Completing its 3rd Cycle on 22 December 2019, the Final (4th) Knowledge Sharing Summit of the Dubai Government Excellence Program (DGEP) was held at Jumeirah Emirates Towers Hotel, Dubai. The agenda was to celebrate the Best Practice learning across all projects and give recognition to all the ten project teams who had been working relentlessly, displaying unwavering commitment over the last year. The ten Dubai We Learn – Excellence Makers Program Project Teams were awarded using the TRADE Best Practice Certification system.

At the final event attended by project sponsors, key stakeholders, guests and project team members, the projects were scrutinized for their quality and evaluated for their performance impact by an esteemed expert panel of judges that included Professor Dotun Adebanjo, University of Greenwich, London, United Kingdom, Dr. Woon Kin Chung, Previous Head of Singapore’s Productivity Centre, Singapore, and Mr. Arndt Husar, Senior Public Management Specialist (Digital Transformation), Asian Development Bank, Philippines.

Amidst an exhilarated audience, the 7 Star projects that received a TRADE Benchmarking Proficiency Certificate with Commendation were:

• Dubai Municipality – Digital Transformation of Contracts;
• Dubai Police – Airport Secure Luggage (Safe Bags);
• Dubai Corporation for Ambulance Services – Moonshot: Is Where Magic Happens.

Coming close with impressive performance were the 5 to 6 Star projects that received a TRADE Benchmarking Proficiency Certificate with Commendation were:

• Dubai Electricity & Water Authority – EV Green Charger 2.0;
• Community Development Authority – Enabling Happiness;
• Dubai Health Authority – Dubai Heart Safe City.
• Dubai SME (Agency of Department of Economic Development) – Improving Entrepreneur’s Business Guidance & Start-Up Services

Showing immense potential and foresight were the 3 to 4 Star projects that received a TRADE Benchmarking Proficiency Certificate:

• Dubai Land – Smart Property Valuation;
• Road & Transport Authority – Return on Innovation for Agile Innovation Journey;
• General Directorate of Residency & Foreigners Affairs – Cooperative Integration System.

The achievements by all teams has been exceptional considering the shortened time of Dubai We Learn this year with teams encouraged to resubmit in May 2020 after they had had more time to deploy best practices and demonstrate results over a longer period of time… We are expecting greater achievements to follow to make this the most successful Dubai We Learn so far!

DGEP and COER will in the next 6 months publish a book, ‘Achieving Performance Excellence Through Benchmarking and Organisational Learning’ showcasing the discoveries of the 3rd Cycle of Dubai We Learn. This will follow on from the book of the 2nd Cycle of Dubai We Learn that was launched at the conference

Click here to download the book.

For more information on Dubai We Learn contact:

Dr. Zeyad Mohammad El Kahlout, Senior Quality and Excellence Advisor,
Dubai Government Excellence Program (DGEP).
Email: Zeyad.ElKahlout@tec.gov.ae

 
Or contact Dr Robin Mann to learn more about the TRADE Best Practice Benchmarking Methodology, r.s.mann@massey.ac.nz

By Dr Flevy Lasrado, Asst. Professor of Organizational Excellence, University of Wollongong in Dubai

I was pleased and delighted to accept the Dubai Government Excellence Program (DGEP’s) invitation to learn more about the amazing projects associated with the Dubai We Learn initiative on Wednesday, 16 October, 2019 at the Jumeirah Emirates Towers Hotel in Dubai. Needless to say, the ‘Dubai We Learn – Excellence Makers Program 3rd Knowledge Sharing Summit’ is one of the most intellectually sophisticated events in the field of business excellence, best practices and benchmarking.

The event was held in the Godolphin Ballroom and the atmosphere was exuberant and lively, with very many erudite professionals and astute officials representing the various authorities of the Government of Dubai. It was a wonderful knowledge sharing summit that included project presentations from 10 government entities. From my own perspective with a background in continuous improvement, I could not have spent 16 October, 2019 in any better way, especially because that evening I was to speak about process improvements to my Master’s class from the University of Wollongong and would be able to share real-life examples with them. The 10 cases of extremely well-presented cases were exemplary and gave the audience much to learn and think about. Each entity presented a themed project and provided evidence of the multitude of benefits that they have achieved, while also giving feedback to co-participants and pointing out future opportunities for improvements. The breakout sessions were also planned so well that even a coffee moment turned out to be brilliant knowledge sharing moment!

The Centre for Organisational Excellence Research (COER), New Zealand, has been orchestrating the learning, knowledge gathering and execution of the Dubai We Learn initiatives (now in their 3rd cycle) in tandem with DGEP. COER assists the teams in using the TRADE Best Practice Benchmarking Methodology so they can identify and implement best practices, and empowers the teams to reach a 7-Star level of excellence that assures long-term sustainability and future relevance

The program included an introductory welcome from Dr Zeyad El-Kahlout, Senior Quality and Excellence Advisor, of DGEP, followed by Dr Robin Mann, who presented the participating teams to the audience.

Without further delay, let me summarise the 11 projects.

1	DEWA	EV GREEN CHARGER INITIATIVE Aim: To develop a new user friendly EV Charger which supports a seamless customer experience as an interim solution till standardization of single EV charging solution occurs Benefit: Encourages adoption of electric vehicles in the city for a sustainable city.
2	Dubai Police	AIRPORT SECURE LUGGAGE (SAFE BAGS) Aim: Find and implement best practices enhancing the efficiency and operational capacity of Hold Bag-gage Screening System (HBS) as well as the productivity of employees engaged within the different processes and levels of the HBS at Dubai Airports by EXPO 2020 Benefit: Increased satisfaction of travellers by speeding up the process, and reduced costs as less delays in flight times due to security issues.
3	Community Development Authority	ENABELING HAPPINESS Aim: Identify and implement best practices in: Loyalty, Motivation, Communication, Empowerment, Innovation and Productivity. Benefit: Increased employed happiness and productivity, reduced absenteeism and greater employee retention.
4	Roads & Transport Authority	RETURN ON INNOVATION – AN AGILE INNOVATION JOURNEY Aim: To develop a simple and reliable approach for measuring and communicating Return on Innovation (ROI) that is aligned to RTA’s  strategic needs to culminate in an Agile  Innovation  Journey Benefit: Estimate and understand ROI for key investments such as the Enterprise Command & Control Centre and Dubai Metro.
5	Dubai Health Authority	DUBAI HEART SAFE CITY INITIATIVE Aim: Improving the out-of-hospital post cardiac arrest (OHCA) survival rate Benefit: Save 1000’s of additional lives.
6	Federal Authority for Identity & Citizenship	INSTITUTIONAL CO-OPERATIVE SYSTEM Aim: To identity best practices that will lead to an effective integrated system between GDRFA’s strategy, Innovation, PMO, Operations and Excellence departments Benefit: Efficiently through adopting international, regional, and local best practices and excellence models, that meets Dubai’s Government directions and GDRFA’s vision, therefore, acts as a best practice in its field.
7	Dubai Corporation for Ambulance Services	MOONSHOT PROJECT Aim: Develop a vibrant Moonshot innovation ecosystem to accelerate the effectiveness and outcomes of all innovation ecosystem components in line with international best practices. Benefit: Accelerate all innovation ecosystems to achieve multiple moon shots every year.
8	Dubai SME	IMPROVE ENTREPRENEURS’ START-UP GUIDANCE AND SUPPORT SERVICES Aim: To improve the process of qualifying and supporting entrepreneurs to start viable businesses. Benefit: Increase efficiency of guidance service and the level of entrepreneurs’ happiness with service information by Dec 2020 to ultimately have more successful businesses.
9	Land Department	SMART PROPERTY VALUATION Aim: To provide an instant, reliable and robust unit valuation service. Benefit: Increase the speed of valuation process from 3 days to instant thus increasing customer happiness.
10	Dubai Municipality	DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION OF CONTRACTS Aim: Accelerate the processes of service contracts, re-engineer the process through technical opportunities. Benefit: Faster service contract cycle time from 210 days to 45 days or less, saving money and increasing supplier satisfaction.

A number of the projects were aimed at improving project agility and cycle times, and implementing new approaches and measures for innovation. Other projects involved incorporating the latest technology applicable to the problem area, including machine learning and AI. A common thread across all projects was to raise happiness for the citizens of Dubai, so that Dubai becomes the happiest and smartest city in the world.
 

Watch highlights of the day video

Overall, it was a fascinating experience to witness the massive improvement of each of the entities and their dedicated commitment to their innovative projects. Dubai We Learn has proven to be a very promising journey for all participating organisations and is paving the way for ‘dreams to come true’! I wish all the teams’ further achievements and success when the projects conclude on 22 December with the final Knowledge Sharing Summit.

For more information on Dubai We Learn contact:

Dr. Zeyad Mohammad El Kahlout, Senior Quality and Excellence Advisor,
Dubai Government Excellence Program (DGEP).
Email: Zeyad.ElKahlout@tec.gov.ae

– A revisit of ‘Dubai We Learn’ Exemplar Benchmarking Projects –

By Professor Dotun Adebanjo and Dr Robin Mann

The great appeal of benchmarking is its ability to enable organisations to identify best practices from other organisations and adopt or adapt those practices to improve performance. The benchmarking process itself can be both demanding and exciting as the benchmarking team seeks to understand their organisation’s performance; identify, shortlist and visit benchmarking partners; determine the most suitable best practices; and work with internal (and sometimes external) stakeholders to implement the best practices.

Although many aspects of the benchmarking process can be underpinned or driven by prescriptive guidelines and also managed along pre-determined timelines, the implementation of best practices is less amenable to prescriptiveness and time limitation. This is principally because the numbers, nature, scope and ease of implementation will vary significantly with the type of project and particulars of the organisation. Indeed, where many best practices are selected for implementation, it may be necessary and beneficial to implement the practices in stages or batches. It is also important to note that the benchmarking process does not end with the identification of best practices or indeed their implementation, it is also necessary to evaluate if the desired outcomes have been achieved and if not, to understand why and refine the practices as necessary.

With this in mind, we returned to a sweltering Dubai in August 2019, 15 months after the completion of the second round of ‘Dubai We Learn’ (DWL) to visit three exemplar ‘7 Stars’ projects. ‘Dubai We Learn’ is an initiative of the Dubai Government Excellence Programme (DGEP) in collaboration with the Centre for Organisational Excellence Research (COER) based at Massey University New Zealand. The second round of ‘Dubai We Learn’ benchmarking projects consisted of 11 projects in different Dubai Government entities and took place between March 2017 and April 2018. Details of the 11 projects and their achievements by April 2018 are available in an e-book (to be published soon). Three of the eleven benchmarking projects were 7 stars for benchmarking proficiency based on the TRADE Benchmarking Methodology that was adopted to drive the DWL projects.

So, 15 months on, how have Dubai Government Human Resources (DGHR), Dubai Health Authority (DHA), and Dubai Police fared with their respective projects.

Case No. 3 – Dubai Police
The Dubai Police project was entitled, ‘Call of Duty: Police Edition – Best practices in vehicle fleet maintenance’. The aim of the project was to ‘To find and implement best practices in vehicle fleet maintenance to improve vehicle availability and labour productivity of the Dubai Police Mechanical Department to world class levels. The target was to increase labour productivity from 40% to 70% and increase vehicle availability from 88% to 95%.’ At the formal close of the benchmarking project in April 2018, the Dubai Police benchmarking team had identified 86 best practice ideas from benchmarking visits to 9 organisations and desktop research. Of the 86 best practices, 14 were approved for deployment.
At the formal close of the benchmarking project in April 2018, the Dubai Police benchmarking team had achieved an increase in productivity from 40% to 72% and vehicle availability from 88% to 95% (Aug-2017 to Mar-2018) saving 14 million AED. There had also been an increase in average actual hours working on job tasks of each mechanic from 2.4 hours per day to 5 hours per day and a reduced average repair time per task by at least 5%. Dubai Police have produced a video of their involvement and achievements in the second round of ‘Dubai We Learn’ projects and this can be found here:

What has happened since then?

Dubai Police had met its key targets by April 2018. The purpose of our visit was to understand if they had maintained their achievements or built on them. Well, we were not disappointed. Dubai Police had not only maintained its performance levels, they had sought new ways to improve the maintenance of their fleet vehicles. In particular they had streamlined the delivery of parts and particularly high value parts. This had been achieved by working in partnership with parts suppliers and it meant that stock was now better managed to meet high demands and short lead-times. In addition, Dubai Police had also started to work more closely with agents from different car companies who are now based in the Dubai police workshop to work on the fleet vehicles to improve performance. KPIs per task have been set for the agents in order to improve efficiency. This has meant that Dubai Police technicians are now better able to concentrate on other maintenance tasks by having them removed from generic tasks such as tyre changing. Productivity and hours on repair jobs continue to be measured and monitored.

Perhaps the most important outcome of Dubai Police’s involvement in the ‘Dubai We Learn’ initiative is the acceptance and widespread deployment of benchmarking and improvement activities based on the TRADE methodology. All departments and sections of Dubai Police are now set KPIs linked to benchmarking improvement. At the time of our visit, there were 254 live improvement projects throughout Dubai Police that were based on the tools and methodologies of TRADE. The departments and sections are encouraged to apply desktop benchmarking in their search for best practices. The management of the roll out of benchmarking across Dubai Police is managed by the Quality Department. In order to promote involvement and improve benchmarking skills and capabilities, Dubai Police held a 4-day TRADE seminar for 1000 police officers. The performance of the departments and sections of Dubai Police against the KPIs set are monitored on an annual basis and there is a General Commander Award for the best performers.

The commitment of Dubai Police to continual improvement and the use of benchmarking as an improvement tool has led to significant external recognition of their performance and achievement. Further to the seven stars recognition at the end of the second round of the ‘Dubai We Learn’ initiative, Dubai Police’s project has been recognised at multiple awards:

• Dubai Quality Group – First Place;
• International Best Practice Award – Second Place;
• Innovation Arabia – First Place;
• Global Benchmarking Award – Second Place:
• Commander Group – First Place
• Knowledge Sharing Competition – First Place
• Dubai Police Club – Shortlisted (awaiting final position)
• Expo 2020 Global Best Practice Competition (awaiting final position)

With Dubai Police’s strong commitment to benchmarking Dubai citizens can be assured that they are in the safe hands of a progressive Police Force. In the future, more awards and international recognition is likely to follow especially as some of the team members from this project are now serving as mentors for another Dubai Police team that are participating in the 3rd Cycle of Dubai We Learn on a project titled “Airport Secure Luggage (Safe Bags)”. This new project aims to find and implement best practices in airport baggage security to enhance efficiency and operational capacity of the inspection process at Dubai International Airport and Dubai World Central by Expo 2020. With 56 million bags handled and secured in 2018, Dubai Police are looking forward to another very successful project that will showcase their professionalism and leading-edge practices to the rest of the world.

Read the other case studies, Dubai Government Human Resources (DGHR) and Dubai Health Authority (DHA).

For more information on Dubai We Learn contact:

Dr. Zeyad Mohammad El Kahlout, Senior Quality and Excellence Advisor, Dubai Government Excellence Program (DGEP). Email: Zeyad.ElKahlout@tec.gov.ae

By Dr. Almas Tazein, BPIR.com Limited, COER

Continuing with its legacy of fostering excellence and imbibing a culture of organisational learning within the Government of Dubai, the Dubai Government Excellence Program (DGEP) in co-operation with the Center for Organizational Excellence Research (COER), New Zealand completed the 2nd Cycle of the Dubai We Learn Excellence Makers Program in 2018. Back then, 11 Dubai Government entities embarked on a journey towards newer horizons, which enabled them to be more resilient and agile in experimenting with and adopting efficacious strategies and best practices from around the world.

Today, DGEP and COER are delighted to announce the release of their 2nd book together describing the 11 success stories and describing how each project team used the TRADE Benchmarking Methodology. The book is titled, “Achieving Performance Excellence Through Benchmarking and Organisational Learning”

Today, is the soft launch of the electronic version of the book. The official launch of the book will stimulatingly coincide with the Final Knowledge Sharing Summit for the 3rd Cycle of Dubai We Learn 2019 that will be held on 22 December 2019. The formal launch will be attended by all the Dubai Government teams, officials, sponsors and key stakeholders in the honorable attendance of the Secretary General of The Executive Council, Dubai.

Where achieving 3-4 Stars and reaching TRADE Benchmarking Proficiency is a challenging task within a one-year timeframe, the book summarizes the secrets of how each of the 11 teams managed to reach up to the 3 to 7-Stars of governance par excellence. The book epitomizes an idealized step-wise implementation of TRADE methodology, depicting structure, purpose and performance.

The book unravels the 2nd cycle of Dubai We Learn’s Excellence Makers Program from a knowledge-sharing perspective, where the reader will be exposed to a plethora of information in the field of public service and systematic benchmarking system. In order to spark a desire to learn from the challenges faced by the Dubai government entities, to showcase the principles and best practices that drove positive organisational change, to inculcate creativity and innovation within the teams, and to encourage the emulation of their success stories, the book speaks of the:

• Key Achievements of each of the 11 benchmarking project teams
• Project benefits classified into financial, customer/citizen, human resource, and process benefits
• Lessons learnt and highlights from the TRADE Benchmarking Methodology
• Importance of Leadership, Teamwork, and Change Management
• Key factors integral to the success of the benchmarking projects during each of the T-R-A-D-E Stages.

This book will make you think, it will make you question the status quo, and for sure, it will inspire you.

Click here to download the book.

Presentation video clips from each of the benchmarking projects are available in BPIR.com’s Award Winner Reports section. Join BPIR.com to access the reports and many other features.

For more information on Dubai We Learn contact:

Dr. Zeyad Mohammad El Kahlout, Senior Quality and Excellence Advisor, Dubai Government Excellence Program (DGEP). Email: Zeyad.ElKahlout@tec.gov.ae
 
 
 
Or contact Dr Robin Mann to learn more about the TRADE Best Practice Benchmarking Methodology, r.s.mann@massey.ac.nz

– A revisit of ‘Dubai We Learn’ Exemplar Benchmarking Projects –

By Professor Dotun Adebanjo and Dr Robin Mann

The great appeal of benchmarking is its ability to enable organisations to identify best practices from other organisations and adopt or adapt those practices to improve performance. The benchmarking process itself can be both demanding and exciting as the benchmarking team seeks to understand their organisation’s performance; identify, shortlist and visit benchmarking partners; determine the most suitable best practices; and work with internal (and sometimes external) stakeholders to implement the best practices.

Although many aspects of the benchmarking process can be underpinned or driven by prescriptive guidelines and also managed along pre-determined timelines, the implementation of best practices is less amenable to prescriptiveness and time limitation. This is principally because the numbers, nature, scope and ease of implementation will vary significantly with the type of project and particulars of the organisation. Indeed, where many best practices are selected for implementation, it may be necessary and beneficial to implement the practices in stages or batches. It is also important to note that the benchmarking process does not end with the identification of best practices or indeed their implementation, it is also necessary to evaluate if the desired outcomes have been achieved and if not, to understand why and refine the practices as necessary.

With this in mind, we returned to a sweltering Dubai in August 2019, 15 months after the completion of the second round of ‘Dubai We Learn’ (DWL) to visit three exemplar ‘7 Stars’ projects. ‘Dubai We Learn’ is an initiative of the Dubai Government Excellence Programme (DGEP) in collaboration with the Centre for Organisational Excellence Research (COER) based at Massey University New Zealand. The second round of ‘Dubai We Learn’ benchmarking projects consisted of 11 projects in different Dubai Government entities and took place between March 2017 and April 2018. Details of the 11 projects and their achievements by April 2018 are available in an e-book (to be published soon). Three of the eleven benchmarking projects were 7 stars for benchmarking proficiency based on the TRADE Benchmarking Methodology that was adopted to drive the DWL projects.

So, 15 months on, how have Dubai Government Human Resources (DGHR), Dubai Health Authority (DHA), and Dubai Police fared with their respective projects.

Case No. 2 – Dubai Health Authority (DHA)
The DHA project was entitled, “Prevention better than Cure / Innovative Prevention Program to Combat Diabetes”. The primary aim of the project was to ‘develop and start implementing a Dubai diabetes prevention framework based on worldwide best practices within one-year (2017) and reduce the pre-diabetic population of 356,460 adults by at least 10% by 2021.’ At the formal close of the benchmarking project in April 2018, the DHA benchmarking team had identified 114 best practice ideas from several sources including benchmarking visits to 4 organisations, desktop research and telephone-based benchmarking discussions. Of the 114, best practices, 14 were approved for deployment.

The primary achievement of the DHA Benchmarking Team was the development of a Dubai Diabetes Prevention Framework consisting of 5 key dimensions:

• Promoting Healthy Lifestyle
• Early screening on DM and risk factors
• Creative and innovative Sustainable Interventions
• Supportive health system and partnership
• Enforcement of non-communicable diseases policy

By April 2018 DHA had successfully carried out diabetes screening of 22,222 Dubai residents in 12 health centres as well as the completion of the pilot phase of a Happiness Prescription Program with 43 participants. The program focussed on people at risk of diabetes using combinations of a comprehensive health survey, nutrition and health education and support, and various fitness classes. To underpin the roll out of the Happiness Prescription Program, DHA started the first phase of the ‘Hayati’ smart application with the focus of the first phase being a diabetes prevention risk assessment survey. In addition, DHA established two lifestyle clinics and developed a non-communicable disease policy for approval by Dubai’s Executive Council. DHA also carried out more awareness campaigns which engaged with 47,303 people i

What has happened since then?

Firstly, it was pleasing to hear that the Dubai Diabetes Prevention Framework is continuing to be used to lead and manage an integrated approach to tackling diabetes in Dubai – this continues to be the prime value of the Dubai We Learn project. This unified approach, consisting of many initiatives by different stakeholders, enables DHA to have a larger impact on diabetes than it would otherwise be able to if it worked in isolation.

The two lifestyle clinics are now firmly established and operating sustainably and with the ability to cover all regions of Dubai. By the end of 2018, the lifestyle clinics had treated 158 residents (increased from 43 treated during the pilot phase) and DHA has been working with various organisations to increase awareness of the lifestyle clinics to encourage more referrals. More than 70% of patients lost weight and reduced their risk of developing diabetes. Members of the benchmarking team continue to manage the operations of the clinics. More lifestyle clinics are planned for the future.

Early screening activities have also become firmly established in Dubai’s health centres. To enable maximum engagement, diabetes screening has become routine as it is part of national periodic check-up and doctors in Dubai’s Primary Health Centres all have to screen patients 18 years and above. 58% of targeted clients had already been screened by the end of 2018.

The development of the ‘Hayati’ prevention application has also moved on from the first phase. The app now has full functionality to assess and refer patients, and will soon be able to follow their daily activities and facilitate the management of activities such as sporting activities and food consumption habits. The policy on non-communicable diseases (NCD) has been approved by the Ruler of Dubai, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, and the Executive Council of Dubai. Implementation of the policy will be completed by 2021. An innovative aspect of the policy will be the use of technology by way of a ‘Telemedicine Doctor’ to improve access of Dubai residents to medical personnel. This one-to-one telemedicine facility will be launched in September 2019. The ownership of NCD has also changed and transferred to the Public Health Department.

Hayati App for managing diabetes available from Google Play

Major strides have been achieved with respect to awareness campaigns and engagement with the public. In partnership with Dubai Government and staff from various department and entities, Dubai Sports World was organised for the summer of 2018 and continues today. Many sports are available in one pro-standard air-conditioned area to encourage Dubai Government staff to participate in different activities to increase their fitness. DHA also participates in the Dubai Fitness challenge (DFC) launched in 2017 by the Dubai Government. DFC encourages all residents of Dubai to engage in 30 minutes of sporting activities over 30 days (30/30). This initiative increases awareness of risk factors of chronic diseases and helps people to start a healthy lifestyle.

A wider campaign to improve the health of Dubai residents and reduce diabetes risk factors is also being led by the Public Health Department. This includes a campaign in Dubai public schools to increase time allocated for sporting activities while also launching a ‘Dubai Olympics’ challenge for the public schools. Awareness campaigns have also been carried out in Dubai Government organisations and are being rolled out to private organisations.

Away from the implementation of the project outcomes, the DHA Benchmarking Team continues to promote the use of benchmarking as an improvement technique and have been sharing their knowledge and experiences with a benchmarking team from the Dubai Corporation for Ambulance Services (DCAS) and were planning on the same day that we visited them to share their learning with a new DHA benchmarking team set up to increase the Survival Rate of Post-Cardiac Arrest from 5% to 20% by the year 2020. For information on this new project click here.

The DHA team are quietly confident that through the Dubai Diabetes Prevention Framework they are on track to meet their ambitious project aim of reducing the pre-diabetic population by at least 10% by 2021. The team believe that without undertaking the Dubai We Learn project it was unlikely that a Dubai Diabetes Prevention Framework would have been developed and DHA’s focus on diabetes prevention would have primarily focussed on the initiatives that it had control of rather than developing a multi-faceted and unified Dubai-wide approach. With the framework they know it will still be a challenge to meet the project’s aim as trends have been indicating higher levels of diabetes in the future and so the trend needs to plateau and reverse. However, with the framework they are steadily making progress and are on track to succeed. This indeed will be a major achievement not only in terms of the health benefits for the 300,000 plus at-risk group but also for their families and the Dubai population as a whole as it embraces a healthier lifestyle.

Read the other case studies, Dubai Government Human Resources (DGHR) and Dubai Police.

For more information on Dubai We Learn contact:

Dr. Zeyad Mohammad El Kahlout, Senior Quality and Excellence Advisor, Dubai Government Excellence Program (DGEP). Email: Zeyad.ElKahlout@tec.gov.ae