'Life-applicable skills, antidote to thriving in technology world' - ITREALMS

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The Group Managing Director of African technology giant, SystemSpecs, Mr. John Obaro, has urged students to acquire skills and attitudes necessary to thrive in a more technologically advanced future.

Delivering the guest lecture during the recently held 10th matriculation ceremony of McPherson University, Ogun State, Obaro said “Today needs thinkers so that we can be relevant tomorrow. It has been said that knowledge in most fields doubles about every five years. You must therefore have your eyes and imagination one step ahead of today, or your skills will be a mismatch for the new world of tomorrow.”

According to the technology tycoon, experts have said that in another 15 years, majority of career people are training for now may be irrelevant as most would be automated. Without meaning to undermine any course of study, some of the careers that have been identified include travel agents, typists, cashiers, librarians, couriers, bank tellers, textile workers, the print industry, sports referees and umpires, pilots, drivers, vendors, telemarketers and fishermen.

He further stressed that most jobs today will become automated in the future, and people who succeed will have to be people who can think outside the box, people who are curious, ever-learning, innovative, people who can flex and adapt to the new changes and realities of tomorrow.

“Creativity is the most important skill you need to equip you for tomorrow. You will not be hired because of what you know or what you have memorised. Google will do a better job than that. You will be hired because of what you can do with what you know,” Obaro added.

In addition, Obaro highlighted some of the attitudes the students need to acquire to prepare for this frightening but exciting tomorrow. These include an entrepreneurial mindset, search for knowledge beyond the classroom, deep and wide reading, familiarisation with digital tools, knowledge sharing, online security and privacy, and quality friends.

To support technology advancement and in line with the SystemSpecs’ Group 30 years anniversary, the GMD donated thirty Monitors and thirty Uninterrupted Power Supply (UPS) to the McPherson University Information Technology (IT) centre.

John Obaro founded SystemSpecs, a foremost provider of financial and human capital technology solutions in 1992. SystemSpecs is the creator of some of the most iconic technology solutions in Nigeria and beyond. These include payment platform, Remita; human resource management solution, HumanManager; and e-commerce platform, Paylink.

On February 22nd, 2022, the firm expanded its operations as it celebrated its 30th anniversary. SystemSpecs announced that it had transformed into a holding company, with two distinct subsidiaries: Remita Payment Services Limited (RPSL) and SystemSpecs Technology Services Limited (STSL). It also announced the emergence of a new chairman. Ernest Ndukwe, former Executive Vice Chairman of the Nigerian Telecommunications Commission (NCC) and Chairman of MTN Nigeria, took over from Dr Christopher Kolade, Nigeria’s former high commissioner to the United Kingdom.