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| Ms Shida Mutuku, the strategy and business development director at East Africa Domestic Services (EADS) |
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Preying on growing up market clients in need of trained workers, East Africa Domestic Services has developed a syllabus that moulds “professional house attendants”
We leave them behind in our houses and entrust them with our belongings, from wealth to children and other domestic secrets. Some of them are the security guards in our houses; some are our children’s guardians. Despite the crucial role they play in society, domestic workers do not exactly command respect.
Most people treat them like third-class citizens, yet they are the reason for our comfort as we work at the office and when we retreat to our havens at the end of a long day. They are given infamous names like Mboch (sheng), maid or househelp.
But there’s some good news for them and their employers. In the heart of the leafy Runda Estate in Nairobi, Ms Shida Mutuku, the strategy and business development director of East Africa Domestic Services (EADS), is changing the negative perception that is tagged to the househelps. “We want to change the perception of the domestic worker. If we professionalise the domestic worker, more people will come and join it,” says Ms Mutuku.
Ms Mutuku alongside three other partners are the brains behind the first ever firm to offer professional domestic management in Kenya and, she claims, in Africa. The pioneers in professionalising the industry, EADS seeks to mould idle labour into valuable productivity through training young Kenyans on domestic work management.
“The youth finish school but some cannot go to higher institutions and just hang around,” says Ms Mutuku. This way, EADS is uplifting the welfare of thousands of Kenyans through gainful employment. The company started in January 2008 and trains people in professional domestic services management for corporate and individual clients. Their target market is upper-class, and thus training tallies with the lifestyles of the high profile clients.
The trainees are taken through a six-week vigorous training that entails six core areas of learning: first aid, child care, housekeeping, cookery, driving lessons and gardening. To provide top-notch services, EADS liaises with experts in the six core areas of training. Apart from the theory, trainees are subjected to practicals. Ms Mutuku says they are taken to malls to familiarise themselves with the places and to adapt before they are sent out to work. They must be above the age of 18, have a primary or secondary certificate and basic understanding of English and Swahili.
Huge market
At the end of the training, EADS employs the trainees. “Our business model is to train and hire them out in the market,” says Ms Mutuku. “The clients have nothing to do with the employees, we take care of them. As soon as they are employed they get a medical cover, a scheme for the legal spouse and two kids, and we open bank accounts for them.”
Ms Mutuku is optimistic about the growth of the business. “The potential is enormous,” she says. “Look at parents, couples, singles who need domestic work taken care of.” She believes that the company will grow big, with a dream of being publicly listed in ten years’ time.
The company has also managed to get clients outside Nairobi. Future plans are to venture into the regional market, but “we are leaning on franchising when it comes to other countries,” says Ms Mutuku. “We are meeting our targets very well…business is good.”
Ms Mutuku says that the company wants to give a holistic solution to domestic problems. In the past, househelps were looked down upon because some could not do things right and they were not trained well. “But after training them now, it commands respect,” she says. So after training they are referred to as “house attendants” because, she asserts, what they do in the house is no different from what flight attendants do.
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