Qatar Airways CEO Akbar Al Baker (second left) with Airline Personnel Directors’ Council outgoing executive vice-president, Manfred Merz (left), incoming executive vice-president, Bernhard Rikardsen (second right), and Qatar Airways’ Chief Human Resources Officer, Elizabeth Johnston, at the APDC’s annual conference in Doha.
DOHA: Qatar Airways is hiring Qatari nationals to train and develop them as future leaders in the industry, the airline’s CEO Akbar Al Baker has said.
Addressing the 64th Annual Conference of Airline Personnel Directors’ Council (APDC) here, Al Baker said, Qatar Airways’ job nationalisation programme has focused on designing development programmes for Qatari students, graduates and professionals.
The drive to hire more Qataris — both graduates and scholarship students — to join the organisation, is in line with the country’s 2030 vision for a sustainable future, he added.
The two-day conference brought together over 40 senior human resource management delegates from airlines around the world to discuss issues and challenges facing HR practices in their respective businesses, as well as those that affect the industry collectively.
Al Baker highlighted some of the human resource challenges faced. “Our workforce of over 150 nationalities work in different disciplines within the airline and our subsidiaries,” said Al Baker.
“English is a second or third language for the majority of Qatar Airways’ workforce, so undoubtedly proving a challenge as English is the working language across the industry, Qatar Airways HR department works hard to address these challenges because as a Qatari organisation that proudly preserves its Arabic culture and heritage, Qatar Airways is ultimately a global network airline,” he added. The Peninsula
