Need for a paradigm shift

Tim: Ahmed Al Dheeb, the accusation is, there is no clear vision and the government doesn’t do anything.
Ahmed: Well, I can say that the government has a vision but how clear it is…

Tim: It is not clear enough to the lady (points out at Lubna).
HE Ahmed: If I were to ask the minister of education whether we have a vision, she will say yes we have vision. But if we ask whether this vision satisfies others, then that is another issue.
 
Tim: It may be there but it’s not being clearly articulated.
HE Ahmed: Of course, people’s aspirations are more than what we have as of now. Do we need education only education’s sake or for employment? We say we have to educate our people for the future so that they get jobs in Oman. Why should they get jobs only in Oman, they can get jobs outside Oman as well. Every year the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Higher Education coordinates with the government and the private sector asking about the workforce that is needed, what sort of demand will arise in the next five years so that opportunities can be created for school leavers and graduates.

Tim: Hani Al Zubair, is it a fair accusation that there is no clear vision?
Hani: I totally agree. I think if the people creating these visions were in the private sector instead of being in the government sector, they probably will be out of their jobs. We have a plan, a vision and there are clear timelines, clear goals that are measurable. Everybody in the company knows where we are going. It has to be clear for everybody to know.

Tim: Do you think government needs more discipline
Hani: I am not sure whether they need more discipline. I think I have go back to my earlier point, which is dialogue. There may be some great plans somewhere but nobody knows about them. We just know that the government is looking at tourism. Is there a clear line as to where we want to be, how do we want to get there, how do we encourage the private sector because this is what the government says – the private sector has to play its role. We want to play our role but is it crystal clear, where we want to go, so that we actually know how to navigate in order to get there? Before you move on, I just want to make a comment on job creation. A great percentage of expatriates are in very low paid jobs and unfortunately, you cannot find Omanis that are willing to take up those jobs. So there has to be a way for us to limit that expectation of the people and say, look it’s a job and it earns a living and it’s a way of feeding your family.

Audience: My name is Eihab Al Hajj, I have a private company and in this, 30 per cent of my staff is busy handling the bureaucracy. What kind of message does that send to the investor in the market? That’s an extra burden you have to take on board when you want to set up a business.
 
Adil: I think employability is an important point, if you look at the gross numbers. We have 40,000-50,000 thousand people coming on to the job market every year. I think there is a consensus that employability is our biggest challenge. We have to recognise that with the 220,000 people in the private sector and the 140,000 in the public sector, the required rate of job creation cannot be sustained with our current way of thinking. We have to look at entrepreneurship as being important and we need to look at how many entrepreneurs we have created in the last 20 years. Fifty years ago, just about everybody was an entrepreneur. The government has to see itself as an enabler of the business environment and do what its customers requires it to do. And this is a two-way street, private businesses have thrived and made money in the last 40 years in this country. They also got to listen and do what the government expects them to do. But the dialogue has to be facilitated and managed. Hussain and I were talking before we came in and we were saying what we need in the government is a department of simplicity and this department has to issue reports, be accountable and transparent. Trust me, the cost of doing business in Oman could drop considerably by just doing that one simple thing.

Hussain: Simplicity and less bureaucracy will automatically lead to many things. And when we come to the point of planning, I think we really plan well. But today’s world doesn’t need complicated planning. Over the years we have been to different countries, we go to Singapore and take really good ideas and say, yes, Oman is small, like Singapore and why can’t we do this? It is very easy. But when we come to the implementation part, and to get the ball rolling it gets difficult.

Tim: Dr Salem, Adil Taqi’s point on the department of simplicity. How much more simple can you get?
HE Dr Salem: What I wanted to say is that it is very important for people, when they are not happy with what they see from the government, to be able to change through peaceful means. And the government has to react to those demands. Otherwise if we do not allow them to change through peaceful means, they will use other means. But let me ask you one question (pointing to the audience and addressing them). How many of you, this year, voted for Majlis A’Shura? Can you raise your hands… (Very few hands go up among the audience) And you are asking for change. You don’t even practice your basic right to vote. How can you have change. HE Darwish cannot approve the budget before it is discussed and challenged by Majlis A’Shura and these are your elected representatives. You should sit with your elected representatives and place all of your concerns with them because now they have been empowered based on the demands of the people. And you know very well a few ministers who were elected by the people directly were appointed as ministers. They should be accountable for their actions. Do you think it is a free ride? And you have that instrument, that
institution, use it.

Tim: I would like to take one more vote. How many people didn’t vote because they didn’t think it would make any difference? (Some hands are raised). OK. Quite a few people. Which is a different problem isn’t it?
HE Dr Salem: Yes it is

Tim: If they felt their vote wouldn’t change anything
HE Dr Salem: They have to change their paradigm of thinking

Tim: They don’t believe that it is going to change anything, that it s going to work
HE Dr Salem: When people spoke, 15 ministers lost their jobs, what else do you want? (audience claps)

Audience: I am Sana Al Balushi, from the ministry of education. Regarding the earlier question of whether the government has the will to change things, I want to say that the government has the will and we have seen that since 1970 the concentration has been on the spread of education. Initially, the focus was on the quantity side, but from 1995, our focus has been on the quality, but it takes time. Besides, there are a lot of reforms underway right now. One of them is the establishment of the National Career Guidance Centre. We are also working on a panel to promote entrepreneurial skills.

Dr Hatem: I know they are doing a very hard in trying to move the process forward improving the quality of education. They are just at the beginning. They have a long way to go. There can never be enough dialogue. We just started this, we need to do more of this. The government is disciplined but they have not been inclusive and the way they were doing things in the past will not be relevant and they have to think about new ways.

Audience: I am a student at the British School Muscat. And my question is — Has the expatriate community been engaged enough in the long term solution and debate. Especially because they are the key stakeholders and occupy many of the high skilled jobs in Oman?
HE Ahmed: First of all we would like to thank the expatriate community. They have done a lot for the development of the country. I think yes we do, really the government considers expatriates’ experience in different sectors. We at the ministry of commerce and industry have committees which have expatriates from the private sector as members and we take their advise. We cannot ignore the role they are playing and we cannot replace the whole expatriate community.

Tim: You don’t want to replace a lot of them…
HE Ahmed: We would like to replace them with Omanis and create jobs. This is the aim and objective of any country in the world, to create jobs for your own citizens. This is not something unique to Oman but a lot of countries around the world do it.

Tim: Isn’t there a danger that in the process of Omanisation that the expatriates will feel unwanted and undervalued
HE Ahmed: I don’t think so. When we started Omanisation, the number of expatriates kept on increasing because of the increasing development programmes. We don’t say that we are going to have 100 per cent Omanis in all sectors. It cannot be and it will not be. Five years ago, we had about 500,000 expatriates, now we have close to a million. We don’t think there is a threat of replacing all expatriates. But there is a demand and request from our citizens. And I hope that the government will be able to satisfy the request of its citizens by creating jobs for them.

Adil: I Just want to make a small point about Omanis and expatriates. I think in terms of employment, Omanisation is a percentage of total employment, so in a sense the more expatriates we have, the more jobs we have for Omanis if you look at it another way. But I’ll come to the Omanisation point I made earlier. The SMEs is the one sector that is forgotten.

Tim: SMEs?
Adil: Eihab (from the audience) was talking about bureaucracy and Omanisation as an added cost for a start-up business. But If you are relaxed with them by way of regulation, I think you possibly allow more businesses to set up and therefore more chances for greater number of businesses in the future that then will take a larger number of Omanis. But if you increase the cost of doing business right from the word go, chances are that a lot of money that would have gone to setting up businesses would sit in banks.

Audience: As a small part of the private sector, I think that the point of dialogue with the youth is very important. But the dialogue has to be two-way. Yes we have to listen to their aspirations but we have to make sure that the aspirations are realistic. My customers demand of me professional competence and experience. Experience does not come with a piece of paper. Experience comes with starting at the bottom and working your way up through the system. The young Omanis I interview on a regular basis do not want to start at the bottom.

Tim: Ahmed Al Dheeb, what would you say to that?
HE Ahmed: Omanis don’t want to start at the bottom and this was true maybe 5, 7 or 10 years ago. But now you will find Omanis in all the sectors and at all levels. You will now find a demand for all kinds of the jobs. But there are some complaints about the way they are treated and the salary levels they are getting from the private sector. I have seen an old lady working in the private sector for 25 years and she has been getting only RO250. This is not fair and people would not be willing to do this kind of a job. And that is why we saw people from the private sector getting onto the streets.

On the other hand we have companies who have achieved 70-80 per cent Omanisation and the workers are very happy with those companies, because they are treated well, there are growth plans, and training opportunities. So we have companies who complain about Omanisation, and we have companies who say Omanisation is good and Omanis are hardworking. So there are sides, everyone is not excellent nor is everyone bad. Just to talk about bureaucracy, this issue has cropped up many times here in this debate. Things have changed in the last three to four years ago. For example, at the Ministry of Commerce and Industry’s one stop shop, 85 per cent of applications received are processed on the same day. And these numbers are documented with us. There are some things which have a long process but as I said we are improving.

Hani: I want to go back to the lady who is working for RO250 for such a long time. I think there has been failure on two parts for that lady. The organisation, not helping her to develop; and the woman not developing herself. We have had similar issues within our organisation. If we have drivers, I can’t potentially see that I am ever going to pay a driver RO1,000 or RO2,000, no matter how long he works for me. But what I would like to actually do is to develop the person to be able to take the next tier job, so that he can move into a different bracket. And I agree that the private sector doesn’t play its role in developing its own internal people as much as possible but also I think there is also a lot of resistance, with some people who just want to do the same job. They are comfortable and they are happy where they are. I don’t think salary is a factor of how long you have been with a company, but it should be productivity and quality and the level of job being actually done by the person.
Hussain: Well, I want to comment on the question that the Omanis don’t want to start from the bottom. Culturally, our forefathers worked outside Oman in the neighbouring countries in all kinds of jobs. Of course, in this new generation, we have a generation gap. The generation that came out after the 1970s, opened their eyes to the modern things and there is a cultural problem. Omanis are reluctant to work in the construction sector or in other sectors that require working in harsh conditions and this will take time to change. I think the private sector needs to bear a responsibility to train such youngsters, even at a cost.

Tim: Is it also the case in the society that the expectations from young people are too high, professor Shanfari?
Dr Hatem: It is understood that the expectations will always be high from the young ones. The people are always aspiring to a better position, to a better life, and if they are not able to get what they wanted, they get very disappointed and express their disappointment in many ways, sometimes in unpleasant ways. But I think the young Omanis and the community in general is very reasonable and the events that have taken place in February and March despite its negative aspects showed that there is a lot of maturity and understanding. People are not insane in their expectations, people are aspiring for a better future; the fact is that they have been excluded from the benefit of the wealth that has been created and the economic growth plus the jobs that have been created in the past. Even though it has been growing at a very fast rate, it was not the right types of jobs that Omanis are aspiring for. It’s the not the jobs that can create sustainability.

Tim: Dr Salem, you wanted to add something. There is also the point that people are not taking responsibility for themselves which is Hani’s point.
HE Dr Salem: Indeed and this is not an attack or an accusation that Omanis do not want to take jobs at the bottom but what I want to say to the Omanis is that they have to start from the bottom. I started with the British Bank of the Middle East with the salary of RO25, and then I moved to Cable and Wireless, laying cables in the ground and believe me the terrain over here is not that easy to dig channels and lay the cable; then I got an increase of RO25 so I got RO50 . I have done other jobs like a table waiter for Mc Donalds, then a truck driver etc. I wish I had started as a minister, but my overnight success to become a minister took me 28 years. . (audience claps).

Audience: My name is Nutayla Al Kindy. If we go to the government sector, and you go into their offices, the mood is completely different from a private company. People are very lazy, laid back and nobody is willing to work. On the contrary if you go to the private sector you see people working long hours, they are probably paid better but at the end of the day they are efficient. If we want our children to understand that they have to start small and then grow, then we need to train them. We have a large expatriate community, because they are willing to work harder. So, how are you going to tackle this element?
Adil: I just want to pick up on the topic, Omanis don’t want to start at the lowest level. I think, as a desire, that is not a crime. We all want a little better. It’s how that expectation is managed and addressed through the education system. I think attitude is the big part of the education system that has often been overlooked. I just want to pick up on the Omanis in the construction industry. We have three fantastic sites where we’ve got 550 Omanis based on site. And they do work up to 12 hours a day. They have dug our marinas, they have moved the earth, constructed villas and done a lot of other things. So I think there are two sides, there is awareness and there is a need to engage people to shoulder the challenge. And I think people will respond, people do respond.

Tim: Let me go back to the questioner here. You raised a lot of questions. How would you answer some of them?
Nutayla: How would I answer? I have to become a minister first. It goes back to the education. I don’t think that education system is up to par. We only have about four really good schools and if you can’t afford to put your children there, then they don’t have a good base. So it has to start there. That’s one. Secondly, why can’t the public sector start establishing training institutes?

Tim: Ahmed Al Dheeb. Why can’t the public sector do them?
HE Ahmed: We are organising trainings. At the same time, we have over 50 private training centres providing courses and the government subsidises the training of Omanis. These private training centres are supposed to have good quality trainers so that they can create qualified Omanis. Well I would agree that we have to put a lot of money and quality human resources and trainers for training. One of the reasons why we have 90 per cent Omanisation in the banks is because we have very high quality financial colleges with the graduates that can go to the banks and do the jobs. I do agree totally that in our industrial estates we should have very good training institutes that can train Omanis who can be absorbed into industries. But this is not only the government’s job, it is also the job of the private sector.

The government is spending millions of rials on the initiative.

Hani: May I just add that the comments I think are absolutely spot on. The private sector also needs to play its role in this area. The biggest worry that I have in Oman is that every company fears that it is competing with everyone else and nobody wants to help anyone else out. Finally after many years of arguing, fighting and deliberations, I think the automotive sector has finally managed through the efforts of a single person to sit down together and agree that we all pool our resources together and create a big institution that we can actually deliver the kind of people that we need for our organisations. I think that if the other sectors can do a similar kind of thing that’s the best way to really start up the SMEs.

Tim: Dr Salem, you want to throw a pebble into these comforting waters, certainly don’t you?
HE Dr Salem: I think if the government were to give subsidies to these institutes for training, you will get institutes but you won’t get training because people will always go after the subsidies. I think what’s important is to have a healthy competition, when you have healthy competition, you will have innovation and creativity. If the government were to provide subsidies they should give them to the people and allow the people the freedom to choose which training institute they want to go to and allow the market to decide in terms of which one would meet their requirement.

Tim: We have one question from Twitter. What is being done to bridge the gap between education and employment in terms of skills beyond the seminars?
Dr Hatem: I believe in education for the sake of education to start with. In countries where the education programme is good like UK for example, a graduate in history is able to take a very challenging job in the banking industry or investment banking. So it’s not the issue of education. Do you have the right education and if you have the right education, the right attitude? These skills can be transferable and through on job training you can change through the challenges that are ahead of you. So I say that still the quality of education is a real issue. Without having the right skills it is very difficult to progress and very difficult to have the employability as others who have a good education.

Audience: I am Saad Al Jenaibi. What happened back in February was something that I would call a wake-up call. A wake-up call for both the private and the public sectors. Because both of us are losers if we don’t work together. I think the government has done enough, but the private sector has to do a lot more and they have to work together. I also think we need to scrap our vision of 2020 and go to 2040, realising that the past education system was not up to the standards that everybody expects.
Audience: (Dr Amer Rawas, CEO, Omantel). I would like to build on Dr Hatem’s latest comment on education that a graduate in history in UK will find a good job in a bank. I think for us to achieve that we need a paradigm shift in the way we deliver education. Right now our education is predominantly a teaching paradigm. I think we need to move to a learning paradigm. We should equip our students with the capacity to learn independently. I think this is a role that can only be driven by the government and the government should lead this paradigm shift. But once these graduates move onto a job, then the private sector has a greater role to play by accommodating these graduates, not expecting them to deliver on the same day; but do some on the job training and equip them with specific skills required for the specific function for them to deliver the expected results.

Audience: My name is Mohammed Al Kharusi. I am from the MB Group of Companies. What we need is a radical rethink in terms of the vision, strategy, training and what Oman wants to have in terms of employment. The sort of industries we are creating are probably capital intensive needing very high level of skills which takes a long time to actually develop. What we need are industries or individuals who can be trained very quickly say within three or four weeks and they can be up and running. Industries which can take Omani products and add value to them, so that we can employ the 50, the 60 or the 70 thousand people who will be coming out in the next five years. I would suggest some sort of a think tank consisting of technocrats, government and investment authorities and entrepreneurs to look at all the issues that are hindering us from moving forward.
Tim: OK. Thank you very much. There is one more question.

Audience: My name is Mohammed Al Harthy. I am the CEO of OPAL. There are two comments which I want to make. One is about expatriates versus Omanis. Expatriates needs to be respected and they are respected. With respect to salary differences, let’s not only talk about low level salaries, but as a CEO, I would love to have an expatriate salary as well. Second is about education. Education is important and a paradigm shift is needed, however I think, we need to start from the basics – we need to study the supply and demand properly to understand what needed and then gear our education system to provide those needs.
Tim: Thank you. We are running out of time. I would like to take one more vote from you.

Question: Do you fear a repeat of the protests that took place in February? Here we are. 71 per cent fear a repeat of the protests, 29 per cent do not. Dr Salem, before you go back to some of the other questions, your reaction to this vote. This is quite alarming, isn’t it?
HE Dr Salem: But its natural.

Tim: Why?
HE Dr Salem: Because we have to work on improving, we cannot stop…

Tim: Under the threat of continuing protests?
HE Dr Salem: Indeed, we have to be very much proactive. We have to…

Tim: Is that going to bring out the best in you?
HE Dr Salem: I hope it will.

Tim: Ahmed Al Dheeb. Are you alarmed by that?
HE Ahmed: Well if we didn’t improve our services and we don’t create jobs for Omanis yes will find that. I think from most of the questions that we heard today we can make out that most people are not satisfied about the bureaucracy, the government’s speed of decision making. But what I can say is that the government is working, we will have to increase our speed, I think. Some decisions have to be made faster. A lot of people have been talking about the vision and the right vision. A vision is usually an indicator, a guideline for the government. We have had a vision from 1995, which is the Vision 2020. It has targets and numbers and tools to those goals. In fact in certain sectors, we are already way ahead of what is enumerated in Vision 2020 document.
 
Hani: I think this is scary. If we have a room full of business leaders, government officials, people who have more capability to change policies and discussion topics in the country, if they feel that anything that they do is not going to have the right result or in a quick time as possible, that this is going to happen, I think it is worrying.
Hussain: I voted for no because as the road is going on, I feel we have learned the lessons and we are all going to change. If we are not going to change, of course, then the 70 per cent are right.
Dr Hatem: If you were to ask the same question to the young people in Oman, the percentage would be very high, close to 100 per cent. And I am more happy to see this because this is reflective of the people’s feelings. It’s not scary, because it’s the reality that we have to face. If we were going to be reactive, it is going to cause more problems.

Adil: I think the statistics are useful and healthy. One, it is reflective of how people feel and also it is going to keep complacency at bay. I think it is going to keep us focused and raise the level of urgency. But I think what this highlights is that we believe and know that the issues are never going to go away fully. People evolve, their aspirations evolve and grow, and they will always have issues and this goes back to the point made earlier by Hani about the dialogue. We need to find ways to engage the street in the policy making. And then only will it be a much better place.
HE Dr Salem: We started with education and we ended up with education and in the middle job creation. I hope we don’t confuse between job creation and job substitution because Omanisation at the end of the day is nothing but job substitution. We don’t create anything by replacing one person with another person. Again, we have to change the basic meaning of education. It should not be teaching students of what to believe but it should be teaching students how to think. When they are creative then other things will follow.
Tim: Thanks to panelists and the audience.

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