XX July 2021: The growing demand for specialised cleaning and hygiene services, which has been accelerated during the Covid-19 pandemic, has positioned the cleaning and hygiene sector to become a major contributor to employment opportunities for young people in the country, according to facilities management company Servest.
“The cleaning and hygiene services continue to provide opportunities for employment. These sectors are among the fastest growing industries and can quickly absorb unemployed young people,” Mc Millan said. “The cleaning sector remains one of the biggest contributing industries to alleviating unemployment in this country, as cleaning remains an essential service in any business and perhaps even more accentuated by the current pandemic. As we grow our market share, there are opportunities for employment for the unemployed, who are willing to use the cleaning services as a springboard to launch careers in the facilities management sector,” says Vianca Mc Millan, HR Director, Servest.
The entry requirements for the hygiene and cleaning services is Matric, Mc Millan said. “But it’s more important that one has the right attitude, willingness to start at the “bottom” and possess the eagerness to grab the opportunities that these sectors present in developing new skills and ultimately enabling career progression in this space.”
Entry level roles that young people will typically occupy include cleaners or hygiene controllers in the cleaning sector. “These jobs are sometimes seen as not very glamorous by young people. The other challenge is that there is also often a need for instant gratification which leads to the expectation that one will start at the top of the ladder without first doing the hard work at entry level first,” Mc Millan pointed out.
Servest is an integrated facilities management company providing a range of integrated facilities management services across sectors, with cleaning, deep cleaning and specialised cleaning services among the company’s primary offerings; enabling the creation of employment opportunities across the various sectors in which the company operates. “It’s important that young people explore the opportunities available to them in the cleaning and hygiene services. We are looking for people who are willing to learn and grow.”
Servest currently employs approximately 7 600 colleagues in the hygiene and cleaning sector of which approximately 37% are young people. “It is sometimes a struggle for us to find young people who are interested in a cleaning job.” Mc Millan said. “We want to change the narrative and professionalise the cleaning industry so that we can attract ambitious young people to enter the job market in cleaning, with the prospects of building a career in our Integrated Services model, with time”.
“A cleaning professional body will recognise the experience of colleagues in this field, which will hopefully attract even more unemployed youth to enter the job market this way,” she concluded.
About Servest cleaning and hygiene services
Servest is the first black owned facilities management company in Africa, providing integrated facilities solutions for the internal and external built and marine environments, including solutions such as internal and external design and space planning, cost optimisation analysis, carbon impact reduction, cleaning, parking, catering, hygiene, security, pest control, office plants, and landscaping solutions across multiple African countries. Servest was established in 1997. In 2015, Kagiso Tiso Holdings (KTH) acquired 51% of Servest making it the first black owned facilities management company in Africa. The Group employs 21 000 Colleagues across 11 000 sites. The company has a presence in eight countries across Africa.
