The Ministry of Labour and Human Resources (MoLHR) has initiated several programs to address youth unemployment. Hence, youth entrepreneurship is an alternate long-term strategy for addressing youth unemployment and more importantly boosting economic growth. To this end, Training of Trainers (ToT) on entrepreneurship development was conducted by the Entrepreneurship Promotion Division, Department of Employment and Entrepreneurship to Incubation Managers from colleges under RUB, Economic Development Officers(EDO), Officers from Regional Employment and Labour Office(RELO), Lecturers/Instructors from TTIs/IZCs, and other ecosystem stakeholders.
Training of trainers on entrepreneurship development is a key activity to promote the culture of entrepreneurship in Bhutan through the capacity building of important stakeholders.
The overall objective of the TOT program is to develop the capacity of stakeholders on entrepreneurship development and enhance the professionalism and competencies of the stakeholders involved and also to spearhead economic development activities and facilitate business setups in the Dzongkhag for Dzongkhags while Institutes are expected to integrate the subjects in their curriculum to build an entrepreneurial mindset in the students.
Participants were introduced to other aspects such as business communication and ethics, financial literacy, Risk Management, licensing procedures, and many more. As a part of the training program, participants were taken for a daylong field visit to various business setups and enterprises on 20th November 2022 to enhance their understanding of Bhutan’s Entrepreneurship ecosystem and experience how the business setups work in reality
The ToT program was conducted using Competency-based Economies through the Formation of Enterprises (CEFE) methodology, an entrepreneurship-training concept for small and medium-scale enterprise promotion, developed and promoted by the German Technical Cooperation (GTZ) which adopts a comprehensive set of training instruments using experiential learning methods to develop and enhance business management and personal competencies mostly in the context of income & employment generation and economic development. During the training period, the participants were introduced to the following modules:
Module 1- Unlocking Personal Entrepreneurial Competencies (PECs).
Module 2- Matching Person with the Project.
Module 3- Business Model Generation
Module 4- Design Thinking and Rapid Prototyping
Module 5- Business Plan Preparation and,
Module 6- Business Plan Evaluation and Idea Viability Test through Pitching Session
Module 7- Training Competency Development
A total of 25 participants (10 Female & 15 Male) participated in the aforementioned program which includes 4 Business Incubation Managers from RUB Colleges, 6 economic development officers, 8 lecturers/instructors from TTIs and IZCs, 4 Regional Employment and Labour office while 1 represented Ministry of Labour & Human Resources and others 2 were youths.
To mark the successful completion of 15 days Training of Trainers Program, a simple closing ceremony was held on 30th November 2022 which was graced by the Director General of the Department of Employment & Entrepreneurship and attended by guests besides participants and organizer. The training of trainers program was funded by the Ministry of Labour and Human Resources through the CSI/Start-up Flagship Program (2018-2023). The training was conducted at the Jigme Wangchuk Power Training Institute (JWPTI) from 14- 30th November 2022