Thursday 24 March 2015, witnessed the launch of a new phase of Blazing Trails. Wonderful, excellent and beautiful finishing were the descriptions of many attendees of the event.

Beneficiaries of the training and potential beneficiaries of the training program thronged the British Council venue to see and hear at first-hand what the phase 4 of the training would bring them.

The Blazing Trails project is an initiative of British Council and Barclays Bank has been running for 3 years and has trained approximately 5,000 young graduates and entrepreneurs.

The focus of this project has been to develop essential (life) skills among fresh graduates and entrepreneurs through training.

This aims to equip participants to be able to demonstrate employable skills needed to secure jobs or gain entrepreneurial skills needed to start and grow a business.

The project has changed the recruitment landscape of Ghana by providing alternative job opportunities for the youth through business start-ups and has enabled fresh graduates to become attractive applicants for employers to recruit.

Speaking for Barclays the lead Financier of this project, Nana Essilfuah Boison, Head of Marketing and Corporate Relations said it has always been the aim of Barclays bank to help empower Ghanaian youth to do more.

In this regard, Barclays aside from sponsoring this initiative is also rolling out the “Ready to Work” campaign which seeks to bring out hidden potentials amongst the youth in society.

As part of the event, the Barclays team enrolled most of the beneficiaries hoping to engage them in coming days on the campaign.

In her speech, the Skills Hub Manager for British Council, Ms. Gifty Amedi, reiterated the need for the youth to be very aware of the times and be innovative to bring up ideas and sustain those ideas in business ventures.

The Dialogue session witnessed two seasoned entrepreneurs Miss Mabel Simpson of MSimps designs and Miss Nadia Takyiwaa-Mensah of Sixth Sense Manifesto.

Also, in attendance were Dr. Etse Sikanku, a lecturer at the School of Communication Studies at the University of Ghana and Skills Hub Manager for British Council Ms. Gifty Amedi.

They deliberated on the theme “building capacity for young people; the right approach to solving unemployment in Ghana”.

It was a very interactive session with each of the panel members sharing their experience to enrich the discussion.

The moderator of the session-Jesse Agyepong, Marketing Director of Tigo ended the session by encouraging the youth to take charge of their future.

The career fair followed immediately after this session. Seven companies including Jobberman, Vivo energy Ghana, MODEC, Airtel, Beige Group, GN Group and Barclays Bank Ghana were present for this session.

Panel members and guest were fulfilled that they have had the opportunity to share their knowledge and experiences as many couldn’t hide their joy and renewed sense of self-discovery.