UAE jobs: Expat creates 400 opportunities for people with disabilities since 2022

In 2022, 27-year-old Hafsa Qadeer made the bold decision to leave her day job in full-time pursuit of a larger mission: to create a ‘LinkedIn’ for people of determination. Venturing into the uncharted territories of the startup ecosystem, the Pakistani expat didn’t have a formal background in business. However, what she did have was a deep sense of purpose, rooted in personal experiences shared with her younger brother Ahmed, who's also a person of determination.

"I'd often think about Ahmed. What would his life look like when he has a job? Will he go to an office? In the back of my mind, I couldn’t shake this whisper: When he goes for his first interview, no one’s going to recognise how talented or witty he is, they’ll just see his wheelchair,” Hafsa recalls.

A couple of years later, the family encountered new challenges when Hafsa’s mother temporarily acquired a disability due to an injury that led her to also use a wheelchair. “This experience served as a wake-up call for me, prompting my transition to working on ‘ImInclusive' full-time. Since then, I haven’t looked back,” says the 29-year-old.

The disability advocate has since transformed her initiative, which began as a conversation between her and her brother, into a revenue-generating social enterprise. ImInclusive now serves not only as an employability platform for people of determination seeking jobs but also offers disability inclusion services to large-scale employers.

“We help organisations, more specifically HR departments, develop a strategy for building a disability-inclusive business and integrate this into their Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) initiatives,” Hafsa explains.

The platform also provides CPD-certified training programmes to help employers educate their teams on how to engage with people with disabilities, conduct interviews, and retain an inclusive team. “We present data-driven evidence to support our approach; for example, research from Accenture shows that companies that hire people with disabilities experience 28 per cent higher revenues than those that do not,” she adds.

The organisation’s consulting and service-provider approach has also resonated with several large-scale clients, including Dnata and Chalhoub Group. “They have embraced our services not just from a corporate social responsibility (CSR) perspective, but as part of their HR strategy. To have companies come together and pledge to be more inclusive, especially such giant industry players, is a milestone that my team will remember for the rest of our lives.”

On September 9, ImInclusive launched the largest career fair for Emirati people of determination in the UAE. “Some of our career fairs cater exclusively to the Emirati population, while others are designed to include both Emirati and expat communities,” says Hafsa, adding that the uptake of these events has increased immensely since their first career fair launched in 2023.

The ‘Inclusivity Career Fair 2024’ created a unique platform for employers, corporate entities, and government sectors to explore and implement disability-inclusive employment solutions. The fair was part of the ongoing Atmah Programme, the GCC’s first Social Impact Bond, initiated by the Authority of Social Contribution – Ma’an.

The event gathered more than 120 HR and DEI professionals, showcasing the importance of hiring people of determination across all levels and providing equitable opportunities for inclusive talent.

“2024 has been a game changer for us,” says Hafsa. “The Atmah programme is significantly changing the way communities interact with one another and we’re the delivery provider for the inclusive employment criteria under this initiative. This means we have increased our engagement from 100 employers per year to 160 additional employers just for this project alone.”

For this career fair, ImInclusive helped select 100 Emirati job seekers of determination to participate. These candidates have either already been placed in roles or will be placed in the coming months through the organisation's upskilling process.

Salem Bawazir, a learning and development associate, shared how the initiative has helped him navigate the job search process with ease. "ImInclusive played a crucial role in simplifying my job search journey. Their event provided me with a platform to connect with various employers and explore a wide range of job opportunities."

"Thanks to ImInclusive, I was able to find the ideal job that aligns perfectly with my career aspirations, enabling me to take a step forward and achieve my professional goals,” says Salem.

Similarly, Mohamed Ashraf Eid Mahmoud, a 24-year-old working as receptionist at the Intercontinental Hotel Abu Dhabi, expressed his gratitude for the support he has received from the community. "The company helped me develop my work by conducting training courses that prepared me with all the support I needed before entering the job interview.”

Currently, ImInclusive works with four primary disability classifications: hearing disabilities, visual disabilities, physical disabilities, and neurodivergence. Through initiatives like career fairs and targeted training programmes, they've empowered many people of determination to succeed in their professional journeys. “So far, we have created 400 economic opportunities for people of determination,” Hafsa says, with a smile.

But what does "economic opportunity" mean in this context? It means that there may be candidates who are eager to work but can only do so from home, she explains. “We create assignments that can be completed remotely, allowing them to deliver work for the corporations we partner with, thus adding direct value to the corporate chain while ensuring they receive compensation for their efforts.”

As a result, ImInclusive not only offers full-time roles but also includes part-time, and contractual roles, with opportunities for event-based hiring. “The entire process is structured as an upskilling pathway,” says Hafsa.

When a person of determination reaches out to ImInclusive—either via email or by creating a profile on our web portal—they undergo a screening process based on the criteria set by the registered employers to find a suitable match. If they are not yet ready to enter the workforce, the organisation also provides events and socialisation groups to help them build their skills and confidence.

“As you may have noticed, all of this aligns with my dream of creating a LinkedIn for people of determination! At the time, the thought seemed very far-fetched but now we’re much closer to achieving that dream," says Hafsa. "We are currently working to upskill at least 5,000 individuals from this community."

Regardless of all the milestones the social enterprise has achieved in recent years, the core mission of ImInclusive remains grounded in the belief that disability should not define a person's ability to work or live fully. "There is real shame and stigma that people face, and a lot of cultural bias that perpetuates the idea of disability as either a curse or a blessing."

"Society often defaults to the charity model of disability instead of recognising it through the human rights or social models, which call for community support to reduce barriers,” says Hafsa.

"People of determination are often tagged as children, however not being addressed age-appropriately is detrimental to an individual's growth, especially in workplace inclusion," she adds. "People of determination are not children but adults—equal and capable—just like everyone else and want to be recognised for their wholesome personalities."

To ensure this, Hafsa and her team have ambitious plans to continue expanding their impact going forward "We have a major career fair coming up in Abu Dhabi again in April 2025, and another in Dubai at the end of this October, inclusive of both Emiratis and expats," she shares. "We'll keep breaking our own records, including people with disabilities actively in all processes, and pushing the boundaries of what's possible."