My Leadership-in-Action project was the third conference of an organisation I founded in 2021 -
Qatar Youth Power, the first and only fully student-initiated and led platform in Qatar to empower
the youth of Qatar to positively impact their communities through learning from the nation’s
brightest leaders and change-makers, impacting over 3000 students to date.

The QYP Conference 2023 took place on Saturday, 9th September at the Wyndham Hotel West
Bay in Doha and brought together 200+ students and 19 guest speakers. We were also
supported by 7 sponsors including the Swiss Embassy in Qatar, Rayyan Water, KPMG Qatar,
Wait Valet Parking, Al Shareef Holding, Al Hallab Sweets, the Laidlaw Foundation, and 3
partners including the Mexican Embassy in Qatar, OX Fitness, and Doha Debates. The
conference consisted of interactive workshops, keynote speeches, and panel discussions on a
range of issues and topics including entrepreneurship, climate change, diplomacy, and
emotional intelligence. Guest speakers included the H.E. Ambassador Guillermo Ordorica of
Mexico; Mrs. Doris Zogg, Swiss consul; Nawaal Akram, a disability advocate acknowledged on
BBC’s 100 Women programme; Dr. Evren Tok, Associate Dean of Community Engagement at
the Hamad Bin Khalifa University’s College of Public Policy; and Jose Saucedo of Doha
Environmental Actions Project.

I lead a team of 16 high school and university students in preparing and organising the
conference, including two affiliate team members from my Laidlaw cohort at UCL who used
QYP as their LiA projects. As Founder and Executive Director of QYP, I secured and liaised with
all guest speakers and oversaw our departments of marketing and social media, website and IT,
communications, and sponsorships. My work began in outlining the timeline for when different
deliverables needed to be done on a detailed Gantt chart from contacting potential sponsors, to
opening up registration to students, and final logistics. The priority tasks were to secure a venue
for a rate within our budget and start contacting potential sponsors because these were the
most important yet the most time consuming parts of organising our conferences. Following this,
over the next 3 months, my team and I began reaching out to potential guest speakers,
finalising details in the agenda, and setting up our registration and RSVP systems. Finally,
during the week before the conference, we focused on last-minute details and logistics such as
tech rehearsals at the venue.

QYP’s target audience is students in Qatar who typically lack opportunities to attend and be
involved in events such as these, hence, we keep our conferences completely free of charge
and livestreamed online, allowing anyone to attend without the burdens of travel costs.
Additionally, this year, we also invited students from the First Assalam School, a school that
targets students from disadvantaged and lower socioeconomic backgrounds.

Through my work with QYP and this conference, I have honed skills such as communication
both internally with my team and externally with stakeholders such as partners, sponsors, guest
speakers and attendees, exposing me to many different contexts where I must be able to adapt
my style and mode of conveying different messages. Furthermore, I have enhanced my social
and cultural intelligence and awareness in ensuring that QYP is Qatar-focused in everything we
do in order to cater for the specific needs of the country’s youth. We do this through ensuring we
are made by Qatar (guest speakers, partners and sponsors are all Qatar-based) and for Qatar
(despite being online, we are only open to students residing in Qatar).

To learn more about our work, visit our website: https://www.qataryouthpower.com/home and
our Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/qataryouthpower/

Press releases:
https://www.iloveqatar.net/news/general/qatar-youth-power-conference-2023-event-communitydoha,
https://www.qatar-tribune.com/article/83389/nation/3rd-qatar-youth-power-continues-to-empowe
r-young-people

Livestream recording:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CtGhl7nlFHc&ab_channel=QatarYouthPower