Pledging for Progress: Custom Laravel Survey & Reporting Platform for the UAE Gender Balance Council

Objective

The UAE Gender Balance Council (GBC) launched the “SDG 5 Pledge to Accelerate Gender Balance,” a landmark national initiative urging private-sector companies to raise women’s representation in mid-to-senior management to at least 30% by 2028. To facilitate this, the GBC required a secure, centralised digital gateway for companies to register, submit annual progress data, and engage with the initiative. GTECH developed the complete web platform and survey system, leveraging a robust backend architecture powered by Laravel and Laravel Backpack, alongside a comprehensive Admin portal for submission management and national reporting.

Challenge

The GBC needed a highly secure and strictly confidential data collection platform capable of handling sensitive corporate metrics from top-tier private sector entities across the UAE (including major multinational corporations and local conglomerates). The primary challenge was twofold: First, creating a frictionless, intuitive frontend survey experience for corporate leaders and HR directors to submit their gender diversity data without technical hurdles. Second, engineering a powerful, scalable backend that would allow GBC administrators to securely monitor aggregate progress, verify submissions, track compliance, and extract data to inform national policy recommendations and the UAE Gender Balance Awards.

Solution

To deliver a secure, enterprise-grade data platform, GTECH executed a seamless integration of clean frontend design with heavy-duty backend engineering:

• Strategic UX & Survey Design: GTECH designed a highly professional, corporate-facing user interface that aligns perfectly with the UAE government branding. The layout utilises a clean, distraction-free aesthetic with high-contrast typography and structured form fields, ensuring that the complex data entry process (aligning with ILO’s ISCO-08 classifications) is intuitive and user-friendly. Clear navigational cues and progress indicators guide signatories through the multi-step survey without fatigue.
• Backend Development (Laravel): The core engine of the platform was built using the Laravel PHP framework, chosen specifically for its industry-leading security features, crucial for protecting highly confidential corporate data. The architecture ensures that all submitted metrics remain strictly siloed and protected against unauthorised access.
• Admin Portal & Reporting (Laravel Backpack): GTECH utilised Laravel Backpack to construct a bespoke, high-performance administrative dashboard for the GBC team. This powerful backend interface allows government officials to effortlessly manage company registrations, review survey submissions in real-time, filter aggregate data, and generate the comprehensive reports necessary to track the UAE’s progress toward UN Sustainable Development Goal 5.

Results

Conclusion