HOW THIS NIGERIAN IN QATAR GOT A JOB THAT HE HAD NO IDEA ABOUT
I’m writing this from Saudi Arabia where I had gone on the Islamic pilgrimage. The career blogger in me was at play when I had a chat with a friend who had also come for the pilgrimage. I think JarusHub readers will find the story of this young man who left Nigeria few years ago teachable.
He holds an HND in Banking & Finance from a polytechnic in South West Nigeria. He was working as an accounts officer in a small company in Lagos up till 2010. Somehow, some Nigerian agents in Qatar were able to convince him to come to Qatar for job. They promised El Dorado. There were jobs in Qatar, they said. In collaboration with some local Qatari firms, these “Work in Qatar” agents brought these Nigerians to Qatar for “greener pastures”.
Well, my friend got there and met a different story. No jobs. All the promises were coated with sugar just to collect their agency fees. Although they were not entirely fraud as at least, they got them visa and facilitated their move to Qatar. It was when they got to Qatar that they dumped them. Everybody was now on their own.
My friend knew no one in Qatar. He met many other Nigerians that had been promised jobs in Qatar only to be left in the lurch.
First 6 months, no job. The visa they got for them was to expire after one year and they needed to be on the employ of a company to be able to renew his residency permit. My friend began to take his destiny into his own hands, searching for jobs on the internet, googling all jobs available in Qatar.
Then he saw an advert for Health, Safety & Environment (HSE) job in a company and applied, despite being a Banking & Finance graduate. He quickly tailored his CV to that role, read about HSE online, quickly registered for an online HSE training just to have HSE on his CV (even if yet to take the training) and sent his CV within days.
He was invited for interview within weeks. Based on what he had read on the internet and the online (American) training they saw on his CV, they asked whether he could prepare an HSE Plan/Programme. He said he could. They asked how many weeks it will take him to prepare the Plan, he said 4 weeks; they told him 4 weeks was too much, and they agreed 2 weeks.
The friend got home and researched HSE Plan/Schedule on the internet and was able to adapt it and come up with an HSE Plan for the company. He said they were wowed and asked him questions on it. As he had developed interest in HSE while doing all internet research, he was able to answer the questions well. He was paid what equivalent of N250,000 in Nigerian money for that assignment and also retained as HSE Supervisor for the company.
He said the first day he was taken to their site, he saw many Nigerians – graduates of even top universities in Nigeria who had run to Qatar on that fake job promises by these agents – doing manual jobs on the site, and this Nigerian community were surprised how he got his own Supervisor role. They never knew he got it by playing smart with Google.
That was 2010. He went on develop himself in the field by registering for HSE exams including NEBOSH and further experience on the job. He now has various certificates in HSE and has moved from about 5 companies/projects. He currently works as the HSE officer for an oil and gas project in Qatar. He is doing well.
He also told me that HSE is a rapidly growing field in Qatar and Gulf countries in general. In fact, as much as 80% of Nigerians that work there work as Safety professionals. I think there is a statutory requirement that for every 20 workers, there must be one HSE officer. What that means is that a company that has 100 workers must have 5 HSE professionals.
HSE is a growing field in Nigeria too, especially in the Oil & Gas industry.
LESSONS
- Be careful with all those “Work in Qatar”, “Work in Dubai” etc agents. They are everywhere on the internet and offline.
- You can self- learn almost anything.
- Almost any CV can be tailored to fit almost any job. The only HSE thing he had on his CV as at the time he applied for that job was the HSE training he quickly registered for after seeing the advert.
- In most Asian countries, it appears spoken English and level of education don’t rank very high in evaluation of candidates. My friend, with due respect to him, isn’t one you will see speak very flawless English. He is also a Polytechnic graduate. And well, a bearded Mallam. In Nigeria, employers care very much about these things no matter the role you’re applying for.
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Thanks for sharing your friend’s story with us. Just hope that Nigerian job seekers will take precautions when applying or accepting job offers online especially from foreign countries.
I’ve heard of similar cases more often, but I’m happy for your friend he got a job at the end.
Tips: Before accepting any job offer try to research the company to confirm the offer is genuine.
Also read this post “Why Are Nigerians Moving Abroad?” (http://www.ansacareers.com/nigerians-moving-abroad/) to discover genuine websites where you can submit your CV for Job Opportunities Abroad