Head scarf and no glass ceiling

Fatima Al Jaber is the COO of a large Abu Dhabi construction-based conglomerate, the Al Jaber Group. Professor Kets de Vries (INSEAD) has studied the path she followed to the top and the problems she faces, typical of family businesses and of entrepreneurial ventures as their founders have to prepare for succession.

This case (see reference below) grew out of INSEAD’s Women and Leadership in the Middle East project. Two features at least distinguish it from many other cases: first, it was written by a five-woman team working under the supervision of professor Manfred Kets de Vries, the director of INSEAD’s Global Leadership Centre; second, it provides multiple excerpts from interviews of the highlighted leader, Fatima Al Jaber. Furthermore, it offers at least two angles for discussion: the conditions for women to rise to positions of leadership; the challenges of running a family business.

Fatima Al Jaber is the COO of a family business, the Al Jaber Group created by her father, Obaid Al Jaber, in 1970. The company started out in the construction sector, contributing to the ambitious infrastructure projects of the United Arab Emirates. Gradually, the group diversified into industrial fabrication, engineering services, marine transport, trading and more recently, real estate. Growth over the years has led to 2008 sales of over $2.5 billion and an employee base of some 50,000 people.

It was in 2006 after 18 years of outside experience that Fatima Al Jaber joined the family group as COO. Let’s look at some steps in that path.

Stepping stones
Al Jaber (henceforth Al Jaber will refer to Fatima Al Jaber) is one of nine children and the eldest daughter. She attended an Arabic language school where, unlike may of her comrades, she took a fancy to the sciences. At university (Al Ain University in the UAE) she married her taste for science and the family’s business grounding in construction by majoring in architectural engineering. But rather than join her father’s group upon graduation, she opted for work in the public sector. Over a 17 year period she was able to gain exposure to the various phases of construction projects (design, contracts, project management) as well as to different types of public buildings (hospitals, mosques, government offices). But then she reached a point where she couldn’t advance any further (one wonders whether this was due more to public sector or to gender issues) and her father invited her to join the family group. She did so as COO, with her brother Mohammed acting as CEO and her father Obaid as chairman.

Female support
The case describes Al Jaber’s youth and brings to the fore factors that probably contributed to her self-confidence and success. One factor might be termed female mentoring. In Al Jaber’s case, her paternal grandmother played a key role. This grandmother was intent on building self-trust in her grandchildren and particularly her granddaughter. Al Jaber summarizes; “She taught me that you have to trust yourself. She would say: ‘Don’t be afraid; there will always be challenges but you can do it’” (pp.8-9). The fact that during her adolescent years, she and her grandmother shared the same room can only have helped reinforce this strength-building interaction. As a token of her gratitude, Al Jaber has named one of her daughters after that grandmother.

Family support
The role of the grandmother points to another potential aid for professional women: the physical assistance provided by an extended family. While Obaid Al Jaber was nurturing his company, his wife, mother and other family members were nurturing the nine children. Today Al Jaber has five children and her mother is able to help in a similar manner raising the children. Not only does her mother help with the children but also acts as something like a guardrail, warning her daughter for example when she starts staying at work too late. Al Jaber, like all professional women, faces the difficult task of balancing work and family - the case invites us to think of the mother as an authoritative executive assistant who helps Al Jaber keep the balance.

One interesting point made by Al Jaber is that the balance becomes more difficult as chidren get older. Her claim is that small children will notice the absence of the mother less than do older children - smaller children accept more readily substitute presences. So as her children have aged Al Jaber has reorganized her work schedule. She tries to group all her meetings into one or two days. In this way she can take reports and papers to work on them at home where her children will know she is there. As she sees it, the simple physical presence of the mother will generally calm older children down. By organizing herself to be able to take some of her work home, Al Jaber is able, by and large, to meet her company’s and her children’s needs.

Male authority
Male attitudes can contribute positively or negatively to a woman’s career. We don’t learn much about Al Jaber’s relationship with her father during her youth but he seems to have been supportive of his hard-working and competitive daughter. He did exercise authority at an important juncture. His daughter wanted to attend a foreign university but he believed it would be too difficult for her to live alone in a foreign environment and so requested of her that she try the local university, Al Ain University. She did and liked it well enough to complete her studies there.

A second interesting moment occurred at the time of her marriage. Her husband felt it better that Al Jaber set aside her career and stay at home. She responded with a variation on her father’s university strategy, answering that she would try it out for a year. After a year, she was going crazy at home and so returned to work.

Challenges of the family business
Moving from the Abu Dhabi government to a family business offered a new set of challenges. The first challenge is one common to all entrepreneurial ventures and concerns the succession of the founder. The second is common to family businesses and concerns the harmonization of family and professional relationships.

When she joined the company with responsibility for a restructuring project, she found that people would often be tempted to try to talk to her father as opposed to trusting her plan. Her solution was to go out in the field and ask people about their projects and ideas and through these meetings to build mutual trust.

As for the succession, a holding company is in place which is being tested. The second generation is asking the necessary questions: “Will the holding structure we have currently in place still work for us when the founder is no longer in control? We have a board but is this board capable of taking decisions without the founder?” (p.14).

Then there is the problem of harmonizing family habits and professional interaction. Al Jaber wants to create a professional environment whereby the brothers and sisters can avoid the clashes they had growing up. In effect, she sees herself as engaged in both a restructuring of the family, just as she was engaged in a restructuring of the company. She reflects: “It took me some time to understand that if we have a clash in the business it will be reflected in our family relationships too, so I go about things in such a way that I don’t create pressure or tension among family members.” (p.13).

Listening to her, it seems that women, because of their concern for all the relationships they are involved in, might have an advantage at the task of growing a family business while maintaining the family: “Women really care about creating the whole environment. I’m passionate about my family business and I need to have a continuing role in the success of my family business” (p.15).

Reference:
ECCH 809-039-1
“Fatima Al Jaber and Al Jaber Group: Traditions and Transitions in a United Arab Emirates Family Enterprise”
Professor Manfred Kets de Vries, Ebba Abdon, Elisabet Engellau, Elizabeth Florent-Treacy, Laura Guillen and Katty Marmenout
INSEAD