There is an incredible initiative in Hermanus that is training as many South Africans as possible in the craft of carpentry, to help them become self-employed and self-sustained entrepreneurs.
House of Growth (HoG) partnered up with Coastal Timber Mouldings (CTM), located in Hermanus (South-Africa), to realise a project both companies truly believe in: giving local people who are struggling, often uneducated and marginalized, a chance to move forward by offering them training and a job.
“CTM, being an established wood manufacturing firm, always has a bunch of spare wood. The goal is to train the local people the craft of carpentry, with this spare wood as a resource. We aim for them to become self-employed and self-sustained entrepreneurs, which we believe will take about 12-18 months of coaching, all depending on how they evolve.”
During the training, the students are responsible for their own finished products. Each trainee is provided a unique identity code, which is tagged onto their individual finished products. This way, in case of future reference, the products can always be traced back to the specific individual. This will ensure that each trainee takes responsibility for their own product quality.
HoG, being a business advisory & consultancy firm, are the business-side of things: helping the students to understand what it takes to become a viable business, understanding the business environment and matters relating to setting up a business.
And when a trainee decides to become independent, HoG helps them through the rough patches.
“Another perk of this project is that CTM will provide wood to the trainees, at a discount, when they decide to become independent, to help them get started.
It’s about more than just a job, it’s about giving them a sense of direction in life, a purpose. This combination enables CTM to have less waste and the people to get an education and a future.”
Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day… teach him how to fish and you feed him for a lifetime!
“We believe that it is important to help the community whenever the opportunity arises. And if there is none, our motto is to create it. It’s one thing to teach someone a skill. It’s a completely different story to show them how to use their skills to build a successful business for themselves and their families.”
Watch their video below or visit their website by clicking here.
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