The scale of the global talent shortage before us is vast – estimated by one report to reach 85 million unfilled jobs by 2030. That is equivalent to around $8.5 trillion in unrealized annual revenues.
Ageing populations and demographic shifts are reducing the pool of skilled workers, even as rapid technological advancements outpace workforce skills. Fields such as artificial intelligence (AI), data science and cybersecurity face surging demands but are struggling to find qualified candidates for these roles.
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Strategies to drive sustainable growth
While not immune, Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) economies are turning this challenge into an opportunity, adopting a three-pronged strategy to drive sustainable growth in the Middle East.
1. Incubators for innovation
The competition for top talent is fierce, requiring the right conditions to attract and nurture it. GCC countries are, therefore, promoting entrepreneurship and innovation by establishing sandboxes, hubs, incubators and accelerators that encourage startups, attract skilled professionals and create ecosystems that cultivate talent.
Supporting local entrepreneurs and channelling resources into business growth boosts talent retention and economic development in the region.
Four Fintech hubs across the GCC demonstrate this evolution, having grown from one incubator in 2018. The Abu Dhabi Global Market, FinTech Saudi and the FinTech Hive at the Dubai International Financial Centre have now joined Bahrain FinTech Bay.
The Digital Dubai initiative complements these initiatives via programmes designed to innovate and scale emerging technologies and provide a testbed for startups and entrepreneurs.
These platforms create innovation-friendly conditions across the region and boost optimism among business leaders: a recent survey of financial-sector CEOs in the Middle East revealed that 53% plan to increase their headcount in 2024, surpassing the 42% figure reported by their global peers.
2. Upskilling local talent
Matching their leaders’ ambition, Middle East employees are also ready to embrace the future: recent research found that 61% recognize the need to learn new tools and technologies to excel in their jobs. In response, GCC countries are investing in upskilling their citizens, empowering them to help drive the tech revolution through skills development programmes, vocational training and policies that encourage private companies to hire local talent.
This focus on developing tomorrow’s workforce is amplified by the area’s demographic advantage: nearly half of the Middle East and North Africa’s population is under 24, representing one of the world’s largest youth populations. This presents an opportunity to build a sustainable workforce and a future-ready talent pool.
In Bahrain, Tamkeen – the national Labour Fund – supports projects that help the local workforce to upskill, reskill and adapt their skills. The wider aim is to prepare them for career growth, aligned with the ever-evolving demands of the real-world market.
In 2023, Tamkeen supported 23,000 Bahrainis enrolled in individual development programmes, in which 92% of employment support was directed to new market entrants, comprising more than 12,000 Bahrainis. As part of these upskilling initiatives, training was provided to approximately 10,700 Bahraini individuals – over 5,100 institutions receiving support from Tamkeen in 2023 to facilitate their business objectives, ranging from startup initiation to local and global expansion.
Bahrain’s ambitious investment in top-level training and skills building has cemented its global reputation as a highly competitive centre for talent retention and development. There is a growing roster of high-profile initiatives spearheaded by Tamkeen in partnership with major international companies: KPMG’s Low-Code Centre of Excellence; PwC’s Service Delivery Centre; Citi’s Global Technology Hub; Amazon Web Services Cloud Innovation Centres and General Assembly’s “boot camp” learning and development programmes.
Saudi Arabia, meanwhile, is partnering with IBM to equip 100,000 young Saudi nationals with new digital skills, including AI, machine learning and cybersecurity. As nearly two-thirds of citizens are under 30, the Kingdom is equipping young people for the jobs of tomorrow.
3. Empowering women in the workforce
Efforts to promote gender equality in the GCC are playing an important role in growing the talent pool. Initiatives to provide equal pay, improve opportunities for career advancement and create a better work-life balance are proving crucial.
Bahrain has made significant strides in promoting gender parity and female leadership in recent years in the public and private sectors. This begins in the country’s education system, where women make up 83% of tertiary school enrolments. Women comprise 42% of those who enrol in STEM (science, technology, engineering, maths) degrees, significantly outperforming countries such as the United States.
Progress on e-inclusion for women is not going unnoticed: Bahrain ranked first globally in female digital skills training and STEM education in a recent study for Meta.
In the public sector, women make up 56% of the workforce, almost doubling between 2010 and 2021. Women also hold 45% of public-sector leadership roles and 33% of diplomatic positions. According to the World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Gap Report 2023, Bahrain leads the GCC in the percentage of ministerial positions held by women.
Female talent is also increasingly present in the country’s private sector: women make up 35% of the corporate workforce, including 35% of managerial positions – higher than the global average. One-third of Bahrain’s broader information, communications and technology workforce is female, far outpacing the global average.
Women are making their mark, too, on the startup landscape in Bahrain, representing around one in five startup founders. In this respect, the nation performs better than both Silicon Valley and London. Inclusivity is also a key principle for Citi Bahrain’s Global Technology Hub, a collaboration aiming to create 1,000 coding jobs in the country. In the first year of the partnership, 22% of participants were women, outperforming the average of females in other Citi tech hubs around the world.
The United Arab Emirates has also made strides in this area, ranking as a regional leader in the Forum’s Global Gender Gap Report 2024.
According to the report, women comprise 70% of all university graduates – with strong STEM representation – and hold 50% of seats in the nation’s parliament body, the Federal National Council. It was also reported that the country had the second-highest number of women on Forbes’ 100 Most Powerful Arab Businesswomen in 2024, after Egypt.
Shaping the talent of the future
GCC economies are responding to the global tech talent shortage at every level. Employees feel it too: the proportion of workers who believe their country lacks people with specialized skills ranges from 45% in the United Arab Emirates to as much as 75% in Kuwait.
However, there is optimism for the future. Respondents were more confident that skills improvement is a priority for their employers than the global average.
By creating an ecosystem that encourages entrepreneurship, elevates local talent and empowers women, the GCC is investing in a sustainable, diverse and inclusive digital future.
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