Measuring our social impact

Over the years, NBF has consistently won awards for outstanding employee experience and is at the forefront of introducing innovative staff solutions and benefits. We care about fostering our people and our culture both in the office and in our broader communities.

2020 in numbers: 

Gender diversity:

In 2020, 42% of NBF’s workforce was female with a strong representation of women in management roles, underpinning the bank’s focus on gender diversity. Women occupy 11% of Board seats.

Equal opportunity:

NBF works actively to put measures in place to promote equal opportunity, these include:

• Raising awareness among our employees on our stance against discrimination and harassment through our Code of Conduct and Human Resource (HR) practices.
• Recognising Emirati staff for their exemplary performance on the occasion of the Emirati Women’s Day.
• The introduction of a diversity and inclusion policy

Emiratisation:

NBF’s Emiratisation ratio stands at 45%, one of the highest in the UAE’s financial services industry. We remain committed to developing the next generation of Emirati professionals, fast tracking their career development, and building a high-performing organisation with a continued focus on Emiratisation.

NBF has deployed a number of measures to promote nationalisation, including:

• Recruiting Emirati talent at NBF career fairs across the UAE.
• A training scheme for UAE nationals that includes the National Development Programme and Career Advancement Programme.
• The tracking and reporting of our nationalisation rate against the UAE Central Bank points scheme – by March 2020 NBF had achieved 830 points, more than double the required level of 408.

Health & safety:

NBF’s commitment to the welfare of its employees was recognised when the bank received the coveted ISO 45001: 2018 Certification for Occupational Health and Safety Management System award. The accolade was given to the Property & Services team after a rigorous audit of our HSE policy, processes and controls and their conformity to the ISO 45001 standards.

NBF’s Employee Wellbeing Programme generates awareness of health and safety issues by:

• Running regular training sessions, emails and webinars.
• Offering a free and confidential professional counselling service.
• Hosting annual staff sporting events to promote a healthy lifestyle.
• Providing annual biometric health tests.
• Offering yoga sessions in the office for stress management.

Responsible relationships with customers:

NBF has various mechanisms in place to ensure responsible customer relations. These include:

• An ISO 9001 certification.
• An annual customer satisfaction survey.
• A dedicated customer service quality committee that enhances customer service in line with industry benchmarks.
• A hands-on customer service team that gathers feedback from premier banking customers.
• Over 70 service quality champions across the business who meet monthly to come up with ways to drive customer service improvement.
• A dedicated customer experience team focused on making banking as user-friendly as possible to use NBF online applications.
• Online platforms, including a mobile app, making easier for customers to transact – 70% of our customer base have now transitioned to digital banking.
• Ongoing customer service training for NBF employees.

Employee training and development:

NBF consistently ranks as one of the top banks in the region when it comes to staff satisfaction. Employee training and development is one of our top priorities and our projects include:

• An in-house leadership development track focused on cultivating leadership competencies among key employees.
• A mandatory e-learning programme for all staff members to help them stay abreast of trends and better fulfil their responsibilities.
• An annual staff satisfaction survey that consistently places NBF in the top quartile of organisations globally.
• Access to certified courses such as Six Sigma and People  Management Program.
• An internal innovation contest that is run during UAE Innovation Month – winners are rewarded for their outstanding ideas.
• A new cloud-based Human Resources system that supports employees in sharing knowledge, experience and best practices efficiently. 

Community initiatives:

In 2020, NBF donated AED 0.3 million to social causes and supported various community initiatives, including:

• A partnership with Emirates Nature whereby customers were able to contribute towards the conservation of Hajar Mountains through NBF’s ATM network.
• The Mission to Seafarers (MTS) – a charitable initiative that cares for seafarers off the UAE coast.
• Support of the Fujairah Welfare Association on various community development projects.

Promotion of social & economic development:

Throughout the year, NBF launched multiple campaigns to support clients’ needs and address social and economic development. Some of the initiatives included:

• A partnership with Emirates Development Bank (EDB) for the ‘SME Credit Guarantee Fund Scheme’, which provides strategic financing solutions to the SME ecosystem.
• NBF GenNext – an annual week-long business leadership and financial literacy programme to help equip clients’ children to take over the family business one day.
• NBFConnect – a first-of-its-kind digital banking platform dedicated to UAE SMEs.

Youth employment:

NBF is passionate about grooming the next generation of business leaders and we do so through various youth employment measures, including:

• Participating in UAE career fairs.
• A mentorship programme for the next generation of leaders.
• An annual Management Training Programme that trains a cohort of around 25 Emirati graduates, many of whom join NBF.
• Internship opportunities for university and college students.
• A scholarship programme for Emirati undergrads.
• A bursary programme for talented final year Emirati students who have the opportunity to work at NBF.
• The NBF Technology Academy, a paid six-month internship aimed at empowering young Emiratis to make a positive mark by leveraging innovation to contribute to the local economy.