Dubai-based Imdaad, a leading provider of integrated facilities,
environment and energy management solutions in the GCC, offered a vital
platform for identifying and recruiting young, qualified and talented Emiratis
at the recently held Careers UAE 2016.
At the event, the company focused on hiring
candidates to reduce the rate of unemployed UAE youths, 18 percent of whom are
women. Imdaad also threw the spotlight on its nationalization program, Elham, to attract Emiratis to join Imdaad and begin a career in the facilities
management (FM) sector.
“Since Careers UAE is an exclusive fair for Emiratis, it
allowed us to reach out to a large number of national youths and identify their
talent,” Jamal Abdullah Lootah, CEO of Imdaad, told Gulf News Journal. “Through
our various initiatives, including Elham, we wanted to address the widening gap
of unemployment among young Emiratis and play a key role in developing their
talent and training them to be successful FM professionals and corporate
leaders.”
Elham, which means to inspire in Arabic, is Imdaad’s
nationalization program that aims to motivate, nurture and train young UAE nationals, especially women, by offering them meaningful employment,
professional growth and inspirational careers. Through this initiative, Imdaad
aims to meet the nation’s goal of establishing diversity and equality in the
local workforce as well as build future leaders who will set new benchmarks of
excellence within the sector.
Elham primarily focuses on recruiting and training young
Emiratis, particularly women, through a Graduate Trainee Program. This
holistic initiative aims to inspire the youth to consider starting and
advancing their professional journey within Imdaad by unleashing their
potential.
“We have improved our Elham program by adding training
courses that focus on facility management,” Lootah said. ” At the
show, we highlighted some of our in-house courses that are delivered by
certified senior technical trainers. We also featured a few professional
courses that will be conducted in 2016 on intensive FM skills by coveted
training suppliers.”
In light of Elham’s success, a Diploma Trainee Program, and a
Technical Trainee Program have been added to increase traction among young UAE
nationals and boost the recruitment of Emiratis. So far, five young Emirati
women were recruited and placed in strategic business units such as operations, finance, human capital, customer relations, marketing and business development.
The program resulted in a 31 percent increase in UAE national walk-in
applications in 2015 compared to the previous year.
“Imdaad remains committed to supporting the UAE National
Agenda and UAE Vision 2021,” Lootah said. “We are confident that our
nationalization program, which is in line with the government’s Emiratization
policy, will contribute in harnessing the full potential of the national human capital.”
He said that one of the biggest challenges faced by FM
companies when attracting Emiratis is the limited awareness about the concept
of facilities management. Elham will offer deeper insights about the sector,
career development opportunities and remunerations and benefits by actively
visiting local colleges and universities to create awareness among Emiratis.
“We want to throw more
light on Elham, which began in 2014 as a pilot program, complementing Imdaad’s
efforts to develop the nation’s future human capital in support of the national
agenda,” Lootah said. “It is an investment on our part, which benefits not only
the company but also the local business landscape.”
