Genavco has certainly got its priorities right with its focus on human resources and quality.

The company set up a training centre – the first of its kind in the Gulf in 1976 – with the support of its principals Detroit Diesel and Allison. This has developed into a well-established Training and Quality Assurance (QA) Department headed by Mustafa Al Hariri.
“In 2003, we trained 60 people and this year we are targeting 80 trainees,” Hariri says.
 The centre was set up to provide technical training to its customers and employees. Genavco arranges and conducts guild examinations for Detroit Diesel and Allison transmission guild members. Later, the centre changed its focus to include human resource development.
Today, Genavco provides complete training for its employees – both technical and non- technical, in aspects such as product familiarisation, electronic controls, failure analysis, diesel and gasoline engines, automatic transmissions as well as customer handling, selling skills and quality assurance. Its suppliers also use this facility for training purposes.
“We coordinate with the department heads to identify the human resource and technical training requirements for employees and design a programme accordingly,” says Hariri. “We distribute literature to update the staff on latest developments and maintain a permanent relationship with the trainees by evaluating them both before and after the training programmes to determine the impact of the scheme.”
“Genavco also maintain a resource centre of subjects relevant to the training programme including organisational policy and training manuals.
The training centre’s mission is to support customers and to improve the operation of the company in terms of overall performance and internal procedures.
“As a QA division, we lead and promote the quality assurance philosophy, including preventive quality measures. We support continuous improvements in processes and systems to provide a high-quality service in an efficient manner.
“We gather customer feedback to identify requirements and plan accordingly for corrective action and continuous improvement.
“Currently, we are focusing on translating our ISO 9002:1994 certificate to ISO 9001:2000. Our objective is to attain the certification by the third quarter of this year,” he adds.