It has always been the mindset of most people who have graduated from the high school or college to get out there and grab a 9 to 5 thing and when such does not happen, they become devastated. Some even think that the sky has come crashing down on them and that there is no other way to go.
The Office for National Statistics carried out a survey on graduates in the U.K. in July to September 2017 and found out that 15 percent of graduates were out of labor or not employed.
While we are talking about the rate of unemployment, it will be a complete disservice if we overlook the fact that a lot of these graduates are obviously underemployed. The Economic Policy Institute in the U.S. carried out a research and reported on May 4, 2017, that “while we have seen the unemployment rate for young high school graduates approach its pre-recession level, the underemployment rate remains elevated.”
I want to believe that this should not be the situation. In my candid opinion, the problem is based on the fact that we have relied too much on the 9 to 5 stuff and lost focus of the possibility of creating employment ourselves and also of being self-employed.
This scenario set me on a soul-searching mission and the experience I got made me conclude that a lot of our unemployed graduates can actually become self-employed and can work towards becoming employers. I also believe that if properly harnessed we would stop talking about unemployment.
There is this nephew of mine a young man by all standards, he actually is 23 years now. After completing his high school went into blogging as a side gig as he was preparing to get into a college. He started blogging at the age of 16 and was doing very fine.
At a point, he told us that he was not ready to go through the formal college thing that he preferred to enroll in an online school. Back then, the idea was a bit alien to us but as he was doing very fine with his blogging which also was rather strange to us at that time we had to give in. The truth was that he had already started making six figures in his earnings after about a year as a blogger.
He eventually secured an admission to study Computer Science. This gave me a lot of joy since I saw in him our own Bill Gates, Elon Musk, or even Larry Page. I, however, was jolted when he told me that he was dropping Computer Science for Psychology. I literally told him that he had gone raving mad.
As if that was not enough, he went ahead to tell me that he was not overly interested in Psychology that he only needed to have a degree so that people will not consider him a dropout.
When I started having a second thought about him was the day he called me and asked me the population of humans in the world which was in 2015. I told him it was 7.3 billion oblivious of what he had in mind. The next thing he said set my mind reeling.
He said he was gearing to feeding 0.5 percent of the people in the world. I quickly ran the figures in my head and what I got was mind-boggling. Without saying it in so many words, I realized he was aiming for the stars and maybe even above.
He was dreaming with his eyes wide open. I considered the potentials and concluded that the young man was aiming at becoming a multi-billionaire and a great employer of labor. This was a sort of an eye-opener.
He started with catfish farming and has branched into some other areas. He presently has a rice farm and has also gone into producing cassava, yam, and maize. He is projecting into having his own hatchery and feed mill since he is thinking of using some of the produce of his farm to prepare feed for the fishes.
He is doing so well with his farming business to the extent that a good number of people consult him on things to do with agriculture. He has a lot of people in his employ and has an understanding with the International Institute for Tropical Agriculture(IITA), which was the brainchild of the Ford and Rockefeller Foundations.
In conclusion, I want to believe that there are many avenues open to our graduates especially the young ones where their vitality and intellect can be applied. They can easily leverage their education to transform themselves from potential employees to employers.
You don’t necessarily need to be a farmer, that is not what I’m saying. You can decide to go into any field of your choice.you can for once be the boss and stop being bossed around. There are a lot of side gigs you can launch your arsenal into. You have packed the punch just go on dishing the blows.