• Home

Employee retention challenge for firms

DUBAI — Ongoing research by the British University in Dubai (BUiD) has found that retention and employee turnover are major challenges the fast-growing industries in the Middle-East face.

In fact, according to a 2007 survey from leading employment web site in the Gulf Bayt.com, 45 per cent of people in the Gulf region would switch jobs if offered a higher compensation package.

This means that companies these days are forced to invest more in finding talents who often leave them for other jobs in a short time.

BUid through its current research hopes to tackle these problems and is looking into tools which can strengthen employee engagement and retention.

A possible solution to this problem, according to Professor Ashly Pinnington, Dean of Faculty of Business at BUid, is ensuring that employees have access to strategic information they need.

She said, "A key factor driving increased employee mobility is the lack of access to knowledge and information, which causes employees to become disconnected from their company's strategic direction and reduces their effectiveness."

The research also suggests that greater focus on knowledge management, i.e. the distribution of knowledge within a company, could result in higher levels of motivation y in the organisation.

• UAE