Mohammed sets up Excellence Council

His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, has issued directives to set up the Emirates Excellence Council to bring together all local and federal excellence programmes under one umbrella, to coordinate efforts, exchange knowledge, promote teamwork and establish excellence as a national culture in the UAE.

Sheikh Mohammed gave the directives during the Emirates Government Excellence Conference, 2013, at the Marriott Marquise in Dubai.

He emphasised that government excellence in services bolsters all sectors, creates many opportunities and further establishes the global stature of the UAE in all spheres.

"Consolidation of efforts by local and federal entities and integration of excellence programmes will result in huge leaps in government performance, establish the stature of the UAE as a favourite destination for government best practices, and create a national culture that encourages all to achieve excellence in all services and businesses," said Sheikh Mohammed.

"Everyone has to be excellent. All employees have the desire to do that. Our job as officials is to provide a favourable environment to unleash the potentials of our sons.

"Excellence in work is part of Islam and our Islamic culture. Prophet Mohammed  (Peace Be Upon Him) said, 'Allah loves those who do their works perfectly.' Excellence is a way to achieve comfort and satisfaction for our citizens. This is what we always demand," he added.

The Prime Minister emphasised that "Excellence is a lifestyle, a government culture and a national advantage by which we can make a lot of achievements. The implementation of the UAE Vision 2021 becomes more feasible for us if we establish excellence at all government departments."

Sheikhs, senior officials, ministers and government excellence team members attended the conference on Tuesday.

On the sidelines of the conference, Sheikh Mohammed joined the participants in celebrating the UAE's latest achievement of high rankings in the Global Competitiveness Yearbook, 2013, issued by the International Institute of Management Development in Switzerland.

In the report, the UAE ranked first globally in government efficiency and emerged as the eighth most competitive country in the world. It has also been ranked fourth in economic performance.

Mohammed stresses significance of concerted efforts to maintain UAE's position
 

His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum has stressed the importance of strenuous work to sustain the position attained by the UAE at international arenas.

Sheikh Mohammed made the remark, while touring the interactive workshops held on the sidelines of the Emirates Government Excellence Conference 2013 at the JW Marriott Marquis Dubai.

The workshops highlighted the pioneer position of the UAE in the area of the government excellence at both regional and international levels.

Addressing the conference, Sheikh Hamdan bin Mubarak Al Nahyan, Minister of Higher Education and Scientific Research, said at the conference that the role of leadership was importance in success of the government development projects, referring to the role of a leader in creating institutional culture that supports excellence and motivates employees to continue developing innovative thinking.

He noted that the institutional excellence was an integral system based on many aspects, including but not limited to: spread and encouraging culture of participation, taking initiative, empowerment, accountability, and decision making in the light of facts and certified information based on performance indicators.

Sheikh Hamdan called for investing in building internal capacities of institutions in the areas of excellence to ensure continuity of good results.

He reiterated that the teamwork was instrumental to bolster the institutional culture and ensure interaction of all inside the institution to upgrade government work efficiency.

Sheikh Nahyan said the services provided to customers have significantly improved, citing that a service used to be provided in 7 working days can now be delivered in one hour, while a field work survey, which used to take 60 days, has been reduced to only five working days.

He underlined that the performance evaluation system has provided to officials and employees the fair evaluation mechanisms that contributed to the job development, stressing the importance of continuous assessment being an important tool to better comprehensive institutional performance.

The agenda included the excellence in areas of police, change management, customer service, economy and job sectors.

Sheikh Mohammed participated in part of the workshops held on the sidelines of the Emirates Government Excellence Conference, 2013, in Dubai.

Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Crown Prince of Dubai, was also present. Sheikh Mohammed and Sheikh Hamdan were briefed on the experiences of a number of participants in the workshops.

They also attended a workshop, pertaining to factors of distinguished careers from two officers at the Ministry of Interior, in addition to other experiences of a number of staff in various government departments in the country.

At the end, they attended a workshop, organised by the office of the Cabinet Affairs Ministry, on the sidelines of the conference, regarding excellence in the field of municipal sector.

The participation of Sheikh Mohammed was welcomed and appreciated by the youth, who exchanged greetings and dialogues with him on a number of topics related to excellence and innovation.

Agreements with 3 universities signed

His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, on Monday attended a ceremony marking the signing of three strategic agreements by the Federal Government for developing abilities and skills of federal government staff.

As per directives of Sheikh Mohammed, three specialised training courses will be directed to federal government staff starting from next September, in the areas of government policies, legal management and government communication.

Mohammed bin Abdullah Al Gargawi, Minister for Cabinet Affairs, signed the agreements on behalf of the Federal Government, at the Presidential Palace.

Zayed University was represented by Dr. Maytha bint Salem Al Shamsi, Minister of State and President of Zayed University. Samy A. Mahmoud, Chancellor of the University of Sharjah and Dr. Franz B. Humer, Chairman of the Board of Directors at INSEAD-Abu Dhabi, were also present representing their institutions at the signing.

Gargawi said, "These strategic partnerships add an important partner to government work, in the light of building its capacity and human resources, where this step is considered as a completion to the efforts of the federal government in order to expand its partnerships. These partnerships include ministries, federal authorities and local governments, the private sector and civil entities."

He pointed out that by inking these partnerships, the Federal Government began a new phase of building strategic partnerships by strengthening the role of higher education and academic institutions towards supporting government work and the march of development being witnessed by the UAE.
 
Under the agreement, the three universities will set up and implement specialised training programmes and enhance the capabilities of federal government staff.

According to the agreements, a joint working group was formed between the federal government, represented by the General Secretariat of the Cabinet at the Ministry of Cabinet Affairs, and Sharjah and Zayed Universities, and INSEAD-Abu Dhabi.

The agreements also state that Sharjah University will secure a training programme for staff of the federal government in addition to overall supervision of the preparation of training resources.

Zayed University will offer a training programme for staff of government communication departments in various ministries and authorities.

Mohammed to attend UAE University graduation ceremony

Sheikh Mohammed will be attending the UAE University’s graduation ceremony of the 32nd batch of students on Wednesday at the university campus in Al Ain.

The ceremony, which will see the graduation of 436 students of which 69 are postgraduates of masters and PhD programmes in various specialties, will also be attended by a number of sheikhs, ministers, senior officials, members of the diplomatic corps, university staff and a large gathering of the student's families.



 

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