My degree is just a piece of paper

As the common wisdom goes, accept this and move on. Look around you. How many other students in your class with graduate with the same degree? Multiple that by all the universities in Kenya (used to be only six in my day) and then add on all the people (like yours truly) coming back from one foreign country or another with untouchable degrees just because they went Majuu (life is bloody unfair my friend).

So if all you’ve got to show is your degree, congratulations, you’ll meet number 1 of the usual 10 job requirements for jobs in kenya.

Respect your degree, respect it a lot. That piece of paper will get you past many rungu-armed askari when you start tarmacking. But I hope your aim isn’t tarmacking. I hope at this point that you are thinking of how to make jobs come looking for you.

STEP ONE to securing a decent job in Kenya

CHANGE YOUR MENTALITY: your degree will just get you in the door, but what will get you the job are the practical and unique skills. Differentiate yourself from the masses.

Give yourself a USEFUL EDUCATION. On top of the 40+ (mostly useless) courses you have to take at your university or college, here are seven that will actually get you a job and on top of that, pay you good ching ching.

1. Impeccable expression through writing.
2. Thinking (yes, you’ve got to learn how to thinking and think in all sorts of ways).
3. Knowledge Gathering and Networking
4. Independent problem solving, Curiosity and Management
5. Presentation skills
6. Person-to-person skills.
7. Computer competency (and no, I don’t mean a bunch of IAT certificates).

It’s not what you do in school that matters, it’s what you do outside school while in school that matters (said one of my career mentors). Start looking outside the classroom.

WRITING: Can you make a clear and intricate argument on paper? Are your sentences well oiled? Do you know what a appositive is? Do you know the 6+ uses of a comma? Basically, if you are wondering how I write the way I write, you are in trouble

1. Go buy yourself an English grammar book and study it from the front to the back. Make sure you understand all the different types of phrases and the use of the semi-colon.
2. Take as many English writing classes on coursera.org (classes are FREE and given by professors from high quality, USA universities).

THINKING, CURIOSITY: There are so many types of thinking–creative thinking or brainstorming, critical thinking, design thinking, model thinking, analytical thinking, predictive thinking, ballparking. And trust me, what you are doing in your Kenyan university classroom is not thinking. You are mostly struggling to master someone else’s thoughts. Thinking is a mode of processing information.

1. Take all the “thinking” classes on coursera.org.
2. Google and study thinking and brainstorming techniques.
3. Look for challenges that force you to write argument based papers or opportunities to debate. The more people critique your ideas, the sharper you will become at coming up with good ideas (I do hope that you all critique this article).

KNOWLEDGE GATHERING on the other hand is about collecting and putting together useful, relevant information that builds you up into an expert. Also, do you know people worth knowing. Does having you in my company open up big opportunities  for my company.

1. Go beyond your textbooks. Pick a good newspaper and read it every day. I recommend the BUSINESS DAILY. There are plenty of online news sources. Skip the politics. Read at least four articles a day that are related to your areas of interest. (Note, not your area of work, but the area you gravitate to naturally. It’s important to find your core strengths and build them up.).
2. Read a book a week. A good, difficult novel; a self-help book; a business thinking book. Just read a book a week.
3. Watch a TEDtalk a day. Much better use of your data bundle than facebook.
4. And you better know a lot about the company you want to hire you–what has been happening to their business or industry and what ideas can you offer to help the company continue thriving?
5. Go for professional events; reach out to people on LinkedIn and actually seek out their advice and knowledge. Many of those who have succeeded like to network with young people who show promise. Run your ideas past them; build a powerful network. 

INDEPENDENT PROBLEM SOLVING, LEADERSHIP and MANAGEMENT: Do you have the ability to spot gaps, inefficiencies? Do you understand how to study those gaps in ways that produce useful solutions? Have you attempted to solve/fill any gaps? You don’t need to know everything, you only need to know how to ask questions. “Genius is not the answer to all questions, it is the question to all answers.” (Tablo, epik high, korea). And lastly, do you know how to organize people, things, time in ways that make these resources very productive? If given a project can you figure out who you need to partner with to make it successful? Can you be left to handle an important client on your own? Will you make a mess of it or bring in even more business.

1. Look around you, in your community, in your school, in the market. Are there any needs you see? How would you solve those problems?
2. Start and run an independent project that demonstrates your leadership skills, your ability to teach yourself new things. Your potential employer would like to know upfront that you will take the initiative and have the skills to improve things in his company.
3. Your project can be a money-making business or it can be a social-good project. All you need to produce are tangible results while illustrating that you are a self-driven, insightful manager.

PRESENTATION SKILLS: can you walk naked through a crowd? That’s what most of us feel when giving a presentation. Naked.

1. Throw yourself into situations where you have to talk in front of people, especially convince them to do certain things e.g. take an internship as a sales person.
2. Study the videos of speeches given by people you admire. How do they do it?
3. Google some tips on how to make jokes. Get over your nervousness of talking to strengths. Learn how to make them comfortable with you because you know what? At that interview, they are not just looking at how great your skills are but also at whether you are the kind of person they would like to talk to 40hr/week. That’s a lot of time.

PEOPLE SKILLS: This skill requires several blogposts to develop fully . Your potential employer wants to know if you can work with a team. What will you add to his/her team? Can you be a leader when necessary, a follower, a supporter etc? Are you persuasive? Can you convince others to change their minds with being condescending? Employers are looking for people who can build their companies by bringing in clients, selling product and service, handling suppliers, all in a professional manner.

1. Read up on teamwork and identify what is your teamwork style (teamwork isn’t just one type).
2. Think about what you can do now to prove that you are a team player.
3. Undertake projects or put yourself in situations where you have to work with a team. Study the results. What did you accomplish. Improve, improve, improve.
4. Again, be very keen about make other people comfortable with you.

Here are some useful questions on teamwork and organizational contribution from Stanford that may help you think deeper on this question:

• Tell us about a time in the last three years when you built or developed a team whose performance exceeded expectations.
• Tell us about a time in the last three years when you identified and pursued an opportunity to improve an organization.

COMPUTER COMPETENCY: do you know that powerpointing is one of the highest demand skill in Kenya and that very few people can actually create decent powerpoints?

1. Teach yourself powerpoint. Learn how to DESIGN professional powerpoints. I mean powerpoints that look like they should have their own T.V. show. Powerpoints that would make Richard Branson put $$$$$$$ into your business. All sorts of free classes and videos online to help you.
2. Excel is your friend. Especially if you can program in Excel. Companies always need someone who can create nifty  spreadsheets.
3. Pick up internet tools. We live in the information age, get with the program. Know stuff and know it well.