By : Mohamed Shawky
Egypt’s Information Technology Industry Development Agency (ITIDA) virtually hosted ‘The Future of Work in Egypt’ forum on the 14th of December 2020.
The event, first of its kind in Egypt, comes in collaboration with the global online learning platform, Udacity and the freelance marketplace website, Freelancer, to introduce and share new business frameworks and models relevant to the highly volatile and digital dependent world, especially post the global pandemic.
“The COVID-19 pandemic has confirmed the importance of digitization and shifting the way both companies and employers work” ITIDA’s CEO, Amr Mahfouz said in his opening remarks.
“We fully acknowledge the importance of going all-digital, and we have been more than ready with our plans in place, including offering many initiatives dedicated to support the mission of digitizing Egypt”, he added.
ITIDA has launched a large number of initiatives and programs that primarily aim at building digital skills and capabilities, nurturing innovation, and enhancing the thriving Startup ecosystem in Egypt; all tailored to ensure that Egyptian Enterprises have the skills and agility required to thrive in the new digital age.
The ‘The Future of Work in Egypt’ event featured discussions on adopting new business models in an ever-so- changing world, training the future workforce of Egypt, freelancers and freelance market, future work challenges and how to overcome them. The event featured local and global industry experts, from IBM, Deloitte, Kuwait Food Company (Americana) and Freelancer.
“Freelancing has become the new normal of work, especially during the pandemic. It provides unparalleled access to skills and talents at a competitive cost, with agile performance, and can efficiently serve technical and business demands”, Mahfouz highlighted.
“It is s a large market size that we are going to tap into with getting our youth well-equipped with right mix of skills while encouraging the freelancing approach amongst our local enterprises.”, Mahfouz confirmed.
The event also highlighted; through an insightful panel discussion moderated by Freelancer with some local and global industry experts, businesses’ experience with freelancers and freelancing marketplaces, what challenges to expect, how to overcome them, and the value that freelancing brought to their companies.
The event incorporated the launch of the new Talent Alpha Program, which aims to offer Egyptian companies with new business strategies for engaging with a flexible workforce. In this light, The Talent Alpha Sponsorship Program allocates USD500 to eligible companies, who will additionally receive tailored support from Freelancer.com to help define their enterprise’s technical needs and hire freelancers accordingly.
Egypt is among few countries that have shown remarkable resilience in the face of Covid-19, thanks to the enormous investment made in developing its infrastructure not only in the ICT sector (USD 1.6 billion investment in the last 3 years) but the power and energy sectors as well. The country is among the first five countries, which are expected to achieve economic growth in 2020.
