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I been weighed down by a couple of issues lately,

One is Filipinos. I see them everywhere, literally everywhere. There are just so so so many of them. What are all of them doing here? I mean what skill sets do they bring to the table? I do know that the government there offers excellent training programs which make them extremely competent in the job market. Still I'm curious regarding the types of skill set they posess.If they were a few of them I would'nt be asking this question. But their numbers here are
mind-boggling, it's got me all curious.
I'll also start job hunting by late November so I need to know about probable competitors.
My woes are compounded by the fact that during my stay in UAE which will be 2 yrs come december, I've done 2 internships and graduated on an exchange program, yet I've never had a working relationship with too many Filipinas.

Secondly does anyone here have an estimate of the expatriate distribution in UAE via nationality?

You know what I was just dicussing this with my wife today and she is a filipina herself. And I don't think its just the middle east.

To be honest with you, they are not necessarily everywhere. There are specifically a lot of them in the Middle East. I mean they are in Canada as well, but not as much. They are very smart people, no doubt about that in my mind.

In my opinion Filipinos tend to be very tight knit which is their greatest strength. Remember Indian communities like Tamils and Malayalees?
These people suceeded not because they were brilliant or anything. They just had each other's backs. I'm sure Rudeboy will testify to that.

As far as Filipinas go, look I have not seen too many of them in manegerial positions, certainly not enough to represent their huge population.
As I said earliar I interned at an investment company and a bank (No Filipinas)- studied at KW( only a handful)
So what kinda jobs make up their numbers? Unlike Indians or Pakistanis or Brits, who have a presence in a variety of sectors and are very often in manegerial positions or are entrepreneurs. My emphasis on manegerial positions is simply cuz it enforces a countries education system.
I reckon a bulk of the Filipina workforce tilt towards sectors like hospitality, services and healthcare(nurses) and basic instrumentation.
Sometimes I look at all of them and I wonder are there that many jobs here? Does anyone smell a rat? (Immigration?)

I think Filipinos are brilliant in many industries such as hospitality, customer service, job roles where there is one to one contact with customers, as they all seem to have a cheery disposition. I mean they just never seem unhappy, are harding working and like to get stuck in, unlike some nationalities who are just miserable, lazy buggers.

I can picture a few positions i would like to see filipino women in.








Sorry i will get my coat

They have pretty much taken over all the jobs at the doughnut shops and McD*nalds (rotten Ronnies) here in Canada. No one wants the job although the pay is not that bad. Should not have to go hungry anyway.

busa wrote:I can picture a few positions i would like to see filipino women in.








Sorry i will get my coat

lol

Ok, I will be the first to admit that the Filipino workers here are generally good in customer service or hospitality roles. At the same time, they are not good (at least the ones here) in business or entrepreneurial stuff. How many Filipino owned businesses do we see ?

I might be of help here to enlighten you a bit.

Most of the Filipinos in the UAE (I would say 70%) are from the remote provinces and mostly are those that did not have high education and/or had an education which is that of the lower quality (even if they are a graduate of such and such, doesn't matter. If they paid peanuts, they get the same quality in return). Sad but true.

The institutions in the Philippines are divided:
1. If you have money, you can get good quality education. The proof of that is that some colleges and intitutes (really, really expensive) in the Philippines are comprised of people from Japan, China, Korea and other neighboring countries who opt to study there.
2. If you are extremely intelligent, you could grab a scholarship provided by the government, however, in return, you have to service the government after finishing studies. This would then lead to limited opportunities (and keep them in the country).

With the above fact, the majority of the population here tend to end up in customer service, hospitality and all kinds of lower jobs.

In other countries such as Japan, Singapore, Korea, etc... Most of the Filipinos there came originally having worked in the manufacturing / IT companies in the Philippines. Most of the people from these countries has the middle / higher level of education in terms of quality. They hold jobs such as Software Developer, IT Specialist, Supervisory positions in manufacturing, etc. The number of people working in the customer service / hospitality is lower in percentage in comparison to the UAE.

I could not possibly discuss all other countries and I will limit it to that and go back to the remaining +/- 30% of the UAE workforce.

There are a lot of Architects (Al Murooj Rotana is designed by a Filipino Architect), Engineers (I personally know 1 x Applications Engineer (multi-national Oil & Gas), 1 x Retail Manager (Oil & Gas multinational firm), Surveyors, etc.

There are also the ones in IT as web developers, managers...etc. I personally know one IT Manager that works for a government here in the UAE.

In the middle of all this are those who works as Technicians, Auditors, Accountants (I personally know one who is a Finance Manager of Oil & Gas multinational company as well), Photographers, Graphic Designers (one works for a well known Newspaper) and Electronic Media.

Business wise, there are a few who holds business here (Restaurants, Web Development, Packaging company). Some are partners in Trading companies having around +-10% stake, etc.

In the field of banking, there is almost negligible number of Filipinos here.

BlackburnRovers wrote:Ok, I will be the first to admit that the Filipino workers here are generally good in customer service or hospitality roles. At the same time, they are not good (at least the ones here) in business or entrepreneurial stuff. How many Filipino owned businesses do we see ?

Precisely. I can't phantom how by restricting themselves to a handful of industries, their numbers here in the UAE are so huge.
If they were well spread out accross all sectors then I would'nt raise eyebrows.
The impact of the recssion should have had a direct impact on their numbers. Which I don't think have fallen all that much. So either my estimation is wrong, or we have no recession or .............????
They have pretty much reframed the expatriate distribution here and I'm tryin to figure out how.

In customer service I'm quite fine when dealing with a Filipino, without doubt they bring goodwill to acompany. Efficieny? Naa....I don't agree.
But you can't slight their work ethic though. No doubt bout that!

Hey Farthest point ur damn on target bout IT. Thats one sector which historically belonged to Indians and Pakistanis as a majority. Now it's become extremely competitive. I had a friend from the Phillipines who owed that to the governments excellent training programs.

There are a lot of housemaids and nannies from the Philippines . The quantity of them is depend very much on the place where you live in.

if you happen to be near Rola (Sharjah) or Deira (Dubai) on Friday you will feel yourself in Bombay or Karachi, not Manila.

Misery Called Life wrote:

BlackburnRovers wrote:Ok, I will be the first to admit that the Filipino workers here are generally good in customer service or hospitality roles. At the same time, they are not good (at least the ones here) in business or entrepreneurial stuff. How many Filipino owned businesses do we see ?

Precisely. I can't phantom how by restricting themselves to a handful of industries, their numbers here in the UAE are so huge.
If they were well spread out accross all sectors then I would'nt raise eyebrows.
The impact of the recssion should have had a direct impact on their numbers. Which I don't think have fallen all that much. So either my estimation is wrong, or we have no recession or .............????
They have pretty much reframed the expatriate distribution here and I'm tryin to figure out how.

In customer service I'm quite fine when dealing with a Filipino, without doubt they bring goodwill to acompany. Efficieny? Naa....I don't agree.
But you can't slight their work ethic though. No doubt bout that!

Hey Farthest point ur damn on target bout IT. Thats one sector which historically belonged to Indians and Pakistanis as a majority. Now it's become extremely competitive. I had a friend from the Phillipines who owed that to the governments excellent training programs.

That's right. With the recession, percentage-wise, the number of Filipinos who lost their jobs (and never found a replacement) is low.

The reason I could think of for this matter is that Salary / Quality ratio is that of the traditional way of running a business (in a business fair sense of the word). It is just "right" to say the least.

What I mean by that is, if a Filipino works say as a waiter/waitress and they earn AED 1,500.00 with free accommodation, food, uniforms plus tips. Without consideration for the high speculation of the cost of living (as they are only slightly affected because they have a company provided accommodation), I would say in a manager/business owner point of view, that salary is fair.

In comparison say to another nationality that need to be paid AED 3,000.00 for the same job, then a traditional business owner would therefore opt for the Filipino one if nationality doesn't matter (i.e. it is not an Arabic restaurant that needs Arabic speaking person).

The same goes for the higher level jobs be it IT / Managerial Post / Accountants etc.

If I am a traditional business owner which doesn't like to take bad risks for my business, I could run a business in a secure and low risk way by putting forward a decision that is similar to this.

Why would I pay higher if I will get the job done right (without being unfair) for a more economical option?

If all workforces are willing to get paid cheaply, if all the companies have similar thoughts, that they will hire the cheapest staffs without thinking about quality, attitude, ethics, then it will hit you (the employees) back as you will never be appreciated with high values and never get higher salary. These people are just ruining the job market.

xty wrote:If all workforces are willing to get paid cheaply, if all the companies have similar thoughts, that they will hire the cheapest staffs without thinking about quality, attitude, ethics, then it will hit you (the employees) back as you will never be appreciated with high values and never get higher salary. These people are just ruining the job market.

xty,

You are right. That would definitely ruin the job market, the same way that the properties people had driven the rental and property market during its boom.

If you will read carefully -- I had written "without being unfair" -- not cheap and Salary/Quality ratio.

A "smart traditional businessman" would never ever decide something that will ruin his company. Never.

A "smart traditional businessman" will keep a sustainable company -- by that, he would need to reward those staff that deserves it. Why? Because it's good for his business in the long run.

It's not about sacrificing the quality because you want to "save" because this is dangerous in the long run for your business. Just as the same way, during the "exaggeration" of the economy here, those are the same people who decided in sticking to their own traditional way of doing business (not bumping their prices because most people don't care with their money) based on honestly, quality and ethics...and true enough, those are mostly the companies that are surviving these days.

No quality is cheap. And hey, not everyone got a salary cut. So yes, we agree, we don't want a ruined job market -- let's just say "more competitive" is the right word. Playing fair.