Dubai: Biz-group emerged as the number one Small and Medium Enterprise (SME) company in the UAE to work for among ahead of five other distinguished SME companies.
Human resource management consultancy Great Place To Work (GPTW) released its list of Top SMEs to Work for in the UAE at an awards ceremony in association with Dubai SME 100.
Hazel Cowling, Partner & Consultant Director at management consultancy firm took Biz-group, said the company was “hugely exhilarated” to taken out top place.
It is the first time GPTW have released a Top SME list for the UAE.
Emitac Healthcare Solutions, Leminar, Dabo & Co, Eton Institute, and Paramount Computer Systems took out the remaining five distinguished SME companies on the list.
The list represents SMEs from the healthcare, air conditioning, communications, education, and security, and consultancy sectors.
Cowling said the list was important in identifying UAE SMEs as ideal employers and showed that they can compete with larger companies when it came to workplace environment.
Navin M Valrani, CEO at air conditioning firm Leminar, said the company developed a strategy six months ago that would ensure the company was a great place to work.
He said the award was recognition of what the company stands for.
Emitac Healthcare Solutions CEO S. Raghavan said the company had not been aware of GPTW a year ago when it first heard of the list. However, he said he wanted to ensure the company was involved following discussions between GPTW and Emitac.
Raghavan said taking out one of the five distinguished SME awards was great motivation for the company.
He said it represented a strong single to improve their position on the list.
“We want do better and be at the top,” he said.
Camilla D’abo from Dabo & Co said the company participated in the GPTW grading to find out more information and to see how it was benchmarked against international best practices.
She said it was an honour to feature on the inaugural list.
David Robert, CEO-Gulf region at GPTW, said he was surprised more companies did not meet the threshold.
Employees of companies who took part in the GPTW list were surveyed on a Trust Index looking at employee opinions of the workplace. GPTW also undertakes a Culture Audit that includes looking at management policies.
Robert said that perception that people and business strategy were two separate practices created that biggest challenge for companies participating on the list.
“Companies that missed on the list did not integrate their strategies,” he said.
GPTW would not say how many companies had applied to be involved in the Top SMEs to Work for in the UAE.
