 Thank you so much for staying with us. Time for a career right now, we want to look to how to lay a foundation, we'll be looking into, you see a young kid who begins to do something by themselves without the knowledge or the any teaching or any training by anyone but they can do 1, 2, 3, especially this era we are speaking of technology, you can find a small kid can operate a computer or a phone, or can even be able to code something through the computer or the phone, does that kid needs to go to school, like you were brought up and actually saw my get papers, you couldn't go for dancing on Ambofa Nyevi, to help me do that is Daniel Njeru is an ICT expert, we'll understand or we'll get to know how does one get to lay the foundation and what is the role of a parent or a guardian to make sure that the kids grow towards their career path or whatever path they choose as young kids or the talent and the gifting, send us your comments to all the social media platforms, I-254 channel, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, good morning, Dereva, Hilary and welcome to the broadcast, good morning sir, good to have you here, now like I was trying to ad-lib here where we are looking into laying a career foundation, it's a journey to so many people, we have been in a position where you are told you can only be this, if you do this, and I want you to be this, our parents used to tell us you're a doctor, and that's where you want to begin, who you are, what do you do? Yes, thank you for having me here on studio, my name is Daniel, just like you said, Njeru, I am the head of department, head of faculty, ICT engineering at ZTek University, and yes, so when you talk about careers, I'm so excited to be in your midst this morning and also to dive into this discussion, yes, all right, now in the career you are today, was it pointed for you, was it pushed for you or it was something that you developed, and maybe at what age did you realize haa, mimi nata wu kwa kwa engineering? If you allow me, I'll give just a brief one minute maybe journey of how I've been here, so my dad is in water engineering, he really wanted me to do structural engineering, so I was called for that in Mo University where I wasn't able to join, and then somehow I got myself into computer science, which I did in a different institution, a private institution, Desta, and so the whole journey, let me say the whole journey has been a journey of just trying to find myself, like I really don't know where I am. Do you blame that on your parents because you will be this? I wouldn't blame them per se because they definitely wanted the best for me, and they were looking at how the economy looked, the way the economy looked at that particular point, so I wouldn't blame them, but what I'm glad about is that at some point I was able to take a journey to myself and ask myself what really do I really want, like what is that exact thing that I want in life, and I think that has made the whole difference, yes. Wonderful, now I'm sure in your interactions you have been encouraging people to do certain careers or when someone comes confused you try to advise them on what career path they can take and how it can be beneficial into their lives. The people you speak to, I'm assuming you speak to mostly young people, who are your targets, where do you find them? My target are the young adults, I would say, and ex-farm foes, so I look for opportunities in high schools, for example, but also, I was actually a high school teacher at some point here, so I look for opportunities in high schools, but also opportunities for the first year, first semester students. I just try to get them ignited around this conversation because the moment they get it wrong, they fight themselves, they are doing PhD, but they still don't know what they want to do here. So I like it when we have a conversation with the students and ask them, hey, so why are you doing BSIT, why are you doing Bachelor of Finance in accounting and not this other one? And so my target has always been where we can have just young adults who are just trying to shape their career and just having a heavy conversation, but also being objective in how objective and listening to them and what exactly is igniting them to do this and not this year. Alright, then brings me to the questions, why go to the high schoolers? We are living at a time when we have seen young kids as old as three and even five becoming innovative, they are showing an exemplary ideas and techniques of doing ABCD. For an example, you find someone who is five years can operate fully a computer, they have never gone to a computer school, but they know a computer has a problem and they can do that, someone who can connect anything in their house. Don't you think it's a time you go to these people and maybe why haven't you chosen those kind of people actually speaking of CBC even in our country? Thank you and that's an interesting conversation that we need to start now starting those conversations and I'm glad about this show because I would really be glad if this conversation started in pre primary, that my son who is now turning five next Saturday, I can start having a conversation with him but also watching him at a distance. And looking at what exactly is this guy passionate about because if this conversation could start that early, we won't have crisis that we have when we get to institutions of higher learning and people are not very clear on why they are doing what they are doing. So to me I would say it's only that probably at that particular point it is at the discretion of the parent now to give the pupil or rather the kid around what they should be having. But if that conversation was to start right there and let me tell you I must say that the way we are going, the confidence based curriculum, there is no option. We will have to start these conversations early because the moment a kid is channeled to a particular strand less is 10. They will not have an opportunity to turn around and say now I want to start and probably they are in senior secondary they have finished and so they are now channeled to engineering and yet someone wants sports and arts and everything. So I think this is a conversation that even the parents, the guardians, we need to start having it these early. It's only that now what we are presented with institutions of higher learning like Z-Tech is whereby the government is giving us students and we must really think how do I shape this particular student to be a relevant person but also to make a contribution to the economy. Such that at the end of the day they will not say I did a degree but I don't think this is it. I think I need to channel myself to something else. Alright we are living at a time when time has changed so should people. You have seen young kids, I will give an example with one of our musicians in Kenya. He has kids who are performing and many other kids out there who are performing are artists and these kids for some time maybe by the time they get into my age they will have a lot of money. But these people ever need to go to school, they have money, they have influence. Sku and kariya and kariya path, do they manage? So you develop a skill set around your areas of passion, your areas of interests. So for example for ecodidas sansa it's very interesting and for me what I would say is if such parents would now be keen to let's develop a skill or let this particular kid gain knowledge around this particular area they are passionate about. Perfect. They will be able to make a greater impact than you're doing this for money, you're doing this because your dad said, you're doing this because you have an uncle who has done this before and so you think this could earn money. If we are able now to take that particular direction I think even the economy will be in a better place. All right, wonderful. Bois down to the parenting and the kind of the information we get right now as we speak there is a variety of platforms where we get information from mainstream, from social media, internet is here, everyone can get whatever kind of information they want but also there is parenting. Now bringing this all together to ensure a certain kid and example those kids knowing them you are in the music industry and this is what is in the music industry. How else can our parents, the current generation that we have ensure that the generation that is upcoming they have the information around what they want and where do they get that information because like you have mentioned current institutions are giving what the government has given out. This is best but we have someone who has been left out. So my thoughts around this would be the parents also need to, we need a change of mindset because as a parent and I am a parent I think I have a very huge influence into what my son becomes. I have, I am an authority to my son and so there is in a sense, in a sense there is a way that whatever I say at some point carries the day. Either I am forcing it or not even if I am just very objective in what I am saying they may listen to me and so there is a need for change of mindset for us as a parent whereby if I am seeing the, you know, tuto wangwa mihaza kuchapa mix, as early as you know primary school or something why should I really subject them to a different area. I think we need to have a conversation or rather the parents need to change their mindset to see that it's not only the conventional careers that we knew before that today can actually be fruitful or that can be the best careers, there are many other career paths that have come and taken shape and those career paths are also valuable, they are excellent career paths. So I would say there is quite a lot that needs to change which in my opinion I am seeing the competence based curriculum if it's well implemented it would give us an upper hand as a country in the sense that people are able to, we are able to channel the efforts where it accounts for a student or a kid early enough before they are channeled or before their career paths shape we are able to direct them in the best way possible. Alright, finally Kabza, striking a balance, I'm sure you have met this kind of people or still going back to our example, there's a kid who is an artist they love singing but maybe they have another thing they feel like I can be a doctor, I can be an engineer. Now becoming an artist who is an engineer or an engineer who is an artist the reverse is true, striking a balance between your passion and what now the added skill maybe to make you be on a different level, how does one strike that balance? Wao, wao, I think when you look at the economy and Kenya at large and Kenyans, Kenyans are very interesting people because it has, I mean we have seen in many occasions whereby someone is doing quite a number of things. So many hasos here and there, you have one haso here and another one. But I think what we need is if we can be able to have a convergence between, let's say for example, I am passionate about rugby. And probably I've done IT, can I do this rugby in a company that probably has a team. And so I'm able to scale up the brand of that company through their team and I've seen many like KCB, they have a team here. So I am able to plug in, my passion is still scaling up but also I'm also able to get my career going. And so the convergence is what we need to maybe establish as much as it's possible. But also I must say where we are at right now, where we are at right now, you will find that almost all the careers there is a place of convergence. If you have two areas of passion, there is a place you can find a convergence. I'm an extrovert. I'm trained as a computer scientist but now I am a teacher. So there is a convergence between being an extrovert and being a computer scientist. So for me that's what I would, but those would be my thoughts. Alright, thank you so much for your amount of time. I'm giving you one second or two seconds to give us your final recommendations to this particular topic of laying the foundation to the career. Okay, thank you for having me in this show. I really appreciate and to the viewers who are out there, my quick thoughts would be let's engage in a conversation with the young ones. Even right from on set, let's engage with them. Let's not be very subjective in how this is, the decisions are being made. But let's be very objective, listen to them and let's also know that all careers today, as long as someone is passionate about it, all careers today they come. There is always a way that someone is able to make money if they are passionate about something. So let's money not be the front thing or the biggest motivator for a particular career choice that we are making. And lastly is also to say get a mentor, get someone who can talk to you very objectively, someone who can listen to you. But also if you are joining institution of higher learning, before you dive deeper and deeper, get to talk to someone like in Zitec we have a career guidance office that helps the students to be able to understand their career choices. And so get to interact with someone who is objective and let them listen to you and get to know how you can converge or get your skills together with the areas of passion that you are interested in. Alright, thank you so much Daniel for coming and speaking to our audience out there. I'm sure they have learned one or two things. Most importantly every career counts, whatever they have so you choose in your life counts at the end of the day as long as it puts food on the table. Thank you so much for watching and staying with us throughout that morning. I still urge you to continue during the rest of our programs. He has been my guest Daniel Ingero, ICT expert and my name is Deliver Hilewi. See you again in the evening with the news. Until then have yourself a very good day and good morning.