Workplace Culture & Employee Experience

CULTURE & EXPERIENCE

Culture & Experience celebrates organizations that make happiness a habit. Featuring case studies and stories on inclusion, engagement, and workplace innovation, it showcases how thoughtful cultures drive belonging and resilience. Each feature offers lessons on building workplaces where people feel seen, valued, and motivated to perform their best.

Designing Workplaces People Choose to Stay With

A column by Kristina Vaneva

What makes someone stay, not because they have to, but because they truly want to?

In today’s fast-moving world, workplaces are no longer just about roles and responsibilities. They are about how people feel when they show up each day. Do they feel seen? Supported? Inspired to grow? This column by Kristina Vaneva gently explores the heart of what makes a workplace worth staying for.

Through thoughtful reflections, real experiences, and simple yet powerful ideas, it looks at how organizations can create spaces rooted in trust, empathy, and purpose. Because at the end of the day, people don’t just stay for the job. They stay for how the workplace makes them feel.

When Football Meets the Workplace: Managing Employee Experience During FIFA 2026

As FIFA 2026 captures the attention of millions across the GCC, organizations face a unique challenge: balancing productivity with employee wellbeing. Kristina Vaneva explores how forward-thinking employers can turn World Cup fever into an opportunity to strengthen engagement, trust, and workplace culture. | Written by Kristina Vaneva, Employee Experience Professional and Founder of Beyond Plus The 2026 FIFA World Cup is here, and it's bringing a massive overtime shift for th

Jun 185 min read

Emirates NBD Partnership Expands Employee Financial Wellness

Emirates NBD, American Hospital Dubai and Mohamed & Obaid Almulla Group are collaborating on financial awareness, banking support and wellness initiatives designed to strengthen the employee experience. | Written by Palak Kataria Image Courtesy: Official Communication Financial wellbeing is increasingly becoming part of the wider employee experience, and a new UAE partnership is bringing the two closer together. Emirates NBD has signed an MoU with American Hospital Dubai an

Aug 201 min read

AI Gave Me Superpowers

Why the thing standing between you and what you could build is almost always a story you tell yourself, not a skill gap. | Written by Preethy Suresh For over twenty years, I believed I wasn’t technical, and I never once questioned it. It was simply a fact I had filed away about myself. Technical was a category other people belonged to. I had the ideas and the interest, but I assumed the building belonged to someone else. Last month, I got my hands on Claude Fable 5, free for

Aug 54 min read

Building Trust Starts With You

Dr. Louise Lambert shares how trust in teams is not built through words alone, but through consistent behaviour, small promises, honest communication, fair action, and the courage to acknowledge mistakes. | Written by Dr. Louise Lambert Many managers say they want more trust in their teams. They want people to be open, proactive, honest, and willing to take initiative. They encourage this by saying things like, “My door is always open,” “You can trust me,” or “We need to trus

Aug 34 min read

20 Leading Employers Transforming Employee Experience in Saudi Arabia

From career mobility and leadership development to wellbeing, safety and future-focused skills, these organizations are investing in the people behind Kingdom of Saudi Arabia’s transformation. | Written by Riya Malhotra Image Credits: AI -Generated Saudi Arabia’s economic transformation is changing not only the industries operating across the Kingdom, but also what employees expect from their workplaces. Career progression, continuous learning, employee wellbeing, inclusive c

Jul 2410 min read

Workplace Misconduct Just Hit a Record High, and HR Is Dangerously Understaffed to Handle It

A decade-spanning benchmark of nearly 9 million employees shows discrimination, harassment and retaliation claims at an all-time high, while employee-relations teams stay flat. For HR leaders across the Gulf and Southeast Asia, the warning travels. | Written by Riya Malhotra Workplace misconduct is rising faster than companies can respond, and the teams meant to manage it are barely growing at all. That's the uncomfortable headline from the latest Employee Relations Benchmark

Jun 293 min read

Presence: Paying Attention, Showing Interest

Strong leadership starts with presence. Dr. Louise Lambert explores why paying attention, showing genuine interest, and being fully present can strengthen trust, wellbeing, and team performance. | Written by Dr. Louise Lambert Most managers think they are good listeners and they probably are. They care about their teams, ask questions, and make time when they can. And yet, one of the most common complaints employees have about their managers is not about workload or pay, but

Jun 254 min read

Why Employee Happiness Begins Long Before Wellness Programs

Safety Culture Isn't a Compliance Program. It's One of the Foundations of Employee Happiness. | Written by Ryan Mitchell The Wellbeing Paradox We have never talked more about employee wellbeing than we do today. Organizations invest billions in wellness programs, engagement initiatives, mental health support, flexible working arrangements, and employee experience strategies. Yet despite this unprecedented focus, employee engagement remains stubbornly low across much of the wo

Jun 176 min read

How Dubai National Insurance Built a Workplace Where People Choose to Stay

Winner: Best Company to Work For – Medium Enterprise | Employee Happiness Awards UAE 2025 | Written by Riya Malhotra In an industry built on trust, Dubai National Insurance (DNI) believes that trust must begin within its own organisation. When DNI was recognised as the Best Company to Work For – Medium Enterprise at the Employee Happiness Awards UAE 2025, the award reflected far more than a successful HR programme. It acknowledged a long-term commitment to creating a workplac

Jun 113 min read

What Recruiters Still Get Wrong About High-Potential Women, And How to Fix It

Common hiring assumptions continue to limit women’s career progression before it even begins. For organisations serious about building stronger leadership pipelines, the real opportunity starts much earlier: in how talent is identified, assessed, and recognised. | Written by Magdolin Boukhary Magdolin Boukhary, Mentor, Saudi Leadership Society Most organisations say they want to hire and promote more women into leadership. The intent is genuine, the diversity statements are p

Jun 35 min read

Employee Happiness Awards Singapore & Malaysia debuts with a landmark gala celebrating people-first workplaces

Inaugural Singapore & Malaysia edition draws over 200 leaders, 80+ organisations, and 25+ categories in a celebration of workplace excellence. | Written by Riya Malhotra The Employee Happiness Awards Singapore 2026, organised by Eventyst Global, made a powerful debut as the platform's inaugural edition in Singapore. Held on 10th April at the prestigious Shangri-La Singapore, the gala evening brought together more than 200 distinguished guests for an occasion that was as celeb

May 263 min read

When Negotiations Fail: What Samsung's Looming Strike Teaches HR Leaders About Employee Trust

A last-minute deal kept 48,000 Samsung workers on the floor on 21 May. Four days later, the union is fracturing over who got what, and HR leaders across the region are watching a new lesson unfold in real time. | Written by Riya Malhotra There's a particular kind of silence that descends on a workplace when trust has finally run out. Last week, Samsung was hours away from that silence breaking, loudly, across 48,000 workers and 18 days of stopped production. It didn't break.

May 254 min read

Why the Best Strategy for the Agentic Era Is a Human One

As organisations race to integrate agentic AI into the workplace, experts are warning that the real challenge is no longer technological, it is organisational. | Written by Riya Malhotra On International HR Day, workforce and AI transformation leaders are urging businesses to move beyond viewing AI solely as a productivity tool and instead focus on the strategic workforce decisions that will define whether the technology creates long-term value or long-term disruption. With A

May 202 min read

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Sunday, 13 September 2026