Out of the Box ...

On a recent visit to Lamcy Plaza I was looking at some watches when my neice pointed out that the signboard had the name of the shop misspelt. Ever ready to do a favour, I quickly pointed out to the salesman at the counter that the letter 'U' was missing from the signboard. He quickly pointed to me saying, "Sir, that's you! We are missing you."

A clever way of engaging the customer and establishing a harmonius bond. I was well and truly taken in. My compliments on a clever ploy drew an even quicker response, "The credit goes to my boss, he's a very clever guy." No doubt.

Rare creativity in Dubai's communications landscape.

Will we lose the most valuable assets due to the financial crisis?

The global financial crisis is taking a heavy toll on human resources. Sweeping job cuts across continents have become as much a lead for the media as ‘bleeding’ stories. The attacks in Mumbai dominated the headlines, but only as long as the drama unfolded, soon to be replaced by falling oil prices, record falls in the stock indices and of course, bailouts. Even the hijacking of one of the biggest oil tankers with over one hundred million tonnes of the black gold is already off the radar.

Men and women across the world who lose their jobs are reduced to mere numbers much like the ‘casualty’ figures in a terror attack. Shattered lives and families without roof over their heads or income source to sustain themselves are only ‘human interest’ stories.

In this de-humanizing crisis scenario, Dubai, as indeed the UAE and the entire Middle East, being dependent on expatriate skills, needs to retain the human resources already available. A programme should be in place to evaluate and where possible locate them in new placements. It would be the human thing to do. It would also be the most pragmatic; considering that significant costs in both money and time will have to be expended during this crisis situation to recruit new staff for those companies that need to. Food for thought …