Jo’speaks awards programme on tactical retreat
Jo’speaks’ Ultimate Motivational Speaker session will this year withhold the third season, while it focuses on training speakers for the next edition to be held next year.
The Ultimate Motivational Speaker is a program that is meant to unleash talent on motivational speaking. Founder and Director at Jo’speaks, Dr Kgomotso Jongman says lack of jobs in Botswana has encouraged them to find ways to create jobs through speaking. “This program aims at creating jobs through talent and passion as well as unearthing talent,” he explained. He highlighted that they have been running the competition for two years now. However, this year they plan on concentrating on training people than going for competition like in the previous two seasons. Currently, they try to look out to those who have already joined the programme, to see to their livelihood. This, he says, would mould them and shape their confidence. “We prepare them first so that when they come for the third season, we don’t spend much time training them because they would already be equipped with what is needed,” he said. Dr Jongman further dubbed this initiative, a community development project and noted that from the last year’s top 10, only one person has indicated not to be doing anything currently. “The rest have sought opportunities and have started their own companies, while some have created You Tube channels. The remaining one has shared with us that he is still identifying what to do too,” he said adding that the program is not for the youth only but for both the young and the old. “It is meant to sharpen their skills and mould their talent to be able to put food on the table,” said Dr Jongman. He has also noted that they take pride in the fact that speaking is for People from all walks of life and cuts across all professions, which could open a job opportunity for anyone within the creatives industry.
Last year’s winner, Mosa Ramopedi Mogote tells BG Style that winning the Ultimate Motivational Speaker was a life changing experience for her, considering the fact that she was joining the competition for the second time after getting position four on her first attempt. “It was a self- discovering moment for me, and motivated me to totally think outside the box after winning. I really had to stretch my potential, and started my speaking masterclass called Mogote Speaking Masterclass,” she says. Through this masterclass, she equips people on basics of speaking and she tells BG Styles that this gives her a whole purpose in life, through her art of speaking. “I am confident that the people who attend my classes would also go as far as me, because we share the same trait of perfection in this art of speaking and want to be recognized globally through it,” she said.
Ramopedi is also currently working on the Mosa Ramopedi Awards, inspired by her scooping the Ultimate Motivational Speaker Awards. She is also writing two books of which she says she would reveal their titles when they are due. What keeps her going is never giving up, and this is the same lesson she instils in her speakers, to make sure that the speaking industry grows and Botswana is represented internationally.