Month: March 2021

We concluded the second phase of our Coding Training Program with 22 successful students who were ready to bravely uncover the new adventures of the next phase “Full-Stack Web Development”.

• Overview:

In this preparatory stage, we hold technical and personal development sessions to keep our students connected with each other and with the learning process till we start the Full-Stack Development stage. Moreover, the third phase is planned to be intensive and packed with various new materials and tasks, so with these weekly meetings, our trainers equip the students with the adequate skills to relieve any possible stress they might have.

This month, our students have made progress on several levels illustrated in the following points:

• Technical Skills 

The students have been trained on an introduction to JavaScript in a practical type of session. They are given some problems to solve and discuss together during the meeting and homework to do alone. In this way, we make sure the students are more engaged in programming and learn new techniques to code.

• Soft Skills

At the hands of an experienced personal development coach, our students learn new skills, such as building a professional CV. They also learn how to control stress and turn it into a motive to work harder. Besides this, the trainer keeps giving them regular pieces of advice and encourages them to keep up the good work. 

In addition to this, the students have participated in a Career Fair attended by startups from the USA and experienced job interviews with international companies. Through such events, we aim to put our students in different learning opportunities that can help them grow vocationally and improve their soft skills that are crucial for their career lives.

• English Skills

To prepare our students to enter the international labor market in the future, we are keen to enhance their English language skills. Using different teaching methods like quizzes, games, presentations, and reading articles. These sessions enrich the students’ vocabulary and motivate them to practice English more.

Join Us:

We need experienced developers and personal development coaches to mentor our students in this life-changing journey. To join our community and support the program – wherever you are based – contact us:

Abeer Abu Gaith ( The founder and the CEO ):

[email protected] 

Noor Abu Gaith ( Project Coordinator ):

[email protected] 

About Us:

 
MENA Alliances is a nearshoring company – for-profit with a social mission- that aims to provide a high-quality remote workforce on-demand. It desires to solve the problem of a local talent shortage for automation while creating economic opportunities for women and young people in the MENA region. Our teams can scale in a short time and handle small to large projects.
We are on a mission to alleviate poverty and injustice in the MENA region by creating jobs for women and young people in this region. So far, we have trained more than 3000 women and young people and created 700+ job opportunities for disadvantaged people by connecting them with jobs from Europe, the USA (such as Silicon Valley), and the Gulf region. 
 
Code Your Future (CYF) is a non-profit institution in the United Kingdom that trains refugees and other disadvantaged groups to become web developers to help them find jobs in the field of technology.

 
“Acquiring the right talent is the most important key to growth. Hiring was – and still is – the most important thing we do.”
– Marc Bennioff, Founder of Salesforce
Throughout our journey in the field of connecting global companies with the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) professionals, we realized how finding the right talent and linking it to the appropriate job opportunity is much more than just a business. This job has been bringing employment opportunities for talented women & young people in the Middle East & North Africa’s untapped market.
 
Therefore, our hiring process has gone through many improvements until it reached the current version which meets our clients’ different needs and gets the best out of the MENA’s professionals.
 
Our work is not limited to hiring developers – they are the most demanded category nowadays, though – but we also source designers, translators, voice-over performers, content writers, admin assistants, and transcribers, just to name a few. We also provide a variety of flexible service delivery models that fit our clients’ business requirements, such as staff augmentation, dedicated team, and project-based sourcing models.
 
 
So how do we guarantee to acquire the TOP talents while managing the diverse requirements?
 
This is all managed through an adaptable recruitment process implemented by the collaborative efforts of the MENA Alliances’ team and is summarized in the following 10 steps:
 
 

• Identifying the Hiring Need.

 
The whole hiring process and its success depend mainly on identifying the recruitment needs accurately. And to do so, we listen carefully to the client and ask the right questions that enable us to lay our hands on their priorities, business goals, development gaps, talent shortage, budget, and other particular needs. 
 
“MENA Alliances team’s ability to listen to our needs and work with us in growing the team as needed have made them true and valued partners!”
– Naama, COO of Colabo 
This is how one of our clients in the USA describes our partnership.
 
 

• Devise the Recruitment Plan.

 
After we discuss the client’s requirements, we make the necessary adjustments to our recruitment plan to fulfill their specific needs. Modifying the plan includes strategizing how to publicize the hiring position, criteria for candidate screening, what the assessment approach will consist of, and how the interview process will look like; all based on the client’s terms.
 
“MENA Alliances’s flexibility has allowed us to recruit both temporary enforcement for immediate short tasks and to grow our team on a more permanent basis with senior and experienced developers working remotely alongside our in-house developers.”
 
 

• Writing a Job Description.

 
To get the right person to apply to the job, it all starts with the job description!
 
In the job description, we write the necessary information that we need the applicants to be aware of before applying to save our time and efforts in the reviewing step. This comprises a clearly defined job title, a straight-to-the-point job overview, a list of specific anticipated responsibilities, and required skills. And we conclude it with a strong call-to-action to encourage high-quality candidates to submit their applications.
 
 

• Advertising the Position

 
At this phase, we start implementing the recruitment plan that we set earlier. 
 
Finding highly-qualified potential candidates begins internally as we look through our talent database to pick up from the available candidates that we assessed in previous hiring processes but did not get chosen. Then, we check the availability of the needed talents in our network.
 
In addition to that, we advertise the job vacancy externally on our social media platforms and job posting sites, like LinkedIn, and spread it out to our online community and other remote workforces. Besides that, our recruitment team uses “headhunting” to find the right professionals for the job. 
 
By using different approaches in this stage, we get the best of the best professionals. 
 
 

• Reviewing, Screening, and Shortlisting Applications

 
Once we receive job applications, our recruitment team reviews them regularly on the basis of minimum qualification. 
 
Later on, they filter and sort the CVs that have the preferred credentials by looking at the expertise and the specific skills that are required for the role.
 
Finally, the most qualified candidates are shortlisted to the next phase, and we send them emails to inform them about their acceptance and arrange for an interview.
 
 

• Initial Interview & Assessment 

 
Our recruitment team prepares for the first video interview to get to know the shortlisted applicants face-to-face before nominating them for our client.
 
The shortlisted applicants get filtered after the interview based on the requirements of our client, English skills,  and their level of professionalism, and the final candidates are sent to the client to prepare for the next level of assessment.
 
Paying a lot of efforts in this stage drove our clients to consistently praise our speed and accuracy in shortlisting the best candidates to the interview, as one of our regular clients says:
 
 “We have reached out several times with very specific talent requirements and were matched with relevant interviewees within a day or two. We are constantly impressed by the developers we meet and have yet to have an irrelevant interview!”
 
We also add the final shortlisted candidate in our database for future job nominations in case they did not get the current client’s job opportunity. (As mentioned in step 4)
 
 

• Technical Test/Interview. 

 
The second level of assessment is more accurate in testing the candidates’ basic technical skills that are crucial for the job.
 
If it is a translator role, we prepare a project-specific type of test to examine the candidate’s translation skills and make sure that it matches our client’s particular needs.
If it is a developer role, we hold a technical interview in which specific web-development tools are used to evaluate the candidate’s programming skills and performance.
 
And so on and so forth!
 
 

• Soft Skills Interviews

 
For technical skills are not the only necessary requirements for a perfect job candidate, we hold another interview to take a deeper look at the interviewees’ characters, adaptability to work in a different culture, language skills, communication skills, etc. We also check their backgrounds and references for a better view of their suitability for the position.
 
These interviews are usually held in the presence of the client who has the last word on who to stay and who to leave.
 
 

• Onboarding

 
After choosing the successful candidate/s who pass the multi-level assessment process, we send them the job offer and the contract with all the clear details. 
And by this stage, we succeed in linking the right talent to the appropriate job opportunity.
 
Nevertheless, our job is not done yet!
 

• Talent Management

 
The talents that we hire for our clients are still considered our responsibility. Whether they are a team or individuals, we manage their workflow with the client, check their performance and progress, solve their problems, and pay their salaries.
 
“Working with MENA Alliances has been super effective to our company. The team is very helpful and supportive and they go the extra mile to support your mission.”
 
To recap, what makes us a trustworthy hiring partner for many of our clients is our constant efforts and passion to bring them the most fitting talent from the best of the best of the MENA’s untapped talent pool and ensure they are satisfied even after the hiring.
 

About Us:

 
MENA Alliances is a nearshoring company – for-profit with a social mission- that aims to provide a high-quality remote workforce on-demand. It desires to solve the problem of a local talent shortage for automation while creating economic opportunities for women and young people in the MENA region. Our teams have the ability to scale in a short time and handle small to large projects.
We are on a mission to alleviate poverty and injustice in the MENA region by creating jobs for women and young people in this region. So far, we have trained more than 3000 women and young people and created 700+ job opportunities for disadvantaged people by connecting them with jobs from Europe, the USA (such as Silicon Valley), and the Gulf region. 
 
Are you looking for new talents to work on your diverse projects on your own terms?
 

Contact us:  

Email: [email protected] 

Phone: +970 59-938-8102

Whatsapp: +44 7380 980791

• Overview:

 
MENA Alliances has recently concluded the second phase “Fundamentals” of its Coding Training Program in collaboration with Code Your Future from the UK over four consecutive weeks. 
 
During this stage, our students get a gentle introduction to what programming is, why they want to learn and how to start learning. 
 
In light of this, we held various types of training meetings that can bring our students the benefits that they need to compete and stay strong in the labor market. This includes different parts, like technical sessions, mentorship, personal development (PD) sessions, English classes, study groups, and “Ya3ni Talk” conversations.
 
 

• Technical Training:

 
Our students are taught the basics of JavaScript and other programming languages by experienced developers in tech along with extra online study resources. They are also provided with various software and online easily accessible tools such as “Khan Academy” and “Code. Org” to help them practice, apply their studies and equip them with self-learning skills. 
 
Moreover, in an attempt to lighten up the mood during the meeting, we conclude with a test that measures the students’ understanding of the studied materials using the “Kahoot” gaming site. And to communicate professionally, the students and trainers use “Slack” to stay connected & informed of the latest updates.
 
At the end of this stage, only the committed, collaborative and hard-working students graduate this phase and move to the next level, which is a “Full-Stack Web Development” course.
Outcome: 33 students successfully passed the second phase.
 

 
 
 
 

• Personal Development Training:

 
Our Coding Training Program was not originally planned to only teach our students programming and improve their technical skills. It rather aims to fully prepare our students to become a professional group of developers who are ready to enter the tech industry confidently and adapt to the local and global markets’ requirements.
 
Therefore, we held Personal Development meetings with experts of developments in the HR field to improve the students’ soft skills in terms of communication, time management, teamwork, problem-solving, etc to make them match the market’s needs better. We also hosted experts from international tech leader companies like Capgemini, French multinational corporation that provides consulting, technology, professional, and outsourcing services, that joins part of our training to deliver training session about “effective communication in the tech market” to our students. Through these sessions, we want to help the students build solid understanding about the skills needed in the tech market and build up their self-esteem and confidence.
 
“Besides learning some basic soft skills, this kind of meeting is a space for me to express my concerns and to share the details of how my study week went,” student Randa says.

 
 
 

• Mentorship:

 
More than 8 mentoring sessions were held under the supervision of specialists and leaders of worldwide known companies in the field of technology.
 
These meetings aim to provide the students with regular feedback on their improvement and pieces of advice to enhance their progress, and to encourage them to move forward to their future dream jobs. They were held weekly using English in a way to boost the students’ language skills. Emphasis was also placed on the importance of creating their own career identity such as a professional LinkedIn profile.

Our student Ibraheem says, “I learned how to overcome the struggles I might face at work in the future.”
 
 

• Study Groups:

 
Creating a collaborative community in which all members get to support and learn from each other is one of the primary goals in our Coding Training Program. Consequently, we were keen to run regular online study groups for the students to strengthen their relationships and foster collaboration and teamwork among them. 
 
One of our diligent students, Rama, describes how she liked these meetings “I made new friends and we talked about our goals and interests and supported one another to keep going forward. Everything was very exciting!”
 

While they were gathering to study and do their homework together, they consciously or unconsciously helped and depended on each other to solve problems. This way, we aim to build a generation of developers who are not only technically qualified, but also collaborative team players.
 
 
 

• Ya3ni Talk:

 
Youth in Palestine are isolated from the rest of the world, because of a lot of restrictions that deprive them of getting the experience and expanding their horizons. Therefore, we established “Ya3ni Talk” as a safe space for young generations to communicate with the world and to learn how to improve themselves both professionally and personally. 
 
Through Ya3ni Talk sessions, we connect our students with local and international experts and business leaders to let them experience open discussions about various topics with great-minded speakers. To help our students in improving their discussion skills, we include the students in breakout sessions in which they directly speak with senior developers, tech experts, and business owners. From this, we intend to build professional developers who are confident to have profitable conversations with their future clients, managers, and colleagues.
 
 

About Us:

 
MENA Alliances is a nearshoring company – for-profit with a social mission- that aims to provide a high-quality remote workforce on-demand. It desires to solve the problem of a local talent shortage for automation while creating economic opportunities for women and young people in the MENA region. Our teams can scale in a short time and handle small to large projects.
We are on a mission to alleviate poverty and injustice in the MENA region by creating jobs for women and young people in this region. So far, we have trained more than 3000 women and young people and created 700+ job opportunities for disadvantaged people by connecting them with jobs from Europe, the USA (such as Silicon Valley), and the Gulf region. 
 
Code Your Future (CYF) is a non-profit institution in the United Kingdom that trains refugees and other disadvantaged groups to become web developers to help them find jobs in the field of technology.
 

To communicate with us: 

Abeer Abu Gaith ( The founder and the CEO ):

[email protected] 

Noor Abu Gaith ( Project coordinator ):

[email protected]