DOHA: With its ongoing commitment to nurture local talent and develop human capabilities, Qatar Shell offers Qataris a wide range of rewarding employment, internship, and sponsorship opportunities.
The Qatarisation drive at Shell has reaped positive results, and numbers are expected to continue rising due to the company's successful sponsorship and retention efforts. The number of Qataris working for Shell is currently over 21 percent or 300 staff, and the organisation is constantly seeking to hire bright nationals, from entry-level graduates to senior level professionals.
According to Dr Jamal Al Ammari, Qatar Shell's Talent and Qatarisation Manager, the organisation is looking to employ professionals in numerous fields, such as scientific research, finance, geology, marketing, information technology and social investment. Each employee is provided with the necessary career progression planning to facilitate their competency and skills development.
"Even if a new hire has several years of experience under their belt, we tailor an individual development plan for them to close any gaps in their skills," he said.
"Engineers may need to know more about commercial analysis and human resource employees may be lacking in knowledge of contracts, and so we identify those gaps and set a timeline for closing them through on-the-job training, courses, or by identifying special projects that our employees can be involved in."
Qatar Shell believes that attracting, training and retaining Qatari talent is critical to the company's success. Upon joining, Qataris are encouraged to gain a deep understanding of Shell through a global on-boarding programme. Shell provides multiple approaches to learning, which include on-the-job coaching, mentoring, short-term international assignments, as well as internal and external courses. Dr Jamal explains, "We have many employees who joined Qatar Shell as fresh graduates and are now working on projects worth millions of dollars, and those who have demonstrated their capabilities and know-how have spent time working at Shell's headquarters in the Netherlands."
An excellent example is Khalid Al Thani, who became Qatar Shell's Corporate Advisor after spending several months working at Shell's headquarters in the Government Relations Department in The Hague.
"The nature of Shell's work means that its government relations office is as important as the foreign affairs ministry of any country," said Khalid. "As Qatar quickly grows in so many arenas it is important that young Qataris get into this field and understand how to run country-wide projects, and Qatar Shell is a great place to get this experience."
© The Peninsula 2013
