Jobs in UAE: Does private sector still rely on expats?

As the government pushes for Emiratisation in the country, its welcome news that more UAE nationals believe their companies offer opportunities to them and try to integrate them into the workforce by having the right policies in place.

According to ‘Nationalisation in the GCC’, a new poll by online jobs site Bayt.com, a majority of the respondents in the UAE (60.09 per cent) believe that their current workplace has effective localisation policies with 37.09 per cent saying the policies are very effective.

Less than one out of 10 respondents believe that localisation policies at their place of work are not effective at all.

Despite the progress made, an overwhelming majority (87.23 per cent) believe that the UAE still relies more on expatriates to take on specialised knowledge-based jobs (in fields such as information technology, health services and engineering, to name a few).

However, experts suggest these roles can be filled by the nationals if companies invest in training and preparing them for the future.

Gavin Smith, Managing Director of ReThink MEA, cites the case of Etihad Airways, a company that has successfully recruited many Emirati nationals by training and equipping them for the job.

“Etihad is a perfect example of this. The airline recognised that there simply weren’t enough locals with the required skills so it looked to develop the talent from the ground up. At the start of the project, the local element of the workforce stood at around 2 per cent and by 2013 had risen to 22 per cent. So, if businesses are serious about meeting targets, get started right away,” he says.

As more companies try to meet their localisation targets, a majority of the respondents in the Bayt poll (64.78 per cent) believe that the unemployment rate among local talent in the UAE is low, while over one third (35.22 per cent) conversely believe that unemployment rates are high.

However, almost half of the respondents believe that finding and hiring local talent is extremely easy, while two out of 10 believe the opposite is true.

On the salary front, a large majority of those polled (72.26 per cent) believe that local employees enjoy better pay and benefits than expatriates.

And this is where the government jobs become more attractive than private ones. “If private companies want to compete for Emirati talent, they simply have to develop employment offerings that at least match that of public sector organisations,” suggests Smith.

Even though most respondents in the Bayt poll believe that nationals do receive better pay packages, fewer than one out of 10 respondents opine that local employees get paid less. Only 20.26 per cent believe that pay is based entirely on merit.

On career progression, 61.86 per cent of the participants say that local employees get promoted faster than expats, while 27.19 per cent believe that promotions are based entirely on merit. One out of 10 (10.95 per cent) believe that the expatriate employees get promoted faster than national talent.
 

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