Manager – Rewards – Aldar Education

Aldar Education is currently seeking a Manager – Rewards to support our growing family of owned, operated and managed schools in the UAE. This is an exciting opportunity to join the highly successful Aldar family of schools and to help shape the future of Abu Dhabi’s leading school group.

As the leading education group in Abu Dhabi, we provide inclusive and innovative learning that inspires and empowers communities. We offer a range of brands for all learners in our community, from nursery through to adult education.  We offer the broadest choice of curricula. In the largest number of locations in Abu Dhabi.

Starting with one school and 250 students in 2007, Aldar Education has grown into a highly sought after education provider, now supporting over 38,000 students in 31 schools and a growing network of almost 5,000 educators, with over 100 nationalities, offering a wide range of curricula and ancillary services such as a Teacher Training Academy.

Working collaboratively, our education network’s purpose is to empower the next generation to shape our future, directly supporting the educational goals of Abu Dhabi’s government. Today, Aldar Education’s efforts are guided by the Abu Dhabi Economic Vision 2030 plan, which aims to build a sustainable knowledge-based economy through premium education.

The incumbent will continuously strive to exceed internal & external customer expectations while embracing the Aldar Education Core Values.

Main Duties

• Develop, communicate, and administer competitive reward strategies, including compensation, benefits, retirement, engagement, and other work experience programs.
• Provide leadership to and direct supervision through effective coaching and performance management.
• Collaborating with P&C leadership and other stakeholders to develop performance management systems that link employee performance to rewards.
• Ensuring that all rewards and compensation practices comply with relevant laws and regulations, including those related to wage and hour laws, equal employment opportunity, and labor standards and approvals obtained in line with company DOA.

Specific Duties

• Conduct analysis on complex data sets to derive insights and recommendations that can benefit the business
• Ensure regular benchmarking and market related pay research is undertaken when necessary to enable the company to remain competitive and an employer of choice for UAE nationals and expatriates.
• Provide support & recommendations for improvement in reward related processes and policies.
• Support in the review, design and implementation of compensation and benefits policy, process, and philosophy, including off-cycle review and adjustments.
• Developing and managing budgets for compensation and benefits programs, ensuring that expenditures are in line with organizational goals and financial constraints.
• Ensure offered employee benefits are in line with the market offering and suggest amendment if needed.
• Responsible to conduct annual salary comparisons within the educational sector.
• Review, create and maintain policies and processes on all reward areas.
• Support on the development of scalable reward management initiatives, from conception and design through project planning, implementation, documentation, measurement, and continuous improvement.
• Designing and managing salary structures, incentive programs, bonuses, and other monetary rewards to attract and retain employees.
• Be data driven and evaluate the effectiveness of reward strategies with data analysis and effectively communicating results and findings back to leadership.
• Developing and implementing employee recognition programs to acknowledge and reward exceptional performance, teamwork, and achievements. This could include formal recognition ceremonies, awards, or other forms of acknowledgment to reinforce desired behaviors and motivate employees.
• Manage multiple projects simultaneously, working both collaboratively and independently to balance and successfully execute on project objectives and related tasks with internal and external resources as necessary.
• Keep abreast of the external environment and ensure the HR systems continue to be compliant with data protection principles and related legislation.
• Foster and maintain relationships with other external professional bodies, advisers, and consultants.
• Any other duties as reasonably expected.

Minimum Qualifications    

• Desired: Bachelor’s / Master’s degree in related subject or minimum of a reward module within a non-HR degree

Minimum Experience 

• A minimum of 3 years’ experience in a rewards function
• Proficient in Job evaluation (ideally certified through Hays, Mercer, Towers Watson etc)
• Working experience within the UAE preferable and a track of career progress and stability is an essential.

Job Specific Knowledge & Skills    

• Excellent understanding and experience of using MS-Excel e.g. pivots, formulas, dashboarding etc.
• Strong commercial acumen and a solid understanding of Financial concepts and jargon.
• Hands-on experience with regular company-wide compensation comparison and analysis.
• Excellent English communication and presentation skills are essential
• Previous experience in working alongside external compensation/benefit consultants.
• Demonstrated ability to exercise judgment, decisiveness, and creativity in situations involving the evaluation of information against sensory, judgmental, or subjectivecriteria, as opposed to that which is clearly measurable or verifiable.
• Work in a highly collaborative and effective manner, both independently and in cross-functional teams.
• Organized & capable of managing multiple complex projects in a rapidly changing, fast paced environment.
• Ability to roll up your sleeves and get things done through taking calculated risks and experimenting with new solutions.
• Ability to build and maintain strong professional relationships across the business.
• Ability to communicate complex reward related issues and risks in terms that colleagues can understand.
• Establish trust by maintaining a high level of credibility, integrity, confidentiality, and skilled communications with all levels of employees

What We Offer:

Aldar Education is a family of world-class, child-centered, and innovative schools based in the UAE. We educate students across our group of owned and managed schools and as we grow, so does our need for highly skilled, inspirational, and dedicated school and educational leaders. We offer an attractive remuneration package including a range of benefits. Our future-focused learning model includes both students and staff, so we place a special emphasis on professional development, coaching, and training.

Successful candidates will have access to a wide network of professionals and opportunities to both lead and contribute to training others as well as developing themselves.

This job description is not all-inclusive. Aldar Education reserves the right to amend this job description at any time.  We are an equal opportunity employer, committed to a diverse and inclusive work environment. We are dedicated to our national development strategy and encourage UAE Nationals in their application to our company.