Top ten blog posts in 2013 (1-5)

As I continue my top 10 list with the top 5 most popular blog posts I am reminded of the many wonderful memories I have from our field trips and action learning activities. I am also reminded of the amazing students I have had the pleasure to teach here in the UAE for the past four and a half years. I have learned as much from them as they have from me.

Number 5:

The blog post about one of my favorite areas of the UAE came in at number 6 with 216 views. Eco-tourism development in Dibba combines the results of two graduation projects about the possibilities of developing sustainable tourism hand in hand with small-scale locally developed (and locally run) activities that concentrate on the cultural, historical and natural beauty of the area. I was proud of the efforts they made to interview people living in the area to see what they would like to see developed as well as interviews with potential tourists - wanting to see the "real" UAE and experience its beauty first hand.

I love how much they love the UAE flag - they manage to place it everywhere in the mountains... look high up next time you visit and you will be rewarded with a tangible example of pride, ingenuity and no fear of heights!

Number 4:

The fourth most visited blog post brings back very bitter sweet memories. We were invited to a student's family mountain retreat to learn about the strategies of survival from the past (the ruins of old family dwellings are still there) and the strategy of maintaining traditions and heritage going into the future.  Hassan Shemali, his father and family welcomed us into their home and beloved mountains. Hassan passed away this past November when his truck was swept away in a powerful wadi (flash flood) - we were blessed to have known him and to have known his mountains. Strategy trip to the mountains of RAK provides photos of a largely undiscovered part of the UAE for expats and tourists and proves that young people do hold on and maintain their traditions... and enjoy passing them on to their friends and professors.

Hassan is on the far left - his father, cousins and friends join in the Nekbah - how the Shehhi and Shemali tribes communicated in the past in the mountains

Number 3:

I am Canadian - so when I saw on facebook that one of my former female students was playing ice hockey at a National and international level I had to learn more. Hockey Night in Abu Dhabi: Spotlight on an Emirati Hockey Queen was viewed 243 times and tells a story through photos of ice hockey in Abu Dhabi and how Fatima Al Ali became so enamored with the game she now plays on the National Team :) She is also the first Emirati sport's photographer and has had a documentary made about her accomplishments! (Click to view documentary)

Fatima in her uniform after the game!

Number 2:

Keeping with a female theme - the second most popular blog post in 2013 at 368 views was Characteristics of Female Entrepreneurs in the UAE in 2011. It contained information from the 2011 UAE GEM Report we published at the end of 2012 in a condensed form. The data and our analysis shows some challenges and also some hopeful signs for the future.

	Female	Male
Knows someone who started a business in the past 2 years	28.1%	32.3%
Expected Job Growth of Established Business	44.0%	18.2%
Employed by others in Full-time work	39.3%	80.9%
Full-time Homemaker	27.4%	0.3%
Stage of Activity as Nascent Entrepreneurs	80.10%	54.0%
Stage of Activity as Baby Entrepreneurs	19.9%	46.0%
Informal Investors in the Last 3 Years	3.8%	5.2%

Number 1:

The most popular blog post of the year was about a wonderful trip to learn about the strategies and tactics used by ranchers of racing camels. At 808 views Camel racing farm visit - another adventure in learning strategy from traditional industries really was a clear "winner". The video we took of the robot jockey was also popular on youtube.

Eating really expensive hay!

Training as the day get cooler... 

It was a wonderful year of adventures in research and learning - I look forward to see what the next few months hold in store!

Smile and courage and best wishes for an adventurous 2014 to you all, Dr. Connie

Top ten blog posts in 2013 (6-10)

As I mentioned in my "Lessons” of blogging post in May (you can read here, readers seem to like lists. As the final days of 2013 countdown I thought it might be interesting – for me as much as for you – to countdown the top ten blog posts of the year as rated by number of views. (I know this places a bias on posts published at the beginning of the year, but hey, the world of lists is full of biases!)

Number 10:

There are three article snapshot posts that made it in the top 10. Coming in at number 10 with 136 views is the post Article Snapshot: Business Opportunities in the UAE. The post provided an excerpt of an article I wrote for a newly launched online magazine in Canada – Canadian Business Strategist Magazine. It outlined the many untapped opportunities available to Canadian companies (or really any company) in health care, adventure and eco-tourism, metals, convenience stores, fashion and food and beverage.

Number 9:

The ninth most read blog post at 145 views was Male Youth Entrepreneurship in the UAE: a Research Project. The project was to study the motivators and deterrents of young men to become entrepreneurs and also looked at the lessons learned from two Emirati entrepreneurs interviewed by Yousef Al Shehhi. Yousef (now graduated) did a great job and he presented his findings at the MIT-Masdar Institute Forum on Entrepreneurship and Innovation  to great interest by researchers and the general public. 

Yousef and his poster 

Number 8:

Looking back at the numbers I was kind of surprised at number 8... The post Joining the Conversation: How to get our voices heard from the Middle East (2/2), with 149 views, is all about research and becoming a bigger part of the global management research community. As we approach the deadline for 2014 Academy of Management submissions I hope there will be more submissions from the Middle East in 2014 than 2013... I know many in the group photo below are working towards that goal!

Caucus participants AOM 2013

Number 7:

The second article snapshot is an article wrote in collaboration with researchers in Tunisia and Yemen. At 165 views, Entrepreneurs and their networks in MENA: an article and project using big data (and policy recommendations too!) was the results of a much larger grant project supported by the IRDC involving 14 MENA countries looking at the networks used by entrepreneurs. (I wrote about the five day workshop we had in 2012 starting in daily blog posts - day 1 here). Taha, Lotfi and I found that there was significant difference between entrepreneurs at various stages of venture development for network size and network diversity and that entrepreneurs with larger networks (number of advisers and more diverse (from different environments, e.g. private, work, professional advisers are more likely to launch their business in a short time. However, most entrepreneurs in the region have shallow and narrow networks... which leads us to our policy recommendations... 

The number of networks used by entrepreneurs in the MENA region

Number 6:

The third article snapshot - in a way a culmination of a project begun in August 2010 in the very room I am currently working in in Lorraine, Quebec - had 178 views. Article snapshot: “Technological innovation in the United Arab Emirates: process and challenges” is about the innovation process of an Emirati inventor and entrepreneur - Mariam Al Hallami, the first author, found that while the process used by the entrepreneur in the UAE is similar to that of entrepreneurs in the West, the lack of Industrial Research Centers puts a hamper scaling up inventions and innovations.

R&D expenditure - the MENA region needs to step up spending!

So that was 10 through 6... the top 5 will follow shortly....