In a first of its kind initiative, the Higher Management Committee at the Emirates Identity Authority held its 36th regular meeting in open air on the football playground of a sports club (Baniyas). The committee members were wearing the official sports uniform of the national football team.
H.E. Dr. Eng. Ali Mohamed Al Khouri, Emirates ID Director General, executive directors and managers participated in this meeting, which was aimed at breaking the routine, going outdoors, firmly establishing the concepts of work and collective success experiences, consolidating teamwork and deepening cohesion and fraternity relations among the Higher Management Committee members.
Significant Speech
At the beginning of the meeting, Al Khouri stressed the necessity to ponder over the significant speech of His Highness Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, may Allah protect him, which he delivered to ministers, deputy ministers and heads of federal and local government departments during the meeting in which the Emirates Identity Authority’s directors took part at the end of last week.
Value of Country
Al Khouri stressed the importance of contemplating and carefully reading HH UAE Vice President’s speech in its deep national dimensions that add to the country’s value, call for consolidating the national identity and view the youth as the spring of hope for a brilliant future. With this in mind, Al Khouri demanded the youths to work diligently for the benefit of the UAE and UAE nationals.
Customer Centrism
Al Khouri pointed out that HH UAE Vice President’s call for the youths not to look to ministers or their superiors for guidance, but to focus on the applicants and customers of the entity they work for, is part of HH Sheikh Mohammed’s prudent directives that focus on “customer centrism”, which is put by the federal government on top of its priorities, and highlight the need to work diligently to raise customer’s satisfaction.
Prudent Directives
Al Khouri added that it is the duty of all the employees at the Emirates Identity Authority to derive inspiration from the HH UAE Vice President’s speech and that the Emirates Identity Authority’s process and procedures related to the public should be studied and services facilitated in line with their aspirations.
Highlighting the role of the directors, employees and supervisors of registration centers in accomplishing the Emirates Identity Authority’s task due to the fact that they are in the frontline and have a direct contact with the public, Al Khouri stressed the importance for them to do their utmost to give customers a warm welcome and a kind reception because, as emphasized by HH Sheikh Mohammed, a good word and a nice smile are half the job of an employee who has to treat people, particularly applicants, kindly and politely, this being before all a fundamental part of our genuine Arab and Islamic values and habits.
Decisions and Recommendations
The meeting discussed all the agenda topics for which the following decisions and recommendations were made:
- Approving the submitted report on completion of work in the first and second stages of the interior re-designing project for the Emirates Identity Authority’s permanent registration centers. The report included initiation of work for the third and final stage of the project for the establishment of a customer waiting area and training rooms for the employees. The Committee also approved some special additions that had been proposed by the Projects Department for adding some characteristics of the UAE heritage and national identity to the centers.
- Re-phasing the appointment system following the completion of the second stage of the interior re-designing project, which led the production lines to increase threefold. Add to this, the new centers that had recently been inaugurated in Abu Dhabi will help give early appointments to applicants with 2-month long appointments.
- The Registration Centers Department submitted a presentation on the productivity of the centers in February 2011 and the results of the opinion polls. The concerned departments were assigned to study the proposals of customers and applicants in these surveys, deal with them as top important and instruct the Customer Service Department at the Emirates Identity Authority to follow up and ensure these recommendations are fulfilled.
- Approving the proposal of the Public Relations and Marketing Department with respect to the media and advertising campaign for reminding nationals of the final extension period for their registration for ID cards, this being the end of June, God willing.
- Discussing the situation of the enterprise resource planning (ERP) project and instructing that focus should be made on simplifying the administrative and financial procedures and the documentation cycle for each procedure. Instructions were also given to establish clear performance indicators for the new system which would be used to measure the efficiency of the system and checking how far it is able to achieve the objectives it was set for.
- Entrusting the Emirates Identity Authority’s departments with the task of reviewing the operating plans scheduled to be implemented for 2011. These operating plans will be presented to the coming meeting of the Higher Management Committee. Instructions were also given to the Strategic Planning Department to review the population registration plan, conduct a study on the demography of the remaining population and devise such mechanisms that ensures that the registration plan is implemented and the relatively high number of registrants in the population register is maintained.
Sportsmanship and Corporate Spirit
Al Khouri concluded the meeting by emphasizing that “only through team work can we develop corporate work in the UAE and that we as officials at the Emirates Identity Authority will spare no effort to serve our country.” Al Khouri wished that all the Emirates Identity Authority’s employees would enjoy high sportsmanship and a spirit of creative competition that seeks excellence and distinction.
Sideline Whispers
- An atmosphere of joy, pleasure and optimism prevailed throughout the meeting, which continued for nearly 5 hours.
- During the break, the participants in the meeting were divided into two football teams and played a 5-minute match.
- The match showed that most members of the Higher Management Committee did not have good physical fitness.
- A number of participants in the match suffered from several cases of muscle tension and early rupture.
- The two teams had to seek penalty kicks due to the insistence by each team that it is the winner in the original time of the match.
- The “modest” skills of a large number of members of the Higher Management Committee showed that it is important and necessary for them to courageously announce their retirement from football in due time in a bid to maintain their prestigious football reputation.
- The goalkeeper of one of the teams suffered from great fatigue and muscle tension although he stood idly throughout the 5-minute match.
- Last but not least, the audience of the match noticed that the match had no referee and this led to the disappearance of yellow and red cards throughout the match, which ended brilliantly, exactly as it started.
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