 Hello and welcome to the leaders room. Today, I'm delighted to be interviewing Dr. Ali Sabah Al-Mari, Executive President of the Dubai School of Government. Welcome, Dr. Ali. Hi. I have a few questions I'd love to ask you about leadership and governments as you are approaching it at the Dubai School of Government. I'd actually like to start with the leaders themselves of the UAE because Dubai or the UAE has been really blessed with some amazing leaders. Sheikh Rashid, Sheikh Zayed, Sheikh Mohammed. I'd love to hear just a few words from you on what their forms of genius were. That's made such an amazing difference to the UAE in really such a short time. So Sheikh Zayed, for example, what was his particular form of genius? I think Sheikh Zayed is very genius in how to engage the people in an emotional way. So he can understand the culture of the United Arab Emirates and he can talk with the people in a very emotional way. So most of the people get in love with Sheikh Zayed, the Sultan. And until now, most of the people, we can see all the people in United Arab Emirates and also in the Gulf, get in love with Sheikh Zayed, the Sultan. And this one is the successful about Sheikh Zayed. So what did he do? What did he do to make people fall in love with him? I think he was very honest. He was talking in very simple way to the people. And he's doing the right thing for the people. So that's why the people believe in him, the people engage with him and follow him. So he's honest, he speaks well and he follows through. How about Sheikh Mohammed? Sheikh Mohammed is very famous about seeing the future for Dubai and his vision about Dubai. And he's very, he can see beyond the borders and he can see out of the scope. What's an example of that? Many of Dubai projects, there was a debate from the people around the world at the beginning of any project. And after that, the successful of the project showing that Sheikh Mohammed has a great vision and he can see what the others cannot see. So like Palm Islands, when the projects started, most of the people saying that it's very, very strange things to do this project. And most of them saying that it cannot be a successful project. But after time, we released, even inside the Dubai and outside the Dubai, saying that it's one of the most successful projects in the world, the Palm Islands. And he started with the one Palm Island and after that in with the three and with the World Islands. So these projects come as a big project for Dubai. And the beneficial of these projects can see in many ways. It's marketing the Dubai brand, the Dubai image have changed, the Dubai image have been changed. And many investors have benefited from this project. Even the local people have something very great. We have something very great. In Dubai, we can visit the place. I think this island has many hotels and very, very high-stars hotels, like five-stars hotels. So I think it's very nice to have it in Dubai. Very nice project. High-risk, didn't necessarily meet with a lot of approval at first. At the beginning it was a very high-risk project. But at the end, it was a very successful project. And Sheikh Rashid? Sheikh Rashid is the same thing as Sheikh Mohammed. He has started many projects and a successful project now. But at the beginning it was a very debate project. And people are thinking that it's not a good project. Like a port of Jabal Ali. At the beginning, Sheikh Rashid decided to build a port outside of Dubai. And the people and the leaders in Dubai are saying that it's a wrong decision. And it will be an empty port. And it won't be successful because of the market at that time. What year are we talking about? How long ago was this? I think that was in the beginning of the 18th. 18th, the 1980s. And that was right when the project has started. Nine years after opening the port, the port was failure. The port was almost empty. But after nine years, now he's one of the most successful ports around the globe. And he's the management of the Jabal Ali port, managing many ports around the globe. I was going to say, now you're even exporting expertise around managing ports. Yeah, managing ports. They have expertise and they are managing the port even in U.S. They are managing the port in U.S. And they are very successful in managing the ports. So this is one of the stories that's giving that Sheikh Rashid was a good in his vision. But I also love it. I also love it as Sheikh Zayed. Yeah, exactly. Very, very interesting. The practice that you're engaged in now as the executive president of the Dubai School of Government is to find the best practices in governance and leadership, whatever they may be, to collaborate with organizations and individuals outside of the UAE and the Arab world and bring them into the Arab world. How do you decide what is a best practice? How do you know that what you're bringing in, in fact, is going to be really good for the Arab world? I think we have a system to indicate as an indicator for the best practice and the best practice and the best case studies in the public sector. This indicator is the excellent reward programs. We have the excellent programs running in Dubai. One is in Dubai and one in Abu Dhabi and one in the federal level. These programs are standards on the AFQM program. So the assistants are coming from outside of United Arab Emirates and they can assist all the projects and all the performance, all the initiatives of the public sector, and they can benchmark them with the practice in the globe and they can assist what's the success story and what is the success story. So I think the successful coming from this part is a very indicator that we are very successful. So very analytical, outcomes-oriented, bring us your ideas, but let's see how they work. But then how about translating them into the Arab cultures? Are there any issues there? Are there any sort of Western best practices that may be great and get good outcomes there? But that would be harder to implement in an Arab society which is different. I think there is many concepts coming from the West that is very good to practice or to implement in Middle East. Like as I mentioned, the AFQM model is the excellent model for the European excellent model. This one is, you can bring this practice, but you have to customize it. You have to customize it in a way that it can be suitable for your culture, for your need. There is a lot of success stories, but you have to get this experience, customize it and implement it in a successful way. What are the key elements of customization? Is it because of how the government might be different or we have the local cultures different or the relationship between business and government? If you can think of an example, perhaps- You have to think of it in many ways, like the culture, like the government needs, like the politics system, what you have. There are many ways you have to think about this practice and how you can implement it in a way that it will be suitable for you. You have to think in many ways to adjust or to enhance this practice to be suitable for you. How about going in the other direction? Are there any practices that you feel that you've helped to shape or create maybe through this customization process that you think, hey, you know what, I think it should go back in the other direction. It's certainly true that the West isn't perfect, right? Or any place that you're seeking ideas from isn't perfect. Have you come across any ideas that you've developed that you think could go in the other direction? I think in our case, in the United Arab Emirates, we have a lot of, we have many sex stories in the public sector, especially in the public sector. We are in a different position or in a different way. We are the public sector performance in the United Arab Emirates better than the private sector, and this one is different than the other countries. And there is, we have a lot of sex story and case studies can be very beneficial for the western countries. So I think in the future we can document many of these stories and many of this practice and can export this practice to others. Can you give me an example? What springs to mind? Like the example like the Sheikh Mohammed last month announced the initiatives that the smart governments, smart government is that all the transferring the public sector entities from the e-government to smart government. Smart government is all the service from the public sector is on the phone, on the smartphone, on the iPad, on the smartphone. And that is already started now and this initiative will be finished within two years and will be ready. How does it work? What exactly is it doing? The application of the public service on the phone. So the initiatives is to make the public sector available 24 hours and you can access to any service of the public sector by your phone. With a very close point to you. So access to the service and get the service through your phone and all the service from the public sector. This is one of the best practices. I've never heard of that anywhere. This is transferring from the e-government to the smart government. I see, I see. It's very smart government. That's very interesting and so that implies a lot of things. You've got a call center there and interesting. That's interesting. The other example I'm thinking of and the name escapes me, but there's sort of an energy positive city in the UAE. I forget the name of it. Energy positive. It's an energy positive city out in the desert that was built as an experiment to see how you could run a city actually while being either energy neutral or energy positive. This is in Abu Dhabi. Al-Masdar city. I think this is the city which is green city. It's most of the energy is coming from the green environments. So this is the Masdar city. Solar. That's right. The transportation. So was that, are you familiar with that project enough to know? Not exactly. I don't have a lot of information about this project. Okay. I just thought that might be one. Okay. What do you think most needs to improve in the Arab world in terms of government and leadership? And I realize that's a very big question because it's a very big and diverse world. So maybe you want to speak more in generalities, but maybe you'd like to speak more particularly. But what would you really like to see happen? So I think what we need is just for the government in the Middle East to understand the need of population and looking for the benefit of the population as the United Arab Emirates do under the rest of the Gulf countries. The rest of Arabic countries need to focus on the population and the need of the population. So this is I think the main focus have to be for the governments. Okay. So Dr. Ali. 10 years from now, 15 years from now, with all the work that you're going, that you've done and that you will continue to do, what do you hope to see the leadership looking like in the UAE, both at the top of the government and business and throughout the society? I think that's what Sheikh Zayed Dan and what Sheikh Mohammed Dan is to build a leadership style for United Arab Emirates. And this leadership style, I think all the population in the United Arab Emirates want this style to be continuous in the future. And a leader in the future has to follow the same leadership style of Sheikh Mohammed and Sheikh Rashid and Sheikh Zayed. This style is more focused on the population need and more focused on the local people and what they need and what are beneficial for the country. So I think the leaders of the future have to stay with this leadership style and continue with this leadership style. So this emotional form of leadership, caring about the people, letting them know, following through, having the vision as well. Having the vision. Where to take them so that they'll trust in that. Wow. That's a... It sounds like that's what you're doing. And it sounds like you're trying to spread it beyond the UAE as well. It's a very, very positive story. And I think if we can say something about the leadership style of Sheikh Mohammed, we realize that now that's more... Most of the leadership in the public and private sector in Dubai speak one language. So this is a difficult thing to do, to get all the people to speak one language, all the leaders to speak one language, to have one vision. So to lead the people for the vision that they all believe in this vision and all speak about this vision is a very great job. So when you speak in one language, you don't speak in Arabic. You mean we all know what we're doing. We're talking about it the same way. Not speaking in one language, that's speaking in one direction. In one direction. And believe in one thing and speak about the vision. And the vision is clear for all of the leaders in Dubai. And if you make an interview with any leaders in Dubai, you will speak in the same manner or same language or same direction. Because it's like a messaging. One message is delivered from all the leadership in the governments because of Sheikh Mohammed is taking... I've spent a lot of efforts to bring the people to speak in one direction. It's an accomplishment. Thank you for joining us Dr. Ali. And thank you for joining us in the leaders room. It's a wrap.