alumni in job search activity. However beyond the educational realm there are many other creative ways to network including virtual job fairs such as those run by Bayt.com, physical job fairs around the region, industry groups and associations, and online professional groups to name just a few channels.
• Creating a competitive online professional brand is essential: Leading regional jobsites, primarily Bayt.com with its deep regional inroads and leading jobsearch tools including the free public profiles platform for networking, have assured unimpeded unhampered unintermediated access to top opportunity through their jobsites which remain totally and completely free for jobseekers and available to all jobseekers at every career level and in every industry and walk of life. Today having a top-notch professional brand online is no longer a luxury for the tech-savvy and professionally elite, it is a necessity for any up and coming professional looking to maximize their universe of opportunity and optimize their long term career path.
Respondents to a recent Bayt.com poll almost all felt that the internet is instrumental in aiding employment in their countries with 32.5% saying it helps to a huge extent, 22.7% saying it moderately helps and 44.8% stating it slightly helps. With a vast majority of Bayt.com poll respondents (86.5%) indicating they believed it was possible to dramatically improve employment prospects through better public policies, clearly there is no substitute for a close public-private partnership in job creation in the long run.
However the great news is that regional professionals know they need not sit back and wait for a delayed trickle down approach to employment opportunity and this realization may to some extent explain why the overall sentiment across the region remains resoundingly positive in this individual empowered era with 65.1% of respondents to the same Bayt.com poll indicating they are optimistic about their career prospects and 64.7% saying they are optimistic about their country’s economy.
