Page 209 - Aamir Rehman - Dubai & Co Global Strategies for Doing Business in the Gulf States-McGraw-Hill (2007)

Building Your Team: Human Capital Strategies for the GCC 191

students seeking to study abroad more competitive than before. At
the same time, less welcoming visa policies, government practices,
and public sentiment in the United States (and, to a lesser degree,
the UK) have somewhat diminished the appetite of GCC-state stu-
dents for studying in the West. Nonetheless, the United States and
other developed countries remain a key training ground for top-
notch GCC talent.
Consider, for example, the backgrounds of the senior manage-
ment team at Saudi Aramco—Saudi Arabia’s national oil company
and by far the most important business in the country. All nine exec-
utives on the top team have US educational credentials, as illus-
trated in Table 7.1.
TABLE 7.1
Saudi Aramco’s Top Team: US Educational Credentials 4

Role US Educational Credentials
President and CEO Executive Education, Harvard Business
School
Senior Vice President (SVP), Bachelor’s degree, University of Tulsa;
Engineering and Project Executive Education, Harvard Business
Management School
SVP, Industrial Relations Bachelor’s degree, Texas A&M
SVP, Refining, Marketing, and Bachelor’s, master’s, and MBA degrees,
International University of California; Executive
Education, Wharton
General Counsel and Secretary Bachelor’s degree, University of California
Santa Barbara; JD, University
of Southern California; Executive
Education, MIT
SVP, Finance MBA, MIT
SVP, Gas Operations Executive Education, Cornell
SVP, Exploration and Bachelor’s degree, University of
Production Oklahoma; Executive Education,
University of Pittsburgh
SVP, Operations Services MBA, University of California Riverside

The credentials gained from the United States on technical
matters (e.g., engineering and law) and executive management
(executive education and MBA degrees) reflect the core knowledge
domains for which Gulf executives admire Western training.