Dubai Electricity and Water Authority (DEWA) has today organised a workshop to discuss its Strategic Plan 2021 at the Grand Hyatt hotel in Dubai. HE Saeed Mohammed Al Tayer, MD & CEO of DEWA led the workshop, which was attended by DEWAs management.

Al Tayer welcomed the participants, noting that DEWA adopts the principles of a strategy-focused organisation and intends to achieve its vision to become a sustainable world-class utility.

HH Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, once observed that, As long as the vision is clear, the objectives can be easily achieved. We know this is true, which is why we have a clear strategy in place. Today, we discuss DEWAs strategic plan for 2021, which supports the UAE Vision 2021 and the Dubai Plan 2021. In fact, 2021 will be a pivotal year in the history of our beloved country. It will be the year when we celebrate the golden jubilee of the union of the Emirates. By then, we will have made more significant accomplishments for DEWA, Dubai, and the UAE, said Al Tayer.

Strategic planning is one of the most important foundations of modern management. It plays a key role in improving the performance of an organisation and developing its work mechanisms to make the most efficient use of our resources. Planning also helps to align resources with goals, to achieve quality, and the happiness of customers and stakeholders, he added.

While we develop DEWAs Strategic Plan 2021, we take into account various factors. These include an expected future growth in demand, major development projects in Dubai, and local and federal initiatives such as the Green Economy for Sustainable Development, launched by HH Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, to build a green economy and a sustainable environment in the UAE that supports long-term economic growth. We will also be considering the Dubai Plan 2021, to establish Dubai as a smart and sustainable city whose environmental elements are clean, healthy, and sustainable, and the Dubai Integrated Energy Strategy 2030, announced by the Dubai Supreme Council of Energy, to diversify the energy mix and reduce energy demand. We will also consider other external factors that may influence our strategy, added Al Tayer.

His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum has observed that, Collective thinking and open dialogue with work teams create better ideas that could lead to successes. We meet here today to build on the results of several initiatives that use collective thinking, and consider other suggestions made here today. At DEWA, we do our best to enhance the Creativity Lab experience in all our operations to drive organisational excellence, increase efficiency and performance, and improve government services to establish Dubai and the UAE as the most creative and innovative in the world. DEWA has organised a range of initiatives and meetings to achieve this, such as the Creativity Lab, where we were honoured by the visit of HH Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum who attended part of it. Our teams discussed five topics: Sustainability, Smart City, Creativity in Customer Services, Happiness, and Research, Development and Innovation. We also launched brainstorming campaigns, for our staff, partners, and stakeholders using social media. We organised the Creativity Lab for Contractors and Consultants, where we listened to the views of contractors and consultants and their suggestions for improvement to facilitate and speed up getting electricity and water services according to world-class practices. We recently launched My DEWA Ideas portal, to encourage staff to put forward their ideas and creative suggestions. DEWA launched several other initiatives to identify different views and proposals. We believe in the importance of brainstorming as a well-established methodology in organisational decision-making to reach a happy society in Dubai, added Al Tayer.

DEWA has an excellent multi-functional workforce. I am confident that today's session identifies new aspects of DEWAs strategy that will help us to manage recent changes, such as increasing the targets for renewable energy in Dubais energy mix to 7% by 2020 and 15% by 2030, increasing the capacity of the Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum Solar Park to 2,600MW by 2030, as well as other updates that should be included in our 2021 strategy. This supports efforts to achieve DEWAs vision to become a sustainable world-class utility and the Dubai Plan 2021 to make Dubai the preferred place to live, work, and visit, concluded Al Tayer.

DEWA's strategic direction comprises of its vision, mission, motto, and values. Strategic objectives are then identified and incorporated into its respective themes and the four perspectives of the Balanced Scorecard: Triple Bottom Line, Internal Processes, Stakeholders, and Support, Learning & Growth. Today, we discuss all these inputs to come up with a clearer picture of DEWAs Strategic Plan 2021, which will define its future direction. We will also present integrated plans and development programmes to drive DEWAs activities and ensure excellence in all tasks. The strategy will focus on positive growth opportunities and explore ways for further improvement, said Waleed Salman, Executive Vice President of Strategy and Business Development at DEWA.

The workshop reviewed the outline of DEWAs Strategic Plan 2021 based on different inputs including its future priorities, its seven-year strategic plan, and the outcomes of the Creativity Lab for staff and partners. Other inputs include the brainstorming campaign to collect feedback and suggestions of customers and stakeholders, in addition to reviewing best international practices.

Sectors and individuals, winners of DEWAs Strategy Excellence programme, were honoured at the end of the workshop.