DUBAI — A ‘Nationalization in the GCC' poll conducted by Bayt.com, the region's No. 1 job site, has revealed that sentiment suggests that GCC residents feel that GCC nationals are given generous support by their governments. In fact, according to the poll, the general perception is that national citizens are given “very much support” by the government as far as job search is concerned as stated by 42% of respondents, with only a quarter (26%) claiming that nationals receive no support. And 35.6% claim that they believe the government does in fact intervene in the hiring of local talent within their company, however, 42% state the opposite, where they claim that the government does not play a part in that respect. With regards to talent availability and ease of sourcing and hiring, almost half of the respondents (52%) feel it is easy for employers to source national talent. Moreover, when compared to expatriates, respondents believe that national citizens receive better pay (46%), receive more support from the government (23%), and are promoted faster (11%). Only, 11% believe that local talents are paid less than their expat counterparts. Most local talents are employed in sales and marketing (33%) or IT departments (21%), with the majority holding supervisory (31%) or managerial (25%) positions. 22% occupy entry level positions, and 5% are in their company's C-level roles. Over a third of the poll's respondents (36%) believe that the best way to find national talent is through dedicated regional jobsites. Social media is also a popular method for finding national employees (24%), as are university career fairs (12.3%). On the other hand, newspaper ads (7%), alumni centers (6%) and local job fairs (7%), as well as some of the dedicated local government sites are seen to be relatively less effective for discovering local talent. “At Bayt.com we have been assisting corporations in the GCC large and small, both local and international, to meet their nationalizations targets for the better part of the last decade,” said Suhail Masri, VP of Sales, Bayt.com. “Most of the region's top employers whom we liaise with on a daily basis are already actively mobilized to source, attract and retain national talent across career levels and job roles and this initiative should serve in effect to give their nationalization targets and activities extra impetus, momentum, direction and drive. “In the GCC in particular, Bayt.com's online recruitment platform has facilitated the entire process of meeting nationalization objectives and targets pan-industrially by making it faster, easier and more efficient to source top national talent across career levels. We liaise very closely with each country's universities and top employers alike to ensure our recruitment platform readily accommodates local recruitment targets from the internship and fresh graduate stage through to mid-management and senior managerial level roles and requirements.” More than half of the companies based in the GCC (52%) have firm policies for hiring nationals, as opposed to the 32% that don't (16% of respondents did not know whether or not their companies have firm policies). Yet, the results of the poll show that the number of nationals working in companies varies widely, with 37% claiming that local talent makes up 0 to 5% of their workforce, and 18% stating that their company comprises of 75 to 100% nationals. The biggest issues relating to hiring local talent are seen to be perceptions they may want less hours or more pay (39%); and perceptions they may be relatively less competitive when it comes to training and experience (14.5%), as well as perceptions they may favor a select few limited industries for employment purposes (10%). When asked whether they believe that the current workplace localization policies in their country are effective, half of polled professionals think they are effective indeed: 22% responded with ‘yes, very', and 28% stated ‘yes, to an extent.' However, 14% claim that the policies are ‘not effective at all', and 16% believe that they are ‘not very effective'. Respondents feel that hiring levels for national talents could be most improved if nationals had access to better educational and vocational training facilities (24%), if there were better coordination between the government and the private sector (22%), or if there were better incentives for the private sector from the government (16%) and better coordination between educational institutes and companies (15%). Data for the Bayt.com “Nationalization in the GCC” poll was collected online from March 15 – May 2, with 2,213 respondents covering six GCC countries. — SG
