Ahlibank has signed as a Banking Partner of Oman Economic Review’s Finance & HR Summit 2019, which will take place at Sheraton Oman Hotel, on Tuesday, April 23.

The third edition of the summit, a flagship event by the Sultanate’s premium business magazine, will focus on negotiating disruptive forces in the financial services industry and driving transformative change in human resource management with globally successful models and case studies.

Says Said Abdullah al Hatmi, CEO of Ahlibank, “The partnership with OER HR and Finance Summit, an important national platform for discussing the latest trends and technology innovation in finance and allied industries, reiterates our commitment to exploring new avenue of digital transformation and technology upgrades. Ahlibank accords top priority to keeping paces with the latest trends and disruptive technologies that are metamorphosing the banking industry in a big way. We ensure continuous technological upgrades to our core infrastructure, network, security and business applications to support business growth and expansion. We also recognised the role and importance of Fintech to provide superior customer services and innovative products to our clients. We do recognise that such technology initiatives will bring in many benefits such as reducing turnaround time of services, minimising human errors, improving decision-making and cutting cost; and we stand prepared to benefit from the ecosystems that are being created by innovators.”

Talking about the importance of driving transformative change in human resource management, another focus area of the summit, al Hatmi adds, “Ahlibank recognises that employees are the cornerstone of any successful business. In this context, we are working on several initiatives to attract talent as well as to provide a fulfilling experience to our growing employee base. Taking inspiration from His Majesty’s vision of enabling and empowering young Omani talent, the bank has designed many programmes to realise the vision. The bank has inducted management trainees into its workforce through a structured programme to groom young, high potential Omanis, to take on leadership roles within the bank in future.”

Says Mayank Singh, Group Editor of OER, “We are very excited to team up with Ahlibank, one of the leading players in Oman’s baking and finance services sector, as the Banking Partner of the summit.”

He adds, “Over the last three years OER’s Finance & HR Summit has emerged as the most coveted platform in the intersection between the two sectors vital to Oman’s socioeconomic development: HR and Finance. This year’s edition promises to build upon that experience and legacy with incisive discussions, case studies, presentations and peer-to-peer interaction. Bringing together corporate leaders, senior executives and global experts to share insights on how to thrive in times of change, the Summit will discuss the key issues relevant to Oman’s transformation journey.”

The finance session at Finance & HR Summit will focus on ‘Negotiating Disruption in the Financial Services Industry’. The financial services industry – banks, NBFCs, insurance companies, brokerage houses etc. have been buffeted by multiple disruptive forces such a challenging economic environment, regulatory changes, fed tightening and a strengthening dollar, digital and technological changes, rising interest rates and the need to raise capital, debt recovery, cash flow management, ratings pressure, changing customer expectations, data-driven marketing and the rise of personalisation. The session will also focus on attracting projects and clients for FDI; recovering money from the market for better cash flow; planning expenses and financial resource allocation; successful project financing models and making a PPP model work.

The HR session titled ‘Workplace of the future – recent trends’ will focus on current trends in HR transformation. HR departments are always inundated with routine paper works. A closer look at these functions reveal that a great chunk of them are consumed in repetitive, mundane and transactional activities. Technology is an enabler that can simplify complexity of HR functions and remove non-value adding chores. The HR session at the conference is meant for all HR practitioners and professionals with interest in people development at all levels and will focus on practical aspects of HR transformation and technology rollouts.

The panel discussions and paper presentations at the summit will feature HR, finance and insurance experts from across the globe; case studies from Oman and Qatar; post conference workshops on workplace mental health as well as employee engagement and HR digital footprint research study.

The workshop on  ‘Boosting Employee Engagement through Mindfulness & Happiness’ will be presented by Zhuldyz Koshpanova, an international speaker and  chief happiness and mindfulness officer of Happy Minds Life. The session will cover five interactive ways to achieve long lasting employee’s engagement through finding meaning at work, building resilience with mindfulness, cultivating compassion, empathetic listening and appreciation.

The highlight of the event will be the presentation of OER Excellence Awards 2019, for outstanding achievements of institutions and individuals in banking, finance, insurance and HR sectors.