From Zero to Techie: Empowering African Talent for the Future of Work

For the past three months, I’ve been immersed in building an institution, and products that will fuel the pipeline of tech talents in Africa.?

As Africa continues to bleed the better part of its young population to the shores of Europe and America, it becomes imperative to create a machinery that maintains the balance.?

CIL Academy is an institution that is driven towards turning African talent into technically capable and competent resources, beyond just training and certifications. This mission is being executed in Africa (now) as evident in Nigeria, Ghana, Kenya, Rwanda, and Angola, and will extend to Europe in the coming year.?

Furthermore, CIL Academy is also a Social Impact Partner with AWS for Africa. Our Social Impact Initiatives contribute to the Sustainable Development Goals, specifically Goal 8 (Decent Work & Economic Growth) and Goal 5 (Gender Equality) by bridging the technology skills gap in Africa and fostering inclusion for female Cloud Engineers. Happy International Women’s Day by the way. ?? ♀?

Personally, driving the adoption and growth of CIL Academy has been challenging and quite fulfilling. I have had to wear multiple hats and really roll up my sleeves and jeans to ensure that our message is heard:

We are intentional about building technical capability. Our programs are not just training or certifications, they are hands-on, ensuring candidates come through our academy with expertise and experience that makes them competitive on the global stage.

We are also working with organizations to upskill and retrain employees for the future of work. This stems from the fact that the survival of many organizations depends on their plans to leverage cutting-edge technologies like Cloud, Data, Artificial Intelligence, and Machine Learning to transform workplaces and business processes.?

Given the growing demand for cloud-related skills, we provide organizations with the knowledge (including AWS Training and Certifications) and tools they need to close the “cloud skills gap”. This gap is the disparity between the current skillset of a company’s workforce and the expertise required to effectively establish and maintain cloud-based systems.

We have launched v1 of our learning platform - CIL Academy LMS and our current Cohort (5) enrolled in our Cloud and Data Engineering (Zero to Techie) Program were the first to interact with the product and take courses on the LMS.

We have taken valuable feedback and will continue to build a seamless product and process for learners to meet their training goals with ease.

A few highlights from the past three months ????

• 0 to 6,000+ community members.
• V1 rollout of the LMS.
• 2,000+ new users on the LMS.
• 700+ enrolled in Cohort 5.
• 180% social follower growth.
• AWS Training Partner with Social Impact.
• Job offers to CIL Teams for 25 Academy graduates from Cohort 1-4.
• Job offers to other companies for 40 Academy graduates.

I’m excited about what we’re doing, and the prospects of what we can do, and this keeps me optimistic about the future of Africa.?

The CIL Academy Community is open. Members can take advantage of our exclusive training and community offerings. Join the #CILDevs https://forms.gle/nYkmBzvXavLu6Xey7.

If your organization needs to hire new technical resources, or train current staff on the key technologies (e.g Cloud, ML, AI, IoT) that are driving innovation, talk to us. [email protected].

Don’t forget to share with your friends, family, colleagues and employers. And if you exhaust their contacts, share it with your enemies ??.

Cheers ???

James from #CILAcademy