Ready to take a career switch plunge? Here’s how 3 UAE residents did it successfully

The manicured lawn is dominated by a long table and comfortable chairs. I count 16. Strings of fairy lights sway in the breeze as if lingering in the joys of the supper club hosted the previous night at Chef Ahmed Halawa’s elegant villa in Dubai’s Jumeirah Village Circle.

‘I have hosted weddings, engagements and corporate events. Many have even proposed to their girlfriends here!’ says the chef.

On our way to the living room, we stop by the kitchen to get us steaming cups of karak chai. I cannot but marvel at the compact but well-equipped kitchen the chef uses to create a 7- to 8-course meal for his supper club guests.

In case you are wondering, chef Halawa is not a professional, yet can hold his own amidst any professional in the field. Self-taught, he is one of the most recognizable names in Dubai’s supper club scene and is proud to showcase his Palestinian roots and Jordanian upbringing in every dish he creates.

Until recently, this 30-something gastronome, who has a double major in Marketing and International Business, worked in the advertising sector since moving to Dubai in 2018. ‘I loved my job, the hustle in the fast-paced corporate world was exciting.’ Developing marketing strategies and executing them was fulfilling for him. But when his passion for cooking overtook the love for his profession in advertising, he decided to listen to his heart and turn his passion into his profession.

Quite like him, Anupam Nair, founder and lead singer of UAE band, Rooh, was also doing well in his career in Human Resource when he decided to change the beat and get into music full time 10 years ago. The 30-something’s passion for music got the better of his notions about ‘job security’ encouraging him to make a major career switch.

Anupam admits he always ‘had a song in his head’. After dabbling in music alongside his regular job for a few years, he decided to make the transition to full time singing– with success: His Arabic-version of the title track of the Bollywood movie, Befikre, received rave reviews and his energy-packed live performance with lead actors Ranveer Singh and Vani Kapoor is on the official YouTube channel of Yash Raj Films.

For some, stepping out of their comfort zone to traverse a new career path may be daunting, but they have found that pursuing their passion can rekindle the fire of enthusiasm and help realise their full potential.

That was the case with hypnotherapist and co-owner of Illuminations, Laila Saif, too. With an EMBA in Strategic Management, Laila began her career in Human Capital in the oil and gas industry before moving to the financial sector. She was fascinated by how it was possible to maximize the potential of employees. ‘It felt wonderful to be able to touch someone’s core where they are happy, engaged and inspired in their journey in an organization.’

So driven was Laila with her job that ‘my 20s were spent completely in the office’.Her job took centrestage, and she realised she was neglecting her health, relationships, and everything she was passionate about and wanted from life.

Pausing for a moment to reflect on her life, she saw an immense gap between where she was and the dream life she wanted. Keen to step out of her comfort zone and realise her dreams, she came to grips with her fears and quit her job.

Not surprisingly, naysayers were many. ‘You have to navigate all of the conversations and stick to [your gut instinct], whether it makes logical sense to others or not. I would call it a leap of faith,’ she says. Having always been passionate about consciousness, mind expansion and hypnotherapy, she took a 3-year career break to reskill herself in hypnotherapy and progression therapy before venturing into the wellness sector.

To heal others, Laila first needed to heal herself. ‘Once you take a leap of faith, you can meet a community who shares the same passion as yours and you realize that you can accomplish much more with a group of people who are like-minded. It was the best decision I made.’

MAKING THE MOVE

Career transition coach and founder of Unwind the Grind, Samia Hasan, makes it clear that a major mindset shift is required in the way we approach and design our careers. ‘You [don’t] have to be married to your profession for all your life. Your skills, interests and passion will evolve with your personal growth,’ she says.

She emphasizes that career transition is a lifestyle redesign that necessitates thinking how you wish to spend your time, how you feel at the end of the day and how it can relate to your long-term goals. So, careful planning and thinking through the why, the what and the when, are mandatory steps.

The desire to make a career change is directly proportional to the clarity of your why, she says. ‘Wayfinding is an ancient art of figuring out where you are going when you actually don’t know your destination,’ says the certified coach, adding we do not need a map to get there. ‘All you need is a compass and a direction. The latter comes from deep within you– from the clues behind what drives you, engages you and energizes you.’

How do we know what energizes, drives and engages us?

For Anupam, it has always been music. ‘Even while a kid, I [enjoyed] music– Jim Reeves, Denver, Eagles and Carpenter,’ says the lead singer who had no formal training in music when he started out in the music industry. ‘My mother had good taste in music and she [moulded my music sensibilities].’

He remembers enjoying composing simple songs on the keyboard she bought him. ‘I would sing in competitions and parties. Music came naturally to me.’

He put together his first band while in school, and while in college could charm an audience with their favourite songs and ‘secure their votes’.

Even after moving to Dubai, he did not miss an opportunity to pick up his guitar and sing. ‘I was the first artiste to sing for a Bollywood radio station, City 101.6 Unplugged,’ he recalls. When the station gave him an opportunity to open a concert at Trade Centre, Anupam was thrilled. ‘But first, I had to create a band. I got together a few friends and we called it Anupam Nair band before renaming it Rooh.’

Word got around and soon Rooh was performing at cooperate events, clubs and events. ‘We were organically growing.’

But he soon was struggling to manage his fulltime job and when it came to choosing between the two, he decided it had to be music.

Today, Rooh’s YouTube channel has more than 72K subscribers and features more than 90 cover songs. They won the Masala Award for the Best Asian Band followed by Wedding Sutra for Best Live Entertainer 2022.

‘Composing and singing for Bollywood movie, Julie 2, was an awesome experience,’ says the singer.

Food matters

No unlike Anupam, Chef Halawa’s passion for creating food too began during his growing years.

Hailing from a household where both his parents were fantastic cooks, creating and experimenting with ingredients came naturally to him. ‘My parents competed on the cooking front. We were at the receiving end, so we did not complain,’ he fondly recalls. His mother cooked authentic Levant food and his father, an engineer, loved to experiment with ingredients. As the youngest of five siblings, he began cooking when he was just 11.

Even as a child, he never asked them for a recipe, instead tried and tested ingredients until he perfected the dish.

This skill came in handy when he moved to Egypt to study. ‘My friends at the University enjoyed the food that I cooked exactly the way it was served at my parent’s table.’ Even then cooking for people was very fulfilling for him. ‘Makloubeh is a Palestinian dish that literally means upside down. It is a rice-based dish cooked with broth and vegetables upturned before it is served. And I became the professional flipper,’ he quips, showing off a video of his expert flip done the previous night amidst cheers from his guests.

After moving to Dubai, he continued to treat his family and friends to his culinary creations over weekends. ‘I had a full-time demanding job in advertising, but I began looking forward to cooking on weekends.’

It was his love for food that got him on the supper club scene. The first few dinners were open to friends and family, but soon word was out, and he started to see acquaintances and even strangers in his house. Although he was working extra hours in his job, the supper clubs kept him energized for the rest of the week.

‘So many connections have been made on my table,’ says the chef who announces communal dates on his Instagram page.

When he reached a point when his advertising career wasn’t fulfilling anymore, he decided to turn to cooking full-time. ‘Supper clubs are a movement now,’ says the chef who features on the ICE system on Emirates Airlines in a show called Tastemakers. Halawa promises his guests a home-cooked Levant food experience, at times alternating with Spanish, Italian or Thai cuisine.

Taking the first step

Laila admits that leaving an area that she had mastered was not an easy one: ‘Starting from scratch can be difficult.’ Even scary.

‘As humans we can train ourselves to be able to face our fear and take that first step. One of the things that helped was sky diving.’ Laila, now a licensed sky diver, took the course to emotionally train herself to face her fears and take the leap. ‘Fear is biological. When I could train myself to get my legs to take that first step despite my fear, I realized that the experience was enjoyable and blissful, and not as scary as the idea.’

She points out that we often surprise ourselves with what we are capable of. What helped her navigate was her desire to give the absolute best of what she knew. ‘If I made mistakes, I learnt from them so that I would not repeat them and moved on rather than beating myself up and dwelling on them.’

She had a saving plan, but she had to downgrade. ‘I owned a Maserati but gave it up as I could no longer afford the maintenance.’ She points out that sometimes joy comes from having an ice cream on the beach. ‘When you realize what makes you happy, you realize that you don’t need very much.’

Chef Halawa agrees.

Taking that first step to move out of your comfort zone is the toughest part because when we are at a regular job, we take many aspects of our life for granted – visa, insurance and a stable monthly income, he says. He tackled them one by one, and things got clear. He did enough dinners to sustain himself financially. ‘You have to believe in yourself, your capabilities, while being rational. You cannot take the leap without the gear that will sustain you.’

One challenge was that supper club was a new idea that people were only getting to know about. However, with perseverance, maintaining high standards and being consistent, things fell into place. ‘My guests are happy; the feedback is fantastic, and the food good.’

In Anupam’s case, he was at the peak of his music career when the pandemic struck. ‘I was stuck in India. And suddenly there were no shows.’ Deciding to take the shows online but with a twist, Rooh started a game called Musical Bingo. The band played songs one after another to an online audience playing a game of Bingo where the cards had names of songs instead of numbers. ‘The bookings kept coming, but the vibe and energy we would get when performing live was different.’

For Halawa, the pandemic meant he had to stop hosting dinners. ‘But I got a permit and started delivering food.’

In Laila’s case, the challenge came with a silver lining. She was ready to open business in March 2020, when Covid struck. ‘I remember thinking, how unlucky! What I did not realize was that we had opened at a time when people needed support the most.’ During lockdown, Illuminations, Abu Dhabi, turned all their services online. This proved to be effective. ‘We were able to give people autonomous specialized sessions that have proven to be very successful.’

Should you have a Plan B?

‘If there is a Plan B to fall back on, then you would not give your all to Plan A,’ says Anupam. He points out that he moved to music full time only after having established himself in the music world, but he too had to transcend the fears of job security and a regular monthly income. ‘I gave myself six months to establish my music career. I worked so hard that I did better than I expected.’ He recalls that one live performance in Bali led to nine new bookings.

Talent and success are two different entities, he believes. To be better than the best he had to upskill by taking lessons in Carnatic music while he was working. An hour’s practice is a must for him other than keeping himself fit with physical training.

Chef Halawa explains that he started the supper clubs when he had a full-time job. ‘I quit only when I was ready. It took me a year and a half of working every single weekend to be able to quit, so there was no need for Plan B.’

His experience in advertising equipped him with skills required to keep up his supper clubs. ‘Creating food can be a complicated job and a lot of preparation goes into making a 7- or 8-course meal from scratch, but I can manage fine because I am used to the hustle.’ He sharpened his culinary skills trying, tweaking and repeating dishes several times, so he was confident.

For Emirati, Laila Saif, Plan B meant that there was a chance that she could fail, and failure was not an option. Laila had resolved that she would face and tackle any obstacle that came in the way, but her mind was set on Plan A. ‘Anything you learn in life is like a toolkit that no one can take away from you.’ She admits she did not have the experience running a business and managing a corporation. The only way to deal with it is to change and adapt our methods.

Coach Samia’s number one insider hack when changing careers is to ensure you hang out there.

If you are in the exploratory phase wanting to learn more information about different career paths, you would want to immerse yourself with people working in those fields. Meeting people who are where you want to be helps you bridge that knowledge and network gap. She asserts that an always-on relationship building approach ensures that you have enough relationship capital to tap into when the need arises. With like-minded people sharing common interests, you learn a thing or two about the new field you want to venture into, and you remain top of mind for them as you talk about your goals and skills. Action breeds confidence as you learn how to embrace your fears, she says.

Looking back, Anupam is happy with the way life has panned out. Having performed in more than 25 countries, he loves the places that music takes him to, and ‘some very amazing’ people he has met and worked with. He is also happy that Rooh’s inception into Bollywood has been on their own terms. ‘I am glad I listened to my heart,’ he says.

Chef Halawa quips, ‘I work 7 days a week and I work harder now, but it is satisfying because you are doing this for yourself. I love feeding people and to see the smile on their face when they take that first bite is priceless.’

Laila feels a sense of pride that she is in control of her life. ‘I am in the driver seat of my life. It is so rewarding and satisfying.’ It gives her confidence that she can achieve whatever she puts her mind to, and at every step she wants to be connected to her heart. ‘I believe our time on Earth is finite and during that time I want to maximize my experience.’