Hiring across borders: what placing people in five countries has taught me

I started recruiting in Dubai, and through Evolve I've placed people in the UK, the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and the US. The same lesson keeps coming back: a cross-border search has to start with the rules and the context, not the CV. In 2026 that matters more than ever.

The UAE. Private companies with 50 or more employees must increase Emirati employees in skilled roles by 2% a year, reaching 10% by the end of 2026, paying a monthly contribution for each Emirati not hired.

Saudi Arabia. Since 30 June 2026, private firms must fill 30% of 46 engineering professions with Saudi nationals. From 14 February 2027, 70% of project management manager, engineer and specialist roles must be held by Saudis. A new phase of the Nitaqat programme aims to localise more than 340,000 more jobs over three years.

Jordan. On 1 June 2026 the Ministry of Labour froze recruitment of non-Jordanian workers in most sectors, with unemployment among Jordanians at 21.0% in the second quarter. Office and sales roles are closed to foreigners outright under the ministry's June 2026 work permit guide.

The side door is the same in every case. Jordan's freeze exempts "occupations requiring specialised skills that are not sufficiently available in the local labour market", and its permit guide lists managers, consultants and executive officers as specialised roles requiring ministerial approval. In Saudi Arabia, the Ministry of Investment says 660 foreign companies have set up regional headquarters, already beyond the 2030 target of 500.

What this means for clients is that a foreign senior hire in the Gulf or Jordan is increasingly judged on what they leave behind: the local team they build and the successors they develop. I now assess that as carefully as technical track record, and I write it into the brief.

ECA International's 2025 survey of 262 multinational employers found that family or partner adaptation is the second most common reason international assignments fail, more likely to derail a move than performance or pay. Only 13% of employers said unmet pay expectations often contribute to failure, yet compensation is now the biggest barrier to getting someone to say yes.

That tension is the whole story of a senior international move. The offer wins the candidate. The family decides whether they stay.

Saudi Arabia's own premium residency data reflects it. An academic analysis published by the Gulf Research Centre in July 2026 found 70.3% of Premium Residency holders are aged 41 to 60, and identified the ability to bring family as possibly the programme's strongest retention tool. In Dubai alone, the immigration authority issued 66,000 Golden Visas in the first half of 2026.

On one assignment in Saudi Arabia, the role had stayed open for a long time and several technically strong candidates had already been interviewed. The answer turned out to be personality, cultural understanding and the ability to work well in that environment. Having lived in the Middle East helped me read those factors, and the appointment was made. I now talk to finalists about their family's view of the move far earlier than I used to.

Gulf pay growth has slowed sharply. Recruitment consultancy Cooper Fitch forecast UAE salary growth of just 1.6% for 2026, with leadership rises about a third of those for specialist individual contributors; by July 2026 its chief executive was predicting "no growth this year". Yet the same research found 40% of executives say the market can't supply the leadership and transformation capability they need.

The premium for moving to the Gulf is narrowing while the shortage of proven leaders isn't. For candidates, that means weighing the whole move: career trajectory, family, residency and the long-term package, not just the headline number.

In the UAE, notice periods are set in law at between 30 and 90 days. In the US, every state except Montana allows at-will employment, so either side can end it at any time for any lawful reason. Senior US executives negotiate their security in instead: Alvarez & Marsal's 2025-26 study found 86% of CEOs in its sample are entitled to cash severance on a change of control.

The route to the top differs too. Russell Reynolds' first-half 2026 data showed 88% of incoming S&P 500 CEOs were promoted from within. Heidrick & Struggles' 2026 data shows the UAE at the other end: 45% of CEOs hired externally, after an average of five years at the company before reaching the top, against twelve in the US.

A UK candidate joining a Gulf employer may serve months of UK notice to join a business where they can leave, or be let go, on three. A candidate heading to the US needs to know that their security lives in the contract, not the law. Both are worth discussing openly before the offer.

On one long-running engagement I supported positions across several countries, currencies and time zones for an international business in a sector I hadn't recruited in before. The practical work mattered as much as the search: keeping interviews moving across time zones, comparing packages like for like, and giving candidates in every country the same quality of information. When several people share that work, things fall between them. When one person owns it, candidates and clients get consistent answers.

1. Start with the rules: localisation quotas, permit categories and visa constraints, before you define the profile.
2. Write the brief around what the leader must build, including local teams and successors.
3. Bring the family into the conversation early, and make sure the offer supports the whole household.
4. Compare offers like for like: notice, severance, gratuity, housing, schooling and residency.
5. Have one person own the process across every country involved.

If you're hiring across borders, or thinking about a move between the UK and the Gulf, I'm happy to talk it through.

• UAE Government portal, Employing Emiratis in the private sector, updated October 2026.
• Saudi Ministry of Human Resources and Social Development, engineering Saudisation (July 2026), project management Saudisation (September 2026) and new Nitaqat phase (February 2026).
• Petra (Jordan News Agency), Labour Ministry freezes foreign worker recruitment, June 2026.
• Jordan News, Jordanian unemployment Q2 2026, August 2026, reporting the Department of Statistics.
• Jordan Ministry of Labour, Comprehensive Guide for Issuing Work Permits, June 2026.
• Mubasher, Saudi Arabia regional headquarters, September 2025.
• ECA International, Global mobility trends 2025, July 2025 (262 organisations).
• Gulf Research Centre, The Premium Residency Programme in Saudi Arabia, July 2026.
• Khaleej Times, Dubai residency and Golden Visas H1 2026, July 2026, reporting GDRFA Dubai.
• EnterpriseAM, Cooper Fitch Salary Guide UAE 2026, November 2025; Khaleej Times, salary outlook, July 2026.
• UAE Federal Decree-Law No. 33 of 2021, English translation on u.ae, Article 43.
• USAGov, Termination guidance for employers, March 2025.
• Alvarez & Marsal, 2025-2026 Executive Change in Control Report, November 2025.
• Gulf News, Russell Reynolds Global CEO Turnover Index H1 2026, October 2026.
• Heidrick & Struggles, Route to the Top 2026 data dashboard, April 2026.