UAE: A nation in pursuit of excellence

On August 28, 2016, around 7.30am, His Highness Shaikh Mohammad Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice-President and Prime Minister of UAE and Ruler of Dubai, was seen unexpectedly walking through the internal offices of Dubai Municipality, Dubai Land Department, Dubai Economic Development Department and at Passport Control counters of General Directorate of Residency and Foreigners’ Affairs at Dubai Airport. Pictures and videos went viral on social media soon after his visit. This was the day when schools and educational institutes across the country were beginning the first day of the new academic year. Shaikh Mohammad appeared without prior notice at different government offices on a surprise spot-check in the early hours of Sunday.

For a moment, I wondered, why would Shaikh Mohammad visit government offices so early? Why wake up early and come all the way to Deira? He has many capable and competent personnel to delegate such a task. Alternatively, he could have placed a sudden request for a complete attendance report on all staff members at government departments and it would have landed on his hand-held device within minutes. So why take the trouble?

I think the idea of his visit was not to raid on staff or catch them red-handed for being absent from work, but to exhibit that he and his government mean business and are extremely keen on punctuality, discipline and appropriate corporate governance.

These are some of the key factors that contribute positively towards our journey to take UAE to the next level. The UAE, and Dubai, is gearing up for some major events in less than five year from now. Any slackness at any level can be damaging. We have a mission to go to Mars and we have massive hosting events, such as World Expo 2020. Nations at ages similar to ours do not have such huge ambitions. Shaikh Mohammad, with his great vision, not only wants to see us ready to take on the challenges associated with these plans and projects, but also wants us to overcome the hurdles that may be standing in the way. In short, he wants happiness for his people today — not tomorrow or after 20 years.

Shaikh Mohammad is a strong advocate of empowering youth and he is always at the forefront of providing every opportunity to them. On the very next day after Shaikh Mohammad’s surprise visit to government offices, he announced the retirement, with full honour, of nine executives of Dubai Municipality. The message conveyed was simple: Nothing against those employees, but let’s get fresh blood and new minds into the game and allow the new generation of young and capable leaders to bear bigger responsibilities in the days ahead.

So what’s next?

A charismatic personality that he is, Shaikh Mohammad is a trendsetter in the Arab world — not just in the UAE. After his visit, I expect governance at all levels in the UAE will improve even further. When I say improvement of governance, I don’t simply mean HR managers would start chasing attendance policy violators and take disciplinary action against them. Rather, I think there will be a broader level of improvement and greater accountability will be enforced across both public and private sectors — be it internal audit, finance, corporate structures, processes, customer service, operational safety, human resource or business management. Fundamentals of any business, process or policy will be questioned again. For example, if a certain establishment or a department is purchasing a system, product or undertaking a project, its ROIs, or return on investments, will be reviewed multiple times, grey areas (if any) in policies and processes will be eliminated, and competencies, skills and capabilities of staff will be further improved. I am not saying all of this was not happening in our offices before, but this visit is an opportunity to further improve the high standards that we have here and take services and performances to the next level in government departments and private sector firms.

As people like to see their role models often, many are also inspired by Shaikh Mohammad’s leadership style. Hence, we may soon find senior executives conducting similar surprise spot-checks in their organisations. We may soon witness similar visits by CEOs, chairmen and owners to their establishments and organisations. The culture of team-work between the senior management and people on the ground will get further promoted, resulting in better services, faster turn-around-times, improved productivity and advanced offering.

In our quest to build a great future for the UAE, which our founding fathers late Shaikh Zayed Bin Sultan Al Nahyan and late Shaikh Rashid Bin Saeed Al Maktoum had planned, we have no other alternative but to strive for the best.

God bless the UAE and God bless President His Highness Shaikh Khalifa Bin Zayed Al Nahyan and the entire UAE leadership!

Hassan Sajwani is an Emirati writer. You can follow him on Twitter at www.twitter.com/@HSajwanization.