Pursuing Growth in Developing countries through Community Capacity Building – An innovative approach towards Skills development

Abstract

‘Change’ is the rule of the disruptive era we are part of. This has been obvious especiallywith regardto the population dynamics of countries and their path towards growth and development. The Demographic Dividend has been upheld as a factor with impeccable potential – that can increase the pace of economic growth for the vast expanse of the developing world if appropriately leveraged. While many East Asian economies seem to have made phenomenal strides in growth owing to the demographic dividend, the same transition has not permeated expected growth outcomes for countries in Latin America. This paper pointshighlights the importance of Governmental Policy making, and developmental programs through upskilling of resource base as a better approachtowards enhancing development in countries like India. The study undertaken among 350 IT skilling graduates in India on their perception of employability potential of the skilling programs and second study parallelly done among 100 trainers on the kind of IT skilling programs rolled out yearly – reveals the existence and the direction of skilling needed in the country by bringing out a
measure called the ‘propensity to upskilling’ in the IT sector. In order to ensure that Development initiatives drive optimum results to economic growth, the need of the hour is an impetus on ‘IT Skills’ and building up on ‘Employability skills’ among the people. This undeniable need for change in Development efforts to be able to give the right thrust to IT Skills and to forecast the right kind of Skills to promote employability and productivity increase. This introduces us to the new approach of Community Capacity Building. ‘Strengths, Skills and Abilities of masses’ - the new direction for governments of developing countries to steer ahead to speedier progress.