The least important factors reportedly are aesthetics of the company such as the logo and website design (13%) and positive media presence (12%).
What matters post hiring
After being hired, the survey showed that the most important drivers of loyalty for professionals in the UAE are opportunities for long term career development (38%), training and development opportunities (38%) and job security (33%).
Workplace culture is instrumental in retaining employees by improving motivation and organizational commitment. Positively,59% of respondents have been working in their current organization for more than two years. In fact, almost6 in10 of the working population in the UAE are happy at their current workplace and65% would recommend their current workplace to someone looking for a job.
Interestingly, nearly7 in10 agree that their company regularly takes feedback from their employees to understand them and67% agree that the leadership takes their feedback seriously. Further, almost7 in10 respondents said they would apply in the current organization for their current role if they had to do it all over again.
Ola Haddad, Director of Human Resources at Bayt.com says: “Besides salary, a large number of surveyed employees longed for long-term career development opportunities as a major driver of loyalty towards a company. This signals how clear demands for heightened company culture that are on the rise, can be closely linked to a desire for more genuine professional development.”
Most attractive business values
7 in10 respondents in the UAE find an employer attractive if they follow good ethics and practices, followed by friendly company culture (60%) and corporate social responsibility (52%).
Attracting talent is an important step that employers need to remain aware of and proactively work on. When asked to what extent companies do a good job at exciting job seekers about their culture and attracting them to apply,48% of respondents said ‘to a great extent’,17% said ‘somewhat’,12% said ‘very little’, and4% said ‘not at all’.
Social Media (27%) and online company pages targeting job seekers (27%) are considered to be the most effective medium to promote a company’s culture to job seekers. When asked ‘what type of information would most excite you to join a company as an employee’,65% of respondents voted for highlighting company’s perks and benefits,44% said employee testimonials and reviews and36% said company events and socials.
Zafar Shah, Research Director at YouGov said: “Overall, it seems that employees in the region are looking for more authentic experiences in the workplace. Now that the pandemic is nearly coming to a close, we foresee a bigger focus on employee loyalty in what has come to be known as the great age of resignation.”
Data for the ‘Attraction and Retention of Talent in the MENA’ survey was collected online from14th October to8th November2022. Results are based on a sample of3,478 respondents from the following countries: UAE, KSA, Kuwait, Qatar, Oman, Bahrain, Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq, Palestine, Syria, Egypt, Sudan, Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia and Pakistan.