03 Mar 2020

Citizen Entrepreneurial Development Agency (CEDA) has launched an inaugural graduate trainee programme to equip graduates from various disciplines with the necessary work experience and prepare them for the corporate world.

Welcoming the first batch of graduates in Gaborone on Monday, CEDA chief executive officer, Mr Thabo Thamane said the programme created a career path for graduates.

He also confirmed that 10 out of almost 2 000 graduates who applied managed to make it into the graduate development programme.

Mr Thamane therefore urged them to develop their talents thus creating certain behavioural attributes needed by the institution.

“CEDA employs attitude, good culture, people who have the love to serve clients, those are very important to compliment your credentials,” he said.

He implored graduate trainees to work hard so as to impress their superiors and boost their chances of being absorbed into the organisation.

Mr Thamane also advised them to live and practice values of their host company and leave a lasting legacy at the end of their two-year tenure, adding by so doing, they would also be helping the company to equally leave a positive legacy.

He said graduates came at the right time when the company was approaching the final year of the strategic plan and they would come handy to give feedback on how to improve the efficiency of the company.

“The programme is no longer the traditional degrees on economics and accounting required by an institution, there are engineers and we are now moving into an era where we are not only looking at business, finance, economics and accounting but also other programmes that fit into the landscape of our service offering and value proposition to the clients and respective customers,” he said.

He added that they needed to have their own engineers to advice and have an input on the way projects were done.

“We cannot always be depending on market we need people that are internal and not taking away the fact that we are still outsourcing some of the functions. As this is the first time we are getting engineers we are looking towards learning a lot from you, and not you learning from us” he said.

For his part, CEDA human capital director, Mr Tirelo Leshetla said the programme was conceived in November 2019 because people development had always been a key part of CEDA employee value proposition.

He explained that graduates would, this week, be inducted before being assigned to their respective branches and departments.

Mr Leshetla emphasised on the importance of good behaviour, which he said should represent them and the organisation.

He said the behaviour should be consistent for someone who worked in a financial institution, adding being selected for the programme did not guarantee absorption after two years.

Thus, he encouraged them to impress their supervisors and enhance their chances of being absorbed. Ends