The Toolkit iSkills (TTI) Ltd

To train young women with in-demand skills in life and employability skills and certify their skills with regulatory bodies and connect them to internship and entrepreneurship opportunities. We will integrate compliance and  occupational safety modules into Toolkit iSkill’s existing blended learning life and employability skills training model. We will also include Community Health Work (CHW) training modules that will provide young women with the skills necessary to meet the requirements of a CHW and be responsive to changing community health needs.

Jane is the Founder-Director of The Toolkit iSkills (TTI) Limited. Jane founded Toolkit in 2014 in response to the growing scale of the youth unemployment crisis in Kenya and in recognition of the profound shortage of skilled labour in the construction, infrastructure, mining and gas sectors. Her previous experience working for the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR) in conflict zones across the world inspired her to launch Toolkit as a way of providing youth with essential life and technical skills in order to provide alternative life paths to violence, crime, drugs, radicalization and irregular migration.

Jane holds a Masters in Law (LL.M) from Harvard Law School and has over 15 years of global experience in the practice and application of international human rights and  an accomplished researcher and has authored numerous publications and tools for government officials, UN and NGOs. Included among her publications are Gaps in Kenya’s Regulatory Framework on Workplace Based Training (ILO, 2010); A Synthesis of Inter-Agency Knowledge on Workplace Based Training Applicable to Skills Training for Vulnerable Youth in Kenya (ILO, 2019) and Standards and Instruments for Pedagogical Upskilling of Master Craftsmen in Kenya (World Bank, Government of Kenya Youth Employment Opportunities Project, 2017).

According to the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics, Kenya's unemployment rates in 2020 doubled to 10.4 percent in the second quarter compared to 5.2 percent in the first quarter due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Youth bear the brunt of unemployment compared to adults. The 2020 edition of the Global Employment Trends for Youth report, globally, one-fifth of young people currently have NEET (not in employment, education, or training) status, which means they are neither gaining experience in the labour market, nor receiving an income from work, nor enhancing their education and skills. 

Merely having vocational skills and training is not considered adequate to find opportunities. According to Dalberg, 2019 report on youth not in education, employment and training in Kenya, employed youth feel that insufficient or unsuitable education, are some main impediments to finding employment.  

The TTI training model, which is tailor-made to fit the marginalized and unskilled needs of youth and women, focuses on three critical pillars: life skills, technical skills, and links to industry. The TTI online training and deployment (OTaD) portal targets youth who are either jobless or doing casual work most of whom didn’t finish primary/secondary education and are vulnerable living in marginalized locations.TTI Pitch Deck

Through our blended learning and technology-based platforms like Zoom sessions, WhatsApp support groups and Toolkit iSkills’ learning management system, we can extend asynchronous, yet interactive trainings to those who need it most. This training environment meets the youth where they are and allows them to learn at their own pace, according to their dynamic lifestyles. Opening doors for young women to disrupt a traditionally male-dominated sector, like construction, allows women opportunities for economic growth and job advancement. Investing in the next generation of Community Health Workers in Kenya will also help to improve primary health care, provide new employment and entrepreneurial pathways for young women.  

The Toolkit iSkills (TTI) Ltd is an innovation in youth employability and a trigger for the SDG goals Agenda 2030 “no one left behind”. Through a unique workforce-based training model, TTI drives job creation, incubation of youth entrepreneurs and job placement in the following sectors: Oil and Gas; Construction and Infrastructure and Organic Farming. TTI exists to raise youth from unskilled and unemployed to skilled and highly sought after. Our motivation came after finding out that International investors are saying that youth in Kenya and East Africa do not have the right skills. The vision and mission of the Toolkit is to create a critical and reliable workforce in Africa by transforming the lives of young men and women - the youth who lack educational and employment opportunities and are wasting away in their numbers – into skilled and resourceful workers