Dubai, Asian cities well-placed to meet acute shortage of management and business professionals

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Delivering the keynote address at a three-day research seminar on 'business clusters' organized by University of Wollongong in Dubai (UOWD) featuring over 30 academics from prestigious business schools, Prof. Travaglione said recent developments had shown that cities like Dubai and Singapore were capable of taking head-on the global shortage of leaders and managers.

According to Prof. Travaglione, most higher education is currently delivered out of the United States, Canada and western Europe, which together have just 11% of world population. About 80% of the students are from Asia and Africa. In Australia, 19% students are from foreign countries, with 80% coming from Asia.

Prof. Travaglione said:

'The Middle East and Asian countries now have the opportunity to move in and fill the gap by creating world class institutions of higher learning through prudent investments and clever strategies. Dubai and Singapore have already shown the way, and others are geared to follow suit.'

He cited the case of China to illustrate the extent of shortage of management professionals. China has less than 5,000 global managers, against the actual need for 70,000. Similarly in leadership, management and accounting fields, there are only 70,000 qualified managers, when the need is for 300,000.

The research symposium on 'Business Clusters: a Source of Innovation and Knowledge for Competitive Advantage' was hosted in Dubai by University of Wollongong in Dubai (UOWD) under the aegis of Society for Global Business and Economic Development (SGBED). The papers submitted will be published in the form of a book.

The event was chaired by Prof. Michael Thorpe of UOWD's College of Graduate Studies and Prof. C. Jayachandran, Director, School of Business, Montclair State University, USA.

Prof. Rob Whelan, President of UOWD, welcomed the delegates, and Dr. David Van Over, acting Chair, School of Business, UOWD, gave the opening address.

The delegates came from such prestigious institutes such as Indian Institute of Management Bangalore, The University of Newcastle in Australia, Montclair State University, USA, Rand Corporation, Boston University, Curtin University of Technology, Australia, Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, University of Technology, Sydney, EADA Business School of Spain and UOWD.

The participants came from across the globe, including United States, Japan, Australia, Finland, Mexico, Malaysia, Thailand, India, Czech Republic, Canada, China, Iran, Singapore, Italy, Spain, Kyrgyzstan and Ireland.

The second day's (Tuesday, January 13) program will feature presentations by Fareed Abdulrahman, CEO, Smart City and Ibrahim Kamel, Director, Dubai Knowledge Village, as well as some international experts, followed by a panel discussion on 'Which way for Clusters and Free Zones.'

Business clusters - such as free zones such as Dubai Internet City, Dubai Media City, Knowledge Village and Jebel Ali Free Zone etc. -- are believed to foster the competitive advantage of firms through facilitating the diffusion of technology and knowledge and encouraging innovation. Successful models of clustering are seen across many regions and countries. The symposium brings together the result of analysis of cluster experiences from many industries in a range of different countries.

The first research symposium, sponsored by The Asian Institute of Technology, was held in Bangkok in 2006, and the papers were presented in a publication titled 'Services Management in Asia Pacific: Issues and Challenges' in 2007.