25 HR Leaders in MENA Reshaping How Talent Works in the AI Era

Ten years ago, HR in this region ran payroll, processed leave, and closed the file. It was a service desk with a headcount.

That job is gone.

The same function now decides whether AI screens candidates, how performance gets measured when half the work happens next to a model, and what “a career” means to a 24-year-old in Riyadh who has never known a workplace without automation. The stakes moved from administrative to existential. A specific group of people moved with it.

The 25 leaders below made that jump early. Most are not on the conference circuit. They are running the actual work inside places like Aramco Digital, GE Vernova, Huda Beauty, and the giga-projects redrawing Saudi Arabia. Some are widely followed already. Several deserve more attention than they get.

Here is who they are, and what their choices signal about where the profession is going.

Why MENA is where the AI-and-talent question gets answered first ?

Most regions are still debating whether AI belongs in the workplace. MENA skipped that debate.

Vision 2030 put a national deadline on workforce transformation. The Gulf’s giga-projects need to hire, train, and deploy tens of thousands of people faster than any traditional HR model allows. The workforce here also skews young and digital-first in a way that makes “pilot it next year” an unaffordable answer. When a country decides to build a new city, the people strategy cannot lag the construction schedule.

That kind of pressure produces a particular kind of HR leader: one who treats AI as an operating reality, not a panel topic. The people on this list did not wait for a global best practice to emerge. They wrote it. Which is why watching this specific cohort matters more than most. Where they land is where the profession lands six months later.

How these 25 HR leaders were chosen ?

This is not a popularity contest and it is not pay-to-play. Three things decided the list.

Seniority with real scope: people leading the HR or people function at a recognized organization, with responsibility for strategy rather than administration. An active voice on the questions that matter now, especially where AI, culture, and performance intersect. And regional influence: leaders whose decisions ripple beyond their own org chart, across the Gulf and the wider Middle East.

The 25 are numbered but grouped into five clusters, not ranked. Nobody here is “number 24 out of 25.” Each leader is a headliner in the story they are telling. The five clusters read as overlapping answers to one question: how do you manage talent well when the ground keeps moving?

The AI-in-HR practitioners putting theory into practice

Everyone claims to be doing AI in HR. This group has the receipts.

1. Rohit Manucha

Independent AI-in-HR Practitioner, Dubai

Rohit is the clearest embodiment of this whole list. Over 18 years across industry and consulting, he builds workplaces where, in his own words, “AI augments human potential seamlessly.” A CIPD advisory committee member and SHRM MEA facilitator, he is one of the few people who can talk GPU-as-a-service and executive coaching in the same breath, and mean both.

2. Sabahatt Habib

CHRO, The Giving Movement

Sabahatt is running one of the region’s more concrete AI-in-HR case studies. She built a full-stack people and culture function from scratch, then embedded AI literacy and responsible-use principles across talent, performance, and learning. A TEDx speaker and one of the Arab Women’s HR Leaders to Watch, she is proof that AI adoption in HR is a leadership decision first, a software decision second.

3. Najib Makarem

Group CHRO, National Holding

Formerly a senior partner at Korn Ferry, Najib brings a consultant’s discipline to the AI question. His thesis is simple and demanding: every people initiative needs a business case, every transformation needs measurable impact. Named among the Top 10 HR Leaders in Asia in 2025, he is openly working the harder version of the AI question, how to integrate it without losing the human part.

4. Ahmed Embaby

Chief People Officer, IMI

Ahmed has spent 30 years turning HR from a transactional support function into a strategic partner, now increasingly powered by AI and data. He has led complex, multi-country transformations across media, tech, pharma, and FMCG. He is good at the part that everyone underestimates: making the shift stick after the announcement.

5. Karen Azulai

Global HR-Tech Advisor and Community Leader

Karen was doing this work before it was fashionable. Named among the Top 100 HR Tech Influencers, she has spent years thinking about how generative AI and automation reshape sourcing and recruitment. A frequent global keynote speaker who also gives back through open community sessions, she is a useful reminder that the AI conversation in HR did not start yesterday.

6. Samar Elmnhrawy

Chief HR Officer and SVP Sustainability, Majid Al Futtaim

Samar works at a scale most HR leaders never touch: $20 billion P&L oversight, billion-dollar M&A integrations, and culture overhauls across the USA, Europe, the Middle East, KSA, Africa, and Asia. With 25 years across retail, automotive, oil and gas, and government, she is an HR executive who sits at the board table by right, not by invitation.

7. Belgin Ertam

Global HR Leader and CHRO, GE Vernova

28 years of human capital strategy across technology, energy, aerospace, and healthcare. Belgin is helping steer the people side of the energy transition, which is arguably one of the hardest talent challenges on the planet right now. A coach, board member, and lean practitioner who has lived and worked in three countries. Rare combination.

8. Deepak Manek

Global HR Leader, IDEMIA

Deepak runs people operations for roughly 10,000 employees across more than 50 countries in cybersecurity and digital identity. His mission statement is refreshingly blunt: dismantle the outdated structures that slow organizations down, and build self-propelling teams. Born in Mumbai, raised in Dubai, shaped by 20 years of work across every inhabited continent. Scale is his first language.

9. Dominic Keogh-Peters

Group CHRO, Galadari Brothers

Dominic may be the most systematic thinker on this list. A Chartered Fellow of the CIPD and Wharton CHRO Programme graduate, he wrote The New CHRO Playbook and built the “CHRO Operating System,” a framework for the people systems that actually move performance. He leads transformation across a conglomerate spanning media, food, automotive, engineering, hospitality, and real estate.

10. Nelly Boustany

Chief Talent and Culture Officer, Network International

Nelly sits at the center of the region’s fintech and payments shift. Her job is deceptively simple and genuinely hard: grow talent and help companies transform through their people, in an industry where the technology moves faster than most organizations can absorb it.

11. Dianah Alabduljabbar

CHRO, NextEra (LTIMindtree and Aramco Digital JV)

Dianah owns the people strategy for a fast-scaling startup built around Vision 2030. She spent 20 years at Saudi Aramco and has upskilled more than 30,000 professionals along the way. Now she is designing workforce structures from a blank page, which is a harder problem than fixing an old one.

12. Nabil Batawi

Group CHRO and Chief Shared Service Officer

Nabil has helped shape the Saudi labor market itself. A board and advisory member on Public Investment Fund projects and Ministry of Human Resources initiatives, and a multiple CHRO-of-the-Year winner, his influence extends well past any single company’s payroll.

13. Esraa Mohammed Al Sharief

Human Capital and Transformation Executive

17 years leading large-scale change across giga-projects, government entities, and multinationals. Named among the Top 50 HR Leaders in the Middle East and the Top 10 Female HR Leaders in Saudi Arabia. Esraa is good at translating vast strategic priorities into people agendas that actually move, and she advises C-suites, boards, and nomination and remuneration committees on the same.

14. Dr. Ghalib Al Hosni

Chief People Officer, Omantel; Chairman, OSHRM

Dr. Ghalib has spent 25 years aligning human capital with digital innovation at Oman’s telecom leader. He frames the work of shaping the future of work as weaving people, culture, and technology into one force for progress, which is a less flashy way of saying it than most people manage. He carries that mission across the region through OSHRM.

15. Fara Siddiqi

Group Chief People Officer, Cognita Schools

Over 23 years, Fara has steered organizations through IPOs, mergers, private equity investments, and reorganizations across the Americas, Europe, and Asia. Her focus is people-centric cultures that promote women, diversity, and digital transformation at the same time, and coaching senior leaders to grow through the change rather than around it.

16. Sara Boueri

Chief Human Resources Officer, Future Pipe Industries

Sara is the rare CHRO fluent in the language of the CFO. Close to 20 years of proving that scaling a business is about making every move count. She uses AI and automation to strip inefficiency out of people operations and free her teams for work that matters, and she keeps workforce planning tied to strategy rather than guesswork.

17. Angelo Andreoni

SVP Human Resources, Huda Beauty

Angelo brings 25 years of international experience to Huda Beauty. Known for building employee trust and high-performance teams, he handles the specific challenge of scaling people operations inside a founder-led global business that moves at the speed of beauty and social media.

18. Anja Petrovski

Chief People Officer, Al Nabooda Automobiles

Anja leads with a philosophy she states plainly: love is real when someone shows it, and leadership works the same way. A women’s empowerment advocate and board member, she spends her energy giving visibility to talented people regardless of where they started. A human-centered counterweight in an increasingly automated field.

19. Caroline Werunga

Global HR Leader, Diversity and Inclusion Advocate

Caroline is a culture shaper across power services, water technologies, engineering, financial services, and logistics, with deep experience spanning the Middle East, Africa, India, and Turkey. She has repeatedly built lean, effective organizations out of complex ones, and leads a global women’s network alongside her day job.

20. Aysha Sulaiman

Group HR Director, Ras Al Khaimah Economic Zone (RAKEZ)

Aysha runs people development for one of the UAE’s major economic zones. The role sits at the intersection of corporate HR and national talent strategy, which is exactly the kind of place where employee experience decisions have consequences well beyond a single company.

21. Ashley Boots

Founder, Next Chapter Advisory

Ashley spent two decades as a senior HR executive and CHRO before founding Next Chapter Advisory, where she works with CEOs, founders, and leadership teams on the people side of strategy. Her specialty is the hardest moment in any organization: navigating the change that redefines how people work, lead, and grow together.

22. Sushree Sahoo

Head of HR, Bhionix Group

Sushree builds high-performing teams and positive cultures. Empathy plus strategy is the frame she works in, and she is deliberate about aligning people initiatives with business goals so employees feel valued enough to stay and grow. Easier said than delivered.

23. Kanza Tariq

Head of HR, Efficient Buildings Maintenance

Kanza has placed more than 1,000 candidates across F&B, construction, technical services, and corporate sectors in the UAE. Her strength is the operational backbone of talent, from Emiratization hiring and workforce planning to labour-law compliance. The unglamorous work that makes everything else possible.

24. Sariga Stanley

Human Resources Manager, Vistacore Holdings

Sariga is one of the operational HR leaders who keep growing organizations running day to day. This is the layer of the profession where AI-era efficiency gains will land first, and also the layer most likely to be underestimated while they land.

25. Fathima Aysha

Human Resources and Recruitment Manager

Over a decade of experience, focused on data-driven talent acquisition and employer branding. Fathima is fluent in HR technology and analytics for hiring optimization. A practical example of the tooling shift changing recruitment across the region.

What these 25 leaders have in common (and what it signals for HR strategy)

Across all 25 profiles, one pattern is worth sitting with.

AI is not the goal for any of them. It is leverage, a way to free people for work that only people can do. They also do not treat culture and strategy as separate things. Employee experience, performance, and business outcomes are one system, not three departments. And almost all of them made the same move at different speeds: HR stopped being a service desk and started being the architecture of how the company actually works.

That last shift is what changed everything. When AI absorbs the administrative layer, what is left for HR is the harder work: judgment, culture, and how performance actually gets measured. Doing that well requires systems that connect goals to feedback to growth to fair, defensible compensation decisions, rather than a stack of disconnected tools and a review cycle nobody trusts. Most performance management processes quietly fail here, not because managers do not care, but because the operating system underneath them was built for a different era.

This is the gap Peoplebox.ai, a performance management platform built for exactly this shift, was designed to close. It ties continuous feedback, OKRs, calibration, 9-box reviews, and compensation planning into one system, so the people strategy these leaders describe has somewhere to live.

The choice ahead for MENA HR leaders

The leaders on this list did not wait for permission to modernize. They rebuilt their operating systems while the rest of the market was still debating whether the shift was real. That gap, between people who moved early and people who waited, is about to widen.

When reviews happen because they have to rather than because they change anything, that is a sign the operating system underneath has not caught up to the ambition. Same for goal-setting nobody references after Q1, feedback that lives in Slack instead of the system of record, and calibration decisions made without an evidence trail. AI does not fix any of that on its own. A better operating system does.

If you are building the people strategy for a company that wants to belong on this list five years from now, the question is what to modernize first.