🇦🇪 United Arab Emirates.
Interviewer: Hello Dr. Fadi, we are very happy to have you here today to accept the appreciation award in properties marketing and management, presented by Prime Global Awards.
Dr. Fadi: Thank you very much for having me today, it is my pleasure.
Interviewer: Today with over 12 years of experience in real estate in the middle east, how can Dr. Fate introduce himself?
Dr. Fadi: Actually, it is 15 years of experience now, but I would like to introduce myself as a hardworking person, detected to advancing the industry and moving it forward, the real estate industry in general and the property and community management industry in particular. I would say I am adaptive to change, and I think was the circumstances and the changes in the economy due to political circumstances, supply and demand factors of the city, we always have to be adaptive to change and I think it is important to have that adaptive mindset in order to progress.
I have a real passion for learning, continuous learning is something that I have in me and something that I instill in the leaders in our organization and the people we work with. I strongly believe that when you stop learning, you stop growing. I would say that I am serious about sustainability, and bringing sustainability into our industry making the properties more sustainable because real estate contributes to 40% of the carbon emission of the industry. So this is how I would describe myself in a nutshell.
Interviewer: would mind please telling us some of the main reasons behind your choice to study and to focus on the real estate industry?
Dr. Fadi: I think with real estate there are two factors to focus on always, the people factor and there is the property factor. I wanted to start at the beginning of my career on the property side of the industry to understand how you can leaf the maximum potential and maximum value of that property. So I studied the feasibility and real estate investment and financing to really understand what adds value to the property, how can we increase the income of the property, and how can we increase the potential to increase the income, not just from rentals, but also from others potentials income sources. on the other hand, as well, focusing on how to control expenses, reduce expenses if they are near over the top and need to be reduced, and understand the balance between maximizing revenue and minimizing expenses and how that drives the property value and the improvement in property value. That was what I wanted to start with and to understand the industry, I wanted to understand the financial aspect before I start moving to understand the people aspects.
Interviewer: You were a Board Advisor for IMMO, a senior advisor for LEAD, and a member of United Nations Aries for Disaster Risk Recover, can you tell us more about your achievements in each role?
Dr. Fadi: I would like to focus on the achievement of the United Nations Aries, so UN Aries was created as part of the United Nations Disaster Risk Recovery, I am a board member of the United Nations Aries, and our mission is to really help businesses in different industries recover fast from disasters. What the United Nations realized is 80% of the workforce in UAE for example are all working for small and mediums enterprises. However, those usually are the least prepared for any disaster that may happen, and disaster could be climate change or any other kind of disaster. So, our mission with United Nations Aries was to improve the preparedness of companies as a whole and be able to face potential disasters that happen today and may happen in the future. As we know climate change is a serious topic, between the years 1992 to 2020 for example, the number of national disasters significantly increased and continues to increase.
One of the achievements of which I am really proud is the work we did in the real estate sector, United Nations Aries hired an engineering company in UK, and us as "KAIZEN" to create a real estate tool to enable anyone in the real estate industry, being a contractor, a consultant, a developer, a property management company, or a maintenance company to measure the potentials coming disasters.
we look at whether the building is prepared for certain natural disasters, like floods, earthquakes, and others, we look at whether the building is close to amenities that individuals and residents will need in case they ere blocked to drive to another area, and I am really proud that tool was created and now we are piloting it in different projects, Dubai government is piloting it in some projects, and property management and community management has started using it too. So this is my notable achievement that I am proud of my engagement outside of ""KAIZEN"
Interviewer: Work life is a journey; would you please tell us more about that journey and where you stand today?
Dr. Fadi: Oh, this a heavily loaded question! I lost my hair during this journey, and I grow a white beard! But it was a fun journey. I think when you were in school whether it is an elementary school or high school, you are still unsure of what you want to do in life, and you go to university with an idea of what you want to do, but also no surety of what is it that you want to do, you know you want to succeed but you do not know how. My journey was similar to all young adults, when I went from school to university I was not sure what I wanted to do, I started in different fields at the beginning, I worked for "Air Arabia", I worked for "FedEx" and "Majid Al Futtaim", then I got into the real estate industry.
In my beginning, when you start a company it is a one-man show, at the beginning, and it is all about serving clients, serving customers, and keeping the business running, you may be doing marketing, sales, business development, strategy for the business, and HR for the business and the accountant for the business, and also the operations for the business, and as you grow, if you counted to learn and advanced yourself, then your company advances with you, and by the time you become a larger group of people and larger company, and the focus changes from running the business, or running operations, or running HR or running the business in general, to really growing the next generation of leaders that they will lead the company forward.
I am now at that stage today in my career, and in my life, where my full time is to focus on how to grow the next generation and leaders in the company, that would not only grow and add value to themselves but also add value to continue to advance the industry, and to continue to be true to our mission of adding value to people and adding value to every property around the world.
Interviewer: You are now the CEO of KAIZEN, a competitive company within the UAE market, with an asset management portfolio valued at AED 22 billion, can you tell us more about your strategies and plans for the future?
Dr. Fadi: Good question. we keep it simple and we keep true to our values, I think this is very important to any organization that wants to stand the test of time. we are living in a fast environment, and fast-changing global circumstances, so to me and to our leaders, it is very important to stay true to our core values as we advanced. Being trustworthy, having a passion for excellence, and having the mindset that only with collaboration we can, collaborating with each other and collaborating stakeholders, being customer and community-centric at the heart and soul of everything we do, keeping people at the heart of what we do, both people within the organization and also people who we serve, and last but not least having the mindset of continuous learning, a growth mindset.
When we are true to your values, and dedicated to our mission, and our mission is to add value to every human and every property around the globe, everything else becomes clearer when you have a clear mission when you have a clear vision, a clear purpose of why you go to work every day that will go through any competitive environment that may come ahead, and I want to always focus with my team that we should never look at what competitors do, we rarely do see what competitors doing, because this is irrelevant. To us we are serving the customers, and as long as we focus on how to serve the customer better, and improve that customer journey that is all that matters, regardless of what competitors are doing. So we focus always on the customer and on each other as people, so that is our strategy
Interviewer: It has been great talking to you today, what advice can you give to young people?
Dr. Fadi: Tough questions! I have two kids, and I can see that the young generation has very very limited patience. I can see that too with the generations entering the workforce, so my message to young people is to be patient, focus on the process, and focus on learning, success and results are not going to come overnight, they are not going to come fast, It is a process, your first five, ten years or maybe 15 years of your career may feel slow, they may feel like you are not growing so much in career or growing so fast, but my message is to really focus on the learnings that you are gaining at the earlier years. The earlier years are not about the money, it is not about how much you are earning, it is really about the knowledge that you are gaining, so my message is to focus on being part of an organization or group of people that will reach that learning for you, grow your values as individual, cautiously learning as learning doesn't stop at the end of school or university, you have got to continuously educate yourself if you want to remain, not only on top of your career but also to advance your career and advance the industry you are in. You need to continuously learn new things and new methods, that would be my message focus on learning, focus on value, be patient, trust the process, and have an end goal in mind but enjoy the journey in between, don't get frustrated with small things, and don't get frustrated because you are not achieving things fast, success doesn't happen very fast unlike what social media makes it sound like, be patient, work hard on yourself, and continuously learn.