Sharjah Chamber opens fifth cohort of Strategic Business Leadership Programme

The Sharjah Training and Development Centre launches its latest leadership initiative in partnership with Spain's University of Navarra, designed to cultivate strategic thinking and managerial excellence across the emirate's institutions.

Leadership development has become the cornerstone of institutional advancement in the modern business landscape, a principle that Sharjah Chamber of Commerce and Industry continues to embody through its evolving commitment to human capital development. The organisation has now opened the fifth cohort of its Strategic Business Leadership Programme, a six-month intensive spanning November 2026 through April 2027 and themed around the philosophy of beginning a successful leadership journey.

Designed in cooperation with Spain’s University of Navarra, the programme addresses a fundamental reality: that effective institutional performance depends on leaders equipped not merely with theoretical knowledge, but with the practical capabilities to navigate contemporary challenges and drive meaningful change. The curriculum integrates seven carefully constructed training modules that weave together strategic thinking, artificial intelligence literacy, design thinking, and organisational behaviour with particular emphasis on leadership in volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous, or VUCA, environments.

The programme targets department directors and their deputies, section heads, and nominated employees from public and private sector institutions. Rather than confining learning to the classroom, participants undertake specialised training at the University of Navarra itself, offering direct engagement with international best practices and expertise. This immersive approach combines advisory training with hands-on practical application, ensuring that knowledge translates into tangible institutional improvement.

A distinctive feature lies in the applied project component, through which participants assess workplace challenges, identify development opportunities, and devise tailored solutions. This bridges the gap between conceptual learning and workplace reality, empowering professionals to refine management processes, enhance work methods, and ultimately improve operational efficiency within their own institutions. The programme cultivates critical and creative thinking, strengthens strategic planning capabilities, and develops competencies in change management and data analysis.

Maryam Saif Al Shamsi, Assistant Director-General for the Support Services Sector at Sharjah Chamber, emphasised that the programme’s launch reflects the organisation’s foundational belief in human capital investment and its recognition of leadership development as essential to institutional agility and economic resilience. This initiative aligns with broader efforts to strengthen the business environment, as reflected in Sharjah Chamber’s presentation of its comprehensive business ecosystem at the Investment Forum 2026, which underscored the emirate’s commitment to fostering sustainable business growth.

Amal Abdullah Al Ali, Director of Sharjah Training and Development Centre, noted that the fifth cohort represents an evolution in pedagogical approach, one that deliberately merges academic rigour with practical workplace application. The programme remains anchored to real institutional contexts, with participants drawing on their own professional environments as laboratories for testing and refining emerging leadership concepts.

The broader significance of this initiative extends beyond individual professional development. As the recent conclusion of the Oxford and Cambridge Strategic Leadership Programme demonstrated, Sharjah Chamber has positioned itself as a cultivator of transformational leadership talent equipped to navigate digital transformation, artificial intelligence integration, and governance challenges. The Strategic Business Leadership Programme continues this trajectory.

What it means for Abu Dhabi

Leadership excellence remains a strategic imperative across the UAE’s institutional landscape. By developing cohorts of strategically minded professionals capable of driving institutional efficiency and fostering innovation, Sharjah Chamber contributes to the broader ecosystem of managerial capability that strengthens not merely Sharjah but the entire emirate of Abu Dhabi and the federation. The emphasis on strategic thinking, change management, and adaptive leadership addresses contemporary economic and technological imperatives that affect all of the UAE’s business sectors and institutions.

The international partnership dimension, particularly the engagement with Spain’s University of Navarra, reinforces the UAE’s positioning as a destination for global expertise and knowledge transfer. This creates pathways through which international best practices flow into local institutions, enhancing competitive capability and contributing to the broader agenda of economic diversification and institutional modernisation across Abu Dhabi and the wider emirates.

Source: WAM