In Bangladesh, youth unemployment is one of the major challenges to the country’s sustainable development. It also suffocates the youth’s boundless vitality and potential.
To support the Bangladesh government in addressing the issue with skill development, Unilever Bangladesh launched ‘Unilever Frontliners Academy’ (UFA), its first ever platform for jobless youth, with only a high school certification.
The platform aims at up-skilling the youth and assisting them in obtaining frontline sales and marketing jobs in the FMCG industry. This initiative is also in line with the company’s social promise of up skilling 10 million youth globally for better opportunities.
The academy’s first batch, consisting of 34 graduates, has already completed their training courses, and secured jobs with Unilever’s distributors.
According to the Ministry of Youth and Sports, about 33% of the total population in Bangladesh is in the age of 18-35 years. The country is in a unique position to benefit from the demographic dividend. Despite the fact that organizations seek for skilled resources, the youth are not being educated in the appropriate skills that are in demand. The same issue extends to a global level. According to the International Labour Organization (ILO), due to the pandemic, global youth unemployment rate has risen to 15%. In order to aid in skill development as part of the solution to this challenge, Unilever Bangladesh is the first company to adopt such initiative across the globe.
The first phase began on Wednesday where 70 students with only a Class 10 qualification applied for the program. Through written assessments concentrating on analytical abilities and an interview to assess communication skills and job suitability, 36 students were chosen for the free training program. The program includes a two-week course that educates unemployed youth on how to become sales officers. Contents from sales negotiations, channel management, incentive programs, merchandising, and other topics are taught through a combination of instructor-led classroom training, market visits to put theory into practice, and finally apprenticeship opportunity, performing the real task to gain first-hand experience. With continuous upcoming vacancies plotted by geography, the graduates are placed in a seamless manner to cater to the urgencies of the business. Going forward, partnerships are being formed with other like-minded organizations to recruit their sales officers from UFA.
The second phase, with 43 students, is now underway at Joypurhat. The training takes place in each quarter of the year and is divided into regions.
“From the pilot program, we learned that the academy provides a safe environment for women to first learn and experience the job, without fully committing to it. Thus, through this platform the contribution of women intake in the team is expected to double”, he added.
Unilever aims to work with development organizations to expand this initiative, which will help to meet its worldwide social promise of up skilling 10 million youth for better opportunities.
