There’s good news in store for those looking for a job in the UAE. Speaking to Emirates 24|7, recruitment agencies and headhunters point to improved signs that UAE firms
have begun their post-Eid recruitment drives in earnest.

While experts maintain it is early to judge the size and scope of the upturn, they see clear signs of a jobs revival in the local market.

“In general, the market is not bad, the companies are active and I can say that even Ramadan period was moderately active,” says Konstantina Sakellariou, Partner – Marketing and Operations Director, Stanton Chase International, a recruitment firm ranked within the top ten global retained executive search firms.

“There were signs of improved activity pre-Eid,” agrees Peter Burdekin , Director, McArthur Murray, an executive search firm operating at senior management to main
board level. “However, it is too early to positively conclude an up-turn in the market,” he adds.

Burdekin says that the post-Ramadan and end-of-the-year period are traditional hunting periods for senior-level hirings, and things are set to heat up from here. “Traditionally,
we would expect an increase in hiring activity post-Eid in the build-up towards Christmas as the more forward thinking organisations consider hiring senior level talent into the
New Year,” he said.

“There is a lot of activity in the market, though Dubai keeps a much slower pace than other markets in the broader GCC,” says Stanton Chase’s Sakellariou. “It is not easy to
compare with last year,” she maintains.

UAE remains a preferred destination for job-seekers as the country offers a host of benefits including tax-free salary and a best-in-class quality of life for expatriates from
all over the world. A recent survey of students and fresh graduates in the GCC, Levant, North Africa and Pakistan by recruitment firm Bayt.com confirmed the UAE as the top
preferred destination to work.

A majority (56 per cent) of respondents who were willing to relocate for work said they’d prefer to work in the UAE, double the respondents that chose the US and UK (28
per cent each).

This points out to the retained allure of the UAE market despite the toll taken on jobs by the ongoing global economic slowdown.

“Broadly speaking, the markets are gradually getting more and more vivid since last year, but of course the steps are not huge,” adds Sakellariou.

According to an earlier salary survey conducted by GulfTalent.com, the average pay-rise in the UAE was 5.5 per cent in 2009, a 60 per cent decline from the 2008 pay-hike of
13.6 per cent.

Even then, the report highlighted that those with a job were better off than previous years as this increase was, for the first time in many years, more than the average
inflation rate. The inflation rate saw a major climbdown thanks to the decline in rents, which forms a major outgoing of the large expatriate community in the UAE.

“They are rather cautious and decision-making still takes time,” Sakellariou concludes.