Somali Youth and their lack of work ethic & Ambition

Coulombs law said:

In all my years of working in industries to studying in secondary and post Secondary I rarely came across Somalis with good work ethic and sky high ambitions.

From the time I was doing my internship at a company I knew a Somali who was a great team leader and a clear cut above the rest in projects. He was way too good for this job, I asked him one day why don't you apply to the Silicon Valley in California or try working your way up through the management or even negotiate a higher salary once your contract is up. He basically said that he was content with his current job and benefits ( Benefits weren't even good either).

Fast forward a few years back to first and second year University, I had like 6 Somali friends starting out in the same program in in September. We were all excited and vowed to get perfect GPA's and obtain work experience and get that "Dream" job. As the semesters dragged on you can feel the energy draining from these guys.

Finals on a Saturday I would phone them up and say lets meet up thursday afternoon to review, I get a reply that they can't make it. Night before the finals I phone them up and ask how their finals review is going and they say they haven't even started yet and are planning to pull an all nighter. This situation drags on for fall and winter semester and during the summer after the completion of first year my friends tell me that they plan on dropping out and plan on pursuing something else. What started as 6 Hopeful youths who had their 4 years of their degree planned out has dwindled down to only 1 person.

Fast forward couple years back to highschool and my Somali friends were ones that played basketball every single day thinking that they would make the NBA instead of doing their biology Homework. When teachers handed out report cards with grades, these guys would just hide them in their lockers and tell their Hooyos that they did not receive any from the instructors.

In my experience I rarely ran into Somalis with the drive to be at the top, the burning passion to achieve their goals no matter what it takes, and the motivation to put in the work necessary to achieve their dreams.

There are many ways to correct this and the main source of remedy to this is for parents to instill that work ethic into their child from the very beginning.

Walahi you see Asian parents always motivating their kids and telling them that they can achieve anything they want through hard work and perseverance and I think this is something missing in our community.

What do you guys think and what have you experienced?

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dr.leorio said:

I kinda understand because even though I finished undergrad I never enjoyed it. Not one bit. I hated coming into class everyday especially when it was snowing, I hated that all my classmates were Cadaan and had no social life, I hated how hard the science courses were, I simple hated everything about University. The only two Somalis that were science majors were two other girls and they were older than me and they graduated and left asap.

The only reason that I never dropped out was the fact my mother and father never had the same opportunity to get an education. I would have insulted all their hard work from raising me to getting our family out of the civil war if I quit. So in a way, my purpose for finishing school and graduating was bigger than me. If Somali parents and their children had better communication and respect their would be a better understanding of where they came from; it would be as clear as day. In an American individualistic society, everyone works for themselves but Somali culture and family is not like that at all. Dagan Celis really humbled me in realizing that people back home would kill to be in my shoes. Their are so many hard working youth back home that don't have any real opportunities. After learning and experiencing both sides of the Somali spectrum, I have no excuse to never work hard.

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dr.leorio said:

I kinda understand because even though I finished undergrad I never enjoyed it. Not one bit. I hated coming into class everyday especially when it was snowing, I hated that all my classmates were Cadaan and had no social life, I hated how hard the science courses were, I simple hated everything about University. The only two Somalis that were science majors were two other girls and they were older than me and they graduated and left asap.

The only reason that I never dropped out was the fact my mother and father never had the same opportunity to get an education. I would have insulted all their hard work from raising me to getting our family out of the civil war if I quit. So in a way, my purpose for finishing school and graduating was bigger than me. If Somali parents and their children had better communication and respect their would be a better understanding of where they came from; it would be as clear as day. In an American individualistic society, everyone works for themselves but Somali culture and family is not like that at all. Dagan Celis really humbled me in realizing that people back home would kill to be in my shoes. Their are so many hard working youth back home that don't have any real opportunities. After learning and experiencing both sides of the Somali spectrum, I have no excuse to never work hard.

Click to expand...

Coulombs law said:

In all my years of working in industries to studying in secondary and post Secondary I rarely came across Somalis with good work ethic and sky high ambitions.

From the time I was doing my internship at a company I knew a Somali who was a great team leader and a clear cut above the rest in projects. He was way too good for this job, I asked him one day why don't you apply to the Silicon Valley in California or try working your way up through the management or even negotiate a higher salary once your contract is up. He basically said that he was content with his current job and benefits ( Benefits weren't even good either).

Fast forward a few years back to first and second year University, I had like 6 Somali friends starting out in the same program in in September. We were all excited and vowed to get perfect GPA's and obtain work experience and get that "Dream" job. As the semesters dragged on you can feel the energy draining from these guys.

Finals on a Saturday I would phone them up and say lets meet up thursday afternoon to review, I get a reply that they can't make it. Night before the finals I phone them up and ask how their finals review is going and they say they haven't even started yet and are planning to pull an all nighter. This situation drags on for fall and winter semester and during the summer after the completion of first year my friends tell me that they plan on dropping out and plan on pursuing something else. What started as 6 Hopeful youths who had their 4 years of their degree planned out has dwindled down to only 1 person.

Fast forward couple years back to highschool and my Somali friends were ones that played basketball every single day thinking that they would make the NBA instead of doing their biology Homework. When teachers handed out report cards with grades, these guys would just hide them in their lockers and tell their Hooyos that they did not receive any from the instructors.

In my experience I rarely ran into Somalis with the drive to be at the top, the burning passion to achieve their goals no matter what it takes, and the motivation to put in the work necessary to achieve their dreams.

There are many ways to correct this and the main source of remedy to this is for parents to instill that work ethic into their child from the very beginning.

Walahi you see Asian parents always motivating their kids and telling them that they can achieve anything they want through hard work and perseverance and I think this is something missing in our community.

What do you guys think and what have you experienced?

Click to expand...

Coulombs law said:

In all my years of working in industries to studying in secondary and post Secondary I rarely came across Somalis with good work ethic and sky high ambitions.

From the time I was doing my internship at a company I knew a Somali who was a great team leader and a clear cut above the rest in projects. He was way too good for this job, I asked him one day why don't you apply to the Silicon Valley in California or try working your way up through the management or even negotiate a higher salary once your contract is up. He basically said that he was content with his current job and benefits ( Benefits weren't even good either).

Fast forward a few years back to first and second year University, I had like 6 Somali friends starting out in the same program in in September. We were all excited and vowed to get perfect GPA's and obtain work experience and get that "Dream" job. As the semesters dragged on you can feel the energy draining from these guys.

Finals on a Saturday I would phone them up and say lets meet up thursday afternoon to review, I get a reply that they can't make it. Night before the finals I phone them up and ask how their finals review is going and they say they haven't even started yet and are planning to pull an all nighter. This situation drags on for fall and winter semester and during the summer after the completion of first year my friends tell me that they plan on dropping out and plan on pursuing something else. What started as 6 Hopeful youths who had their 4 years of their degree planned out has dwindled down to only 1 person.

Fast forward couple years back to highschool and my Somali friends were ones that played basketball every single day thinking that they would make the NBA instead of doing their biology Homework. When teachers handed out report cards with grades, these guys would just hide them in their lockers and tell their Hooyos that they did not receive any from the instructors.

In my experience I rarely ran into Somalis with the drive to be at the top, the burning passion to achieve their goals no matter what it takes, and the motivation to put in the work necessary to achieve their dreams.

There are many ways to correct this and the main source of remedy to this is for parents to instill that work ethic into their child from the very beginning.

Walahi you see Asian parents always motivating their kids and telling them that they can achieve anything they want through hard work and perseverance and I think this is something missing in our community.

What do you guys think and what have you experienced?

Click to expand...

AceofSom said:

I always wondered why no Somalis made it to the NBA


One must never forget that getting a degree means instant success, or you will succeed in life. Couple Somali guys I know who dropped out in

year 10 of high school are millionaires in Kenya

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IslamIsTheAnswer said:

The problem is not one of ambition. Somalis can be very ambitious. That's why every other farax wants to become president or wazir. The problem here is one of grit, something Somalis don't have. Somalis are lazy and have trouble following through on commitments, especially if they require many short-term sacrifices for a long-term gain. But you won't get far in life without grit

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VixR said:

This. Grunt work is definitely considered lowly and beneath us, and this mindset is engrained into the culture. There's a preference for highway shortcuts in a world that continues to structure itself like a long winding forked road, wherein you must to reach (a) to get to (b) before you can reach (c), ie, the uphill climb of educational degrees, company promotions, any position of prestige in the Western sphere, the stark opposite model being the one of nepotism and clan relations that Somalis are traditionally used to, etc. Unfortunately, there is no highway ramp that allows you to reach (c) without traversing (a) and (b), but for the very select few.

I believe there's a strong entrepreneurial spirit, but even that lends itself to a preference for the path of least resistance, hence its success (significant) being most prominent in countries with less regulation, namely the African continent. We need to reprogram our 'collective' definition of success, what it means to get there. Of course, there are many hardworking Somalis, and I believe there's a changing trend in that thinking in a segment, but there's definitely a strong element of it that followed us out here, and very incompatibly so. This is a merit-based culture.

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Jubba_Man said:

Meritocracy in the west is largely bullshit, especially in North America. The good jobs and positions are almost always secured through family connections and nepotism (ex. WASP kid's dad and executive at company they are applying to were in the same fraternity). This is not an excuse to give up, but we need to acknowledge that the idealized reality you are constructing in your post is just that: a construction. Things may be a little more subtle here, but the fundamental workings of the job market are the same here as they are back home.

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Jubba_Man said:

Meritocracy in the west is largely bullshit, especially in North America. The good jobs and positions are almost always secured through family connections and nepotism (ex. WASP kid's dad and executive at company they are applying to were in the same fraternity). This is not an excuse to give up, but we need to acknowledge that the idealized reality you are constructing in your post is just that: a construction. Things may be a little more subtle here, but the fundamental workings of the job market are the same here as they are back home.

Click to expand...