Firm launches platform to upscale skills, reduce youth unemployment

In a bid to reduce rising youth unemployment in Africa’s biggest economy, FUZU Ltd has developed a platform that will upscale Nigerian youths with requisite skills, and make them employable.

With the website www.fuzu.com, the platform provides users and job seekers with personalised job recommendations, application feedback, access to career coaches, hundreds of online courses, career forums/ communities and peer-to-peer learning that will help improve their career goals.

At its launch in Nigeria’s biggest commercial city, Lagos, the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of FUZU, Jussi Hinkkanen, said the company was established with the mandate to unleash human potentials by providing them a fully personalised user experience based on a 360° assessment of skills, personality and interest.

According to him, FUZU is working with employers of labour across various sectors to open up opportunities with a promise to instill and impact the requisite skills into prospective employees, making them fit and proper for the future of work challenges.

Hinkkanen affirmed that the groups add value to career builders by Job matching, Curriculum vitae (CV) creation, Instant feedback for every application, e- Learning and forum creation, aimed at supporting the career Journey of millions of users.

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“FUZU allows career builders to search and apply for jobs that they are best fitted for. We provide Nigerians with free access to professionally designed CVs upon completion of onboarding. We use advanced Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools to compare candidates and provide immediate personalized feedback,”

“We have a library of 100s of relevant courses created specifically for African context. We automatically recommend the best courses based on their past experience and future career goals. We also create forums geared towards supporting the career Journey for users to communicate ideas and tips to grow.”

He noted that FUZU also adds value to businesses by outsourcing talents, candidates assessment, automated candidates ranking & shortlisting, hiring management & collaboration as well as headhunting. “We will provide your business with infrastructure and knowledge support,” he added.

On her part, the country director, Patricia Duru, reaffirmed FUZU’s commitment in transforming job seekers with poor chances for employment to long term career builders with strong growth trajectory.

According to her, they do this through its Needs- assessment, competence profiling, AI – recommendations, goal setting, skill validation, community engagement, among others offerings.

Duru stressed that FUZU would also seek to synergize with educational institutions – where the real problem lies, as most degree awarding schools do not respond to the needs of the economy by churning out “not fit for the tasks” graduates every year.

“We hope to meet the career needs of Nigeria youths by pursuing a clear reduction in the competence and skills gaps of graduates, providing a peer and Professional support network and a solution that both matches and creates jobs.

“We want to reduce brain drain and mass exodus of talents. We want to give reasons to over 45% of Nigerians who had planned to leave the country in the next five years. Nigerians are the biggest resources and reason for optimism (if properly harnessed).

“We want to ensure that no one entering the job market in the future has to face the personal and financial uncertainty that has been so commonplace in the past,” she averred.