2023 Middle East Consultant Awards to take place on 22 November – nominations now open
Several new categories have been added and nominations can now also be in the form of video entries
The 2023 edition of the annual Middle East Consultant Awards (MEC Awards) will take place on 22 November at the Ritz-Carlton JBR in Dubai. The magazine’s editorial team has also revealed that the website for the awards is now live and nominations are now open.
As before, the awards categories have been segmented into three categories: Company; Project and People. Several new categories have been added for the 2023 edition such as: Metaverse Architect of the Year; AI-led Design Champion of the Year and HR + Wellness Champion of the Year. To read about the full list of categories, click here.
Discussing his ambitions for the 2023 MEC Awards, Paul Godfrey, Head of Content at Middle East Consultant says, “I’m aiming to achieve the highest overall standard of entries of any edition of the awards to date. The judges’ feeling last year was that the company and product categories were somewhat under-served, whereas the people categories received a very high standard of entries. This year, I’d like to see very high quality entries across the board, with some really exciting projects taking centre-stage.”
Nominations for the 2023 MEC Awards will close on Friday 27 October 2023. Pressed for his advice on what firms can do to submit strong nominations, Godfrey reveals, “The best advice I can give is to ensure that you enclose not less than three client testimonials (signed and stamped) and really spend time thinking about why your nomination is the worthy winner. What truly makes it special and have you fully communicated this? Have you attached images that do it justice and have you told us anything of special interest that will stay in the Judges’ minds?”
As before, all of the nominations submitted for the 2023 MEC Awards will go through a multi-step judging process which includes several rounds of elimination. Apart from the magazine’s editorial team, an independent panel of judges will also preside on the nominations; both groups will work together to produce a shortlist and decide upon winners. Read about the nomination guidelines here and to nominate, click here.
Godfrey also points out that, this year, he’s calling for the industry at large to focus on video entries. He notes, “This year, we are allowing entrants to submit video entries for the first time (the details of the kind of format that companies can use are listed on the website). I promised this when I was on-stage at the awards gala last year, and now it’s actually happening. I expect to see this dramatically increase the number of entries to the awards and also change the style of entry, too. Of course, you can still apply the traditional way, using the nomination form, if you want to.”
Asked for his thoughts on what companies can do to ensure their nominations aren’t eliminated by the panel of judges, Godfrey explains, “Firstly, please, please, only enter projects that fall within the stipulated timeframe – if they don’t, they won’t be considered. The second biggest turn-off for the judges is seeing an entry that’s only one page long and has clearly been submitted as an after-thought. This simply won’t get the job done. We take these awards very seriously and of course, we honour the companies that take them seriously, too.”
Read more about the 2023 Middle East Consultant Awards by clicking here.
