Twenty-third International Conference on Diversity in Organizations, Communities & Nations

Abstract

The King Abdulaziz University (KAU) founded in 1967 situated beside Red sea in Jeddah lays between 21° 29′ 38″ N, 39° 15′ 1″ E. Internationally, KAU, one of the prestigious university, has consistently stood among top 5 universities in the Middle East as well as in around top 200 institutions across the world for over 4 major ranking categories for the last 10 years. As per the latest QS world university ranking (2022), KAU stood at 109 for its continuous research contributions and academic reputations. KAU having 28 colleges, 185 departments, 28 research centers, 5 distinct institutions for specialized education and 24 affiliated centers for supporting research and educational accomplishments in different premises/campuses is the largest university of Saudi Arabia in terms of number of students and area. KAU has more than 50 distinct research groups conducting their research in collaboration with top ranked universities across the world along with active participation of good numbers of foreign faulty members. This study evaluates the emergency crisis management of King Abdulaziz University (KAU) with a case study conducted during global pandemic (COVID-19) by interviewing major stockholder’s opinions through cross-sectional questionnaire survey. More than 100 responses have been recorded from students (69.9%), faculty members (16.8%), and staffs (13.6%). The collected data have been analyzed using statistical method and illustrated by different schemes, graphs and diagrams. Interestingly, the KAU emergency crisis management capacity has been well-appreciated by the respondents and it has emerged as a success story at post-secondary institution in KSA.