Counsellors lunch meeting

Dr Ayoub Kadhim started the forum by discussing the expansion of Dubai in terms of introduction of new businesses that made the economic cycle spin faster. The main company is Dubai Holding, as its the giant in the USE having organisations that span investments, business parks, hospitality, and also properties.

Expansion in education, transport, hotels, oil and gas, new airports, and many others had meant that many jobs are created and many businesses are also benefiting from this expansion. Also a discussion on renewable energy and clean technology sector. The figures are astounding, more than 150 billion dollars are being spent on introduction of initiatives to generate clean energy like Masdar, nuclear energy and solar, wind and hydro. The industry has also grown tremendously, like Dubal's expansion and Emal starting in Abu Dhabi.  Cement manufacturing had also increased to support the construction industry, however the financial crisis meant that the consumption was reduced. One must not forget the media sector, this had attracted major international media companies like CNN and BBC. Also many schools teaching media had started due to this expansion. UAE has a very strong ICT sector, Etisalat and DU are just two examples.

A survey was completed by organization in the UAE, they confirmed that they will be recruiting this year, and are looking for engineering, science, IT, the skill sets required by employers are bilingual communications, team work, strong leadership skills. Also the employees should be trustworthy, flexible and have strong character and morals.

The next speaker is the dean of engineering at the British university in Dubai (Bassam AbuHijla) And he is talking about the various fields of engineering and the suitability for a person's career path. He quoted a nice sentence by Von Kamran ( scientist seek to find what is, but the engineer seeks to create what was not). Engineering is a wide field and covers a huge range of skills, knowledge and abilities including the skills that industry needs these days.

Majors in engineering are a lot, but basically they are architecture, chemical, civil, mechanical, electrical. However engineers should not just take their degree and feel that they are equipped, they should join the engineering society in their country or the associations for their respective fields (these are mostly in USA or UK).

Rema Menon (my friend) talked about the career destination.

Stay cool, stay as a life long learner, if I can do it, any one can do it. I am going to encourage her to join TED talk, she has a nice presentation. but please Rema, dont repeat the word Obese, you have some sort of deficiency not obesity. 

My final word:

At the end of the day I think people should know their strengths and their weaknesses; think of it this way, many people can stand in your way, but you can jump them as hurdles, however if you stand in your own way, then no one can save you from your loss, as you are the only one who can jump that hurdle.

Even though the world needs more engineers, these will need guidance, so having us the Counselors and encouraging students to take up this helping profession as a career path is equally important.