BrazilFormer consultants feature on GCC young high-achievers list
Former consultants and employees of some of the world’s leading management and professional services firms once again feature prominently on the latest list of young high-achievers.
The latest GCC Young Achievers list has been released by Arabian Business magazine, and as per usual it features several alumni of some of the world’s leading consulting and professional services firms including Strategy&, Accenture, KPMG, McKinsey & Company, EY and Deloitte. The Young Achievers list celebrates entrepreneurs and experts disrupting their industries and shaping the future.
Now a Senior Vice President at Mastercard and country manager for Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and the Levant, J.K. Khalil prior to joining the payments giant spent four years at Strategy& predecessor Booz & Company in Dubai. Crossing from Barclays as an associate in 2012, Khalil provided analysis and strategic advice to financial services and healthcare organisations among others.
Also an alumnus of the PwC network is FeedUs founder and acting CEO Abdullah Abdulwasa, who spent two years as an IT Consultant in the professional services firm’s Risk Assurance practice between 2013 and 2015. Following a five-year stint at electronics supplier Tarsam Image, Abdulwasa launched FeedUs, a restaurant and delivery solutions start-up based in the UAE.
Khalid Alkhudair, who was last year appointed as Chief Experience Officer at Riyadh Bank, earlier in his career spent seven years at KPMG as the Chief Operating Officer for Markets in Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Kuwait. He also served as KPMG’s Head of Marketing, Communications & CSR, before setting off on a diverse entrepreneurial, advisory and mentorship career in 2013.
Albeit brief (they are still ‘young’ achievers after all), Eman Hylooz, the founder of book-focused Arabic social network Abjjad, also spent a three-month marketing & communications stint at KPMG in Jordan during the same period as Alkhudair. Meanwhile another entrepreneur, Jad Toubayly, founder of e-commerce platform Idealz, spent two years in corporate finance at EY.
Sticking with the Big Four; E-commerce expert and managing director of digital advisory Emerce Consulting, Lina Gallagher, started off her career with Deloitte in the UK – gaining experience as a manager of retail digital transformation. At Deloitte for altogether four and a half years, Gallagher would soon after spend a year as a Digital Management Consultant with PA Consulting in Abu Dhabi.
And then of course there’s the obligatory McKinsey cohort. Hassan Damluji, the Deputy Director of Global Policy & Advocacy (Middle East, Pakistan) at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, was an engagement manager with McKinsey for over four years. Louis Lebbos, the founding partner of digital ecosystem platform and accelerator AstroLabs, also spent a year at McKinsey.
As did Arash Dara, the Group CEO of diversified conglomerate Lootah Holding, as head of McKinsey’s Middle East organisational data offering OrgSolutions. But it was at Accenture where he first earned his consulting stripes, spending ten years with the firm between the UK and Middle East, the latter region where he headed a trading, investment and optimisation strategy division until 2018.
