Tamkeen, an organisation tasked with developing Bahrain’s private sector, will focus on enhancing quality, customer-centric approach and achieving results under its draft strategy for 2015-2017.

This was revealed by Tamkeen’s chairman and acting chief executive Shaikh Mohammed bin Essa Al Khalifa as he opened a two-day consultation forum that has brought together business owners, employees, students, job-seekers and other stakeholders to discuss the strategy.

More than 200 people today attended the first session of the forum.

Shaikh Mohammed appreciated the large attendance and interest in Tamkeen's initiatives and stressed that Tamkeen continues to seek the opinions of its stakeholders through such open forums with a view to developing its services to meet the ambitions and expectations of the public.

“Tamkeen’s programmes have served over 100,000 customers to date, including 70,000 Bahrainis and 30,000 enterprises, and expectations are high. As such, the next phase will focus on quality, not quantity. Our benchmark for success will be not be by the number of customers served or programmes launched. Rather, what was the impact of those programmes on our customers and economic development at large,” Shaikh Mohammed said.  

The new strategy took into consideration the feedback from stakeholders, results of its impact assessment studies and recommendations of the National Audit Court, in addition to the lessons learnt from the 2010 – 2014 strategy.

Shaikh Mohammed outlined the main features of the draft of the 2015 – 2017 strategy, noting that it is a new paradigm aimed at addressing challenges in the private sector within Tamkeen’s mandate in the National Economic Strategy and Bahrain’s Economic Vision.

“The new strategy is based on three main pillars: enhancing quality, focusing on customers, and achieving results. We have re-engineered Tamkeen’s initiatives to become more focused and effective, in line with those strategic objectives,” he said.

Yousif Ali, senior manager, customer engagement and support in Tamkeen, then reviewed details of the new draft strategy, which was designed from a customer-oriented perspective to achieve results.

For enterprises, this includes three segments: Start-ups, growing enterprises, and mature enterprises. For individuals also it covers three segments: students, professionals, and job seekers.

Ali noted that Tamkeen will focus more on certain areas, such as fostering entrepreneurship and supporting more business diversification and expansion. He also said that the revamped programmes will be more flexible and streamlined programmes, and offered as integrated packages that address the needs of each customer.

In addition, Mr. Yousif Ali said that Tamkeen will work to further develop the customer relationship side of its operations, with more direct outreach through Tamkeen community representatives, in addition to visits to local mijlises and its social media channels, and relevant organisations. He noted that 3 new customer service centres were opened at Seef Mall, Enma Mall, and Sitra Mall this year and last year, and progress is being made to re-design Tamkeen’s website to enable customers to apply for any support programme and track their applications through an integrated online portal.

The second and final session of the forum will be held Monday (September 29). Once concluded, the feedback will be collected and integrated within the 2015 – 2017 strategy to be approved by Tamkeen’s Board of Directors by year-end. - TradeArabia News Service