Modern organizations have tried to increase the collaborative effort by creating centers of expertise, regional hubs and invested heavily in collaborative technologies. However, despite all the investment, invariably they fall short of the mark because open-plan office design has shown that it is negatively related to workers’ satisfaction with their physical environment and perceived productivity […]

After many years of work with clients across Africa and the Middle East I decided to join a large research organization, more specifically, Huawei’s European Research Center (ERC) headquartered in Munich. I figured that researching security and digging deeper into the cloud would not only give me a chance to put my field experience to […]

The Middle East is changing, without a doubt, and Dubai is certainly one city that can attest to dramatic changes. Whether the changes are for good or bad, I’m going to reserve judgement for now. However, I would like to say that an infusion of new blood into any community adds a cosmopolitan feel to […]

With my birthday just around the corner I find myself looking back at my accomplishments, my memories and thousands of pictures. My life laid out on the table in front of me as if it all just happened yesterday. I wanted to achieve a great many things, a handful have materialised, others are still works […]

Today I was approached by a friend and colleague to give a talk about the benefits of working in the information technology consulting industry and “How you attain achievement and enjoyment at work”. To be honest, I was taken aback by the mere proposition of talking on the subject in a positive voice given my […]

Corporate travel is somewhat of a gigantic monster to come to terms with, especially when it begins devouring any remaining probability of maintaining a healthy work-life balance. To be honest, I’ve never really understood the whole work-life balance debate coming from people who spend their working life on the road. Surely they knew what they […]

I’ve never really given it much thought previously, it was something that hadn’t touched me, or to an extent, wasn’t part of my life. I simply refused to accept that I was being subjected to pressures of any kind. You see, stress takes on so many different shapes and sizes that it’s actually quite difficult […]

When one works with (or within) large organizations, the process and logistics associated with claiming expenses incurred during normal work-related activities can be quite tedious. Logistics aside though, most of the problems are related to internal Accounts Payable (AP) audits which take far too long to resolve. True, I travel more than the average person […]

No matter where you live in Dubai, there are certain things that you can’t get away from — some more annoying than others — irrespective of how hard you try. For instance, there’s the low hum of nearby freeway traffic, which, to the untrained ear, could be confused with waves crashing on the adjacent beaches. […]

There are things that most people wouldn’t consider being part of a job description; taking your clothes off probably being one of them. So what would you say if I told you that that is exactly what I had to do? One of my clients — the largest diamond miner in the world — invited […]