More than 75 per cent of employees in the Mena region are ‘extremely passionate’ about their work, while about 91.5 per cent feel that the work they do adds purpose to their life, a report said.

An overwhelming majority (86.5 per cent) of Mena respondents said their work has helped them discover who they really are, in the ‘Passion for Work in the Middle East’ survey, recently conducted by Bayt.com, a leading career site in the Middle East.

Over half of those polled (57.9 per cent) were generally happy with the work culture and environment at their organization, 64 per cent of which are ‘extremely happy’ and 36 per cent of which are ‘moderately happy’. Conversely, one in ten poll respondents in the Mena admitted that they were ‘not happy at all’ with their current work environment.

An impressive 87.1 per cent of Mena professionals feel a sense of connection with their co-workers , and approximately half ‘agree’ with this sentiment (50.2 per cent), while 36.9 per cent ‘strongly agree’. In fact, very few respondents ‘disagree’ (3.5 per cent) or ‘strongly disagree’ (1.2 per cent).

More than half of the Mena respondents felt that their workplaces recognized or celebrated special personal occasions such as birthdays and marriages (51.3 per cent). According to 36.1 per cent of respondents, their companies ‘always’ recognised such occasions. However, 33.4 per cent of Mena companies ‘almost never’ recognize special occasions.

“As a business that has been successfully connecting professionals and companies together for the past 16 years, the results of this poll are indeed very inspiring to us.  At Bayt.com, we work very hard to ensure that there is a vast number of jobs on Bayt.com that professionals find immediately relevant and can fall in love with,” said Suhail Masri, VP Employer Solutions, Bayt.com.

“On any given day, we have thousands of vacancies on our jobsite that people can apply to for free, across the entire career-level and industry spectrum. Meanwhile employers searching for qualified people to hire are able to find their ideal candidates quickly and easily with Bayt.com's industry leading CV Search tool which recruiters can try for free on bayt.com/en/search-cv/.

“Over the last decade and a half we have redefined the vanguard when it comes to the evolution of recruitment portals to the realm of essential full-fledged social engagement platforms,” he added.

When asked whether their workplace has a culture of transparency and honest communication, 60.2 per cent ‘agreed’ that this was true and another 11.8 per cent ‘strongly agreed’. More than three quarters claim that their manager provides feedback and cares about their professional growth and development (76.8 per cent), and only 7.3 per cent ‘strongly disagree’ that this is the case.

Moreover, the poll also showed that for 81.7 per cent of Mena respondents, exceptional performance is recognized and rewarded at their workplace, compared to only 10.9 per cent who said that this is not the case for them.

When it comes to giving  100 per cent of their effort and passion at work, more than half of the respondents ‘agree’ (54.3 per cent), and 35.9 per cent ‘strongly agree’. Actually, only a small minority of respondents ‘disagree’ to always giving their best performance at work (2.3 per cent), and 2.1 per cent ‘strongly disagree’.

Another mere 6.6 per cent of the respondents said that they do not look forward to going back to work after a vacation or weekend while the majority of the respondents claimed to look forward to returning to work (86.9 per cent), and 37.6 per cent strongly agreeing with this sentiment.

“Feeling passion and ownership towards work has a considerable impact on both the employee and the employer,” Masri continued.

“Employees who are motivated, passionate, and happy at work tend to stay at their companies longer, and employers benefit from the improved loyalty and team retention rates. A great way for employers to assess how passionate a potential candidate is about the work they do is by studying their activity on Bayt.com Specialties, which is a specialized content sharing and Q&A platform that empowers professionals to share their interests and expertise in their career specialties.

“Professionals benefit from this platform tremendously insofar as nothing leaves a better impression with potential employers than expert job-related knowledge and sound networking acumen. Moreover, the Bayt.com Specialties platform is highly popular as a reference for employers for its professional’s skills rankings which are earned through peer endorsements,” he added. – TradeArabia News Service