Women emerge as the biggest winners in Safaricom's latest recruitment exercise

Women are the biggest beneficiaries of the ongoing Safaricom recruitment exercise.

The Telecommunication giant is in the process of recruiting a total of 63 university students, of which 40 of them will be women for their technology internship program.

In a bid to promote inclusivity, Safaricom has further disclosed that out of the 63 positions; four will be reserved for people with disability.

The internship program, which was launched in 2012, is set to equip students with basic training on technology.

The lucky students will also get a chance to be mentored by industry top players on how to survive and network in the demanding world of tech.

Kenya has a deficit of qualified technology and engineering professionals. This has seen local technology firms partner with universities and other training institutions to bridge the gap.

Safaricom CEO, Bob Collymore has not shied away in calling for the tech industry to employee more women, terming them high achievers, furthermore it will go a long way in boosting gender inclusivity.

He once even penned a lengthy article on Linkedin titled; Its a Man's Man's Man's World where he argued on the need of more women to be running the show in the tech industry.

“The tech sector are often the worst culprits: just 17% of Google’s workforce are women and the story is no better at younger start-ups such as Airbnb where it’s 13% or Pinterest at 14% or even Dropbox where it shrinks to just 6.3% of the population” part of his article read.

Apart from training on technology, the program will also be expanded to include courses in application development, personal finance and inter-personal skills.

“We have carefully designed the structure of the academy to ensure participants are well prepared to tackle Kenya’s demanding technology sector,” Safaricom director of technology Thibaud Rerolle said.

Since its inception, Safaricom has trained 360 students, most of who have already been absorbed by 18 companies that have signed partnerships with Safaricom.

While the move is commendable, tech companies have in recent times complained of the high number of women who after sometimes less than five years in the tech industry, resign to go into more ‘friendlier’ industries like banking or even settle down as house wives, robbing the tech industry of crucial talent.

The company began receiving applications for the program on Monday. The deadline for submitting applications is February 26.