OML Africa Launches Initiative to Support Small Businesses

By Benedicta Gyimaah Folley

A human resource service dubbed: "Deliver My HR", has been launched in Accra to provide human resource support to small scale businesses with little or no internal professional expertise.

Launched by the International Human Resource consultants, OML Africa, on Wednesday, the initiative is intended to help grow the Ghanaian Informal and Small Business.

The provision focuses on helping entrepreneurs find the peace of mind to concentrate on their core business.

In an address, the managing consultant, OML Africa, Ms Anita Wiafe-Asinor, underscored the important roles informal and small businesses play in the socio-economic development of the country.

She stated that "with the explosion in youth population growth resulting from the annual increases in graduates coming out of our vocational, technical and tertiary institutions, the informal had become the main guaranteed and ready source of employment available for the majority of these youth."

Ms Wiafe-Asinor was quick to add that many businesses were faced with difficult and hostile business climate, which affected their growth, stressing that "If you meet any Ghanaian businessman or woman, you would hear a lot of worrying stories of how they ploughed through uncharted terrain, falling and rising before coming to where they are now with the greatest challenge being Human resource."

Shedding light on a report, the managing consultant said 70 percent of organisations in the country did not have HR as a strategic partner, with 20 percent out of the remaining 30 percent having their HR departments not working efficiently.

In addition, she said, "My long HR experience working across industries in Africa and beyond made me recognise that a business does not always require a permanent HR function just as long as it has access to expert support when it needs it."

Giving his personal experiences, Mr Emmanuel Awunee, a start-up Business Development Consultant and the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of SESIL Consult, disclosed how he lost huge sums of money because he did not have in place good HR policies and structures.

Mr Awunee lauded the OML for their initiative in providing confidential services to small scale medium enterprises.

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