The Dubai Reality Check: The Real Cost of Building a Dubai Agency with Justin McGuire

Before we dive into today's conversation, I want to quickly shine a light on the 3 partners who are behind the mission of the podcast this year. First up, we have Atlas. This isn't just another CRM with AI added on as an afterthought. Atlas 2.0 is the first platform in our space built with AI from the ground up and at its core. Next up, we have our longtime partner Sourcewell. You may know them as a world-class outbound sequencing tool, but they fully evolved into a multi-modular system. And the best part is you can plug and play their tools from the AI note-taker to the inbox agent, all without ripping out your entire tech stack. And finally, Raise. They remain the most powerful way to fund and run your contract book if you want to unlock cash flow and scale your agency with total confidence. You have to check them out. So if you go to the link in the description below, you're going to be able to get access to exclusive offers to all three of our partners this year. Let's get into this week's episode. Justin, welcome back to the podcast.

Hishem, it's my pleasure, my friend. How are you?

Really good. We, we last did an interview like 5 years ago?

5 years? I, I mean, the world was a different place then. I was in a different place then, physically and mentally. Um, I was, I was in Singapore then, wasn't I? So, uh, and, and in part of a different business. Wow. Wow.

So now today you're joining me from Sri Lanka?

Yes.

Very recently went through an MBO of the business that you have spent blood, sweat, tears time on for 15 years. Still very much involved in now, which, which I'll touch on. And our goal in this conversation is to try and give everyone a genuine and transparent look into what do you need to do and what you need to understand to set up a business entity in Dubai. What are the benefits? What are the pros and cons? We're going to be very honest about that. And also we're gonna share some real insight into not only if you're interested in setting up and moving your life over to, uh, Dubai potentially, but actually serving the local market in the UAE and serving those, uh, local, uh, economies. So you've been serving this Middle East and Asia region for like over 16 years.

You know what, I've become Mr. Middle East and Asia. I don't think if you'd have asked a 25-year-old Justin, would he be an expert in the Middle East and Asia? But that's what I've ended up being. So yeah, actually I've done 18 years in the Middle East, right? Moved there just after the financial crisis and or during the financial crisis. So arrived in Dubai when actually it was getting smashed by the financial crisis. So I got offered a job by the time I arrived, the job had pretty much dissolved. But the weather was better than England and I decided to sit it out and I'm very pleased I did because I've seen one hell of a journey in that time. And I suppose I've been there before it's become the well-known establishment sort of UK exodus capital city of the world now to what it is. So yeah, I've seen it change a lot and I built business there. I've ridden 3 downturns there. And obviously, as you just said at the end, I've also sold a business there. I sold a learning and development company there back in 2020 as well. So I've seen a lot of things and I'm happy to share all with your audience today.

And what's also worth sharing is your world has very much been— and let me know if any of this is wrong— but your world and your recruitment business is like very perm-focused. Right.

Yeah. And it has been, and we'll touch on this, I'm sure, in the show, but it has been predominantly perm very much because the regions that my business has always served, and that is the Middle East and Asia. So MCG, which Charlie Boesch has now acquired and I'm chairman of, that has 4 locations. Okay. That's Dubai, Riyadh, Hong Kong, Singapore. And each of those are very perm-driven markets, but they also serve the wider region. And all of the wider region is predominantly perm-driven markets. People Typically in those parts of the world, people like having a, you know, if they're local, people like having a permanent steady job. The contracting and freelance world is, whilst it's coming into the market, it's still not necessarily that mature. And in the Middle East, you predominantly had a region that's been growing through expat growth. So because the, just to kind of give some context to that, the GCC, which is the Gulf Cooperation Council, that's the oil-producing countries where most expats go to. They're wealthy countries, but they've got quite low-density population. So a lot of time expats have gone in to help grow the economy. Saudi's obviously the one that's different there. It's got quite a high population around 30 million, but typically a lot of people have migrated into those markets to take permanent jobs, to get visas and to grow. And if you've got a visa, then you can only really work for your employer because your employer sponsors you in.

And your, your world for a very long time has been communications, media, digital. Is there anything else there, or do most things fall under those sort of headings or categories in terms of your world and your ecosystems?

Yeah, I mean, I'm a— I'm a focus on your niche, focus on what you know, be a master within that world. I was a guy that worked in the creative and communications world for 8 years. My journey into recruitment was basically I was an unsatisfied candidate. No one really seemed to understand what I was doing. This is back in the day when digital marketing was a, you know, was a new thing, and I worked in that space. So I realized there weren't a lot of recruiters that understood digital marketing, so set up my own business in that space. Yeah, yeah.

And then before— and then I've got here, before we get into it all, you're a gold visa holder in the UAE.

What? Yeah, did I tell you that?

Yeah, it sounds— I don't know, it sounds fancy, like a sort of gold American Express card. Like, what's the deal?

What does that mean? They used to— now they give them out to anyone. No, it's Basically, it means you get a 10-year residency. So I was awarded a Golden Visa for merit. So for having a business in the UAE and I suppose contributions to the economy, I got awarded a Golden Visa. That basically means me, my family, I could even sponsor my parents if they wanted to move to Dubai. We are entitled to a 10-year visa, which is a lovely thing to have. And having a UAE visa, even though I've got a British passport, having a UAE visa has been phenomenal thing to have in my life. And when you and I last spoke, I was living in Singapore. Living in Singapore during COVID was not the most pleasurable experience in the world just because Asia was really quite restrictive in what you could and certainly what you couldn't do. So having that UAE visa like we had then, my family and I were able to quickly sidestep back into the UAE in late '21. And having a UAE visa, aside from the well-known tax benefits, it's been a tremendous place for us as a family to grow up, to bring kids up, for my wife and I to— as you know, my wife has built a successful career in recruitment as well. She sold a technology platform to the Access Group, and I've built one of the first niche specialists from Dubai that serviced the Middle East and Asia market.

So let's— like, from our conversations, we— from both our conversations, because I know now you try and really share all of these things that you've learned the hard way with other recruitment entrepreneurs and anyone that may be really interested or need help in the, the UAE, uh, market— is that we feel like there's people that right now might fall into two categories. So one of those categories will be people that maybe are really interested in moving their life to Dubai personally, but also setting up a business entity in the UAE, but not necessarily because they want to serve the local market, but want to base themselves out of there, or at least have an entity there, and then potentially serve European, uh, or even US markets. And maybe even some people want to operate in the UK market from there. So that, that's the first category which we're going to talk to. And then the second part of this is also then there's people that want to do that, move their life or, you know, set up a business over there, but they see an opportunity in serving the local market for whatever niche that they're in and whatever sector they're in. Or they may see there's real growth markets in their world over in the UAE and they want to set up over there and also serve the local market. So where we wanted to start is what needs to happen and what are some of the practical steps and some transparency around if I'm in the, the position of I've maybe spent some time in Dubai on holiday, or I have friends over there, I maybe have my own recruitment business, and I love the idea of putting my life over there and setting up a business entity but not necessarily serving the local market. Justin, talk us through, like, right now— and I know you said this can change and it keeps evolving and there's different things that can change— but, you know, from what we know today and, you know, from your experience, like, what are the first steps to even, like, get near that? Let's just talk about that, like, what needs to happen and what are some of the checklist almost, like, what do we need to understand if we're really interested in setting up this business entity and moving our personal life to the UAE? Like, what do we need to understand and where do we need to, to start to make that a reality?

Yeah. So if you want to move your life over to the UAE, first of all, you're going to have to understand that when I moved out over there, it was— the cost of living was far less than what it is now. So the first thing I will always say to people, and probably the bit that's not talked about as much as I think it is, is yes, it's tax-free, but it's a very expensive place to live. It's an incredibly popular place to move to. And if you want to move there, you're going to need some cash reserves. Going in and moving your business, moving your life into somewhere like the UAE is going to involve quite a considerable amount of firepower from your bank account. Right. And I'm talking anywhere between $50,000 to $100,000 you should put aside in dollars to get just for the move. And I'll break this down why. Okay. First of all, you've got to, like, the minute you arrive in Dubai to set up your spending. Okay, you've got to— in order to operate in the UAE, you need a trade license and there's going to be multiple people pitching multiple trade licenses to you. Personally, I would always go for an onshore trade license. Onshore means that that's a Dubai or a UAE government license. There are lots of different free zones. There are lots which are quite cheap and there are some—

What's a free zone? Because you wrote that down and shared it. You got free zone and onshore. What does that mean?

I wasn't sure on that. Sure. So, and these go back to, a lot of things go back to heritage and how the UAE was set up. So when they decided to open up the market years ago, it was essentially, if you were a media company, you worked in Media City. If you were an internet company, and this shows you how old it was, you worked in Internet City. If you were a production company, you worked in Production City. If you're a financial company, you worked in Dubai International Financial Centre. Each of them are free zones. Essentially what they did is they opened up the capabilities. If you were a business that served those markets to open up in those free zones, and you could really only trade with other companies within those free zones. Now those rules have changed. Now you can set up a business in one of those free zones and trade throughout the whole region, and you can open up a business from the mainland. Now, what's the difference between a mainland business from when I was there to now? Well, A mainland license used to have to be owned by an Emirati, right? So when I first set up my business, there was a 51% local that owned the entity. Okay, so 51% was Emirati owned. I then had to go to a courthouse and get him to sign over his 51% and say that he's not got anything to do with that 51%. It was a whole complicated, quite arduous process that you would go through through setting up. Now, you can set up a mainland license, 100% owned. I would always do that. Why would I do that? For a start, you're backed by the government. It means that you're investing into the UAE. It means you have the weight of the UAE law always behind you, not just of the Free Zone. And that in itself, I think, is very powerful. Also, if you want to pitch for government work within the UAE, and let's be clear, most of the government work, or most of the big projects going on in the GCC are government-focused. Having a mainland license, even though people don't say it, tends to give you an advantage. Okay, it's also easier to scale a business. There are certain restrictions in terms of, you know, you have to have a certain office of a certain size in order to get an amount of headcount, but we can go on to that. But I would focus now on getting a good established license. The renewals are pretty cheap. What a lot of people make the mistake of doing is getting a really cheap license and they're not looking to what the renewals cost for the following year. And that's where people can get really stung. So there are some free zones which can be like less than $5,000 to set up, say for example something in Sharjah, etc. But to renew it after a year is incredibly complicated and really expensive. So a mainland license means you get everything works efficiently, you've got the government backing you and you're able to scale and grow your business.

And who could, who helps us with these licenses? Obviously I've never done that. So like, is there like a platform or Google way? What's—

there are many, many, many companies, many, many companies that can help you with that. Um, obviously one of the things I'm now doing, um, having exited my businesses, particularly for recruitment businesses, I can advise them, put you in touch with people who can give you the right license. So you're always got to— I'm not here to sort of, I don't, I don't I'm not going to advertise anyone else's services because I know people— there's varying, you know, Google gives you different reviews on what you get. They tend to make commission out of you. It just depends how long a business is established or how long that person you're talking to has been in the UAE is how long I would use them. But there's lots of agents out there. To get a recruitment license, you can apply for an executive search license or you can apply for a recruitment agency license. Office addresses, you'll always need an office address in the UAE. You can do that through co-workings. You can also get flexi desk arrangements, but you do have to have an address in the UAE in order to get your trade license. It's normally like an Ejari that supports it or something to show that you've got a residency of sorts in the UAE. Then you get your establishment card. When you get your establishment card, you can open up your bank account. And then of course you can start applying for your visas. And you'll need, in order to get a visa, you have to have private medical insurance. And then once you've demonstrated that, you get your Emirates ID. Once you get your Emirates ID, you can rent a property formally. And just to kind of let everyone know, people say Dubai is tax-free. There is VAT in the UAE. So there are actually some tax obligations that you have to do as a business. You have to register for VAT. And there's corporation tax now as well. So corporation tax is 9% in the UAE.

And what do you— and then just because you like shared a lot there, typical timeline for all of that, like if things go smoothly, like how long can that take from starting the first domino of getting my trade license? Like what, how long can that typically take if things go smoothly?

Yeah, I think that whole process I've just outlined there can take, if things go smoothly, around about 6 weeks. It typically doesn't take longer than 12. It's all about the things that you're going to need to get prepared are just all you're going to need. Your birth certificates, you're going to need your stuff notarized. So if you're in the UK, you'd have to go to the UAE embassy. If you're married, get your marriage certificates, like basically all notarized by the UAE. Just that basically certifies that everything is true. If you need a degree, which typically you do in a lot of areas to get licenses, you get your educational certificates attested. So all those attestations you'll need sorted. And if you've got everything in order beforehand, it should be a very smooth process. Now, that's why you need an agency to help you out with setting up the business, because they'll go through the checklist with you. I mean, the UAE really has made it incredibly slick. When it comes to opening up a business, and that's why it attracts so many people versus, say, anywhere like the South, or so many more people than, say, Saudi, for example.

And then this, just to tie this together then, this might be a stupid question, but just to understand, so if I have a limited company in the UK right now, yeah, like I do, and it's a recruitment business but I want to move my life and to the UAE and have a business entity there, this is what I would need to go for, even though I don't plan to operate or like serve the local market. Like, if I want to stay there longer term and have a, um, yeah, like part of my business there or set up there, this is what we, we need to do.

Yeah, absolutely. Everyone needs to do it, okay? Everyone will need— everyone will need to set that in, in order to get a business entity set up, you need a trade license, and in order for you to work there and live there, you need a visa. Okay, there, that's, that's rule 101. So you're going to be spending on that whether you like it or not. That is what you have to do.

But yeah, and then got some figures here just to give people a bit of insight, right? So I know you shared this with me before, and it can really vary, but like you said, something that we really need to be mindful of is the first year cost reality. Like you said, you're going to need some, some, some bank power balance, uh, in this. So got here, we'll do it in, in dollars because I know a lot of people operate in dollars, right? So trade license can be anywhere between $5,000 to $12,000. Maybe a small office flexi desk can be anywhere from $3,000 to $15,000 annually. Visa per person might look like $3,000 to $5,000. Medical and Emirates ID, I've got here $500. I don't know if that's Maybe something monthly you have to keep paying, or—

no, that's— look, I'm giving you a pretty basic cost there. That can go up on the medical. The visa per person just depends on if it's a spouse or if it's someone working. Obviously, the office, that's probably something we should just go back to. I mean, €3,000 to €15,000, that's it. I'm assuming it's someone coming out as a 1 to 2 person operator, so very small. It also I'm giving an average there. If you wanted to go in like one of the main districts, like, you know, the well-known areas in Dubai, like DIFC, or which is Dubai International Financial Centre, for example, you can be paying 50,000 plus, right? So your summer, it's, you know, it's like London now. You've got premium, you know, got premium office space and it's, the prices are like for like. So what I'm trying to give here is a realistic view of what I would do if I was moving there now.

And then I've got health insurance, potentially again it can be varied, right? $1,000 to $2,000 per person as well. But that's all like a really good insight. I think the other thing, as we're, as we're talking about this, because it's part of the conversation if we're moving there, and Justin, you, you know, you and your family spent a lot of time there, lived there for a long time, so you would have seen this massively change. Again, this can really vary, right? But I think something that you shared with me when we prepared for this is something that you've certainly seen is that cost of living reality there. And that's also come true in the conversations that I've had from, from people. So yes, a lot of people were instantly— the headlines on the newspapers or, you know, from Google is tax-free and the tax benefits. But you have to, in terms of like earning and, you know, making money, you have to be doing pretty all right to lead a pretty good life there, right? So I've got here, again, this can really vary, right? But I've got villa to rent, 60K to 120K annually. Now that's going to really vary on what type of accommodation that you want to live in, where you're living in. But I've also got here— this, this came up quite a lot as well— I've got a pound sign here, but you'll be able to help us out. But speak to a lot of people that move their families over there, a big pull is the schools. When I have, uh, conversations with people and raising their, their children there, I've got here 15 to 20K per child schools. You can enlighten us on that, but the cost of living is something that I haven't actually been— that's something that I, I need to do. But when I have had conversations, I think that's the, the real reality that you have to be very aware of. Again, we're coming back to, to money. There's tax benefits and these things that we always hear, but the reality of leading a good life there, maybe that's really changed over, over time in terms of what's required to be leading a good life earning-wise.

So let me just say, I've got 3 kids. They are 11, 11, 9, and 7, and there's £20,000 each, £20,000 each to each child, or 20,000, actually just under £20,000, so close to $20,000. So that's whether you like it or not, that's what schooling costs, right? But that is a good school. That was, but there's a waiting list for that school and you're not going to get much cheaper than that. You're really not. Not far off.

So like if it was like a tip, I don't know, average or below average school, we're what, we're getting there, more 15K per child or no?

Yeah, I guess so. But everything, if you're an expat living there, you have to go to a private school. There is no public schooling for expats, right? So it is, it is, you, you have to pay. And that doesn't include school uniforms, lunches. You've also got, if there's transportation to and from school, if you want to do buses, etc. So it's a, it's, it's quite, it's quite a hefty layout. The house, like, to give you an idea, we rent out our 5-bedroom house in Arabian Ranches, which is quite a well-known district in Dubai. We actually rent that out for 150,000. So that's, you know, that is, it can go up. Yeah, it can go up and up and up, right? So you're looking at, you're looking, getting close to now to sort of premium UK city central location prices. And That is the big difference from when I moved out there. So there were, when I moved out there, Dubai was the 66th most expensive city in the world. All right. I think it's, I think it's about 4, anywhere between 4 or 5 in the world now. So that tells you where it's, where it's gone. Yeah. And that is, um, that's, that's, that's the thing that's changed. Like, and this huge influx to Dubai, by the way. Happened around the time you and I were talking. It was during COVID because the UAE was very smart and it stuck its hand in the air and said, while everyone else was closing borders, they went, come here, check it out. They did. People enjoyed it. People who came in then saw a cheap side. The spike from then has been like a, the, the, the cost of living spike since then has been the fastest growth I've ever seen. Everything's gone up so seismically. And so that is for every 6 months that someone's procrastinated about moving, just keep in mind that, that, that's, that things are going to go up, right? Things are going to go up. And that's the bit that really are— there's fundamental difference that I've seen between before and now is that people find the cost of living a struggle. Now we're going to talk about what it's like to do business there, but that is why, particularly if you're going out with a family, I think if you're going out as a as a single person and you can try your luck, you know, there's ways you can navigate certain things. But if you've got a young family, you know, like you and I have, then there's certain things you cannot, you cannot compromise on. And that is what the cost is going to be. So that's, that's the bit that can really take people back. Supermarkets, it's like shopping in Waitrose all the time. That's the best way I can, you know, to give people a comparison. Yes, you can go cheap. But there's not a lot of places there. And if you want to eat rice and curry every night, then maybe there will be cheaper places there. But that's not what predominantly a lot of people come out and do. Right.

And then what tends to be cheap there? Fuel, I can imagine, is nice and cheap.

Yeah. So fuel's cheap, which it should be. I mean, it literally comes out of the ground. Um, it's beyond that. It's quite hard to tell you what is cheap, really. It's an expensive place. It's an expensive place. You know, it's like living in Soho in central London, you know.

So some real honest insights there. I think then let's talk about, because we wanted to give some realities on that, which sometimes can be overlooked. But let's also then talk about, before we get into doing business in this region, let's just talk about, like, from the conversations that you have, and this is where you might be able to help me out here, like, the tax benefits. Like, that— let's talk about that. So what, what's the best way to, to talk about this in terms of, like, you, you, you almost shared with me the— what Dubai is coming is almost like Monaco on, on steroids. Yeah. So tell me what you meant by that. Like, what are the actual benefits here for, like, okay, if I can afford all of that and I'm leading a good life, I'm doing well, what can then be the benefits for me financially by having my— you know, you mentioned corporation tax there, these things. So they're going to be benefits. Let's just talk about those because that is what can spark a lot of people's interest and is the initial pull there.

Yeah, so I can understand, like, if you're coming from the UK or Europe or, you know, other— Australia, for example— I can, I can understand why people would want to invoice out of Dubai because essentially you can be very smart and you can pay no tax on the money that you get in. Or if you do pay tax, it's a minimum 9% corporation tax, which is one of the lowest in the world. But that's only if you cross a certain threshold. I think the threshold is around about £60,000 or so, but I'll clarify that afterwards exactly what the threshold is.

I'm no tax expert, Hishem, but that's why, yeah, this isn't a tax podcast, but it's got to be part of the conversation.

This is why people are interested. Yeah, there is corporation tax in there. But what, so the big, again, a huge difference I've seen happen since COVID what's happened is people pre-COVID, everyone that moved to the Middle East moved to transact in the Middle East. Okay. Now people move to the Middle East to have it as an HQ to serve the world. Why? Because of the tax benefits of doing so. Right. And those people play a very interesting game. I've noticed those people take a visa. As people have a license and an HQ set up in the UAE, they quite often have staff in the UAE, but people are working American hours, people are working Australian hours, people are working UK and Europe hours. So you'll find that people are actually using Dubai's tax-free benefit to serve a much wider market. That was never ever there before. You're not just seeing it in recruitment as well, by the way, you're seeing it in everything. And the government itself is attracting businesses, so they They are using this as a lure to get people in and away from the likes of London. Okay. They see the investment that they're putting into tech. They see that as a huge advantage to try and attract the best talent and the best companies. So Monaco on steroids is that you can live there and it is a tax haven. You can live there and you will not pay, you know, isn't it? Wouldn't it be great if you can do business with the USA and actually not have to pay And you don't have to pay any tax in America or the UK. It would just come straight into your bank account there. The UAE benefits from that. The UAE banks benefit from that. And that is the biggest benefit that you've got working in the UAE right now, is the fact that they've just, you know, they are, whilst it is expensive, they're happy for you to operate in a very low tax environment.

So should we just try and give people just a bit of like a really straightforward example? Because I'm not ever listening to this as a business owner, but let's just try and give people an example. So like, for example, so firstly, if I'm an employer in the UK, am I going to be paying less tax from like PAYE standpoint, these types of things, if I have more headcount in the UAE per employee? Is that going to be different? So in terms of the salary, rough—

what I've noticed, salaries are anywhere in the UAE, and largely because of the cost of living now, um, they're, they're a little bit higher. Let's call it 5%, about 5% higher, 5, 5, 15, 5, anywhere between 5 and 15% higher than what you get in the, in, in the UK. So as an employer, you are just paying salary though, okay? You're not paying National Insurance, you're not paying pension contribution or anything like that, okay? That's what you do have to do though as an employer, and the, and this is, this is the, I suppose, the pension scheme for expats. In the UAE is the gratuity system. So for every, just to kind of not make it too complicated, but essentially for every year if someone works with you, you have to hold back one month's salary. So if someone works for you for 4 years, when they leave, you pay them off 4 months' salary as well. Okay. And that is essentially, it was a system brought in as like a light pension protection scheme years ago.

Okay, and then just with, with AI's help here, Justin, and maybe this can help us give us a bit of an example, but just a bit of a comparison at a glance. Don't hold me to this, right? But this is what the wonderful, uh, AI is, is saying. So tax category UAE versus UK. So firstly, UAE personal income tax 0%.

Yep.

UK 20 to 45%. So I think that's often a big pull, right, is like the amount of income tax people are paying. So how much money I'm actually, uh, how much tax I'm paying on my, on the money that I'm making. So that, that's like a big one and probably the, the thing that people end up learning about speaking about fairly quickly. As you said earlier, Justin, corporation tax, it's a 0% up to 80K, so that might be the current threshold, and then 9% above that. And then in the UK, I've got here 19% for SMEs to 25%, obviously that can vary. Then again, another more personal tax that people might want to pay less of is capital gains tax. 0% for individuals, 10 to 28% in the UK depending on where that is. Dividends, dividend tax, again 0%. That can be 8.75% to nearly 40% in the UK depending on, you know, what's going on there. You mentioned VAT earlier there. VAT standard rate 5% in the UAE, obviously 20% in the UK. And it says Social Security 0% for expats, 8 to 13.25% for National Insurance. So I think really here, if you're doing the hard yards or being an entrepreneur, building a business, doing all of that, and at the end of each year you feel like you're earning less money or you're paying more taxes, I think this really is where it's a lot of the, the, at the end of the day, how much you're paying personally, it feels like. Is a lot of the pull here and a lot of the benefits.

Yes, exactly. It's— and I think this really suits, you know, recruitment entrepreneurs, lean businesses, technology companies. Now, this is, this is where Dubai is attracting numbers in it at scale now, okay? Because people are going, you know what, I'm just quite frankly sick of it, sick of giving my money away. I could just do it there. And it'll be okay as long as I, you know, I could be in the UK for 90 days a year. I can come back in the summer when it gets hot. I can go somewhere else.

All right.

And I can transact and run my business out of Dubai. Perfect. And that, that is, that is what Dubai is becoming a big part of right now. We can talk if you want about the social impact of that, I think, on the, on the society in Dubai as well, because what I think it's making Dubai even more of a transient city than it was. So does that, you know, it means transient house in terms of how the different types of people there, people would live in for fixed periods of time, right? People— no one's there. Like, if you can get out when it's 50 degrees in the summer, you get out, right? People leave for the summer. People spend a few months in Dubai, then they go somewhere else, and they go somewhere else. It's very You know, everyone that you meet is playing that game, right? So it can become very hard to meet people. It can become very hard to, you know, like friends and the social, societal aspects of that can make it quite challenging. And you've just got to be prepared for that, that it's a city that's very seasonal. The traffic is astronomical in the winter and fine in the summer.

So should we, should we talk about— I've set up a business entity there, but I see a real opportunity to serve my niche or the, the actual local market there. Uh, where, where should we start here? Because I'm sure this has massively changed since you've been there as well. Like, what are some of the just fundamental principles and things maybe overall we should understand about serving this, this local market? Like, what are some of the things just to, you know, give people as just like a good educational point in terms of like just principles and things just overall we need to understand first before we get into some of the details of things?

Yeah, so the, the Middle East market is a, is a young, dynamic market, right? So that's— it's, it's emerging. It's, um, it's spent— like, it's, it's well known that the governments of the Middle East spend a lot of money Anyone that's a fan of sport, anyone that looks at anything can see what Saudi spends, see what the UAE spend. So it spends, but it's like what makes it very different to anywhere else in the world? It's largely driven through government spend. Okay. And all of that is connected to oil. Okay. So if the price of oil is high, people, governments tend to spend. A lot of it is driven through the sovereign wealth funds. You'll find that the Public Investment Fund, which invested in Newcastle United and other things like PIF in Saudi, that brought Ronaldo over to play, you know, working, and gosh, has invested in all sorts of amazing sort of giga projects that you've seen announced. They spend. The UAE sovereign wealth funds, they spend. But they have this knack of spending, of slowing down and speeding up quite a lot. So A lot of it is connected to government spend. That's the main thing you need to think about. The other thing is you need to choose your sector very carefully because some sectors are very big and some sectors are quite small in the GCC. Okay. So technology, huge investment into technology because that's what really the UAE sees as one of its big, and Saudi sees as one of its big diversification plays. Obviously, huge aviation transportation hub. Logistics, absolutely, you know, given where it is geographically located, huge sector. Defense, well known that they spend a significant amount of money on defense. So there are some big industries there, but where there are, in some areas, the industries are very small. You'll find that healthcare is an emerging, health tech is an emerging growing sector there. It's, you know, if you work in a specific niche, it's going to be very hard for you to grow a business in the Middle East. Okay, because there's just not going to be many businesses there that you're going to be transacting with. It's going to grow over time, but only in certain areas of healthcare. The creative and advertising world that we've been in, you know, it is, whilst it's moved quite successfully, it's also quite small compared to anywhere else in the world. There are actually only 300 million people in the region, right? Now, when I worked, you know, we would always say that that's the population of Indonesia. That was one country that we worked with in Asia. That's an entire region. Okay. So just by the sheer numbers that you're playing with there, getting scale out of something is quite hard because there just isn't, you know, there aren't cities like London in the UAE. The UAE's population, I think, is around about 9 million. I think that's less than the entire population of London, right? So you just need to put into perspective how big the market is. The opportunity is huge. But really, there are, you know, there's not many ginormous clients out there that you can really get your claws into.

And then what have you typically found from experience and then from conversations that you've been having over the, you know, last 12+ months with people? Like, are— like, with your business, did you spend most of your time operating in Dubai and doing business in Dubai, or also was it just as— I guess depending on what's going on, but then you're also doing just as much business in Saudi or Qatar, these things? Like, what does that look like? Because when I have these conversations, again, I'm not, uh, entirely educated here, which is why I'm asking the question. It seems like the most established markets are Dubai, the UAE, but then when I hear about growth or seeing opportunities, it's places like Saudi and these types of places. So what does that look like as well? Are you finding, and have you found yourself most, in terms of if I'm going over there and wanting to serve the local market, am I most likely going to be, uh, transacting in Dubai, in the UAE? Or like, how do you see that? How does that work?

You're gonna— your two main markets are going to be the UAE and Saudi. The UAE because it is the most established. It's simply put, the infrastructure, the Dubai You know, let's peel it back. Dubai in the '60s knew it was going to run out of oil, so has used consumerism to diversify its economy. Tourism, I mean, it's, you know, it's the most visited city in the world now. So it's a hyper-consumerist city. Then you've got Abu Dhabi, which is a financial powerhouse where a lot of oil, a lot of money comes out of. That's sat there as well. Okay. So those are the two big dynamic markets. Then what you've got is you've got Saudi, which is the only country in the G20, okay, in that entire area. Saudi is an absolute powerhouse, right?

What does that mean? Sorry, what does that mean? Sorry, with what you just said.

Well, it's one of the 20th largest economies in the world, Saudi is.

Right.

Okay, it's the only GCC country in that region that is in the G20. So, you know, most of the world's oil comes out of that country. It's, you know, it's, it's, uh, it's huge. It's half the size of Europe, but it really has two big cities in it and, uh, and, and, uh, and produces a ton of oil, but they, they want to diversify. You know, they've got World Cups coming up. They've got all sorts of interesting things happening now. They're investing like no one's ever seen before to transform their city. No one's really ever visited Saudi. It's been a closed country for many, many, many years. So now people have visited. Now they open the country up. It's no longer a, run by religious— when I first went to Saudi, you had the religious police walking in the streets, and it was a very sort of intimidating place to go to. Now everyone's welcome. It's like the UAE. You can just rock up with your passport and you can go there. So tourism has opened up the country completely. And MBS, the leader, wants the world to see Saudi. So there is a huge opportunity there. But in terms of league table, what I would give you into a league table for where you would probably transact, I would say number 1 would be Dubai because you'd likely be set up there. So you would use your neighborhood. The second one would be probably Riyadh. That's the capital city of Saudi. You would likely transact there. And the third one would be Abu Dhabi. Now, it could change between 2 and 3 what you would do. And then the fourth one would be Doha. Because Qatar does have some really interesting big pieces of business that happen there. Obviously, they had the World Cup not too long ago, and they're an incredibly wealthy country. It feels like they're in no rush to kind of change, but I think because they're just too rich, quite honestly. But there is big opportunity there. And then you've got the other countries around that. Well, we do bits and pieces of business with those being Kuwait, Bahrain, and Oman.

Okay, really, really great breakdown there. Should we give people some realities of then transacting in this local market? I think you and I both know Liam, who I had not too long ago on the podcast. I know that you worked with him. He gave us a really good insight into just how he's had to learn some of these things the, the hard way in, uh, transacting and going from like doing a very particular niche in the UK market to then going over to Dubai. So a couple of things here. What I mean, firstly, overall, fair to say it's become a lot more competitive, right? I've got here like, you know, AI might give us different numbers, but you know, over 400+ agencies opened up there in the last 12 months. Now, how many of those are actually transacting in the local market? I don't know. But there's— fair to say there's more competition. With, uh, agencies. I think you shared with me when you, you know, first opened up there, there really wasn't many players at all in terms of like niche specialist-focused agencies, right? That's drastically changed.

Yeah, so when I opened up there— sorry to interrupt you then— when I— so when I just—

big—

to give some context, right, when I, um, opened up my business in Dubai, I was basically— you know, there wasn't— there was really no one else that was competing within my niche, right? It was There was Michael Page there, there were Hayes, there were a couple of other established firms that come over from Asia. And really it was kind of open playing field. Now over time that's changed, you know, our competitors, so some of the ones that are quite famous now like Salt and Digital Gurus who got acquired, etc., they came over. No one really hit scale there. No one's really gone beyond 20 people, but they came over. But there's been a ton that have that have tried and failed. Um, but now it's a lot of the— what you're seeing now is you're seeing a lot of successful boutiques in other international markets that are opening up. So, you know, Liam's a good example of that. You know, he has a really good niche within technology. He wants to take that over to, um, you know, over to the Middle East. He works within the fintech Web3 space, and he can work between the UK and the UAE from the UAE. Okay. And that's transferred really, really well. He found a good niche. He's a great recruiter. He's got a really nice niche business. There are other people who are doing successfully out in the UAE who have found a really good niche, found where there's an opportunity and have managed to wiggle their way in there because not many other people have. But the key to success in the UAE is finding where there's an opportunity and a gap.

And that obviously, that has shortened over time because just so many people have poured into Dubai since COVID And then let's just talk about, because I've got here, and Liam shared this with me as well, but like fees and percentages and how we're transacting. It can be really common where it's expected that you're going to charge 8 to 12%, uh, we're talking perm here, right? Because a lot of, you know, from your experience, there's a lot of, um, perm recruitment happening versus contract. 15% I've got here could be seen as expensive for a lot of people. Um, talk to us about that. Like, how is it? Because like you've been transacting and working there for a long time. Is that just the reality of doing business?

Average fee size at MCG is $16,000, which is actually quite high, right? Um, but we were— we had to become quite ruthless on rates, and also we just didn't work below a certain salary threshold. So you've got to be really You know, you've got to be in for a scrap in the Middle East. Now, why is it like this? Why people are— I thought it was like the question that I always get asked from people. Why in a country that's so rich, why in a part of the world where they just spend billions and millions and drive gold-plated Rolls-Royces, etc., why is the actual monetary aspect so bloody hard out there? And it's, look, it always has been that way. It's a, I think there's cultural elements in there. I think it's a very, everyone likes, you negotiate constantly out there. You're always in a negotiation with people. And I also think it's proximity to Southeast Asia where it's typically been served by markets that could work into the Middle East. So it could charge low and have, and then get serviced elsewhere. You've had a knock-on effect of that as well.

So yeah, Liam mentioned India as well, like that. Yeah, as well. There's a lot, like you said, a lot of people selling services that can do it way cheaper as well, is a big challenge, like you just said.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, so the way you've got to look at it is the UAE, the expats that have been the longest in the UAE is the Indian population, right? If you look at the 10, like, I remember looking at this a few years ago, and I don't know if this is accurate now, but the 10 wealthiest people in the UAE 5 are Indian, 5 are Emirati. Okay. Why is that? Because the, you know, the 4 or 5 generations ago, the Indian guys and girls that moved there, they brought industry with them. They created the industries, right? So a lot of the original competitors that I was against were Indian firms that would be on the ground, but also have sort of huge delivery teams outsourced in India. So you've got quite a lot of that, particularly within construction as well, where they would bring over the manpower in vast quantities. So that's always been there. So you have to learn to fight and negotiate hard to earn, basically to earn your rates. Now, what worked for you in England won't work in the UAE. It just won't. You'll need to understand that you understand the region, you understand the market. Now, people are, they want to know, clients I'm talking about, they want to know that you get what their needs are rather than you're an expert coming from the UK because They're sick to death of hearing about experts coming from the UK. You've got to identify what you're an expert in a market and that you get the region. And if you can do those things, then you'll justify a good fee. If not, you're just going to be in a scrap with everyone else. And the bit that I've always just been so surprised by is how many people are willing to go low on rates because sometimes there's simply no sense in it. But we would walk away from a lot of business there. And I've always had the UK where I've recruited in and Asia where we had 50% of our business to compare it against. And we just bumped into a lot more flaky briefs, flaky contingent briefs in the Middle East than we did anywhere else. And I'm sure Liam told you this as well, that your job sheet will often be very high, but the quality can be very low. And that's the bit that can chew a lot of businesses up. You need to make sure that you are always, always quality controlling the type of businesses that you've got. Make sure that the response rates can be incredibly so. And the usual telltale signs, if people don't come back to you quickly, test them with one CV. If they don't come back quickly, you probably know you're in for a bumpy ride. Processes can either be super quick in the Middle East or go on forever. I think my record was when I was on the tours was 6 months between process, between first and second interview. And the client calling me up acting like the interview was yesterday and it was 6 months previously. You know, and the best bit was the candidate wasn't surprised. Um, you know, so you've got it, you've got it. Patience has got to be a virtue there.

Yes, I think, I mean, I think this is becoming, it's always been important, right? But I think in this context that, that market focus, niche, really knowing what you're going to say yes to, what you're going to say most importantly no to is, is really important here. Like, what— where are you going to be really focused? Like, skill set-wise, like you said, there's a certain salary banding that we don't look at. This is all really important stuff. What about getting paid? Because I've got here 60-90 day payment terms can be common, delays can sometimes be common. Um, I've heard— I think that can be sometimes where people hear horror stories, like, did a placement or you know, uh, had a successful placement, then never got paid, got ghosted, these types of things. What, what does the reality look like there from what you see? Like, what does that look like today?

It is the toughest market in the world to get paid. It's— and, and, uh, not a lot, not enough people talk about this. And, um, and it starts, it starts at the, you know, the, the government don't pay you quick. And if the government don't pay you quick, and they make the rules it trickles down to everything else. Okay. So, you know, whereas in, again, I talk about the UK a lot because you're there, but you've got societies that protect you, you've got legal, you know, you've got legal protection, you've got contracts. It's an arduous process. Let me just tell you this. I mean, I saw 2 emails going out this morning and we're recording this in February and I saw 2 emails go out this morning for invoices that haven't been paid. At MCG from last September. And no one's surprised, by the way, because, and I won't tell you what industries they are, but they're connected to the top. So it's just how business is done. So if we go back to what we were talking about at the beginning, if you're going to go and move your life to the Middle East, particularly as a startup business, or if you're going to move to the Middle East and expect to be transacting there. Not only do you need a buffer to save, but if you want to be earning revenue out of the Middle East, you're going to need a long buffer to get cash in as well. Now, this isn't carte blanche for everyone, right? But it can be. It's hard to get paid. Now, what's the best way to go about it? First of all, don't be the person, don't, if you want to be successful out there, don't be the collector and the salesperson. Because people don't like being chased by the person that they've got to then talk to about the next bit of recruitment they've got to do. So one of the first hires I got when I moved out there was get a really good financial director and someone that understands the way the ecosystem works. And that person's still with me today, like a rock that we've had. Because you need to be on it, you need to be absolutely on it at all times. And you need to, you need to plan for payment cycles. If someone signs 30 days, that they're going to pay at least 45. If someone signs 60 days, it's going to be over that. And it's, it's, it's really with multinationals as well as local businesses, it's, it's tough. It's tough.

You just found like, it sounds like the way that you were talking, it's like it's just part of the game.

It's in doing business here, it's, you know, it's, it's just one of those things that I can see a lot of people get very angry about this to a point. I get quite angry about it, but I guess I've got the gray hair now and I've done this long enough to know that's just the way it is. And anyone you talk to in coffee shops, bars, restaurants, everyone talks about the same thing. It's, you know, it's, and we're getting retained work. It's not impossible, but it's also very hard. It's not a market where people typically are used to paying retained fees. The interesting thing is, None of the Shrek, like the established executive search firms, have huge offices at all in the UAE, but they do get used quite regularly. Now, there is a degree of people like to show off and use a badge with the logo. People like management consultancies. You'll find that PwC, Deloitte, KPMG, etc., got very big offices there, very successful offices there. My friends that work at Russell Reynolds, Spencer Stuart, etc. They don't do any new business. They get called in. But often the governments that use them like to show off that they've got them in. For those boutique businesses, for those independent businesses looking to break in the market, it's very hard to get retaining fees. And that applies to many, many other industries as well. You'll find that the SME ecosystem for getting paid well is a very tough nut to crack. In the advertising world where MCG's always transacted, It's one of the only parts in the world where 80% of that entire market is still run by the big international players. Only 20% is independent. It's complete opposite everywhere else in the world.

And then what about just not getting paid? Do you find that that comes up in conversation? Does that still happen a lot?

Yeah, you get the debt collectors in then. They're a pretty decent firms that'll, that'll run them, you know, just hound the hell out of them basically. And eventually someone caves in and gives you, you know, and gives you, uh, gives you— well, you come to an arrangement on an invoice, but you have to sometimes surrender up to 30% of your fees with these, these, um, lawyers. And it's, it's good business for them, right?

Okay, some really— so yeah, we, we've got to be all over our cash flow then, all over transactions, local, you know.

Expensive place to live, expensive place to do business, yet like tremendous tax-free benefits. Wonderful, wonderful entities, brilliant for networking, lots and lots of pluses. But it doesn't, you know, it's not all plain sailing.

What's typical notice periods then, like on pub positions?

1 to 2 months. Okay. Um, it's probably good for me to just kind of give, um, a big difference that I've seen from before and now in terms of the talent that the businesses are hiring from. The best chance you've got to succeed in the Middle East right now is if you can get your hands on local talent. So when I first started recruiting in the Gulf, we relocated 80% of the talent. Now, as a business, we probably relocate less than 10%.

Okay, really?

So yeah, yeah. So the bulk of businesses want people on the ground. The bulk companies, they only want regional experience. So that's why it's become very hard for businesses to open up doors, like coming in fresh, because they go, I can bring experts from around the world, blah, blah, blah. Yeah, that works in certain niches, but most businesses now, they really just want people that understand the region. And that's a sign of the Gulf market maturing. Also, the big opportunity in Saudi, Like it used to be that people thought that they could get a job in Saudi and that would be their retirement fund sorted. Saudi's got really strict laws around hiring local. So most of the briefs that we get in Saudi are to find Saudis. So that's probably a myth that not a lot of people are aware of that it's, you know, a lot of the successful recruitment businesses now, if you look at their deal sheet, they, they, they don't move. They don't do that many relocations anymore. It's—

yeah, because I remember I was just gonna say, when we did our, um, marketing personal branding stuff together, like, that was— I remember you saying, like, nearly— it was a lot of very expat-driven and moving people into the, the region.

Well, it's expat-driven because it has to be, but it's expats that have lived there a long time.

They're already—

yeah, yeah, already, already lived there. You know, people like me moved there and said, I will stay there for a couple of years. And, you know, lo and behold, 18 years later, they're still there, right? So there's a lot of people that have been there a long time now. And, and, uh, yeah, there's a lot of people that moved there in COVID. The population is like nearly doubled from when I moved there. So people want local experience.

And then the part that you said has been like the, the hardest part. We've given like a real transparent look into transacting there, doing business there, setting up there. But I've got here like access to talent, and I feel like we meant like internally, right? Like if, if we're there transacting and we want to build a hub in, uh, the UAE but serving the, the local markets and serving, um, the market, we want to grow a bit of a team there. You said one of the hardest things that you found on your journey and you know, given the realities here, is then like growing that business with local talent and access to that. Let's just talk about that.

So it's, it's, you know, it's, it's— well, you speak to any recruitment business founder that's, that's had a business in Dubai a long time, what's been— they'll all sort of tell you what one of the toughest parts has been, scaling a business. And there's various Various reasons why, let me break it down. Number one, it's no one's home. Yeah. So everyone there, like one of the joys of working in Dubai, you can, you can be in an office with 30 to 40 different nationalities. You can be, you know, you can be in a cafe and everyone's from a different corner of the world. There's, there's about, I think it's 13 expats to 1 local in Dubai now, different in Abu Dhabi, other places. So given that no one's from there, that means that really, like, anything can happen. And someone like your dad gets sick, you leave, you know, your partner gets sick, you leave, you decide, you know, you decide, you simply decide you want to live, you want to go home, you leave, whether your employer likes it or not, right? You leave. So you could lose people through no fault of your own. So that's the big thing. The other thing is, and this is something I don't have the data to prove this, but I can tell you now that it happens and talk to any founder out there, it's the truth. A lot of people get complacent very quickly in Dubai. Why? Well, you feel like you're on one big bloody holiday. That's why, right? You know, it's beach clubs. It's designed, the city is designed to make you spend to make you feel, you know, everything's— you turn up to a— you can buy a— you can be there 6 months, and if you're really stupid, you can put a Mercedes on credit, you can have your— you can have an apartment that's probably a bit more luxurious than you probably ever lived in before. You put, you know, you've got— you pimped out all your clothes from all the various different shopping malls you've gone to, and you can eat at some of the best restaurants in the world. And next thing you know, you're in chronic debt, and also you're living beyond your means. But you become quite complacent. Life's all right, you know, you pay off your credit card minimum, you get these tax-free checks, you find that people all of a sudden start settling, start realizing and feeling they've reached their peak when they haven't, and they chill. So a lot of people that we moved over that had an edge and then lost it within 18 months was staggering. Staggering. And, and it's a city that can really breed complacency. And I just think it's because it makes life so easy. I mean, honestly, you could, you, you can— there's an app for everything. You don't need to go anywhere, right? You, you got— you don't even have to put petrol in your car. There's a, there's a, there's a company that rocks up and fills it up for you, you know, in your driveway. You don't need to go anywhere. And I think that level of convenience breeds a bit of complacency. Okay. And that's a big problem that we had. And then the other problem that we had was because it's so easy to set up a trade license there now, it's, you know, keeping hold of your good people was quite hard. They would just, you know, they would often become your competitors. I know this happens anywhere else in the world, but it happens a lot in Dubai. And it's because the city encourages entrepreneurism so much because it has, Everyone you meet has got their own. You'll meet more entrepreneurs in Dubai than anywhere else. It's like a village full of entrepreneurs. Okay? And if everyone you meet has got their own business, you inevitably want to have your own business. So that's what's happened. A big part of those 450 companies that we spoke about earlier, they're people that have worked for other companies for 1 or 2 years. I mean, the funniest thing I would find is I would fire people for not having— I didn't That makes me sound a bit brutal, but reality is if someone wasn't doing well, inevitably you have to have the tough question. I can think of a few occasions where I fired someone and they've thought, oh, you know what I'm going to do? I'm going to go and set up my own business. And that would happen quite often. Now, not a lot of those standing still, but that's what it can carry. You can get carried away with it, right? So that happens a lot. And the other thing is, once you've got a bit of regional experience, You get headhunted continuously. Your staff will get headhunted all the time. And people will, you know, everyone in the UAE, let's be frank, like the main reason people move to the desert is to make more money. Yeah, it's the tax-free element. So if your modus operandi is to go out, spend 3, 4 years in the Middle East and make a lot of money as a recruiter, and within 6 months you're getting offered like 20, 25, 30% more. People move. So it can be very hard to keep hold of staff as well.

So what can be— it can really vary, but like typical salaries for like recruiters, it like— give us a bit of an idea there.

Yeah, so you're looking now— again, I, I put up a post about this and it, it, um, it sparked a bit of controversy because I think there's a lot of businesses out there that don't make any money, right? And I know what some of my ex-staff have got paid and I know what they were capable of billing. So you can get, gosh, have I got to talk in, I've got like too many different currencies going through my head.

What currency would you normally go to? And then I'll convert it. Is it dollars?

All right, so let me tell you what people get paid, because it's monthly in, in the UAE, people get paid monthly, right? And you'll find that, like, a mid-level recruiter could get anywhere between— and I'm talking sort of 2, couple of years— anywhere between 15,000 to 18,000 dirhams a month, right?

Okay.

And then up from that, you're looking at You're looking between 18 to 20 up from that. That's, and that's, those are people that bill like, I don't know, like £120,000 to £180,000.

So £15,000 to £18,000 in dirham currently today is approximately £3,000 to £3,600 roughly.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, per month.

And then what did you say? So that, that might be like a mid-tier recruiter copywriter experience.

That'd be someone that's got like a couple years experience, 2, 3 years experience.

And then what if I've been doing it for, for a while? Like, I really wanna— like, what? Yeah, if I'm— if I've got some really good recruiters, very capable, you know, paying them well is gonna help me keep them. Like, what— where can that get to, do you think? Are we getting more towards like, as a base, like 5K a month or more? Yeah, as a base.

Yeah. Yeah, you'll find that people who bill over £200,000 are seen as like amazing recruiters for firms and they're paid pretty well. Whereas in the UK you would bump into a lot more of them. I'm always quite staggered how high people are paid versus what they can bring in a business in the UAE because on top of that, the employer has always got to contribute They've got to contribute visas, all the things that we spoke about at the beginning, right? They're paying for their visas, they're paying for their private medical, they often have to pay for return flights home, they often have to pay if they've got families, sometimes they've got to pay for those families' visas, etc. And they've got to give them high commission rates. So it's a really, it can be a really tough place to make money out of, given the way that the cost of living and the cost of doing business has gone up so much as well.

And what did you like, what did you typically work to then? Like, whenever I speak to recruitment leaders and we're talking about growing recruitment business, one of the main metrics is then productivity per head. So what, like, what was your sort of nice productivity per head number that you'd liked, which then resulted in good numbers at the end of the year? Like, if we could get everyone at X per month, like, what did that typically look like then with knowing the cost and everything? What did that do for your business?

Yeah, so I changed my structure in Dubai as the cost of living was going up. I brought down the headcount we had onshore and increased the headcount we had offshore, right? So that made our Dubai business way more profitable. So I took out all delivery from Dubai and I put it into the Philippines and Sri Lanka. I took out all finance and I took out all operations and admin and I put that into India. Okay. So what I kept in Dubai was literally just client managers, marketing and business development. Okay. And that from that area, we were able to crank up our margins pretty high on people. So that, you know, for example, if we could get around about 40% of some, we'd be very happy.

Okay. Yeah, because I know that was one of the things that you wrote down, like the going offshore earlier would have changed like economics completely.

Yeah.

You felt like you took a bit too long to do that.

Uh, I think I was a pretty early adopter. I did it in during COVID Okay. So, you know, well, that time you and I were speaking was when I discovered real offshoring. Why? Because I was living in Singapore, and that's the most expensive place in the world to have a business. So You know, I could get the same quality talent from Philippines for like $5,000, $6,000 less a month, which was a no-brainer.

So to round this out then, what, like from the conversations you had, what do you think is more of like if we were to make a bit of a bet and a bit of a stance, what do we think is more of an opportunity for an entrepreneur that maybe wants to, yeah, like take home more of their money, wants to like live a good lifestyle that could also be for their family, these types of things. Like, do you think the opportunity is to move there and then serve US, Europe, different markets, or is it just as much of an opportunity to move there, get all those benefits that we've spoken about, but serve the local market? Like, what, what do you think is like— what do you think more people are going to be doing? Over the, like, future-wise? Do we think more people are going to be based there, have all those benefits, lifestyle, as well as personally, financially, but then serve markets out of, uh, that aren't the, the UAE, um, and Saudi? Or is it just as much an opportunity to move there and then look to actually serve the local market?

See, if I was to do this again How would I go about it? That's, that's, that's, that's essentially what you're—

yeah. Or just also like what you right now from your lens, what do you think is more of an opportunity? Like, do you think it's like, do you think people really—

I believe that there is an opportunity in the Middle East if you have a real— if you have a niche within the sectors that we spoke. And, and then, and you— but understand the limitations you've got there based on the size. Based on the size of the region. I think the UAE is a fabulous place to set up your business, but if I was to do it again, I would serve a global market with having UAE as my base. I think the cheat code with the UAE is to use, make use, advantage of the tax, you know, the tax, like the huge tax advantages you've got operating there, but to serve a global, a global market. And because you're just, or you're always going to be limited as a recruitment business by the fact you can't, it's very to open up, to get a contract license out there, a manpower license, you're looking at a 7-figure USD investment, right? The investment that you've got into there is just, it's sizable. And you can run contract books from the UAE into other markets. You can run an incredibly tax-efficient business out of the UAE. I would have a US desk, a Europe desk, an Asia desk, Australia desk, and a Middle East desk with Dubai as my HQ and get teams running different time zones from there. And you can milk all the tax advantages coming out of it and have a very, very lovely life. That's how I do it now.

Nice. And then in order to do that, I've got a— you'd like to think enjoy living there. Just give us an honest assessment of, you know, you spend time in Sri Lanka, you spend time in Dubai, you spend a lot of time there. What about for anyone that's actually, I guess, two personas really. I might be there, might be single, might be an entrepreneur, I want to work hard, these things, that persona. And then also I speak to a lot of people that want to move their family there and do that, and they have a family unit and they want to spend time there. Just give us the honest assessment there, because you spent a lot of years there, and in order for us to do that, we've got to be happy living there, right? For the most part, even though I might spend time in the UK or other places Yeah.

Being single in the UAE is actually quite a tough game. I know that from when I started. I'm too old to talk about that now.

I've been married too long.

But I struggled. Like, when I first moved there, I was single. I actually met Helen when I went back to the UK because there wasn't any talent in the UAE when I started and I had to go and relocate so many people. I was spending loads of time in London. I met Helen when I was in London and then brought her back to the UAE essentially as my wife rather than as a placement. And what I think you've— Dubai is a very tough— because everyone's there for a reason. Everyone wants something. And you'll find that it's a tough place to meet people because everyone's trying to keep up the Joneses. A lot of people that it's hard to meet people who are— you've got loads in common with outside of your crew. People, I think people really do struggle with meeting— if they're guys, I know struggle meeting girls who are not looking at them, see how much they're making, you know, rather than looking at who they are as an individual. It's a very materialistic place, so people can really struggle with that. That can be quite a lonely place. So being single can be very tough in the UAE. It's a place to do business. It's not necessarily a big place for socializing, a lot of people find as well. Families, you're just looking at the cost. You're just looking at the cost. You're just looking at the cost. It's, if you can afford it, you can have a wonderful time there. The schools are amazing. Food's amazing. Houses are massive. It's, you know, you can buy beautiful cars there for half the price in the UK. You can drive, you can fill up, you know, a Range Rover for about 25 quid. Wonderful. You might, you know, the traffic's a bit crap, but you can have a lovely life if you've got money there. It's a city designed to entice people to enjoy it if you've got cash. If you don't and you're not sure you can afford private school, you're a bit worried about if you can or can't, not looking at finances, it looks a bit tight, the UA is going to put a significant amount of pressure on you and your family and your relationship therefore. So tread with caution.

Justin, look, I think not everyone's going to be interested in making this move, but there's also going to be lessons in here that we could take into I guess like different international markets, right? What do we need to know? What do we need to be aware of? But for anyone that is seriously considering moving their life there, setting up a business entity there, growing a team, I think there's plenty of lessons. We've kept it real and honest, and I know you're always going to be happy to connect with people if they wanted to ask any further questions. You've had to learn all these things the hard way, spent so much time there, but I think that is a really great honest assessment right now of what the opportunity is there and why it's attracting so many people and why people are going there. And I think that will give so many people some reality, some really good educational points on like what it takes. So I appreciate it. Thank you so much.

You're very welcome. And look, um, obviously this is a big part of what I do now, right? So after selling the business, I advise and help a lot of people and companies if they want to come out into the Middle East and Asia. So happy to answer any questions. We didn't really touch on the salary element. I'm sorry, I didn't have that data to hand, but perhaps we can give people some more information about what they should pay staff afterwards as well, which I'm happy to share.

Love it. Thanks for joining me.

Thanks a lot, man. Take care.