In parts of rural Africa, many workers don’t have access to training programs where they can learn skills needed to secure better, higher paying jobs. Ugandan-based human resources company Q-Sourcing is working to change that.
The company is “up-skilling” job seekers by providing on-site training in electrical, plumbing, construction, health & safety, and welding. One training center is even built inside a shipping container and can be driven to remote communities to train job seekers there. Their efforts are giving hundreds of workers the opportunity to receive skill certifications at American and European standards. “You hear their stories,” says company founder Patrick Mbonye. “Some of these guys had given up on life. Now there is a light at the end of the tunnel.”
A former official with the UN Development Programme in Uganda, Mbonye started Q-Sourcing after witnessing firsthand how small business owners struggled to keep afloat. Today his business both trains and recruits employees and manages human resource needs for companies in five countries. His goal is to take the company public and, in doing so, to become a role model for other business owners in East Africa.
Leadership
Patrick Mbonye is the managing director and founder of Q Sourcing, an outsourcing and human resources company in Uganda doing business in five countries. Mbonye started the company in 2006 after leading a UN Development Programme to establish advisory centers for small businesses throughout Uganda. Prior to that he worked for two years at the World Bank’s Ministry of Finance to establish regulatory policies for low-income citizens in Uganda. Mbonye received an undergraduate degree from Makerere University in Uganda and a master’s in science including international business management from the Imperial College London, with a dissertation on financing to small businesses in Africa.
Mbonye participated in the Seed Transformation Program in East Africa in 2018.