Self-Education is the Key to Success

With the alarming rate of unemployment in South Africa it is worrying to see more and more qualified, skilled, semi-skilled and talented youth drowning in the mud pond of poverty. We always see and hear about what causes these alarming statistics to skyrocket year after year but little has been said about measures to curb the rate. What has been happening is a chain reaction type of tragedy with deeply rooted causes and the time is now to lead each other out of these dark alleys.

A lot of the blame has been placed on apartheid, Jan Van Riebeeck, government this – government that and of cause things are not about to change unless the change starts with you and I.

Let's be honest with ourselves, not everyone has enough resources for formal post matric education and in fact the majority of South Africans can’t afford higher education. I won’t mention student loans or NSFAS, that's not affordability but simply a loan to kick-start your better life provided it's used wisely and don’t forget the debt at the end of that. With such situations we need to shape our minds differently and incorporate the elements of self-education throughout our hustles. Autodidacticism (also autodidactism) or self-education is the act of teaching oneself about a subject or subjects in which one has had little to no formal education. Many notable contributions have been made by autodidacts. Autodidactism is often complemented by learning in classrooms and other social settings. 'Formal education will make you a living; self-education will make you a fortune.' ~ Jim Rohn

Whether you have the highest formal education or you have never seen the higher education institution gates, self-education is still a key to success. I know throughout our lives we've been conditioned to follow the formal education path, get a job and earn a living, in fact the conditioning has been so well done that we expect to fail without those steps and we were never prepared for self-education. If you do pay attention you may agree with the common generalisation that a lot of young people are ignorant, lazy and mere putting more effort on things that won't make them a better person in the future, they have this air of entitlement about them. This is a common global crisis with variable percentages and it needs to be managed by those who are willing to shed some light on these matters.

Without stepping on some more toes let me share some few important points in this life of ours.

Just a bit of how my journey started

I remember some years ago I was one of the unemployed statistics in the big city of Johannesburg. Life caught up with me at the point where there was little financial backing and of cause no money to further my studies so I could also follow in the path I thought was my only way to being a success. For once in my life I felt like I was in the middle of an ocean with no compass. One thing that kept me going was the drive to do something and educate myself with whatever learning material I came across. Luckily there were more libraries then, they had books, good books, I mean good fundamental books and that's all I needed to kick-start my crazy career while broadening my horizons.

For some reason I was extremely fascinated and curious about computers despite kick-starting my higher education with intentions of becoming a charted accountant which I had already        completed 2 out of 3 years of the said Financial Accounting diploma through NSFAS, it was called TEFSA then :P

Only after failing to complete my diploma I realised there was something missing in me, I felt empty, angry and had no confidence. I felt like I was back to square one, also I was caught in the confusion of loving computers and cracking figures. I first operated a computer in my first year at Technikon…but became a skhokho :P, even enjoyed unlimited anytime internet while the rest of students had to wait for 3 pm (lab internet access time) to get access to the internet. At some point the lab administrators were aware that I am using the internet during restricted times but couldn’t figure it out why it's always my workstation…well until a certain point. I was approached several times, I played dumb, for some reasons I have been wearing this clueless face all my life and that has been helping me get away with most of the things I did out of curiosity. At some point we had to cut a deal because I was threatened with a permanent ban if I didn’t show them how to access internet during restricted times. I had to do it to save my butt, however I gave them one out of three ways, they blocked my trick, I couldn’t use it anymore and they always kept a lion's eye on me. I ended up being friends with some during my second year, I showed them some more tricks that they didn’t know and I enjoyed my privileges to access internet during spare time. Gone were those days and I missed them like crazy J

Back in Jozi; computers already stole my heart, wanted to learn more and more. I used to go to the city library every day to read computer books, I read computer programming languages to networking and administering software trying to understand this whole world of computing. No one pushed me to read tons of books but I’d put an effort to harness the spark and eventually the ducks started waddling in an order. All I wanted was maximum knowledge and in that process I was trying to find myself in the haystack. Surprisingly good for me; my books of interest in the library shelves were always available, all the times and somehow I thought I was sick differently, but later realised that my youth never cared to read out of their own will and got more worried as time goes on.

Look around you

On the other hand I found myself thinking loud about South Africans and it's common culture of not reading while we have state and community resources. At some point I saw more foreign nationals at my isle of interest than South Africans and maybe that's the reason why they own every computer repair/sales shop in Johannesburg central business district (CBD). I've had conversations with a couple of these computer sales/repair shop guys, most have no formal education, they come from rural areas and have learned the hard way to fix computers.

The job hunting

I remember when I didn’t know what to put on my CV, I googled a couple of ideas and found a good CV template that had self-education section called "informal skills". From there I knew I could list my self-tough skills, even though I had no experience I strongly felt someone should know I did this by myself and if I were to be given a chance to demonstrate I'll do it again and again and again. To my surprise recruitment agencies and companies started responding to my applications, even though the experience part killed me, I had a chance to represent myself in the 10+ interviews I've been to. That alone thought me something, I never saw myself as a failure in life just because of rejection emails, I even laughed at some emails, mostly standard responses and sympathetic rejection kind of emails.

My eagerness to learn more kept me going and my CV's skills section changed every month. I also had a reason to keep sending my CV to recruitment agencies as "updated CV", calls came in, went to interviews, failed and nailed some but no job offer.

This called for clever job hunting strategies, I sat down and started figuring out what makes employers reject me even though the interview was professional and fine. One thing that came to my mind was "there is someone out there with same or better skills plus experience" and yes I was somehow right, I started to have conversation with candidates who were called for interview and hell yeah some would tell me about their 8 years of experience.  I had to boost my confidence around this area, knowing that you are competing with someone who has 8 years under their belt is not easy as eating pap and milk.

After a lot of tries, strategies and formulae the hard work paid off and was successful with my first goal of getting a job. I was so excited to add some bits of information to my CV. Even though I had a lot of temporal and limited duration contract offers from various companies, I have accepted them without thinking twice and the number of pages in my CV started growing. This was a sign of good beginnings, at some point I was asked why I changed companies every year or six months and my answer was simple "limited duration contract", 'I can point a gun at my employer and force them to extend my contract and I had to move on hence I'm sitting in front of you. :P ' I know some prospective employers thought my previous employer should have extended my contract and that always left me dazed for some seconds. Limited duration contracts are simply limited duration contracts, nothing compels employers to extend them unless there is a business need to have you there. What must happen now?

Learn about people, their Cultures, Norms, Religion and Stereotypes (CNRS)

In one of my limited duration contract I was fortunate to work and electronically support 19 countries in Africa, that one alone thought me a lot about people and luckily prior to that I've never put myself in the box when it comes to learning about other people. To some extent you can easily develop relationships when you know and related to people's CNRS. Cherry on top if you can speak their language, which alone gives them some level of comfort and trust with you.

When is this self-education paying?

It's funny but true that most of us want to get involved if there is money, yes we all have bills to pay and also put bread on the table. To think of it, self-education is a long term investment, with good attitude and determination combinations you have the key to success. The things I've learned by myself 13 years ago are still relevant today and much in use. Some of these things are critical in my strategic planning to decision making. Think of self-education as a seasoning spice, we can buy the same steak but the end taste will be greatly impacted by the seasoning spice.

When Oprah Winfrey searched for a president for her television network, the Oprah Winfrey Network (OWN), she cut down applicants with a question that made some people very uncomfortable, she says at a presentation at the Stanford Graduate School of Business last year. One woman even burst out crying. It was: "What is your spiritual practice?"

First of all, the woman who cried was immediately taken out of the running, Winfrey says. But for those who protested that they weren't religious, Winfrey clarified that she wasn't asking about religion — she was asking about their inner relationship with themselves.

She was getting at, "What do you do for yourself? What do you do to keep yourself centered?"

Talking about success

Let's focus on the positive side: It's simply the accomplishment of an aim or purpose. Aligning this to the real world it simply spells winning at most times and progress in one's life but not limited to touchable or materialistic things. We all sometimes have our own definition of success, at some point some of us always define it as the good life and all nice things in this world. To some it's accomplishment of goals that cannot be seen or touched. To me it's just an accomplishment of any goal you set in your life, without being materialistic I can safely say I am or have been successful throughout my life and I am proud of my success.

In concluding

The little effort you put in knowing things around you and beyond your borders is the key to hidden treasure of information that's been bundled with a map to success in every positive thing you do. If we all can spend some time self-educating ourselves, our understanding and level of engagement in the matters that matter the most cannot be relinquished. There is a lot to learn from people of all races and cultures, people in the same or lower league and by paying attention to little details you end up having a combination to unlock the biggest vaults. That combination is called “Key".