Bereng Mpaki
MOST budding enterprises are unable to attain financial independence and sustainability due to lack of requisite skills to successfully apply for job tenders.
This was said by the Association of Lesotho Employers and Business’s (ALEB) Legal Officer Tšolo Hlalele who said most enterprises have the capacity to tender for most jobs but unfortunately miss out on these live-saving opportunities due to lack of requisite tendering skills.
ALEB, with the support of the International Labor Organization (ILO), yesterday organized a one-day workshop to equip local enterprises with tendering skills.
“There is an information gap when it comes to tendering among our enterprises. You will often find that most firms have the capacity to do the job offered in a tender but do not know what steps they have to follow to secure the tender. So the idea of this workshop is to equip them with skills on how to go about successfully tendering for a job,” Adv. Tsolo said in an interview with Lesotho Times on Wednesday this week.
He said the workshop was part of the continuous training programmes meant to support entreprsie development in the country that ALEB was involved in with the support of ALEB.
Earlier this year, ALEB trained micro and small entrepreneurs on business management skills training to improve sustainability and profitability of their businesses under the Start and Improve Your Business (SIYB) programme of ILO.
SIYB is the largest global business management training programme with a focus on starting and improving businesses as a strategy for creating more and better employment for women and men.
“You will be aware that we have had a couple of similar trainings were are trying to help enterprise development for job creation and sustainability through different avenues. But we have since discovered that in as much as we want to grow business enterprises, they face a major challenges of access to finance,” Adv Tšolo said.
“So to try to mitigate that challenge, we found it imperative to equip them with necessary skills on how to respond to public tenders. We believe their ability to secure job tenders will make it easier for them to get business loans at the financial institutions in order to commence the contract,” he added.
Adv. Tšolo further indicated there would be more trainings which would build on where this particular workshop has left off.
“We have lined up more trainings after this one where we will be looking at how to move forward after helping enterprises to secure job tenders. The whole idea is ultimately to help enterprises to be financially independent and sustainable as part of our function as the association.”
One of the trainees Daniel Monyaesa said the training had increased his knowledge and confidence to comfortably face the tendering process.
“Before this training, I never had an opportunity to be formally introduced to the tendering process. So, I found it quite informative as a first time learner as I now know that it takes to apply for a tender,” Mr Monyaesa said.
“I feel motivated and confident to face the tendering process from now onwards,” he added.
Mr Monyaesa further said the information he learned at the workshop would also come handy in developing his company’s procurement system.
