Tunisia: Companies Desperately Seek Skills for Hiring!
13 August 2011
Read by 1451 persons
It was with great amusement that I read the Tunisian newspaper La Presse on Sunday, August 7, 2011; this newspaper reflects the employment trend in Tunisia, at least regarding companies' demands, as one can find the sectors that are recruiting, the profiles sought, and even the number of positions to be filled.
However, what is striking when reading the advertisements are the details of these jobs. As a result, a number of reflections are necessary.
# First, the profiles sought must be trained on the moon, in our opinion, because the majority of them do not exist on the Tunisian job market; they are only found abroad or within certain companies. Here is a small sample: certified infrastructure consultants with experience, service manager support troubleshooting and SS7, billing engineer, Prestashop expert, telesales expert, senior PHP technical project manager, GOGNOS application support technician, SAS Datamining - SAS Dashboard engineer, BSS engineer, Packet Switching Engineering engineer, VAS product manager, PDH/SDH Transmission Support Engineer, Senior Manager Equity Research Reporting, and finally Senior Data Analyst Network Voice and Firewall, etc.
Frankly, we admit we don't know more than 20% (that is, we ignore 80%) of these professions and the very meaning of the work required. But let's move on.
The second observation concerns the ICT, Internet, and telecoms sector, which are recruiting massively to the point of constituting, currently, the largest pool of jobs in Tunisia, and also unfilled, since companies continue to publish their requests every week.
Now, if we want to create 100,000 or 200,000 jobs, we know it's possible, except that it won't be done with the current profile of our young unemployed; then, we know what to do and what direction to guide the training.
Thirdly, the number of computer engineers trained each year, around 8,000, is below the market's absorption capacity and the needs of companies, estimated at 20,000 engineers per year by the ICT Chamber (INFOTICA). Some analysts believe that to reduce unemployment, one of the avenues to explore is to transform several literary schools and sectors (or those with low employability) into schools of computer and telecoms engineering and electronics. This last specialty, moreover, highly sought after by the telecoms industry, is only taught in Tunisia as a separate sector in a single educational institution, in Monastir, at least to our knowledge.
Fourthly, the job market demands technical expertise, IT certifications are highly sought after and requested, but also proficiency in English and French. In short, this exposes all the weaknesses of the Tunisian education and training system. This is why companies no longer require the diploma, which is devalued, in favor of prometric or TOEFL or TOEIC certification or other certification delivered by an international organization and which truly reflects a level of technical and linguistic mastery.
Moreover, some private higher education institutions have understood this. This is the case of ESPRIT, which requires, for the award of the engineering diploma, 2 certifications, one technical such as Cisco, Java, Oracle or Microsoft, and the other linguistic for English. Result: 100% of ESPRIT graduates are recruited immediately by the private sector and even before the award of their diploma, according to the information at our disposal.
Let's say that the private education sector, like ESPRIT and MSB, is showing the way... For other sectors to follow suit and draw inspiration from it.
TB
Published August 11, 2011.
Posted online August 13, 2011.
Webmanagercenter.com
However, what is striking when reading the advertisements are the details of these jobs. As a result, a number of reflections are necessary.
# First, the profiles sought must be trained on the moon, in our opinion, because the majority of them do not exist on the Tunisian job market; they are only found abroad or within certain companies. Here is a small sample: certified infrastructure consultants with experience, service manager support troubleshooting and SS7, billing engineer, Prestashop expert, telesales expert, senior PHP technical project manager, GOGNOS application support technician, SAS Datamining - SAS Dashboard engineer, BSS engineer, Packet Switching Engineering engineer, VAS product manager, PDH/SDH Transmission Support Engineer, Senior Manager Equity Research Reporting, and finally Senior Data Analyst Network Voice and Firewall, etc.
Frankly, we admit we don't know more than 20% (that is, we ignore 80%) of these professions and the very meaning of the work required. But let's move on.
The second observation concerns the ICT, Internet, and telecoms sector, which are recruiting massively to the point of constituting, currently, the largest pool of jobs in Tunisia, and also unfilled, since companies continue to publish their requests every week.
Now, if we want to create 100,000 or 200,000 jobs, we know it's possible, except that it won't be done with the current profile of our young unemployed; then, we know what to do and what direction to guide the training.
Thirdly, the number of computer engineers trained each year, around 8,000, is below the market's absorption capacity and the needs of companies, estimated at 20,000 engineers per year by the ICT Chamber (INFOTICA). Some analysts believe that to reduce unemployment, one of the avenues to explore is to transform several literary schools and sectors (or those with low employability) into schools of computer and telecoms engineering and electronics. This last specialty, moreover, highly sought after by the telecoms industry, is only taught in Tunisia as a separate sector in a single educational institution, in Monastir, at least to our knowledge.
Fourthly, the job market demands technical expertise, IT certifications are highly sought after and requested, but also proficiency in English and French. In short, this exposes all the weaknesses of the Tunisian education and training system. This is why companies no longer require the diploma, which is devalued, in favor of prometric or TOEFL or TOEIC certification or other certification delivered by an international organization and which truly reflects a level of technical and linguistic mastery.
Moreover, some private higher education institutions have understood this. This is the case of ESPRIT, which requires, for the award of the engineering diploma, 2 certifications, one technical such as Cisco, Java, Oracle or Microsoft, and the other linguistic for English. Result: 100% of ESPRIT graduates are recruited immediately by the private sector and even before the award of their diploma, according to the information at our disposal.
Let's say that the private education sector, like ESPRIT and MSB, is showing the way... For other sectors to follow suit and draw inspiration from it.
TB
Published August 11, 2011.
Posted online August 13, 2011.
Webmanagercenter.com
