While it is difficult, it is still possible to make it in life even if you do not find a job, says the recently crowned Miss Supranational Lalela Mswane.
In an interview with the Business Report, the model who won the 63rd edition of the Miss South Africa pageant late last year, said to rise above initial unemployment and make it in life takes tenacity, will, drive and determination as well as a lot of patience.
“Making it requires innovative and creative means to generate income, such as identifying a gap in the market and establishing a profitable business enterprise to bridge that gap. Some people were destined to be employers and not employees,” Mswane said.
At the beginning of June, Statistics South Africa (Stats SA) said young people in the country continued to be disadvantaged in the labour market, with an unemployment rate higher than the national average.
According to the Quarterly Labour Force Survey (QLFS) for the first quarter of this year, the unemployment rate was 63.9 percent for those aged 15-24 and 42.1 percent for those aged 25-34 years, while the official national rate stood at 34.5 percent.
Stats SA said unemployment among the youth continued to be a burden, irrespective of educational attainment.
Mswane, a 25-year old who hails from KwaSokhulu, near Richards Bay in the north of the KwaZulu-Natal, also experienced unemployment first hand as she applied for articles to no avail after obtaining her Bachelor of Laws degree from the University of Pretoria.
“I don’t have an infallible plan or process for success in this regard. What I do know is that life sometimes forces you to seek creative solutions to empower yourself economically and that doesn’t always come through being employed but rather through being the employer. That requires a lot of perseverance. Giving up cannot be an option,” Mswane said.
She said young people and unemployed people need to shift away from a mindset of awaiting opportunities and rather seek meaningful ways to create their own opportunities for success.
“I’ve always encouraged a culture of self empowerment through entrepreneurship. Which is why I find my #BeReady campaign effective and impactful. It is a step-by-step entrepreneurial program designed to assist budding entrepreneurs to establish their own businesses by providing them with the information to enable them to do so.”
She said she believed that South Africa’s education curriculum ought to include the development of alternative skills at a school level to ensure that learners were well rounded citizens, who could actively contribute towards the economy, whether or not they obtained jobs in the fields in which they studied.
“The reality is that most people are not employed in their chosen fields of study. We need to nurture a culture of adaptability and a workforce capable of doing much more than what they may be qualified to do.”
The supermodel said in her reign she had seen that the lack of access to technology, which helps to gain access to information regarding employment opportunities, made it difficult to seek and find a job.
“At times, people do have technological devices, but the lack of internet access is a problem. To resolve that I would suggest having lower data costs or even zero rated websites to access such information,” Mswane said.
BUSINESS REPORT