Marks Bahraini's 30 years of service
DHL this week celebrated the 30-year anniversary of Bahraini employee Majeed Khadem, duty manager at DHL's Middle East hub in Bahrain at a special dinner attended by Majeed's colleagues and friends.
Joining DHL on September 1, 1976, Majeed Khadem was one of three people that established DHL in the Middle East, initially operating from a room in the souq. He began his career as a flying courier, continually hopping from one commercial airline aircraft to another, delivering parcels to and from companies in Dhahran, in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. At that time DHL had about 15-20 companies as clients including Otis, Shlumberger and Aramco among others.
Majeed went on to set up DHL's offices in Sharjah and Riyadh. He returned to Riyadh in 1981 as Operations Supervisor and then went on to Doha as station manager. He eventually returned to Bahrain, taking up the role of as Area operations co-ordinator. Today, Majeed is a duty manager in DHL's regional hub in Bahrain.
In the 30 years he has been with DHL, he feels as though many of the staff are like his brothers; particularly those from the early days, such as "Mohd Zayani", "Adel Ali", "Mohd Rabia" and "Jamal Nasser". He never expected DHL to become as successful as it has, and in particular cites technology as having changed tremendously.
Majeed reminisced about some of the things that stand out in his memory, "It all started with an interview in the street which still seems incredible. I can also still remember when DHL bought its first aircraft." Majeed went on to proudly say that during the Iraq war and the war in Lebanon, he was part of the teams that ensured DHL operations never stopped, saying, "I was in Lebanon during the war to ensure vital shipments were delivered."
© Bahrain Tribune 2006
