UAE companies look to hire locally as travel ban from India remains in place

The shift may lead to a spike in the cost of talent acquisition for employers.

“We are shifting our hiring funnel from 80 percent expats to 50 percent expats, and remaining talent [is sourced] from the GCC region,” the global human resources head of a GCC-based corporate group told Arabian Business.

“Of the 80 percent expats we used to hire, at least 35 percent were from India, which is now being relooked at in the short term [because of the travel ban],” said the human resources head, who wished not to be identified because of internal communication policy issues.

The human resources head, however, said India would still remain a key talent hub for the multi-business group in the long term.

The human resources head also said their group’s leadership hiring in the short term will remain external.

“But over the next three years we plan to build capabilities to grow enough leaders internally. It’s something in hindsight we should have done three years back,” the human resources head said.

Senior human resources employees at several other UAE-based companies who spoke to Arabian Business on the condition of anonymity also confirmed the travel ban from India is forcing them to shift their short-term hiring plans.

“Our big short-term shift is from talent acquisition to skill acquisition,” the chief human resource officer (CHRO) of a consumer retail brand said.

“While 60 percent of our needs will still be met externally, the rest, 40 percent, will now be serviced locally. We are not yet good at it but it’s a strong agenda. We are now looking at talent acquisition more holistically,” the CHRO said.

Prerna Seth Garg, vice president at Dubai-headquartered global talent consulting firm Seintiv Talent Solutions, said with the outbreak of the latest wave of Covid-19 in India their clients have had to think about their heavy dependence on expat hiring, especially from India in the short-term.

Prerna Seth Garg, vice president at Dubai-headquartered global talent consulting firm Seintiv Talent Solutions

“Getting talent from India, especially for the tech space – as it remains one of the highest demand segments for expat hiring – will remain a challenge for now,” Garg said.

“So, to that extent I agree that the hiring funnel has shifted towards tapping more into the inside GCC talent pool now.

“However given the limited pool available locally, especially for complex niche roles, the saturation levels can reach pretty quickly if we only rely on recruiting from local talent. So, the approach should be not to completely keep aside the expat hiring, but to get to the right balance of tapping into the local pool wherever possible along with continuing to hire the right talent from outside,” said the senior executive of Senitiv.

The CHRO of a Dubai-based fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) company said companies in the GCC region had earlier drifted on their internal talent growth agenda and were mostly acquiring talent externally.

The hiring funnels of many companies were filled by an expat workforce for lower-ranking positions as well as for leadership positions.

The human resources head also said their group’s leadership hiring in the short term will remain external

“However I think for the first time in three years we have started looking at filling the hiring funnel internally more aggressively. This would also mean we need to give more learning and skill acquisition to our internal teams,” the CHRO said.

The Dubai-based CHRO of a global tech company said the latest move on tweaking hiring plans was also on account of a global challenge.

“We have started looking at revamping our hiring process for mid and senior leaders completely, not just because of the ongoing India challenge but also because of the global challenge,” the CHRO said.

“The cost of talent is going up fast. People are not willing to move countries as freely as before. Families are holding back and there are mental blocks,” he said.

The human resources head of the GCC-based business group added: “There are two clear impacts [of the short-term hiring tweaks]. The cost of talent is going to shoot up in the GCC countries for expats as well the local population, which is a good windfall from a candidate’s lens but not quite what employers would like it to be.”