Jessica Hawkey

What does your company do?

Pioneering a new way for South African youth to enter skilled careers in technology, such as software development, software testing, test automation and data science. redAcademy’s innovative skills and experiential learning hub specialises in teaching coding and technology skills. By collaborating with South African businesses facing a massive skills gap, our purpose is to build a sustainable tech talent pipeline for the future. redAcademy has a clear goal: to give carefully chosen, talented South Africans the opportunity to sprint into their IT careers. By giving Sprinters the opportunity to work in a live environment and gain experience on our clients’ own tech stack, we work closely with industry-leading senior developers and our client partners to ensure that Sprinters have the soft skills and work-readiness to step into a career in the tech industry. Through these strategic partnerships, our Career Sprint is designed to fast-track careers in the real world.

What is your biggest success?

96% youth employment success rate. RedAcademy is an innovative skills and experiential learning hub that specialises in teaching coding and technology skills. This accredited 12-month program includes six months of theoretical learning followed by six months of hands-on experience with live development projects, training South African matriculant youth, inside the client live working environment. Our Skills-Integration-as-a-Service (SIaaS) solution is a demand-led customised program which includes learning the clients tech stack and operational processes. The second half of the program is spent on real world project delivery, ensuring candidates are equipped with the technical and soft skills to be work ready from their very first day of employment, having already delivered into the clients business. This in-person customised approach including working experience has enabled redAcademy to achieve a 96% employment rate of graduates in the tech industry, the day after leaving the program.

What has been your biggest hurdle?

Educating the market that there is a new way to obtain work-ready tech talent at scale, within a year Solutions that create sustainable employment for youth, solutions that assist in stabilising the economy and lessening the tech skills gaps. Educating the market that there is a new way to obtain work-ready tech talent at scale, within a year of students, “Sprinters”, graduating from our programme. Educating the market that traditional means of obtaining an education and achieving a degree cannot be the only solution to youth upskilling and sustainable employment at scale. Our process has a proven track record, with a 96% success rate of candidates being placed into employment, from day one of their graduation. The Skills Integration as a Service model, learning, earning and working, also sees candidates remaining with their employers long after graduating. Additionally, the Skills Integration as a Service model is achieved at no extra cost to an IT budget, with real work benefit being gained by organisations within 6 months of the year-long program. The momentum for this solution is growing.