Kuben Nair on youth employment, AI and South Africa's jobs future

Speaker A: Foreign. Nair is my guest on what's Next. And Kuben is the Chief Technology Officer at Harambee Youth Employment Accelerator. He leads the teams and multi channel systems that are responsible for designing and delivering products and services to Harambee's network of partners. So, uh, Kubin, it's lovely to have you with us. Thank you very much for joining us.

Speaker B: Aki, thank you. It's been a privilege to be here. Thank you for the time and the opportunity.

Speaker A: Oh, uh, man, listen, it's uh, it's a great organization you work for. I know about your organization. But for many of our viewers it might, they might not be familiar with Harambe. So could you tell us a little bit about Harambe, what it does and why it's such an important part of the South Africa ecosystem.

Speaker B: Thank you. Thank you. Aki. Uh, yes, as you said, I'm part of Harambee Youth Employment Accelerator. That's our full name. Um, and Youth Employment Accelerator, I think tells what we do. We are a social enterprise. We are founded in 2011, so we just celebrated our 15 year birthday in April this year. And we were founded, I think with the very ambitious goal and mission to tackle youth unemployment in South Africa. Um, very ambitious as you would know, because we have more than 54% of our young people in South Africa currently unemployed. So we had crisis levels with the highest youth unemployment rate in the world. So of course, I mean one organization like ourselves cannot solve this alone. We have to do this with all of society. Um, and I think that's uh, what is in our first name. Uh, Harambi, which is a Swahili word that means pulling together. And our work involves that. It involves pulling together with government, with business, with society, with young people, uh, especially, and most of all, ah, and maybe a little bit to say what we do exactly, because youth unemployment is a big problem. Um, I think on the one side we simply help young people find jobs so to secure work and income across all sectors in the economy. And we do that by helping employers as well identify talent and potential in these young people. Uh, we do this through a platform we call SA Youth, where we have a network of, uh, close to 5 million young people in, uh, South Africa. And we have over 3,000 employers that are hiring, uh, but more than just, I think a recruitment platform, um, we work with employers, we work with government, we work with policymakers to shift, I think some of the hiring practices, the incentives and the costs that are in the system that prevent young people from finding work easily. And we also work very closely with business and government to identify new growth opportunities, where new opportunities, new work can be created for young people. Because certainly with 9 million young people currently, uh, not working, not studying, not training, um, we don't have enough, uh, work and job opportunities. Um, so, yeah, I would say, I think over the past 15 years, as I said with Harambee, we've helped over 1.6 million young people find work, uh, and income. And I think I'm also proud to say that we've helped break many barriers in front of these young people, uh, and create new growth opportunities with business and government. But, uh, I think as I said with, with 9 million young people still out of work and studying and training, um, we have to do a lot more and a lot faster together.

Speaker A: So listen, I mean, that's pretty amazing the work that Harambe has done. And uh, of course there is still a lot more work to do. I mean, I, I would categorize us as a crisis in South Africa at the moment with youth unemployment. And I often kind of ask myself, how did we get here? Uh, what are those reasons behind South Africa's youth unemployment crisis? Because, you know, it's something that's always highlighted and I think many people, and I include myself, we sometimes feel helpless in addressing the issue and doing something about it. But yes, I think as a collective, we can all do something about it. How do we get to this point? What are the reasons?

Speaker B: Yeah, a great question, Aki. Uh, and I think if you ask, uh, most people on the streets and in South Africa, I think the most common answer they'll tell you is education. And our education system being broken. And that is true. Uh, I think our education and skilling system isn't adequately like preparing young people for work. But, um, for problem as wicked as youth unemployment, the answers are, uh, I think a lot more complex and deeper. Um, so maybe I think instead of speaking in stats, Akhi, I'll use, um, a real story to paint a picture. In my first month at Harambee, I was doing what we call mock interviews. So we give young people these practice interviews and then give them feedback because they often don't receive feedback. I met this young woman. Her name was palesa. She was 23 years old at the time, and she had never been employed before. After finishing the trick, um, now I was asking her a typical interview question. So I think it was tell me about a time where you had to influence or persuade someone, uh, to do something or buy something. And Palesta, she, her head dropped and she said, I'm so sorry, sir. Um, I don't know how to answer that question because I don't have work experience. And she passed me her cv, which was mostly blank. Um, it just had her personal details. It had a schooling history, matric marks. Um, and so I kind of changed tack and asked her, well, uh, since matric, um, what kept you busy? What gave you hope? What did you do, uh, to find any income and to keep going on? And so Palesa, I think she lit up and she said, look, I saved some of, uh, our grant money. Um, we bought cosmetics from a wholesaler nearby and then repackaged them into smaller packs. And I started selling that in my community to my neighbors to make some money. Um, and then I started to offer to apply makeup and give advice and beauty tips and made a bit more money that way. And so as we got into that conversation, it was dawning on me that actually Palesa does have the experience, she does have the, the skills, and she could be able to answer that question that I asked. It's just that her experience was informal. It's something, you know, young people call a hustle. And, and it's not something that would typically find its way on the CV or she thinks that she can talk about in an interview. Um, and it was just an example, I think that dawned on me as like the real even, even with, uh, problems with our education system and maybe matric and not being trusted, uh, many millions of young people like Palesa, they actually do have potential and capabilities and skills, even if informal, um, that are sort of invisible to employers. So this is why a lot of young people's capabilities is invisible to the economy and is part of what locks them out. Um, when employers, I think, are trying to de. Risk and looking for people with some work experience or even a graduate degree when it's not yet required, and then they overlook young people. So, I mean, a core part of that, uh, is that problem. Um, I think there's also, uh, a real problem here in it's very expensive to look for work. I don't think many people realize that young people on average. Um, there was a, There was a research study recently, a SIAKA study that, uh, said that young people on average spend over 1,500 rand every month just to look for work. Um, it's transport costs, it's data cost, it's airtime, it's like printing and certifying certificates. And, uh, this is part of the reason why. But the lower income you are, the further away you live from work, the more Likely you are to stay unemployed and young women especially who have to stay at home and can't travel out, afford this. Um, but yeah, I mean even if we solve for all of these barriers and problems, I think the big part, and this could be a whole podcast on its own and I'm sure you've had many uh, uh, guests on this around just the economy and we need economic growth, then we need to solve for the barriers of that and creating new jobs and prioritizing young people. Um, but in that growth, I would say the biggest problem we need to solve for is actually in self employment. Because in South Africa we do have a very thriving private sector, but our informal sector is highly underdeveloped and I think we lack a culture of self employment. Like if I take the Palesta example, young people are doing that, like that cosmetics business to survive, you know, to make some income, to get by, to hustle. Um, but we need to make it easier, to make it more lucrative, more desirable, more sustainable. So Palesa and millions like her can uh, grow that into a business and maybe employ other young people one day, not just use it as a means to survive while waiting for a job. Um, because we, we're just never going to have enough jobs. Uh, so yeah, a complex issue, but I think many sides to that problem of why, why it's true, yeah, it

Speaker A: is very complex as you mentioned. But listening uh, to you, there are green shoots there and there are, there is optimism behind many of the things that you've said. And, and I love the word hustle that you used because that I think for me uh, is a distinguishing factor on who we are as South Africans. You know, we, we really are hustlers. You know, we, we look for solutions, we find answers to problems. And, and I think South Africans are also very street smart when it comes to finding a way of uh, a solution around a problem. And, and, and that Palesa example is such a great example of someone who's hustling, who makes a plan, who's street smart, under understands, you know, their economy, their environment around them, what's going to sell, what's not going to sell. So that for me shows that there's hunger, there's initiative coming. And Harambe is really behind the innovative side of the South Africa youth platform. It's something that you guys have tapped on really well because South African youth are innovative, we are entrepreneurial in many ways. Could you tell us about uh, a little bit more about what SA youth is? Uh, I mean I just gave you my perspective but what is SA Youth and what does it offer?

Speaker B: Yeah, Aki, I mean you said it so well. Palesa story is just an example of like South Africans and South African youth and uh, like their drive and innovation and entrepreneurial spirit. Um, and I think uh, the real core of like SA Youth was trying to figure out how do we make that more visible to employers? Because I think employers, once they know that and realize that can make uh, a better, more confident hiring decision. So uh, Palesta's story inspired me and my team, I think, to design a platform that, you know, eventually and is now become known as SA Youth. So I would say today Palesa, um, if she had to come to SA Youth, she would come to our uh, Mobi site. So SA Youth Mobi, and it's meant to be a Mobi site so you don't need data to download and update. It's zero rated with all of the network. So uh, she doesn't need any data to set up a profile and to look for work and apply for work. It's on her mobile phone so she can look for work from home and she doesn't have to go into town. Dropping off CVs is fully digital, so she isn't spending money and time printing and certifying documents. So what Palesa would do do then is she would set up a profile. She would build her CV using screeners that we have that help her assess her problem solving capabilities, her fluid intelligence, her behaviors like grit and resilience that I talked about, um, her communication skills and take into account of course her education and her work experience, including what's informal like this hustle that she has on the cosmetics business she was running and bringing those skills into her profile and her cv. She then gets recommended the work opportunities that are available that are nearest to her and that matches best to her, that she can then apply to and she can get guidance at any time. So if, if she wants to prepare and practice for an interview, for instance, she can now call us and she can speak to one of our guides over the phone toll free. Um, she needs no airtime. So all of this I think is one to make that high cost of looking for work completely free for her. And then on the other side we have an employer platform at SAU Co Za and that's where employers can sign up and post their vacancies for talent. And then they will be recommended. The best match young applicants, including Palesa, to set up interviews with. And then they get to see their essay Youth CV which incorporates all of this information about Peresa's capability and potential and they can even listen to Peresa answering her uh, questions or a story on a voice note. Um, and we have a team of course that also supports all our employer partners to be able to do all of this. And even for employers that service is free to use. Um, so that's the kind of basics of the SAU platform. There are many other features as well. Like we offer skilling on the mobile phone on WhatsApp. Whether you're looking for a job or looking to be and stay self employed, um, we recommend other services that are near you to help you build your skills and profile. And I think we also make visible and accessible opportunities from other job platforms. So young people have what they need in one place to start with. Um, and I'd say that's the basics of the SA Youth platform.

Speaker A: So it's SA Youth mobi, is that right?

Speaker B: Yes, correct. SA Youth mobi for young people and SA Youth uh, co za for employers.

Speaker A: So I mean that's, that's actually so brilliant that you've made SA Youth Mobi so accessible. You know there's a uh, it's not, it's zero rated so doesn't cost airtime. There's a toll free number as well which is brilliant. And I see that Harambe recently partnered with the, the Bridgepan Group to conduct research into the role that AI is playing in the workplace. And we know how AI is shifting so many goal posts, it's is creating a little bit of anxiety about jobs and taking away jobs and all sorts of things. But there's a lot of positive as well to AI that it's uh, creating opportunities for others and just making people work more efficiently. So based on this research, do you believe that AI is a net good or is it a net bad thing for the modern workplace? What's your take?

Speaker B: Yeah, thanks Zaki. Um, it was important piece of uh, of research that we had to take. I think there's, there's not enough research about the AI, the impact and the potential impact of AI on jobs and skilling, particularly in South Africa. In Africa. Um, and so this was really informative. I mean personally I'm an AI optimist and I see huge potential but I'm not naive. I know that for AI to be a net good for work, like we have to be very intentional in steering it that way. Um, and so I think this research really uh, did uh, showcase that the research we did with Britsban, we looked uh, at the potential impact of AI on particularly two quite different sectors which was um, one being Global Business Services, the other being tourism. And by Global Business Services it was also called BPO or business process Offshoring. Um, and I think most people might recognize this as the call center industry, uh, by and large in South Africa. Um, and of course that's been a hot topic. There's been a lot of talk about how AI is going to automate, and decimate uh, the call cent industry and BPOs and all of this work. And so we wanted to just understand and work with people in the industry locally and globally to understand the trends and where it's going. Um, I think what we've learned is that uh, already AI is being used quite extensively in companies to just deliver more but at lower cost than before. Uh, and that's not being achieved through like massive job cuts. In fact, uh, if anything there's far more employment and growth in jobs uh, in these companies. What they're doing is rather they're using AI to automate like the repetitive work, uh, the repetitive services and augmenting the human agents with like virtual agents. So the human agents can then work on more complex tasks, more complex conversations that require empathy and more uh, human touch. Um, but what that does mean is that the nature of work is changing and is going to change even more rapidly as we go into the future. It means for example, that the requirements to be a customer service agent is higher. Like you're having to work with AI, you're having to manage more complex conversations than you had before. You're having to uh, have greater communication skills and be able to like express empathy and care in ways that only a human can do. Um, and uh, to kind of contextualize with South African industry. Like the south, South African businesses service a lot of work in health care, in financial services, in legal industries across the globe. Um, and these are, these are services in industries where a human touch is either needed or perhaps even mandated by regulation. So that sort of focus area does provide some insulation. And I think by focusing on what we strong at versus our global competitors like in India and the Philippines, um, we're seeing and we believe that we can grow the industry and actually create more jobs for uh, South Africans and young South Africans into the future with AI rather than shrink jobs. But I think the main kind of takeaway from the research was that um, it's not just going to happen on its own. Employers and the skilling system at large needs to shift very quickly to be far more agile. And I, uh, think it's happy to say perhaps in this past year that government and industry have started to work together on what informally they've been calling a skilling revolution, like to uh, to be ready for this future. And I think we're excited to see how that's going to pan out.

Speaker A: Fascinating stuff. So the next five years are going to be interesting against the uh, you know, just even the backdrop of AI where you know, you think you're seeing how fast the change is happening around us. Um, and, and of course you know as, as a country we're revolving, we're changing uh, the socio. Economically we are shifting gear in many ways and I'm, I'm quite optimistic and positive. From your perspective at Harambee, what, what do the next five years look like for you guys? And in particular for the unemployment challenges which is the space that you really are focused on in South Africa as a whole. Is it going to get better? Is it going to get worse? How do you see it panning out?

Speaker B: Yeah, Aki, I think, I mean um, if we look at uh, the stats over all of the, the years over the last like 20 years, um, it just feels like you know, youth unemployment has kept climbing. Uh, there's more and more young people that are unemployed then uh, than before. Um, but uh, my optimism, and I share, I mean your, your optimism as well, that is that in this next five years we really want to change that. Uh, we are really planning to bend that curve and to turn that trend the other way. Um, we've been working very hard with government and industry together on what internally we've been calling Vision 2030. And that's a joint society goal to reduce youth unemployment by 20% by 2030. Um, and what that means is that uh, we have to put young people at the center of hiring into existing work. That's through SA Youth. Yes. But through all other recruitment platforms and services and supporting uh, and boosting programs like yes for youth Youth employment Service that gets young people into internships to get more work experience in private sector. Um, also in accelerating our uh, growth plans in, in priority sectors to create new jobs for young people. So some of those sectors where exciting work is happening and we can see already new jobs being created is as I mentioned in global business services but also in the digital sector, in digital jobs and preparing young people for tech work. Um, there's early childhood development, um, and the work with the Department of Basic Education in uh, creating new jobs. The green economy as we get into just uh, the just energy transition, uh, is um, creating potential for new work, installation, repair and maintenance. I know we need a lot of plumbers and electricians and artisans, um, and getting young people into that work. Automotive industry, the touring industry, uh, and agriculture offer huge uh, opportunities for new growth. But again that, that needs plans and active work which we're doing with kind of business and government. We also then need to shift the uh, incentives, I think that support and the culture to promote self employment and really setting ourselves a stretch goal to get up to a million more young people self employed sustainably by 2030. Um, we need to keep some of the public employment programs alive because they give young people uh, some of their first jobs and their first work experience to build skills and on skilling, we need that skilling revolution. We need their skilling system to be more agile and responsive to what business needs. So we're preparing young people for the future of work. So I'm excited that work is already underway. Um, and all of these plans are kind of coming together for 2030. So it does mean us, you know, having to do a lot. We have to pull together in a big way and much faster to make this happen. But I'm very optimistic and I believe we can turn the tide of youth unemployment by 2030.

Speaker A: Brilliant, brilliant, great, great optimism there. So in closing, Kuben, what advice do you have for, for both employers? Um, I'm an employer. I employ people and, and for work seekers who are struggling to find jobs and I find myself sometimes struggling to find people to fill positions in South Africa. What is your advice? Because, uh, I think that the, you know, what's great about what you guys do is you, you, you, you, you join the dots, you bring the employer and you bring the employee closer together. You find that common ground. But is there advice that you can give for both employers and work seekers in South Africa?

Speaker B: Yeah, I think for, for employers like yourselves and I think many of your listeners, um, we know we employ ourselves and in fact, uh, most of the people that we employ are young people themselves, um, who haven't had work experience before. The guides that we apply in our contact center, uh, those young people from our own platform. So we really understand how it works. We know finding and hiring the right talent in young people is hard, but I think all our work is about making that easier for you as employers and like showcasing this real capability, potential. And the stories of young people like Palesa, um, we know as employers as well, like you are the key to unlocking this potential and this like future South Africa that we all want to see grow and thrive and breaking the back of youth unemployment. So we'd love to help employers and um, I think for that recalling on employers to speak to us, uh, come to SAU Co Za ping us. We will get in touch with you, have a conversation, uh, and just be able to guide you more than just a platform, but know how we can kind of support your goals and help you find talent. Um, and I think for young people, um, again, come to SAU Mobi or even just call us toll free on that. Uh, you know, it's 0800-727-272 so that's 0800-SASA. Um, because that's a space that you can call us if you need guidance and advice on even just where to start or even a place to be hopeful. Because I think the thing that I want to say to young people is that no matter how hopeless it feels right now, there's always, always a next step to take to move forward and we can help you figure that out. Um, so don't be afraid. Call us, uh, or come to our MOBI site and talk to us and we can guide you.

Speaker A: Kuben Nair, who is the Chief Technology Officer at Harambee Youth Employment Accelerator. You've got all the details. There's no excuse not to make contact and understand how the system works and for you to be part of it. If you are an employer or if you're somebody that's looking for employment, um, you know, share those details and let's, let's help bring down and turn that curve around as Kuben said earlier. Kubin, thank you very much for your time. It's much appreciated.

Speaker B: Thank you Aki, for the time and the platform. Um, you have an awesome rest of day.