Professionals in KSA broaden career horizons in line with Vision 2030: Report

JEDDAH: An increasing number of professionals in Saudi Arabia are taking up roles in the government, education and non-profit sectors, moving away from the traditional oil and gas roles, according to a LinkedIn report.

The employment-oriented social networking service, in its latest talent migration report for the Saudi market, said the number of professionals working in the government, education and non-profit sectors increased by 3.5 percent between October 2016 and October 2017. This was followed by the oil and energy sector, which saw a rise of 0.7 percent of professionals, along with architecture and engineering, also at 0.7 percent.

This reflects a commitment to stay true to the Saudi Vision 2030, which aims to diversify the Kingdom’s economy and reduce dependency on oil and gas.

The report looks at workforce and migration changes across different LinkedIn markets in the past year.

According to the report, most professionals in government, education and non-profits are opting for roles pertaining to marketing and business development. “Our results indicate that the market understands the steps that need to be taken for a balanced and diversified economy,” said Rabih Haidar, head of Saudi Arabia Territory, LinkedIn Talent Solutions.

“With our report, we endeavor to provide unique labor market insights to the policymakers, enabling them to make better-informed decisions,” she added.

The report also sheds light on the migration trends in the Kingdom — the biggest net migration to Saudi Arabia is from India (33.84 percent), the US (31.18 percent) and the Philippines (5.20 percent).

India (19.50 percent), the US (14.54 percent) and Egypt (10.49 percent) are top sources of talent to Saudi Arabia. The top functions benefiting from an inflow of talent are engineering, operations and information technology.