Australia Awards South and West Asia

Kaiyan Yousaf has been instrumental in initiating a 1.5 Million USD program to help improve international remittance services in Pakistan thanks to his skills gained from his Australia Awards Scholarship.

Kaiyan was awarded an Australia Awards Scholarship to study a Master of International Business at the University of Melbourne and found the experience to be rewarding on many levels.

“I learned to appreciate the advancement of my fields of study over the past 10 years. It helped me develop a theoretical understanding of elements that I had noticed while looking at competitive strategy and value chain analysis.”

“It was such a rewarding experience and has helped me truly appreciate the power of diversity. I learned about diverse cultures and made friends with people from various countries.”

Kaiyan realised the complex and competitive job market that he was returning to and actively started searching for employment well before his return.

“I was offered a job even before I came back to Pakistan and joined the organisation a day after coming back.” He believes that it would not have been so easy had it not been for his Australia Awards Scholarship.

“[It was the] advanced degree from a reputable university with a prestigious scholarship which helped improve my marketability.”

Kaiyan returned to Pakistan and took a position as a Senior Manager in the Knowledge Management department at Karandaaz, Pakistan where he was responsible for developing knowledge and insights into the markets of digital financial services, corporate investment and credit to help design initiatives that increase financial inclusion in Pakistan.  

“I had only been back six months, and I had already designed and initiated a program worth 1.5 Million USD to help improve the current international remittance services in Pakistan.”

Kaiyan delivering a session during the Reintegration Workshop 2018

Talking about his experience with Australia Awards Scholarships, Kaiyan said, “Australia Awards has been extremely supportive and the guidance I’ve received has been exceptional. From the pre-award stage to my time in Australia, it was a great source of support. My Masters might not have been possible if it wasn’t for the scholarship, but it goes beyond that. Taking such a huge step, I didn’t feel like I was alone, because of Australia Awards. I knew that someone was looking out for me.”

“My Australia Awards experience has also given me a vision. Even if not covered by the scope of my current job, I want to use the skills I’ve gained in Australia and work towards making Pakistani enterprises more innovative and help them improve locally and compete globally.”

Kaiyan is now working as a Competitiveness Enhancement Lead in a USAID-funded project and is responsible for designing and developing the project’s Small Medium Enterprise Administration development strategy.

Before his Australia Awards Scholarship, Kaiyan completed his MBA from a reputable University in Islamabad and worked for over nine years in the development field as a consultant on economic growth and livelihood development on projects funded by the United States Agency for International Development.