The Bedaya Centre for Entrepreneurship and Career Development (Bedaya Centre), a joint initiative by Qatar Development Bank and Silatech, recently hosted a workshop on ‘Personality & Individual Differences and impact on Professional skills’. The workshop focused on how personality determinants affect 
professional skills.
The day-long workshop was conducted by eminent internationally accredited, financial analyst and soft skills expert trainer, Dr Abdel Rahim 
al-Hour. 
Dr al-Hour is an economic consultant to a variety of corporations, utilities, and government agencies in the finance industry. 
As general manager of Hi Tech Training Centre, Dr al-Hour is responsible for the overall performance and management of the centre which includes quality assurance, revenue goals, enrolment, staff management, marketing and advertising, programme development, and curriculum, and developing operating policies and procedures.
“There exists a strong connection between personality and professional skills which affects performance and bring about goal-oriented behaviour, and behavioural reactions,” Dr al-Hour explained.
According to him, individuals bring a number of differences to work, such as unique personalities, values, emotions, and moods and when new employees enter organisations, their stable or transient characteristics affect how they behave and perform. 
Reem al-Sowaidi, general manager, Bedaya Centre, commented, “This workshop was aimed at welcoming all those interested in the subject of organisational behaviour and its co-relation to professional skills. Moreover, companies hire people with the expectation that individuals come with certain skills, abilities, personalities, and values. Therefore, it is important to understand individual characteristics that matter for employee behaviours at work.”


Reem al-Sowaidi  Dr Abdel Rahim al-Hour


92 outlets closed for violations in 6 months


Fines amounting to over QR3.1mn were imposed on different outlets within the Doha Municipality’s jurisdiction in the first half of 2016 for violating food safety regulations.
Some 92 outlets within the jurisdiction of the municipality were also closed during this period for flouting norms, the official Qatar News Agency 
reported.
The health control section at the Municipal Control Department, Doha Municipality, conducted a total of 12,105 inspection tours at food establishments in the said period. The inspections covered dried and frozen food products in shopping malls and storehouses, meat products and related items, according to a half-yearly report issued by the department. The tours also targeted the vegetable and fruit market, slaughterhouses and meat shops. Health safety inspections were also carried out at laundries, beauty parlours and salons.
The inspection campaigns were aimed at ensuring compliance with regulations that guaranteed the safety of food sold to consumers, the report stressed. 
The inspections resulted in the issuance of 922 violation reports and the erring outlets were collectively fined QR3,108,370. At the same time, there were 640 reconciliation reports pertaining to similar food safety violations, valued at QR1,845,200. 
During the same period, orders were passed for the administrative closure of 92 food facilities for violating food safety regulations. Around 430 samples of food products were tested at the Central Laboratory of the Ministry of Public Health, the report pointed out. 
While 418 of these were found fit for human consumption, four were found unfit for such purposes and eight did not comply with the standards. 
Inspectors from the municipality also examined 84,033 tonnes of vegetables and fruits displayed at the Central Market in Doha. They destroyed 1,050 tonnes after the items were found unfit for human 
consumption. 
Further, they checked 378,274 heads of livestock supplied to the Central Market slaughterhouse and destroyed 118 tonnes of rotten meat. Some 9,873 tonnes of fish were also inspected before being displayed for the public at the Corniche and the Fish Market, with 38 tonnes of rotten fish being destroyed.