Manager - Community Engagement, AD Food Hub

The Community Engagement Manager at Abu Dhabi Food Hub (ADFH), part of the Economic Cities & Free Zones Cluster at AD Ports Group, is responsible for ensuring the operational integrity, safety, and compliance of the live market environment. Acting as the primary client-facing representative, this role is pivotal in embedding a safety-first culture among tenants and clients, overseeing outsourced operational functions, and maintaining high standards of cleanliness and compliance every trading day. The manager safeguards ADFH’s premium positioning by delivering a differentiated, safe, and clean market experience that encourages tenant retention and service charge renewal. Operating under strict cost discipline, the Community Engagement Manager enforces service level agreements (SLAs) and performance deductions with contractors, directly impacting the largest controllable operating costs and protecting the service-charge recovery ratio. By proactively managing revenue protection and health, safety, and environment (HSE) oversight, the role prevents incidents and trading interruptions, ensuring continuous market activity and occupancy. This position is integral to maintaining ADFH’s reputation as the safest, cleanest, and most compliant food trading hub in the region, distinguishing it from competitors.

Core & Strategic Responsibilities:

Operational Oversight & Compliance

• Monitor daily market operations to ensure cleanliness, safety, and regulatory compliance.
• Embed and promote safety culture among tenants, clients, and contractors, including the execution of training and induction training enforcement.
• Conduct regular inspections and audits to identify and mitigate risks associated to the community (assets, behaviors, bad practices)

Contractor & SLA Management

• Oversee outsourced service providers, ensuring delivery aligns with contractual SLAs.
• Enforce performance deductions and cost controls to optimize operating expenses.
• Track and report contractor performance, escalating issues as necessary.

Client & Tenant Engagement

• Act as the primary point of contact for tenants and clients, addressing operational concerns and feedback.
• Facilitate onboarding and orientation for new tenants, emphasizing safety and compliance requirements. Induction trainings.
• Build strong relationships to encourage service charge acceptance and unit occupancy renewals.

Revenue Protection & Market Differentiation

• Implement strategies to maintain a clean, safe, and well-run market that supports revenue retention.
• Monitor and prevent incidents or stoppages that could disrupt trading activities.
• Support initiatives that enhance ADFH’s premium positioning versus competitors.

Reporting & Continuous Improvement

• Prepare regular reports on market operations, contractor performance, and compliance metrics.
• Analyze data to identify trends, propose improvements, and support decision-making.
• Collaborate with internal teams to drive operational excellence and innovation.

People Management Responsibilities:

• Lead, coach and develop the community engagement team, setting clear objectives and reviewing performance regularly.
• Direct the day-to-day work of on-site staff and outsourced contractor teams, so that service levels, safety standards and tenant expectations are consistently met.
• Run induction and safety training for the team, tenants and contractors, and keep training records up to date.
• Build a client-first, safety-first culture in the team, and step in on escalations, conflicts or performance issues.

Educational and Technical Qualifications: Bachelor's degree in Business Administration, Operations Management, or related field.

Language Skills:

• English (Mandatory)

• Arabic (Good to have)

Years of Experience: 5 years of professional experience

Nature of Experience: Contract Management, Property Management Services, Civil Engineer, Project Management.