LaStartupStation aims to encourage the startup mindset within large public and private institutions to democratise the culture of innovation and entrepreneurship. They are extremely active in entrepreneurship, capacity building programmes (for youth) and work very closely with startups, NGOs, public and private institutions, and corporations. Through project African Tech Talents Academy (ATTA), Startup Station aims to increase youth employment, while simultaneously tackling the loss of competitiveness in the tech and ICT sector in Morocco.
The Problem
The unemployment rate among young highly educated Moroccans is one of the highest in the world. Main cause for this is the misalignment between the hard skills possessed by the young graduates and the demand of the job market. The second cause of youth unemployment is the lack of soft skills of Moroccan youth. The hiring companies say they cannot recruit youth that are not able to manage conflict situations, adapt to changes of any kind (through creative thinking and innovation), or build lasting and sustainable relationships among themselves, and communicate effectively with content tailored to the target audience and communication channels. Consequently, they state that in a time of rapid changes of environments, these soft skills should be an essential part of training and learning strategies.
Moreover, many young Moroccans do not have sufficient language skills to work in a multinational environment. Additionally, women are reporting unique challenges, such as societal expectations and limited networking opportunities, that they face in the male-dominated field.
Main challenges that ATTA project aims to tackle are youth unemployment in Moroccan Tech and ICT (TICT) sector, especially for women who are already underrepresented in the sector, and loss of competitiveness in Moroccan TICT sector.
The Solution
African Tech Talents Academy (ATTA) aims to tackle these issues by:
- Defining TICT profiles and skills needed by Moroccan companies.
- Delivering exclusive upskilling TICT Bootcamp training for aspiring young tech professionals, including pre-employment internships. These bootcamps focus on improving both the hard – and soft skills of Moroccan youth. Hard skills focus on expanding technical skills and learning about the recent developments in the industry. Soft skills focus on communication, teamwork and adaptability, as well as improving language skills.
- Managing Job Matching services designed to bring together young job seekers and employers.
Additionality
With the support of CFYE, the projects can have a better social impact on gender. With the expertise and the technical assistance from CFYE, LaStartupStation can develop an efficient outreach strategy to involve more women in the capacity building and job placement activities.
Without CFYE support, the project would not likely progress at all due to different reasons e.g. being too high-risk or having high training costs linked for high-end tech jobs.