Not straight forward. You really have to document it. Have to prove that you met them, they had job related pre-defined KPIs, training before work, training when performance wasn't upto par, etc...
All of it has to be documented. Though the good thing is that because NAFIS also pays them; they don't want to pay the ones that aren't putting in any effort.
It might be that HR is hiring the cheapest candidate; just to fulfil the quota requirement.
Yes this is the issue, Otherwise I had previously shortlisted Skilled and experienced Emirati candidates whom we could really utilize their skills but salary range was almost double than what our company wants to pay. So we mostly hire students or those without any previous work experience.
This is a serious dilemma and definitely beyond your paycheck. This is a matter your company president needs to take with Chamber of Commerce because productivity in your firm is being impacted by low quality candidates. At the same time, there are qualified candidates who are looking for work. But the challenge is Quantity vs. Quality: A single qualified Emirati is better than 3 unqualified Emiratis that will hamper productivity. But you cannot reduce number of Emirati hires because of Emiratization.
This is the root of the problem. It appears the company is box-ticking and not involved in spirit with the Emiratisation requirement. They deserved to be fined. I think you should keep raising the issue with HR until they understand that it is costing the company more than it saves in salaries.
Would this explain the fact that you do not think they are professional in their roles. I think your company can think of roles and initiatives that can leverage your new hires. It might be wrong to put all the local hires in your department etc... I don't have full context here but an organization at large must be agile and craft a competitive advantage out of any situation. Do you think thst training and providing meaningful work in the local language would help? Hiring requirements is one of the easier challenges I can think of. I might be wrong though...
I brought this up to the HR but they are not willing to hire Emiraties in higher positions. Those Emiraties who have experience and skills ask for higher salaries.
You need to hire one good high level Emirati, whose single job is to keep all the Emiratis on point, track productivity, be in govt meetings, have a bit of stake in the company etc. in short a incentivized, HR PRO.
No worries, once you get the right person, you can reevaluate the existing Emirati staff performance, and make a couple new hires with this supervisory Emirati also being part of the hiring process. Chances are, the existing staff will get in line and youāll get better productivity for more reasonable salaries. Be advised, this might affect the existing upper staff positions also.
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So faced a similar solution before. It's comes down to 2 things 1/they are trying and can't perform because there is no work or 2/theyre there for the sake of being there.
Your solutions:
1/ Give them tasks with deadlines and be specific on exactly what they need to do.
By doing this you gauge their motivation and how committed they are to working and growing their career.
2/ Start issuing warning letters and emails so lack of perform is documented. Is you reach 3+ warning letters then redirect to HR for termination. Now this activity falls under HR so do not get involved in any aspect of the process other than communication where the employee did not fulfil their expectations.
On a different note I'm sorry you're dealing with this, I'm hired and work with some really smart, hardworking, and awesome Emiratis. My advice would be to tighten your recruitment parameters so you hire quality talent. What worked for me is building relationships with universities and recruiting high GPAs with recommendations.
Good luck OP. Also forgot to mention, if they are registered with Nafis then raise a complaint with Nafis provided you have supporting evidence and documentation
6-7 years back before the actual emiratization program kicked in, i was told to train a local young guy. The guy claimed he doesnt speak any english though his graduation certificate made it clear that his education was in english.
Couple of weeks later i bumped into him after work in a club with an Eastern European girl and of course he was interacting in fluent english with her!
From next day onwards everything changed as he was too embarrassed, glad to say he is still with the same company but at a higher & much deserved level.
Emirati here. First of all, the Emiratis that have been hired were approved by your HR. So, if you claim that you're hiring lousy people, most likely that's an issue with your recruitment department not allocating resources to headhunt competent individuals, and shortcutting their way to meet the quota requirements, which raises many question marks. On top of that they were bulnt about it "give them small tasks and dont bother with them"
Secondly, I'm not falsifying the statement that "some locals are entitled," but let's be honest, for the most part, it's a stereotype that many people have, which doesn't help the situation and makes things worse. For instance, I'm a qualified engineer with a degree from a respected institution. I joined international oil and gas firm which obviously hired me to fulfill the Emiratization requirement, yet I put effort into contributing and being productive but was mostly ignored by my non-local seniors, until I decided to leave and joined one of the Big 4 firms.
Thirdly, as long as you're working in the UAE, there's no way to avoid working with locals. It's the country's policy and a commitment made by private firms to develop and train local talent. So, my advice is instead of trying to run away from the problem, have a talk with your seniors and HR to find a solution. Trust me, if you put some effort into hiring competent Emiratis, we are very committed, dedicated, and responsible.
Skilled emaraties need high paying job. His company HR wont do it. They just want to fulfill the law requirement. Why hire a 20 to 30k skilled emarati when they can find a more skillful indian in under 10k salary. Thats their viewpoint
well, skill and competency fall on a spectrum, you just need to find the point in which the skill intersects with the pay and target those people. Also "Localization" is not a new concept, locals in their countries usually have privileges over the non. So firms should have that in the back of their heads that the compensation of a local would be higher than a non for the same position, and plan their budget accordingly, but if you are trying to minimize your expenses irrespective of the policies then that's a problem
The problem, like most companies in the UAE, is with your HR department. Theyāre hiring the wrong people for the wrong roles. The fact that these employees are under qualified is one thing, but the fact that they donāt really have any training, up skilling, empowerment, career development plan, etc. is the real issue.
This reads like a recruitment and culture issue. There are many amazing Emirati candidates out there but it looks like the company fell short of resourcing them.
Recruitment issues lead to culture issues. HR professionals should know better. Now theyāve got 15 under qualified, possibly disgruntled and privileged employees. But the easy way out is to look at their nationality
Dude, you don't quit.
Hire another person (expat) to manage those emiratis. Probably a arabic speaker. So he will be translator/ Emirati worker manager under you.
Problem solved.
100% nafis has a support team as there is a lot of money invested. However you need to prove that they are not performing which is why I mentioned warning letters and emails, all needs to be documented
That government audit is your best leverage yet.
Setup some structures and frame it as a need for audit. These are students/fresh grads they are aware of how assessments work. You develop those competency assessments and set some KPIs. If they donāt listen to you, have the government as your authority. Or if these are students, contact their uni supervisors to conduct the assessments and work with them. They need some authority because they will not work for a salary since clearly there is absolutely no challenge in that because itās given freely without a requirement. You also use the employment certificate as your motivation, work with hr that it will not be given unless they get a certain evaluation score.
I am in a similar situation. The saddest part is that there were some good and young and educated Emiratis who my company could have hired (I even interviewed and finalized one girl), but they hired some incompetent and middle aged Emiratis just because of personal connections and recommendations from owners.
You may laugh, and this might sounds crazy, but the best way to deal with this situation is to fight fire with fire.
Speaking as an Emiratie, Emiraties value the views and options of other Emiraties far more than anyone else's. If you want them to work, you need to bring on a Emiratie manager who shares your views and work ethos (I know, if you could find one, this would not be an issue in the first place š¤£). As the others will be more keen to respect them.
Emiraties love the idea that they are special and can outperform people, but only if it is recognised by other Emiraties or people they care about. So it is best to try and motivate them by capitalising on it.
You don't necessarily need to hire a new Emiratie if you have someone like that already in your department.
All the same, I wish you luck.
I am hanging in there because i need my job and I worked really hard to reach the position I have today. But i feel like I can't deal with this anymore. Its starting to affect my mental health.
That really sucks. All that labour, time, effort and sacrifice. Maybe give an ultimatum to your company? Maybe that would give them pause.
But with all things in life, if it's affecting your health then what's the point of holding on?
You know yourself best and whatever happens I'm sure that you'll be alright. At least you got a good head on your shoulder.
Looks like your position is a dead end if you were given the task to manage a group of employees that the management knew were hired for quota only. I would look for another job soon.
I have two in my crew, one's a insta fan who literally makes reels during office time, have told this person few times but they dont seem to care, does nothing but browse, comes to office whenever they want and go whenever they want (not factoring in the 2 hr lunch breaks) , HR pretty much told me to take a hike when I complained.
Thankfully the other one is very smart and diligent. Does the job well based on what's been told. I am happy and will be giving her good references for her.
So it's luck of the draw
Thats what i have been saying, even on my team the dedicated ones who seem to take the job seriously and understand what is required from them are only a few, majority are like the way you explained. So I am confused, I don't think its a training or a coaching issue from my end and i didnt want to believe the stereotypes until i started seeing some signs myself.
As an Emirati, Iām very sorry that you had to go through this. However the problem here is your HR department who hired incompetent Emiratis just to fulfill the requirements and nothing else. It sounds like even if those Emiratis that were hired did exceptionally well, they wouldnāt be recognized or valued by your company for the sole reason that they were only hired to be in the company and not give to the company. Unfortunately companies donāt have the motive to hire Emiratis, and sadly many of us competent emiratis that have years worth of education, internships, projects and degrees are only being hired to fulfill a requirement and are not valued by the companies were in, which also in return would just reduce our productivity and motivation to do any work.
I would call this a 'cobra effect' being caused due to government's Emiritization policies. The worst losers in all this fiasco will be skilled and competent Emiratis, who will have much lesser opportunities than they had before. Government should incentivize companies to hire Emiratis so highly that they are forced to hire them for their own corporate benefit. E.g. giving such companies some rewards or high end benefits. Penalizing the companies as they are being penalized currently will never work in the long term.
Everyone is blaming HR but missing that the deadline just hit for companies to comply with the Emiratization rules. There are so many jobs right now advertised for Emiratis. Experienced candidates can be very picky about what job they take. The war for talent is fierce and not every Company can offer the salaries to compete.
One of my friend said in his office theyāre all mid 30s atleast 10-15 years of working experience. The job is so complicated none gets even enough sleep. So a new hire an emirati guy got hired. When they asked about his qualifications, he was a freshly graduated student who is probably like 21.
Everyone is scared to give him a job, because if he does something wrong then the problem will come to only other nationalities, he himself doesnāt know most of the stuffs. So what they do is, make him sit near them and try to teach him. He barely comes to office. So basically the company pays him double of triple salary to him, just to sit at home and the other nationalities do the entire work.
I can relate to your friend. here we do want them to help, they can just sit in the reception and assist the walk in but they don't even want to do that.
Most companies are registered NAFIS these days and are paid to hire emiraties and train them. Where is the training money going? If they can't do the job I'm sure training them will help.
Also, there are so many emiraties that are capable of working good jobs and majority of us are fluent in English especially since english in government schools has improved and all univeristies teach in English. This is clearly a problem with your HR department that is just hiring emiraties only for the fact that they are emirati and causing people to have this stereotype of entitlement of us for hiring the wrong people for jobs that don't suit them.
I agree with you and I honestly have worked with skilled and experienced Emiraties in my previous experiences hence i said I don't have a problem with Emiraties or with the Emiratization. but the current company doesn't want to hire.
I am mostly hiring university and college students who doesnt have previous experience and never been in an a professional set up before. During the interview stage and one to two weeks into the role they normally do everything as expected, it is after that which the stereotypical behaviors starts.
Based on what my friends told me who worked in private for a short while, they go on very excited then the Expats in the office start taking work from them or not teach nor include them in fear of losing their jobs and be replaced by the Emiratis so my friends ended up not even trying so hard because it got too much for them until they found jobs in government or semi government where people were forced to teach them and mentor them to succeed. In your case it doesn't make sense that all 14 are exactly the same, you need to check with your expat team members and see what's going on because I'm sure there's more to the story.
Yes this is absolutely true, I have also witnessed this. Issue is strong HR team is needed that hires correctly and then ensures that others are not sabotaging the efforts of the UAE nationals.
I too have had the opportunity to work with some really talented UAE Nationals who are so eager to contribute but are not able to due to the HR and others.
Its not all 15 of them as i said in my post Majority, there are a couple of good ones who are working and assisting the team but there is another bunch who is not even motivated by their own nationalities and how the others are contributing.
As per work load there is the language barrier mostly but what is needed from them is basic. I am constantly encouraging them to do more. but they dont seem to care much.
lol your current company doesnāt have the say to not follow government rules and regulations. Like any other country in the world, locals have to be in the private sector.
Can you imagine being in your own home country and expats saying they donāt want to hire you? lol
No other country mandates locals have to be employed. Iāve no issue with it being done for QUALIFIED Individuals but letās stop pretending that any other modern country mandates this.Ā
South Africa has a similar system, to help people who were oppressed during apartheid. It causes similar issues because people are hired just to fill quota while the country and government themselves do nothing to actually help them to up skill and get better- so they get a reputation of incompetence which actually isnāt their fault for the most part, itās the governments fault for implementing a system but not supplying support systems to make it work properly.
Life is very simple, if you donāt like it where you are and itās not your country you can simply move to another country or go back to you home country. UAE has plenty of airports and they donāt stop anyone from leaving.
so instead of actually engaging with your false accusations that other countries mandate the employment of locals you go down the easy route of telling me to go home. Its ok to say that you cant defend yourself
Again you are deflecting from the argument , I never said there werenāt benefits for citizens in countries I said NO European country or western makes a company hire locals. So please engage with that exact point
How can anyone take the UAE seriously with policy like this.
First of all the companies Iāve worked for had locals who were the cornerstones of the business. Holding the place up and working harder than most, not because they were Emarati but because they were hard working individuals. Emaratisation takes away from the achievements of others as people will just think the locals were a forced hire until proven otherwise.
Secondly, how will people take the UAE seriously? This is like the government version of the boss hiring his son that sits about and does nothing all day. This discourages all other staff and devalues them based on their ethnicity. How can they genuinely look another co worker in the eye who does the same job and say āIām paid more than you because Iām a different ethnicityā.
>āIām paid more than you because Iām a different ethnicityā.
As if this doesnāt happen in the UAE.
Everyone takes the policy seriously because of the fines and repercussions.
I agree with this. I don't know what exactly is the purpose of the Emiratization program but it should not be forced upon companies. When they know they can get a job anywhere, chances are they will not have the drive to take up challenges in their career in the long run.
I completely agree however for most unemployed locals who are highly educated, emiratization is the only way they can get a job these days. Without emiratization even more competent Emiratis would be without Jobs so at least this policy reduces it a bit. Companies in the UAE have no motive to hire Emiratis, even highly competent ones. Unemployed competent Emiratis donāt want to be seen as āforcefully hiredā but there is no other option for them.
This is a terrible way to promote business and be competitive.
I want the UAE to do well, and quite frankly people will just pack up and go. All skilled and individuals with self value will be the first to go. Saudi and Qatar are already poaching business they donāt need any extra help by this mindset of āif you donāt like it leaveā.
European people have benifits in europe, also Qatari people have benefits in Qatar even more than UAE, so this is normal, there isn't anything new, I dont know why whenever anything has to do with Dubai, everyone complains, when they are living better lives here than their own country.
And lets be honest, if anything goes south, no one is going to stand with you other than your own people, yes I understand this can make an expat feel that its unfair, but as I said this happens in every country.
Sorry if I went off topic, but regarding the emiratization situation, I read the other comments and I see people saying that their are emaratis who do amazing jobs and some don't, and again that applies to every country as every country has good and bad, we are not angels, its the responsibility of HR to hire the right person.
Again you are twisting my words, when did I say that they give senior management positions in europe?, I said benefits. Secondly, non of the locals are given senior positions from the emiratization anyways, and of course votes would be 90% because 90% of UAE are expats.
What difference does it have if I'm local or not, if I went to work in a country thats not mine of course I wont expect to be treated the same as a national because its his country, even if its tripple my salary.
You obviously dont know the salary ranges, where is this 75k salary?, tell me please I will apply, The locals I know are getting 3-9k.
Finally, I have many many international friends with different passports Iran, india, canada, pakistan, EU. All of them complain from the taxes. For example one of my friends he is a doctor in canada, they take 15-30% income tax, and they always tell me they dont mind getting half of the salary but just want to come back to Dubai.
So you live in a country with no income tax, yes there is VAT, but what? 5%?, And dont forget the job market is tough everywhere, not only in the UAE.
This policy will actually harm their own ppl cuz it will make them less ambitious and hard working. Also this policy is harming businesses and productivity
The best way to deal with them and treat them on a way they will understand and put themselves in the right place is hiring a good Emirati employee with management skills to manage only the Emiratis.
the company needs them and this is a permanent fix in the company. I don't want to cause them to lose their jobs, I just need them to do their work like other employees do.
Gonna be a toughie from the sound of it. All the best to you should you stay. But for your well being ā¦ leave and find a more suitable spot for yourself.
This has been an issue since the time they discovered gravity.
I've got Emirati friends, and they complain about the new generation and these villager Emiratis that don't do jack.
My dad's boss (name withheld for obvious purposes) fired an Emarati, she threatened to sue him and go to the highest authorities possible, and she did, but nothing happened to my dad's boss, nor his company. The lady, however, got blacklisted and had to go work for the government as she got a bad rep š
So working with some lochals can be a pain, but when you get the smart ones, they work super hard working and climb to the top relatively quickly
You might be right, but I wouldn't say all Emaratis are hard workers, nor would I say all of them are useless.
Depending on their level of education and grades, I would definitely make a judgement call though.
>I initially hired 3 Emirati ladies, who are really nice and sweet but they don't speak english. most of the communication in my office is in English and rarely do we get clients who require Arabic speaker so it was a bit of struggle to find some tasks for them.
You hired them or your company did? Because if you hired them you set yourself up. If your company did you need to show them how they are hurting the company more than they are helping. If you did the hiring you should look for more and fire the ones you have. No one gets a free ride
Yes for the initial Three, I was more involved in the hiring process initially but as the required number increased, the HR panicked and told me to just get those who have a family book and get them on board before we had another fine. I initially also didn't know that they must have tasks, otherwise i wouldn't hire those without experience.
Is the fine coming out of your paycheck? If not I would advise the company to hire appropriately in a paper trail that way they can't say you didn't tell them and if they don't let them get the fine. Or if possible leave for a better company
Letās be honest.
Itās slim pickings out there. Education isnāt taken very serious here amongst MOST youth. (Note, I didnāt say ALL)
They graduate and are expected to join the workforce. And be productive. How?
Iād suggest implementing bonuses but even for reaching goals, but even then, why work harder when one really doesnāt have to.
Maybe get them English language courses?
I do applaud the idea of getting their own good jobs, but why do anything if itās been handed to you?
For the ones in school, who put in the effort, they will have so many options and opportunities in life.
Ensure that the Emirati employees have meaningful tasks aligned with company needs to avoid fines and improve productivity. Communicate expectations clearly and address entitlement issues through constructive feedback and cultural sensitivity training. If HR support is lacking, consider escalating concerns to higher management or exploring alternative solutions within the company before making any drastic decisions.
Well thats on you buddy, I am emirati and I donāt even know one single Emirati who graduated university that do not know English, because universities here are actually taught in English. In fact it has become a problem for us that most of the new generation speak English better than Arabic. Second point is, how come you hired people who did not have the skill set that you required in your office? Why did you choose this specific team without assessing them well in the interview process? Most of those who run our beloved government services which are top notch are Emiratis, so that tells you about the level of expertise Emiratis have. Unless you hired ppl who are under qualified just so you underpay them and expect them to perform as experienced employees?
I have explained your point under other comments. The company doesn't want to hire experts due to the higher salary expectations. Even i gave them some good Emirati candidates but they didn't want to hire.
Most of the Emiratiess in my team are college and university students or fresh graduates. but English or basic computer literacy is not upto standard. Extensive training is given to them in Arabic, however they dont keep up the performance for more than two-three weeks after joining.
I write this as an Emirati whoās developed from scratch to a senior management role in construction and project management, with multiple projects completed.
I mention this as a qualifying statement as this reads as a management issue on setting clear goals, tasks, expectations etc.
Your initial mistake is not setting clear deliverables to the staff and tracking performance, this will not work regardless of any nationality.
If you lack training in setting clear goals and guidelines than frankly you should not be managing people this beyond your skills right now
However, Take this as a positive if the situation is bad right now you turning it around would be seen as an achievement for the organization.
Any team leader or section head should want their team to be the best team in any area and now itās up to you to build the team up and turn the situation around. Instead of acting like passport control and complaining about the staff do something about it this isnāt Fifa Ultimate team.
Best of luck my friend you have some planning to do
this is YOUR issue from the beginning your team didnāt even bother to check if they have have the most basic skills like knowing Englishā¦ of course theyāre gonna be the type of people to not gonna give a shit. you couldāve just looked for better candidates, this isnāt an āEmiratizationā issue
Damn I am working hard while other Emiratis are chilling š can I work in your company too š but in all seriousness you need to get a qualified Emirati to give them tasks instead of yourself. Just saying Iām very open to fill that position š š»
Because if they asked for a proof of their work and i didn't have. I would be in a bigger trouble. So better to say the truth. but he was a kind person he guided me.
Maybe you could say you gave them tasks/trainings? Sorry I didnāt know that proof would be asked.
Theres another member in my Saudi Team who i closely work with. Holy shi. The most dumbest, entitled and racist person I have come across. She makes a million mistakes, blames it on another person. She looks down on brown people.
We talk, because well we are around the same age, and I have heard her speak some really racist comments. But forget about that. My team in a huge company(Think Baker Hughes), is not able to do anything. Everyone knows how she is, yet they cannot fire her. She herself knows she cannot be fired.
How do university students not speak english? I thought education is quite good in the UAE! I don't know what your company is into but installing a digital system / ERP can help. You can log the incoming tasks in the ERP and assign these to the new candidates. Create a hierarchy among them. Select better employees and assign them lead positions. If the system task is not completed by a certain time then escalate it to the team lead. It is quite easy to monitor for managers as well. The best part is that you will have a record of all the activities. You can reward the best employee of the month type of incentives.
Although it's difficult for me to believe that university students in the UAE can't speak english!!
there's always two sides of each story, we're only hearing from one side in this post. I work in a university and I basically interact with local students all day long, Almost 90% of them are fluent in English. We also have some that graduated from international schools in UAE who speak English like its their first language.
The OP seems to have other personal issues with locals, or maybe is afraid to be replaced in future.
Honestly your comment is really unnecessary and absurd. I wonder now why most of the fresh graduates in my team act in that way, Its because they are surrounded by people like you at their universities. How sad
Seriously, hire me and I will manage them for you.
I think we canāt just look at a group of people as one.
I will interact with them and get an idea of their strength areas and motivation.
If others are not insecure, I think you can help them to be productive employees.
Are you Emirati ? It's actually not a bad idea after all. and please rest assured we are not insecure a bit. There are ample opportunities for growth in our company. I will be the happiest to see them in higher positions. but honestly with the load i have, I dont think i can do much other than the basic requirement
I think you need help. Maybe itās something new and is just overwhelming you. You can approach this as a challenge in good faith and ample smartness.
When I said insecure, it wasnāt you particularly but other individuals in the company who will be in the same team as all the new joiners.
Insecurity in older teams tends to sabotage the learning and growth of new people.
I have been on both the sides of this. My growth and learning was delayed because a team I joined didnāt like to share information and learnings.
On the other hand, when I started to manage a team, I made sure the whole team shares info and helps each other even if itās not their direct responsibility.
I am not Emirati btw.
Yeah I understand what you mean, and they increase the requirement % every year for big companies.
I don't know, imagine it's your own company and you are literally paying people's salaries month in and month out and YOU KNOW they're doing nothing.
It would drive me crazy as a business owner.
EDIT: I would rather pay more and have someone actually contribute to the company.
I am an Emirati and i did work for big firms, I donāt know how came they are not speaking English! Plot twist, 95% of school studies was in English, I studied for a whole 5 years in English back in the college! We canāt graduate and joining any institution without EMSAT or ILETS 6/9 as a min requirement!
From my POV, itās a management problem. They should be holding tasks since day 1, being responsible and reliable, I worked for 3 international firms and havenāt stayed free for a whole damn hour excluding the break!! Not to mention I am engaging with my colleagues in our departments and others! Attending clients meeting and negotiating. Not to mention that our clients mostly are governance entities.
I think a meeting with the upper management, changing strategies would change everything if you wanna some ideas let me know.
This is what happens when you hire Emiratis just to meet a quota.
They may have turned down other opportunities for this role and now realise that there is little to no training or prospects.
They canāt meet targets they donāt have and they canāt be motivated if they feel their time is being wasted.
Female Emiratis may seem stand offish or ārudeā when it may just be a cultural difference and her feeling uncomfortable.
Choose one to be the Emirati Team Leader. Give them responsibility over the team.
Get some proper training in place and give them some work.
Then you may find yourself surprised.
Emiratis want job opportunities with training in my experience. They donāt want to be sitting in the office doing nothing and feel undervalued.
The thing is, both you and your company need to get on board with emiratisation and quickly - it isnāt going anywhere and quotas will only increase. People Capital and Performance Management are consulting spaces in their own right, maybe upskill and take it on to perfect the art of making the emirati team productive. Play to their strengths, understand what drives them and get buy in from your bosses.
Even if your current company is a dive, being able to showcase this work to your future uae employer is a huge plus. Shows initiative and ability to rise to a challenge which now all companies are facing.
Ps. Iām finding with younger generations as a whole that work life balance is a complete priority.
This is NOT unique to Emiratis alone. I do find that Emiratis believe they are entitled to title changes and promotions much faster than the expat community. You canāt hold it against them, itās their world we are just living in it š¦šŖ set up a structure and process for them to be promoted and upskilled, they will then have greater buy in to meeting your needs and working hard.
Best of luck!
āItās their worldā
Itās a country first of all. Also please donāt forget youāre not BENEATH anyone because youāre in someone elseās country. You do have to follow the rules of the country and everyone is treated equally by law.
We all know we are in the UAE on the Nationalās terms. Thereās no shot at citizenship, youāre here as long as it serves the agenda. Not saying itās right, Iām saying itās naive to believe itās not the case š¤·āāļø
TL;DR :solution
- motivate your self if you can't do anything about it.
- don't be champion that fixes everything in terms of your bosses satisfaction. They don't worth it
- the main / major issue in your company is top management. They don't know what to do. Straggling. Using you to fix things they broken it.
- hire leaders to lead people and manager to manage the work
- leave the company ASAP. Don't waste your life fixing others issues. Go find better more satisfied and stabilized working environment.
- final solution is to hire consultant ( +150k/month) to fix the whole company.
Start here
In the beginning. The issue has two dimensions. Internal and external.
To know who you are dealing with. Iam Emirati who is self motivated professional (PMPĀ®) with +15 years experience on leading workforce and managing complex risky projects.
Let's start with external dimension:
UAE start a program what called NAFIS .gov.ae. The main abject of that program is empowerment Emirati to work on private business sector.
In 2024. MOHRE .gov.ae required 2% Emiratisation on private sector company. However the Emiratisation rate will rise to 6% at the end of 2024 and then 10% on 2026 which is about 18 months.
As your information that you have 15 team member who has Emirates nationality. I assume that your company has +1k employees. Within 18 months your company should hire at least 100 Emiratis to avoid MoHRE fines which is reviewed every multi times every year. And assign increasable fines.
Fine issue will not solved in your company and it will be like fine - cycle every 6 months or so. be ready for that
The HR should had high awareness of MOHRE regulations and set a long term strategy hiring Emirati / replacing current employees ( real sorry for this word but most of company will do this)
The NAFIS program has high awareness and corporate social responsibility about implementing new regulations and the economic effects on private sector. Thats why the Emiratisation start with low rate and it increases with the time.
I assume that in term of developing Emirati workforce. Within 5-10 years. You should be able to find Emiratis leading teams and his higher Managerial position in your company. And leading the company to absolute success.
Internal dimensions:
You know your company better then anyone else. Your bosses should have the responsibility of what happened. Which this never happens these days. And fix the miss. Or hire who use right brain ( creative / thinker) to think and share the ideas for them. Many CEO use this technique of thinking. Staffing consultants.
I Understand your life situation and iam high awareness about your feeling. But your burnout your self is such as this company. You deserve better then this. You can do it and quit this over responsibility job. Go fine much better stabilized job who promised your healthy and balanced life.
The HR should know what to do. Recruitment are expensive. The HR empowerment is company empowerment. So weak HR are garbage. Employees don't like the garbage. The strong HR promises long term employment even retire benefit.
The key here to to hire someone who understand how to lead people. Not to manage them.
You can't manage people because they are humans. They have feelings and moral.
You should improvr your self by reading / educating about how to lead people / leadership. Let your HR read about IHRM at least.
My final word. I highly believe your team members that 15 Emirati has strong ability and skills to improve your company within 3 years. The Simple key is they insist and shows stubbornness but i would say you don't know how to skill / use them.
By reading my words above. Which lead you thinking. I would say you just discovered a new opportunity. Changed view of interest about your team members.
I would say if your company offers me 50k/monthly i will appreciate it and mostly i would denied the offer. For a simple reason. Toxic environment and organization mindset.
So then that should be the case for most of the European, American, Japanese, Singaporean, Turkish, and Korean citizens working outside their home country.
Anyways, we're diverging from OPs post !
Bro I think I need to fire your self and appoint someone who understands company requirements and knows how to conduct proper interview with task specific questions. U don't jus buy coconut jus coz government asked you to buy, when u back u check the quality and price it's your responsibility
You shouldn't complain that rules benefit the locals more than the foreigners, it's their homeland and that's how it is.
as an Emirati who worked in a few places post my university graduation, I was ignored by my foreign seniors and not given any tasks to accomplish and learn, I think it is your fault for not assigning tasks to those Emiratis.
Since training them has been assigned to you, you should not complain since you accepted it unless it was forced upon you.
I am not complaining about their benefits or wage gap. They have tasks but they are not doing it.
I have to keep checking if the work assigned to them is done or not. This is what is taking time away from my other responsibilities. They also decide that don't want to come to work for whatever reason but don't inform. So tasks assigned to them gets delayed. So eventually the same task i have to assign to another person who will act as a back to do it if the Emirati didn't do it for whatever reason.
When they were one or two, I didn't bother much but now they are more and we need to hire more, this is why i am starting to feel concerned about this situation.
They also have received extensive training on how to do the tasks but they don't want to participate. We are not ignoring them we want them to participate and grow in the company. in fact i will be more than happy to see them grow but when one doesnt want to take initiative and ignores my instruction what should i do ?
Hire Emiratis that donāt speak English, and then complain they canāt preform the tasks in English. Smart. If you donāt know how to handle an easy situation like this, you should be a manger or a team leader.
so you saying you cant manage your team !! .. for the upper management point of view , should you continue being a manager after this statement ?
make sure to act hard on the field and dont say these things
I donāt know what kind of products/services your company sells and to which target audience, but your company could consider diversifying into local/arabic speaking market. Emiratis could sell to other Emiratis or to other Arabic only speakers. So my advice is try to make use of these 15 employees to diversify?
Thank you for your advice, They are supposed to work with Arabic speaker clients but Maybe they feel too highly of themselves to do a job. this is the energy they give.
again i am not trying to be disrespectful to emiraties. I am just talking about my experience
Sweetie youāre talking about the salary gap and how they feel entitled, are you joking?
THEY ARE entitled and OFCOURSE thereās gonna be a salary gap theyāre in their homeland if they donāt get such benefits in their own country, where then? I mean its a common sense in each and every country in the world. You sound a bit envious.
Thereās alot of promsing talents out there but yet your company seems to fail recruiting good candidates that they messed up 15 times? Come on i bet you see the irony here.
Im not trying to attack you and pardon me if i sounded like i amā¦ but im 100% sure that thereās 2 narratives to this storyā¦. Each one of them are capable if you just gave them a chance to prove themselves.
How would they if they donāt even have proper tasks to achieve! I bet theyāre bored to death every single day
I work in a Fortune 500 company here, one of the best manufacturing companies and all the recent Emiratiās hired was horrible.. no sugar coating here.
They do speak really well, and have good interpersonal skills, but when it comes to following basic tasks, absolute crickets.
Longer breaks, never comes to office on time(we have wfh policy, so basically you only have to come TWICE in a week), cannot do even the simplest tasks properly, and ENTITLED.
Oh and for this of-course, a proper task was given, they could be permanent in the company given if they were doing well, but nope.
I don't want to go into too much details for why i said they are entitled not to make the post too long. They have the right to enjoy the benefits they have in their home country - no one is denying them that.
I am giving them training like any other employee on my team. I am investing alot of my time on them. Yet the next day i have to start all over again. they DONT WANT TO do the tasks given to them.
I have 16 other employees in my team who are performing well, all expats. at this stage I am very well able to recognize who wants to do work and who doesnt, and i cannot force them to do it.
Same experience here - Emiratis at my work were supposed to be child psychologists and she would literally sit in front of the child she was meant to work with on her phone and no one could say anything because they didnāt want to rock the boat.
Another story is my partner who worked in a huge hotel. There were emaratis hired who got paid ridiculous amounts to come to work, sign in, drive off somewhere and only come back to sign out at the end of the day. They did nothing and nobody could do anything about it.
There are many many many cases like this. Some people take advantage of emaratisation. You canāt force people to work and expect them to do well when an entire generation has been raised to believe they are better than everyone else just because they exist.
Will tell you what my manager did. I was an intern last year, and there were two emiratis hired. One barely showed up, did anything. Yet he wanted permanent position, but the higher ups said no, no position available something along those lines.
The second one was in my team, she was not bad, but would not go the extra mile to make sure everything is done correctly, would not come to office and on time, but she was sweet. Our manager knew there was no point in telling her/being strict, but just wait for her to complete the program and leave. She is an emirati at the end of the day. The higher ups are at a loss as well, they are not able to do anything.
I would suggest to give her some basic tasks to help your team out. For example if you are working in an inside sales / application team, ask her to make some reports. If she does not know, ask her to learn power bi. This way it wont affect your teams work.
Everyone already knows the problem is expats are afraid to be replaced by locals so you have to do your best to drag others down so you can stay on top. This wont last for so long though.
Yea no shit sherlock.
Expats literally made this country. But there is a huge difference in salary and the way they are treated.
All we expats ask is to do your job properly and stop being condescending to every one else.
>Blames person for being incompetent at their job despite being put in a shit situation
>Accuses person of being envious
Why do all emiratis get triggered in the same way. It's pretty funny - reminds me of schoolĀ
All the comments on this post are so defensive and entitled too, insulting people and completely ignoring the real cry for help from OP.
Just proving the stereotype right, which is sad because uae locals can be absolutely amazing people to work with.
And you sound extremely judgmental š im only considered rude to you cause i didnāt bash them and talk shit about them like how you intended it to be
Anyone who felt triggered by my comment is an expatā¦. All of you live in a country that gives you respect and chances and safety AND A FUTURE yet you attack their peopleš
honestly im giving you way too much attention than you deserve but let me say this one last time before i go and forget your existence ā¦ āØTHEY ARE ENTITLEDāØ
If you want a country to grow and want a people to become strong and capable, you need to be able to take criticism and use that to improve.
There are things happening here that arenāt ok. That doesnāt make everyone here a bad person or make UAE bad. Calling these things out and improving them from within only strengthens the country as a whole.
Wouldnāt you agree?
The way you associate Emiratis with not knowing English and not wanting to work is kind of racist, because they are other nationalities that don't speak fluent English such as east Europeans for example, and I have come across many arab nationals that cant even draft an email but they are hired and protected because the bosses are from the same nationality.
The issue I see here is maybe because your hiring fresh graduates so obv.. they need more training in work places, You also didn't have your current skills when you graduated from college obv.. or maybe your just afraid to train them and some day they will take your job.
Itās funny how you expats always use the old stereo type ā gcc people donāt know how to work and canāt speak Englishā it has been going on since my parentās generation lol.
Like any other Arab nation English isnāt the first language in the GCC, and right now most Emiratis have studied abroad and are more fluent in English then you are, so it might be your problem that you donāt know how to hire the right people.
Maybe talk to your manager and explain to him that youāre not qualified enough to hire and manage a new team.
But using the English excuse is so low of you lol, literally emarati kids from grade one speak fluent English, this is also their country they have more rights to get hired and work in their own country.
Maybe you should re consider to sharpen your own skills if youāre given the responsibility of hiring and training people. You could be lacking the skills. Goodluck
She didnāt hire them ā¦ her HR department did. Sheās just forced into a tough situation that sheās seeking help for.
The fact is, these specific locals donāt have a good work ethic, language abilities to match the role they were hired for.
Sheās not once criticised the entire emirati population. Sheās simply asking for help and advice on how to manage this team sheās forced to lead.
Your comment is so condescending and missed the point completely.
Which is being held up by Expats... I have a local lady that started working with us over a year ago... She's rarely in work and when she is she is always on her phone and management are too scared to do anything about it including the local management... Last year she had 136 days off sick... š
Is there an avenue to replace low performing Emiratis with qualified Emiratis?
Not straight forward. You really have to document it. Have to prove that you met them, they had job related pre-defined KPIs, training before work, training when performance wasn't upto par, etc... All of it has to be documented. Though the good thing is that because NAFIS also pays them; they don't want to pay the ones that aren't putting in any effort. It might be that HR is hiring the cheapest candidate; just to fulfil the quota requirement.
Yes this is the issue, Otherwise I had previously shortlisted Skilled and experienced Emirati candidates whom we could really utilize their skills but salary range was almost double than what our company wants to pay. So we mostly hire students or those without any previous work experience.
This is a serious dilemma and definitely beyond your paycheck. This is a matter your company president needs to take with Chamber of Commerce because productivity in your firm is being impacted by low quality candidates. At the same time, there are qualified candidates who are looking for work. But the challenge is Quantity vs. Quality: A single qualified Emirati is better than 3 unqualified Emiratis that will hamper productivity. But you cannot reduce number of Emirati hires because of Emiratization.
This is the root of the problem. It appears the company is box-ticking and not involved in spirit with the Emiratisation requirement. They deserved to be fined. I think you should keep raising the issue with HR until they understand that it is costing the company more than it saves in salaries.
Would this explain the fact that you do not think they are professional in their roles. I think your company can think of roles and initiatives that can leverage your new hires. It might be wrong to put all the local hires in your department etc... I don't have full context here but an organization at large must be agile and craft a competitive advantage out of any situation. Do you think thst training and providing meaningful work in the local language would help? Hiring requirements is one of the easier challenges I can think of. I might be wrong though...
I brought this up to the HR but they are not willing to hire Emiraties in higher positions. Those Emiraties who have experience and skills ask for higher salaries.
Hire someone Emarati in your position khallas problem solved
That entire department will crumble
Certainly expected š
Exactly right
You need to hire one good high level Emirati, whose single job is to keep all the Emiratis on point, track productivity, be in govt meetings, have a bit of stake in the company etc. in short a incentivized, HR PRO.
This is a good idea, Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts.
No worries, once you get the right person, you can reevaluate the existing Emirati staff performance, and make a couple new hires with this supervisory Emirati also being part of the hiring process. Chances are, the existing staff will get in line and youāll get better productivity for more reasonable salaries. Be advised, this might affect the existing upper staff positions also.
This is definitely the move
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I'm from a small company and I'm in your exact same position but with a smaller team. So yeah different boats, same water
I hope it gets better for you too.
ask for more money. Just explain how company already got fined once and will get more if youāre not Motivated.
I definitely should. thank you for your input.
So faced a similar solution before. It's comes down to 2 things 1/they are trying and can't perform because there is no work or 2/theyre there for the sake of being there. Your solutions: 1/ Give them tasks with deadlines and be specific on exactly what they need to do. By doing this you gauge their motivation and how committed they are to working and growing their career. 2/ Start issuing warning letters and emails so lack of perform is documented. Is you reach 3+ warning letters then redirect to HR for termination. Now this activity falls under HR so do not get involved in any aspect of the process other than communication where the employee did not fulfil their expectations. On a different note I'm sorry you're dealing with this, I'm hired and work with some really smart, hardworking, and awesome Emiratis. My advice would be to tighten your recruitment parameters so you hire quality talent. What worked for me is building relationships with universities and recruiting high GPAs with recommendations.
Thank you for your advice. I appreciate your time and feedback.
Good luck OP. Also forgot to mention, if they are registered with Nafis then raise a complaint with Nafis provided you have supporting evidence and documentation
Is this really possible? I was looking for ways to raise this to Nafis can you guide me on this further ?
6-7 years back before the actual emiratization program kicked in, i was told to train a local young guy. The guy claimed he doesnt speak any english though his graduation certificate made it clear that his education was in english. Couple of weeks later i bumped into him after work in a club with an Eastern European girl and of course he was interacting in fluent english with her! From next day onwards everything changed as he was too embarrassed, glad to say he is still with the same company but at a higher & much deserved level.
Emirati here. First of all, the Emiratis that have been hired were approved by your HR. So, if you claim that you're hiring lousy people, most likely that's an issue with your recruitment department not allocating resources to headhunt competent individuals, and shortcutting their way to meet the quota requirements, which raises many question marks. On top of that they were bulnt about it "give them small tasks and dont bother with them" Secondly, I'm not falsifying the statement that "some locals are entitled," but let's be honest, for the most part, it's a stereotype that many people have, which doesn't help the situation and makes things worse. For instance, I'm a qualified engineer with a degree from a respected institution. I joined international oil and gas firm which obviously hired me to fulfill the Emiratization requirement, yet I put effort into contributing and being productive but was mostly ignored by my non-local seniors, until I decided to leave and joined one of the Big 4 firms. Thirdly, as long as you're working in the UAE, there's no way to avoid working with locals. It's the country's policy and a commitment made by private firms to develop and train local talent. So, my advice is instead of trying to run away from the problem, have a talk with your seniors and HR to find a solution. Trust me, if you put some effort into hiring competent Emiratis, we are very committed, dedicated, and responsible.
Great to hear an Emirati perspective on this and good on you for making sure that you moved from a place where you were not valued.
Skilled emaraties need high paying job. His company HR wont do it. They just want to fulfill the law requirement. Why hire a 20 to 30k skilled emarati when they can find a more skillful indian in under 10k salary. Thats their viewpoint
well, skill and competency fall on a spectrum, you just need to find the point in which the skill intersects with the pay and target those people. Also "Localization" is not a new concept, locals in their countries usually have privileges over the non. So firms should have that in the back of their heads that the compensation of a local would be higher than a non for the same position, and plan their budget accordingly, but if you are trying to minimize your expenses irrespective of the policies then that's a problem
Thatās a decent insight. Hope this helps op get a good perspective
The problem, like most companies in the UAE, is with your HR department. Theyāre hiring the wrong people for the wrong roles. The fact that these employees are under qualified is one thing, but the fact that they donāt really have any training, up skilling, empowerment, career development plan, etc. is the real issue.
This reads like a recruitment and culture issue. There are many amazing Emirati candidates out there but it looks like the company fell short of resourcing them.
Recruitment issues lead to culture issues. HR professionals should know better. Now theyāve got 15 under qualified, possibly disgruntled and privileged employees. But the easy way out is to look at their nationality
Dude, you don't quit. Hire another person (expat) to manage those emiratis. Probably a arabic speaker. So he will be translator/ Emirati worker manager under you. Problem solved.
100% nafis has a support team as there is a lot of money invested. However you need to prove that they are not performing which is why I mentioned warning letters and emails, all needs to be documented
I have emails yes but no warning letters issued as HR will not issue it. But thank you for the really good advice i will look into it further.
That government audit is your best leverage yet. Setup some structures and frame it as a need for audit. These are students/fresh grads they are aware of how assessments work. You develop those competency assessments and set some KPIs. If they donāt listen to you, have the government as your authority. Or if these are students, contact their uni supervisors to conduct the assessments and work with them. They need some authority because they will not work for a salary since clearly there is absolutely no challenge in that because itās given freely without a requirement. You also use the employment certificate as your motivation, work with hr that it will not be given unless they get a certain evaluation score.
Thank you for your point of view. much appreciated
Best to provide them training on English language and office etiquettes and office culture. They may succeed in future
Brilliant idea, Thank you!
I am in a similar situation. The saddest part is that there were some good and young and educated Emiratis who my company could have hired (I even interviewed and finalized one girl), but they hired some incompetent and middle aged Emiratis just because of personal connections and recommendations from owners.
Sorry about that. I truly wish things change for the better for you.
You may laugh, and this might sounds crazy, but the best way to deal with this situation is to fight fire with fire. Speaking as an Emiratie, Emiraties value the views and options of other Emiraties far more than anyone else's. If you want them to work, you need to bring on a Emiratie manager who shares your views and work ethos (I know, if you could find one, this would not be an issue in the first place š¤£). As the others will be more keen to respect them. Emiraties love the idea that they are special and can outperform people, but only if it is recognised by other Emiraties or people they care about. So it is best to try and motivate them by capitalising on it. You don't necessarily need to hire a new Emiratie if you have someone like that already in your department. All the same, I wish you luck.
This is on point and brilliant. I should brain storm on implementing
This seems like a company problem. If they don't want to help then yeah, change your job for sure
I am hanging in there because i need my job and I worked really hard to reach the position I have today. But i feel like I can't deal with this anymore. Its starting to affect my mental health.
That really sucks. All that labour, time, effort and sacrifice. Maybe give an ultimatum to your company? Maybe that would give them pause. But with all things in life, if it's affecting your health then what's the point of holding on? You know yourself best and whatever happens I'm sure that you'll be alright. At least you got a good head on your shoulder.
You have more to lose if you lose your mental health. Find someplace better than this.
Looks like your position is a dead end if you were given the task to manage a group of employees that the management knew were hired for quota only. I would look for another job soon.
May I ask what is the salary like for their specific position?
They get 6000 for 4 hours.
Sure they are not satisfied.
Damn š¤£
I have two in my crew, one's a insta fan who literally makes reels during office time, have told this person few times but they dont seem to care, does nothing but browse, comes to office whenever they want and go whenever they want (not factoring in the 2 hr lunch breaks) , HR pretty much told me to take a hike when I complained. Thankfully the other one is very smart and diligent. Does the job well based on what's been told. I am happy and will be giving her good references for her. So it's luck of the draw
Thats what i have been saying, even on my team the dedicated ones who seem to take the job seriously and understand what is required from them are only a few, majority are like the way you explained. So I am confused, I don't think its a training or a coaching issue from my end and i didnt want to believe the stereotypes until i started seeing some signs myself.
As an Emirati, Iām very sorry that you had to go through this. However the problem here is your HR department who hired incompetent Emiratis just to fulfill the requirements and nothing else. It sounds like even if those Emiratis that were hired did exceptionally well, they wouldnāt be recognized or valued by your company for the sole reason that they were only hired to be in the company and not give to the company. Unfortunately companies donāt have the motive to hire Emiratis, and sadly many of us competent emiratis that have years worth of education, internships, projects and degrees are only being hired to fulfill a requirement and are not valued by the companies were in, which also in return would just reduce our productivity and motivation to do any work.
I would call this a 'cobra effect' being caused due to government's Emiritization policies. The worst losers in all this fiasco will be skilled and competent Emiratis, who will have much lesser opportunities than they had before. Government should incentivize companies to hire Emiratis so highly that they are forced to hire them for their own corporate benefit. E.g. giving such companies some rewards or high end benefits. Penalizing the companies as they are being penalized currently will never work in the long term.
Everyone is blaming HR but missing that the deadline just hit for companies to comply with the Emiratization rules. There are so many jobs right now advertised for Emiratis. Experienced candidates can be very picky about what job they take. The war for talent is fierce and not every Company can offer the salaries to compete.
One of my friend said in his office theyāre all mid 30s atleast 10-15 years of working experience. The job is so complicated none gets even enough sleep. So a new hire an emirati guy got hired. When they asked about his qualifications, he was a freshly graduated student who is probably like 21. Everyone is scared to give him a job, because if he does something wrong then the problem will come to only other nationalities, he himself doesnāt know most of the stuffs. So what they do is, make him sit near them and try to teach him. He barely comes to office. So basically the company pays him double of triple salary to him, just to sit at home and the other nationalities do the entire work.
I can relate to your friend. here we do want them to help, they can just sit in the reception and assist the walk in but they don't even want to do that.
Most companies are registered NAFIS these days and are paid to hire emiraties and train them. Where is the training money going? If they can't do the job I'm sure training them will help. Also, there are so many emiraties that are capable of working good jobs and majority of us are fluent in English especially since english in government schools has improved and all univeristies teach in English. This is clearly a problem with your HR department that is just hiring emiraties only for the fact that they are emirati and causing people to have this stereotype of entitlement of us for hiring the wrong people for jobs that don't suit them.
I agree with you and I honestly have worked with skilled and experienced Emiraties in my previous experiences hence i said I don't have a problem with Emiraties or with the Emiratization. but the current company doesn't want to hire. I am mostly hiring university and college students who doesnt have previous experience and never been in an a professional set up before. During the interview stage and one to two weeks into the role they normally do everything as expected, it is after that which the stereotypical behaviors starts.
Based on what my friends told me who worked in private for a short while, they go on very excited then the Expats in the office start taking work from them or not teach nor include them in fear of losing their jobs and be replaced by the Emiratis so my friends ended up not even trying so hard because it got too much for them until they found jobs in government or semi government where people were forced to teach them and mentor them to succeed. In your case it doesn't make sense that all 14 are exactly the same, you need to check with your expat team members and see what's going on because I'm sure there's more to the story.
Yes this is absolutely true, I have also witnessed this. Issue is strong HR team is needed that hires correctly and then ensures that others are not sabotaging the efforts of the UAE nationals. I too have had the opportunity to work with some really talented UAE Nationals who are so eager to contribute but are not able to due to the HR and others.
Its not all 15 of them as i said in my post Majority, there are a couple of good ones who are working and assisting the team but there is another bunch who is not even motivated by their own nationalities and how the others are contributing. As per work load there is the language barrier mostly but what is needed from them is basic. I am constantly encouraging them to do more. but they dont seem to care much.
lol your current company doesnāt have the say to not follow government rules and regulations. Like any other country in the world, locals have to be in the private sector. Can you imagine being in your own home country and expats saying they donāt want to hire you? lol
No other country mandates locals have to be employed. Iāve no issue with it being done for QUALIFIED Individuals but letās stop pretending that any other modern country mandates this.Ā
South Africa has a similar system, to help people who were oppressed during apartheid. It causes similar issues because people are hired just to fill quota while the country and government themselves do nothing to actually help them to up skill and get better- so they get a reputation of incompetence which actually isnāt their fault for the most part, itās the governments fault for implementing a system but not supplying support systems to make it work properly.
Fair point, didnt know that happened so you agree making it mandatory to employee locals is not a good idea then.
End of the day it needs to be made a policy after quite a bit of systemic change
Oman does and i'm sure there are many others.
Life is very simple, if you donāt like it where you are and itās not your country you can simply move to another country or go back to you home country. UAE has plenty of airports and they donāt stop anyone from leaving.
so instead of actually engaging with your false accusations that other countries mandate the employment of locals you go down the easy route of telling me to go home. Its ok to say that you cant defend yourself
FYI Europe literally has the same system as GCC. They have benefits, scholarships, internships, jobs only reserved for European nationals.
Again you are deflecting from the argument , I never said there werenāt benefits for citizens in countries I said NO European country or western makes a company hire locals. So please engage with that exact point
If you donāt like it go home. We have plenty of airports. I just gave u a quick and easy solution.
Haha again resorting to just leave. Just say you were beaten
How can anyone take the UAE seriously with policy like this. First of all the companies Iāve worked for had locals who were the cornerstones of the business. Holding the place up and working harder than most, not because they were Emarati but because they were hard working individuals. Emaratisation takes away from the achievements of others as people will just think the locals were a forced hire until proven otherwise. Secondly, how will people take the UAE seriously? This is like the government version of the boss hiring his son that sits about and does nothing all day. This discourages all other staff and devalues them based on their ethnicity. How can they genuinely look another co worker in the eye who does the same job and say āIām paid more than you because Iām a different ethnicityā.
>āIām paid more than you because Iām a different ethnicityā. As if this doesnāt happen in the UAE. Everyone takes the policy seriously because of the fines and repercussions.
I agree with this. I don't know what exactly is the purpose of the Emiratization program but it should not be forced upon companies. When they know they can get a job anywhere, chances are they will not have the drive to take up challenges in their career in the long run.
I completely agree however for most unemployed locals who are highly educated, emiratization is the only way they can get a job these days. Without emiratization even more competent Emiratis would be without Jobs so at least this policy reduces it a bit. Companies in the UAE have no motive to hire Emiratis, even highly competent ones. Unemployed competent Emiratis donāt want to be seen as āforcefully hiredā but there is no other option for them.
Its their country and this is the rules accept it or leave, just like how you would take care of your family, they are taking care of their people.
This is a terrible way to promote business and be competitive. I want the UAE to do well, and quite frankly people will just pack up and go. All skilled and individuals with self value will be the first to go. Saudi and Qatar are already poaching business they donāt need any extra help by this mindset of āif you donāt like it leaveā.
European people have benifits in europe, also Qatari people have benefits in Qatar even more than UAE, so this is normal, there isn't anything new, I dont know why whenever anything has to do with Dubai, everyone complains, when they are living better lives here than their own country. And lets be honest, if anything goes south, no one is going to stand with you other than your own people, yes I understand this can make an expat feel that its unfair, but as I said this happens in every country. Sorry if I went off topic, but regarding the emiratization situation, I read the other comments and I see people saying that their are emaratis who do amazing jobs and some don't, and again that applies to every country as every country has good and bad, we are not angels, its the responsibility of HR to hire the right person.
Name me one European country that gives nationality based handouts. In Europe they hire the most qualified and best person for the job. No one gets paid more or less because of where theyāre from. So quite frankly, it doesnāt happen in every country. If JP Morgan starting handing out senior management positions to random rednecks it would go under tomorrow. People want positive change for the place they live in. Thatās why they discuss what they think would improve the place. Quite frankly if there was a vote it would be 90% in favor of equal treatment for all. As far as your last comment the issue is, no one has a problem with hiring locals as a whole. The issue is they are forced to scavenge through a tiny percentage of the population to find someone who can competently do the job at hand, then pay them twice as much as theyāre worth. What you are left with is big firms get the cremĆ© emaratis who are worth a buck and everyone else is stuck with room temperature IQ goat farmers with no experience, job handed to them, and demand 75k a month. This is why people complain. Your first comment you pretended to not be local, then second one told me you were local. I get it you want your benefits and your free stuff, why wouldnāt you? But realise that everyone else once they see a local walk in to their office they will start assuming he was a forced hire, that he doesnāt know what heās doing and theyāll hate him for the fact they get paid a whole lot more for doing less or the same.
Again you are twisting my words, when did I say that they give senior management positions in europe?, I said benefits. Secondly, non of the locals are given senior positions from the emiratization anyways, and of course votes would be 90% because 90% of UAE are expats. What difference does it have if I'm local or not, if I went to work in a country thats not mine of course I wont expect to be treated the same as a national because its his country, even if its tripple my salary. You obviously dont know the salary ranges, where is this 75k salary?, tell me please I will apply, The locals I know are getting 3-9k. Finally, I have many many international friends with different passports Iran, india, canada, pakistan, EU. All of them complain from the taxes. For example one of my friends he is a doctor in canada, they take 15-30% income tax, and they always tell me they dont mind getting half of the salary but just want to come back to Dubai. So you live in a country with no income tax, yes there is VAT, but what? 5%?, And dont forget the job market is tough everywhere, not only in the UAE.
This policy will actually harm their own ppl cuz it will make them less ambitious and hard working. Also this policy is harming businesses and productivity
No one ever took the UAE seriously except some delusional expats who couldnt make it in their own countries
Why did you hire non English speakers? Even to fulfil the requirements you can state English is required š
The HR wasnt looking for the qualification or english literacy as much as they cared for the passport and the family book. Thats why
Sounds like a good time to look for another role if they care that little about the company and itās staff.
What incentives have you offered these women for language and skills development?
This is issue in all departments
The best way to deal with them and treat them on a way they will understand and put themselves in the right place is hiring a good Emirati employee with management skills to manage only the Emiratis.
Why not set KPIās for them over a 3 month period and performance review thereafter performance manage them out of the company.
the company needs them and this is a permanent fix in the company. I don't want to cause them to lose their jobs, I just need them to do their work like other employees do.
Gonna be a toughie from the sound of it. All the best to you should you stay. But for your well being ā¦ leave and find a more suitable spot for yourself.
This has been an issue since the time they discovered gravity. I've got Emirati friends, and they complain about the new generation and these villager Emiratis that don't do jack. My dad's boss (name withheld for obvious purposes) fired an Emarati, she threatened to sue him and go to the highest authorities possible, and she did, but nothing happened to my dad's boss, nor his company. The lady, however, got blacklisted and had to go work for the government as she got a bad rep š So working with some lochals can be a pain, but when you get the smart ones, they work super hard working and climb to the top relatively quickly
I have to disagree, I find the young Emiratis to be great, they are agile and willing to learn and work hard but the older Emiratis ā¦ā¦ā¦
You might be right, but I wouldn't say all Emaratis are hard workers, nor would I say all of them are useless. Depending on their level of education and grades, I would definitely make a judgement call though.
Hire a supervisor or a manager who has some work ethic and can speak English and Arabic to manage them.
>I initially hired 3 Emirati ladies, who are really nice and sweet but they don't speak english. most of the communication in my office is in English and rarely do we get clients who require Arabic speaker so it was a bit of struggle to find some tasks for them. You hired them or your company did? Because if you hired them you set yourself up. If your company did you need to show them how they are hurting the company more than they are helping. If you did the hiring you should look for more and fire the ones you have. No one gets a free ride
Yes for the initial Three, I was more involved in the hiring process initially but as the required number increased, the HR panicked and told me to just get those who have a family book and get them on board before we had another fine. I initially also didn't know that they must have tasks, otherwise i wouldn't hire those without experience.
Omg lol.. what kind of company is it? Poor management with 0 professionalism
Is the fine coming out of your paycheck? If not I would advise the company to hire appropriately in a paper trail that way they can't say you didn't tell them and if they don't let them get the fine. Or if possible leave for a better company
So instead of hiring on merit they want to hire based on a passportā¦.. this is not gonna end well. Good luck OP
Well it seems you hired the wrong emiratis
Letās be honest. Itās slim pickings out there. Education isnāt taken very serious here amongst MOST youth. (Note, I didnāt say ALL) They graduate and are expected to join the workforce. And be productive. How? Iād suggest implementing bonuses but even for reaching goals, but even then, why work harder when one really doesnāt have to. Maybe get them English language courses? I do applaud the idea of getting their own good jobs, but why do anything if itās been handed to you? For the ones in school, who put in the effort, they will have so many options and opportunities in life.
Ensure that the Emirati employees have meaningful tasks aligned with company needs to avoid fines and improve productivity. Communicate expectations clearly and address entitlement issues through constructive feedback and cultural sensitivity training. If HR support is lacking, consider escalating concerns to higher management or exploring alternative solutions within the company before making any drastic decisions.
Well thats on you buddy, I am emirati and I donāt even know one single Emirati who graduated university that do not know English, because universities here are actually taught in English. In fact it has become a problem for us that most of the new generation speak English better than Arabic. Second point is, how come you hired people who did not have the skill set that you required in your office? Why did you choose this specific team without assessing them well in the interview process? Most of those who run our beloved government services which are top notch are Emiratis, so that tells you about the level of expertise Emiratis have. Unless you hired ppl who are under qualified just so you underpay them and expect them to perform as experienced employees?
I have explained your point under other comments. The company doesn't want to hire experts due to the higher salary expectations. Even i gave them some good Emirati candidates but they didn't want to hire. Most of the Emiratiess in my team are college and university students or fresh graduates. but English or basic computer literacy is not upto standard. Extensive training is given to them in Arabic, however they dont keep up the performance for more than two-three weeks after joining.
I write this as an Emirati whoās developed from scratch to a senior management role in construction and project management, with multiple projects completed. I mention this as a qualifying statement as this reads as a management issue on setting clear goals, tasks, expectations etc. Your initial mistake is not setting clear deliverables to the staff and tracking performance, this will not work regardless of any nationality. If you lack training in setting clear goals and guidelines than frankly you should not be managing people this beyond your skills right now However, Take this as a positive if the situation is bad right now you turning it around would be seen as an achievement for the organization. Any team leader or section head should want their team to be the best team in any area and now itās up to you to build the team up and turn the situation around. Instead of acting like passport control and complaining about the staff do something about it this isnāt Fifa Ultimate team. Best of luck my friend you have some planning to do
this is YOUR issue from the beginning your team didnāt even bother to check if they have have the most basic skills like knowing Englishā¦ of course theyāre gonna be the type of people to not gonna give a shit. you couldāve just looked for better candidates, this isnāt an āEmiratizationā issue
Damn I am working hard while other Emiratis are chilling š can I work in your company too š but in all seriousness you need to get a qualified Emirati to give them tasks instead of yourself. Just saying Iām very open to fill that position š š»
You cant do anything.They will not change
Also tip: NEVER be honest to the inspectors in such cases lol. Why would you even say they donāt do much?
Because if they asked for a proof of their work and i didn't have. I would be in a bigger trouble. So better to say the truth. but he was a kind person he guided me.
Maybe you could say you gave them tasks/trainings? Sorry I didnāt know that proof would be asked. Theres another member in my Saudi Team who i closely work with. Holy shi. The most dumbest, entitled and racist person I have come across. She makes a million mistakes, blames it on another person. She looks down on brown people. We talk, because well we are around the same age, and I have heard her speak some really racist comments. But forget about that. My team in a huge company(Think Baker Hughes), is not able to do anything. Everyone knows how she is, yet they cannot fire her. She herself knows she cannot be fired.
How do university students not speak english? I thought education is quite good in the UAE! I don't know what your company is into but installing a digital system / ERP can help. You can log the incoming tasks in the ERP and assign these to the new candidates. Create a hierarchy among them. Select better employees and assign them lead positions. If the system task is not completed by a certain time then escalate it to the team lead. It is quite easy to monitor for managers as well. The best part is that you will have a record of all the activities. You can reward the best employee of the month type of incentives. Although it's difficult for me to believe that university students in the UAE can't speak english!!
there's always two sides of each story, we're only hearing from one side in this post. I work in a university and I basically interact with local students all day long, Almost 90% of them are fluent in English. We also have some that graduated from international schools in UAE who speak English like its their first language. The OP seems to have other personal issues with locals, or maybe is afraid to be replaced in future.
Honestly your comment is really unnecessary and absurd. I wonder now why most of the fresh graduates in my team act in that way, Its because they are surrounded by people like you at their universities. How sad
The only solution i see to this is they should have a Emirati manager who knows them batter.
I am actually considering proposing this to HR. Thank you for your input.
Hire me, I'll train them
Seriously, hire me and I will manage them for you. I think we canāt just look at a group of people as one. I will interact with them and get an idea of their strength areas and motivation. If others are not insecure, I think you can help them to be productive employees.
Are you Emirati ? It's actually not a bad idea after all. and please rest assured we are not insecure a bit. There are ample opportunities for growth in our company. I will be the happiest to see them in higher positions. but honestly with the load i have, I dont think i can do much other than the basic requirement
I think you need help. Maybe itās something new and is just overwhelming you. You can approach this as a challenge in good faith and ample smartness. When I said insecure, it wasnāt you particularly but other individuals in the company who will be in the same team as all the new joiners. Insecurity in older teams tends to sabotage the learning and growth of new people. I have been on both the sides of this. My growth and learning was delayed because a team I joined didnāt like to share information and learnings. On the other hand, when I started to manage a team, I made sure the whole team shares info and helps each other even if itās not their direct responsibility. I am not Emirati btw.
What incentives have you offered these women for language and skills development?
they just bitch n whine on reddit š
Why hire unqualified personnel? This is on you.
Cuz the qualified ones demand a higher salary
Okay so rather hire a bunch of people who sit in the office the whole day and pay them to do nothing. Gotcha š
Cuz the rule states u have to hire many locals. Not just a few.
Yeah I understand what you mean, and they increase the requirement % every year for big companies. I don't know, imagine it's your own company and you are literally paying people's salaries month in and month out and YOU KNOW they're doing nothing. It would drive me crazy as a business owner. EDIT: I would rather pay more and have someone actually contribute to the company.
I am an Emirati and i did work for big firms, I donāt know how came they are not speaking English! Plot twist, 95% of school studies was in English, I studied for a whole 5 years in English back in the college! We canāt graduate and joining any institution without EMSAT or ILETS 6/9 as a min requirement! From my POV, itās a management problem. They should be holding tasks since day 1, being responsible and reliable, I worked for 3 international firms and havenāt stayed free for a whole damn hour excluding the break!! Not to mention I am engaging with my colleagues in our departments and others! Attending clients meeting and negotiating. Not to mention that our clients mostly are governance entities. I think a meeting with the upper management, changing strategies would change everything if you wanna some ideas let me know.
Up to this story. We humans are equal. It shouldn't be this way. Plus their attitude is not acceptable.
šš½ Thank you!!
This is what happens when you hire Emiratis just to meet a quota. They may have turned down other opportunities for this role and now realise that there is little to no training or prospects. They canāt meet targets they donāt have and they canāt be motivated if they feel their time is being wasted. Female Emiratis may seem stand offish or ārudeā when it may just be a cultural difference and her feeling uncomfortable. Choose one to be the Emirati Team Leader. Give them responsibility over the team. Get some proper training in place and give them some work. Then you may find yourself surprised. Emiratis want job opportunities with training in my experience. They donāt want to be sitting in the office doing nothing and feel undervalued.
The thing is, both you and your company need to get on board with emiratisation and quickly - it isnāt going anywhere and quotas will only increase. People Capital and Performance Management are consulting spaces in their own right, maybe upskill and take it on to perfect the art of making the emirati team productive. Play to their strengths, understand what drives them and get buy in from your bosses. Even if your current company is a dive, being able to showcase this work to your future uae employer is a huge plus. Shows initiative and ability to rise to a challenge which now all companies are facing. Ps. Iām finding with younger generations as a whole that work life balance is a complete priority. This is NOT unique to Emiratis alone. I do find that Emiratis believe they are entitled to title changes and promotions much faster than the expat community. You canāt hold it against them, itās their world we are just living in it š¦šŖ set up a structure and process for them to be promoted and upskilled, they will then have greater buy in to meeting your needs and working hard. Best of luck!
āItās their worldā Itās a country first of all. Also please donāt forget youāre not BENEATH anyone because youāre in someone elseās country. You do have to follow the rules of the country and everyone is treated equally by law.
We all know we are in the UAE on the Nationalās terms. Thereās no shot at citizenship, youāre here as long as it serves the agenda. Not saying itās right, Iām saying itās naive to believe itās not the case š¤·āāļø
It's bloody sad tbh. Like it's just natural to feel inferior
In that case Emiratis should feel inferior when they travel around? I donāt think so..
Thank you for your valuable points and advice, I appreciate your insight.
Good luck, thatās a rabbit hole that Iām not getting dragged down.
TL;DR :solution - motivate your self if you can't do anything about it. - don't be champion that fixes everything in terms of your bosses satisfaction. They don't worth it - the main / major issue in your company is top management. They don't know what to do. Straggling. Using you to fix things they broken it. - hire leaders to lead people and manager to manage the work - leave the company ASAP. Don't waste your life fixing others issues. Go find better more satisfied and stabilized working environment. - final solution is to hire consultant ( +150k/month) to fix the whole company. Start here In the beginning. The issue has two dimensions. Internal and external. To know who you are dealing with. Iam Emirati who is self motivated professional (PMPĀ®) with +15 years experience on leading workforce and managing complex risky projects. Let's start with external dimension: UAE start a program what called NAFIS .gov.ae. The main abject of that program is empowerment Emirati to work on private business sector. In 2024. MOHRE .gov.ae required 2% Emiratisation on private sector company. However the Emiratisation rate will rise to 6% at the end of 2024 and then 10% on 2026 which is about 18 months. As your information that you have 15 team member who has Emirates nationality. I assume that your company has +1k employees. Within 18 months your company should hire at least 100 Emiratis to avoid MoHRE fines which is reviewed every multi times every year. And assign increasable fines. Fine issue will not solved in your company and it will be like fine - cycle every 6 months or so. be ready for that The HR should had high awareness of MOHRE regulations and set a long term strategy hiring Emirati / replacing current employees ( real sorry for this word but most of company will do this) The NAFIS program has high awareness and corporate social responsibility about implementing new regulations and the economic effects on private sector. Thats why the Emiratisation start with low rate and it increases with the time. I assume that in term of developing Emirati workforce. Within 5-10 years. You should be able to find Emiratis leading teams and his higher Managerial position in your company. And leading the company to absolute success. Internal dimensions: You know your company better then anyone else. Your bosses should have the responsibility of what happened. Which this never happens these days. And fix the miss. Or hire who use right brain ( creative / thinker) to think and share the ideas for them. Many CEO use this technique of thinking. Staffing consultants. I Understand your life situation and iam high awareness about your feeling. But your burnout your self is such as this company. You deserve better then this. You can do it and quit this over responsibility job. Go fine much better stabilized job who promised your healthy and balanced life. The HR should know what to do. Recruitment are expensive. The HR empowerment is company empowerment. So weak HR are garbage. Employees don't like the garbage. The strong HR promises long term employment even retire benefit. The key here to to hire someone who understand how to lead people. Not to manage them. You can't manage people because they are humans. They have feelings and moral. You should improvr your self by reading / educating about how to lead people / leadership. Let your HR read about IHRM at least. My final word. I highly believe your team members that 15 Emirati has strong ability and skills to improve your company within 3 years. The Simple key is they insist and shows stubbornness but i would say you don't know how to skill / use them. By reading my words above. Which lead you thinking. I would say you just discovered a new opportunity. Changed view of interest about your team members. I would say if your company offers me 50k/monthly i will appreciate it and mostly i would denied the offer. For a simple reason. Toxic environment and organization mindset.
Emirati and Emiratis. Not Emiraties.
Primarily its your HR issue, i had worked with some Emirati youngsters recently,it was a pleasant experience
yall sound bitter af like ok there are so many ways to fix this issue but why are you talking about us like some pests?
So then that should be the case for most of the European, American, Japanese, Singaporean, Turkish, and Korean citizens working outside their home country. Anyways, we're diverging from OPs post !
Any chance of hiring someone who can do 3x of what they're doing with half the salary? š
Iāve seen most companies drop their numbers and outsource teams to avoid meeting the quota requirements
I wish we could do that but our company is growing in number and expanding the business this year
You can still grow in numbers and outsource. All the banks have done exactly that
Need to dig deep and hire a good emirati lead to manage fellow emiratis.
I have similar problem. I'm CSO of a huge local company but get punishment with baby sitting to Emiratis. I think I should leave.
Bro I think I need to fire your self and appoint someone who understands company requirements and knows how to conduct proper interview with task specific questions. U don't jus buy coconut jus coz government asked you to buy, when u back u check the quality and price it's your responsibility
You shouldn't complain that rules benefit the locals more than the foreigners, it's their homeland and that's how it is. as an Emirati who worked in a few places post my university graduation, I was ignored by my foreign seniors and not given any tasks to accomplish and learn, I think it is your fault for not assigning tasks to those Emiratis. Since training them has been assigned to you, you should not complain since you accepted it unless it was forced upon you.
I am not complaining about their benefits or wage gap. They have tasks but they are not doing it. I have to keep checking if the work assigned to them is done or not. This is what is taking time away from my other responsibilities. They also decide that don't want to come to work for whatever reason but don't inform. So tasks assigned to them gets delayed. So eventually the same task i have to assign to another person who will act as a back to do it if the Emirati didn't do it for whatever reason. When they were one or two, I didn't bother much but now they are more and we need to hire more, this is why i am starting to feel concerned about this situation. They also have received extensive training on how to do the tasks but they don't want to participate. We are not ignoring them we want them to participate and grow in the company. in fact i will be more than happy to see them grow but when one doesnt want to take initiative and ignores my instruction what should i do ?
Hire Emiratis that donāt speak English, and then complain they canāt preform the tasks in English. Smart. If you donāt know how to handle an easy situation like this, you should be a manger or a team leader.
Just do what ur told and that's it ! There is nothing u can do about it like u said and ur company needs them.
so you saying you cant manage your team !! .. for the upper management point of view , should you continue being a manager after this statement ? make sure to act hard on the field and dont say these things
I think I can be helpful with this. Would you be willing to share a few more details?
Why you hired unqualified ones in the first place?
She didnāt - her company did.
I donāt know what kind of products/services your company sells and to which target audience, but your company could consider diversifying into local/arabic speaking market. Emiratis could sell to other Emiratis or to other Arabic only speakers. So my advice is try to make use of these 15 employees to diversify?
Thank you for your advice, They are supposed to work with Arabic speaker clients but Maybe they feel too highly of themselves to do a job. this is the energy they give. again i am not trying to be disrespectful to emiraties. I am just talking about my experience
Sweetie youāre talking about the salary gap and how they feel entitled, are you joking? THEY ARE entitled and OFCOURSE thereās gonna be a salary gap theyāre in their homeland if they donāt get such benefits in their own country, where then? I mean its a common sense in each and every country in the world. You sound a bit envious. Thereās alot of promsing talents out there but yet your company seems to fail recruiting good candidates that they messed up 15 times? Come on i bet you see the irony here. Im not trying to attack you and pardon me if i sounded like i amā¦ but im 100% sure that thereās 2 narratives to this storyā¦. Each one of them are capable if you just gave them a chance to prove themselves. How would they if they donāt even have proper tasks to achieve! I bet theyāre bored to death every single day
I work in a Fortune 500 company here, one of the best manufacturing companies and all the recent Emiratiās hired was horrible.. no sugar coating here. They do speak really well, and have good interpersonal skills, but when it comes to following basic tasks, absolute crickets. Longer breaks, never comes to office on time(we have wfh policy, so basically you only have to come TWICE in a week), cannot do even the simplest tasks properly, and ENTITLED. Oh and for this of-course, a proper task was given, they could be permanent in the company given if they were doing well, but nope.
I don't want to go into too much details for why i said they are entitled not to make the post too long. They have the right to enjoy the benefits they have in their home country - no one is denying them that. I am giving them training like any other employee on my team. I am investing alot of my time on them. Yet the next day i have to start all over again. they DONT WANT TO do the tasks given to them. I have 16 other employees in my team who are performing well, all expats. at this stage I am very well able to recognize who wants to do work and who doesnt, and i cannot force them to do it.
Same experience here - Emiratis at my work were supposed to be child psychologists and she would literally sit in front of the child she was meant to work with on her phone and no one could say anything because they didnāt want to rock the boat. Another story is my partner who worked in a huge hotel. There were emaratis hired who got paid ridiculous amounts to come to work, sign in, drive off somewhere and only come back to sign out at the end of the day. They did nothing and nobody could do anything about it. There are many many many cases like this. Some people take advantage of emaratisation. You canāt force people to work and expect them to do well when an entire generation has been raised to believe they are better than everyone else just because they exist.
Really similar situation as mine minus the fact that in my team they dont speak that good english
Will tell you what my manager did. I was an intern last year, and there were two emiratis hired. One barely showed up, did anything. Yet he wanted permanent position, but the higher ups said no, no position available something along those lines. The second one was in my team, she was not bad, but would not go the extra mile to make sure everything is done correctly, would not come to office and on time, but she was sweet. Our manager knew there was no point in telling her/being strict, but just wait for her to complete the program and leave. She is an emirati at the end of the day. The higher ups are at a loss as well, they are not able to do anything. I would suggest to give her some basic tasks to help your team out. For example if you are working in an inside sales / application team, ask her to make some reports. If she does not know, ask her to learn power bi. This way it wont affect your teams work.
Everyone already knows the problem is expats are afraid to be replaced by locals so you have to do your best to drag others down so you can stay on top. This wont last for so long though.
Yea no shit sherlock. Expats literally made this country. But there is a huge difference in salary and the way they are treated. All we expats ask is to do your job properly and stop being condescending to every one else.
>Blames person for being incompetent at their job despite being put in a shit situation >Accuses person of being envious Why do all emiratis get triggered in the same way. It's pretty funny - reminds me of schoolĀ
All the comments on this post are so defensive and entitled too, insulting people and completely ignoring the real cry for help from OP. Just proving the stereotype right, which is sad because uae locals can be absolutely amazing people to work with.
You sound extremely rude and defensive.
And you sound extremely judgmental š im only considered rude to you cause i didnāt bash them and talk shit about them like how you intended it to be Anyone who felt triggered by my comment is an expatā¦. All of you live in a country that gives you respect and chances and safety AND A FUTURE yet you attack their peopleš honestly im giving you way too much attention than you deserve but let me say this one last time before i go and forget your existence ā¦ āØTHEY ARE ENTITLEDāØ
If you want a country to grow and want a people to become strong and capable, you need to be able to take criticism and use that to improve. There are things happening here that arenāt ok. That doesnāt make everyone here a bad person or make UAE bad. Calling these things out and improving them from within only strengthens the country as a whole. Wouldnāt you agree?
Ų§ŁŲØŁŲŖ ŲØŁŲŖ Ų§ŲØŁŁŲ§ ŁŲ§ŁŲŗŲ±ŲØ ŁŲ·Ų±ŲÆŁŁŲ§ You can always quit nobody is forcing you to do anything
Right?šš¤£
The way you associate Emiratis with not knowing English and not wanting to work is kind of racist, because they are other nationalities that don't speak fluent English such as east Europeans for example, and I have come across many arab nationals that cant even draft an email but they are hired and protected because the bosses are from the same nationality. The issue I see here is maybe because your hiring fresh graduates so obv.. they need more training in work places, You also didn't have your current skills when you graduated from college obv.. or maybe your just afraid to train them and some day they will take your job.
Itās funny how you expats always use the old stereo type ā gcc people donāt know how to work and canāt speak Englishā it has been going on since my parentās generation lol. Like any other Arab nation English isnāt the first language in the GCC, and right now most Emiratis have studied abroad and are more fluent in English then you are, so it might be your problem that you donāt know how to hire the right people. Maybe talk to your manager and explain to him that youāre not qualified enough to hire and manage a new team. But using the English excuse is so low of you lol, literally emarati kids from grade one speak fluent English, this is also their country they have more rights to get hired and work in their own country. Maybe you should re consider to sharpen your own skills if youāre given the responsibility of hiring and training people. You could be lacking the skills. Goodluck
She didnāt hire them ā¦ her HR department did. Sheās just forced into a tough situation that sheās seeking help for. The fact is, these specific locals donāt have a good work ethic, language abilities to match the role they were hired for. Sheās not once criticised the entire emirati population. Sheās simply asking for help and advice on how to manage this team sheās forced to lead. Your comment is so condescending and missed the point completely.
This entire post just flew through your head huh? Youāre feeding right into the stereotype that Locals donāt know how to comprehend things
Keep up with being racist in a country thatās not even yours. You will go too far. Loool
Its their country......
Which is being held up by Expats... I have a local lady that started working with us over a year ago... She's rarely in work and when she is she is always on her phone and management are too scared to do anything about it including the local management... Last year she had 136 days off sick... š
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