Naledi leadership program where stars are born and developed everyday to be a better version of themselves and shine the way they should.
Naledi leadership program was established in 2009 by Boitumelo Sefako and Keamogetse (Kea) Mokgokolosi, after they discovered that people do not live up to their potential anymore, they lack the motivation to see themselves beyond where they currently are in life. Speaking at Lejwe la Thuso NPO in Dobsonvile where they held a session recently, Boitumelo mentioned that,“we created this program to help people in general to tap into their inner intelligence and be empowered”.
Many a youth in communities are unemployed and not finding jobs puts a strain on them dropping their confidence. This program helps redirect their focus to what is important and how they can build themselves and also deal with interpersonal conflicts. It is about personal growth, as much as it focuses on teaching entrepreneurship it also focuses on how you can grow yourself as a person and how you can adjust to situations that dim your light. You get to learn about things you did not know about yourself and learn ways to deal with each aspect of yourself.
Kea and Boitumelo mentioned that the biggest challenge they are facing is commitment. “Since our program does not offer money/stipend we find that the number of attendees is decreasing” said Kea. Boitumelo added that when they first started, they had a lot of males who overtime quit the program because they are having a hard time to open up about their emotions, attributing emotional feelings to women which is a challenge.
The goal of the Naledi leadership program is to challenge the youth to think of ways to create jobs, identify opportunities, to shift the mindset of people from job hunting to thinking entrepreneurship and making choices that will be beneficial to them and those around them.
“I joined the program out of curiosity, I saw Naledi facilitating on leadership and decided why don’t I just give this a chance and see what they offer. During the program I started to see life differently they made me dicover things I did not know about myself” mentioned Obakeng, who is based at Lejwe la Thuso. Other attendees agreed that the program is helped them a lot especially when it comes to personal growth and dealing with their emotions. Ditokelo said that as an introvert she has learned to be more social and she also learned to be more responsible and own up to her actions.
In the future Kea and Boitumelo would like to see the program growing and have more men joining in, they want to see greatness, growth and shine in every youth member they have groomed. “I want to see the program being in every school in Gauteng, both primary school and high school” said Boitumelo.
Naledi leadership program is a place to shine your inner self, to restructure yourself and think like a leader. At Naledi, it is believed that everyone is a star. Slindile Sibiya
Soweto Sunrise News
