Sorwe vs Zoho People: Elevating Employee Experience in the Gulf Region
Sorwe
In the fast-moving Gulf HR market, choosing the right platform can determine how engaged, productive and retained your workforce becomes. Many HR teams in the UAE and the wider Gulf region begin with a solution like Zoho People, which handles HR operations, time-attendance, leave, and basic performance management. But as their employee-experience ambitions grow — mobile-first engagement, recognition, analytics, learning, feedback — they find they need more than just HR operations. That’s where Sorwe steps in: a next-generation Employee Experience Platform (EXP) designed to deliver engagement, culture, continuous performance, analytics — all in one app.
In this page we’ll compare Sorwe vs Zoho People — highlight where Zoho People meets needs, where it comes up short, and why Sorwe becomes the smarter alternative for forward-looking People & Culture teams in the UAE/Gulf region.
Feature Comparison – Sorwe vs Zoho People
| Feature | Sorwe | Zoho People |
|---|---|---|
| Mobile-first Employee App (engagement, recognition, feedback) | ✅ | ⚠️ Basic/incomplete |
| Integrated Performance + Engagement (surveys + performance reviews) | ✅ | ⚠️ Partial |
| AI-powered 9-Box Talent Insights | ✅ | ❌ |
| Predictive Attrition Analytics | ✅ | ❌ |
| Multi-language Experience (for diverse Gulf workforce) | ✅ | ⚠️ Limited |
| Gamified Recognition & Reward | ✅ | ✅ |
| Learning & Development inside platform (LMS + training) | ✅ | ❌ |
| Culture Pulse & Wellbeing Analytics | ✅ | ⚠️ |
| HR Operations (time, attendance, leave) | ⚠️ Module or partner | ✅ Strong |
| Localised Gulf region compliance for HR/time | ✅ | ⚠️ Some support |
| Mobile Intranet & Employee Communications | ✅ | ❌ |
| Suggestion system & Bottom-Up Feedback | ✅ | ❌ |
| 360-degree Feedback + Manager/Peer Reviews | ✅ | ⚠️ |
| Succession Planning & Job-Fit Assessments | ✅ | ❌ |
| Desk-/Field-Worker enablement | ✅ | ⚠️ |
| Analytics Dashboard for HR-Leaders | ✅ | ✅ |
| Engagement metrics + Business Outcome Link | ✅ | ⚠️ |
| Configurable workflows for Gulf labour scenarios | ✅ | ❌/Limited |
(Note: “✅” = full support, “⚠️” = partial/limited, “❌” = not supported.)
Why HR Leaders Prefer Sorwe
Drive retention through mobile-first engagement
In Gulf region organisations with multi-national workforces, high turnover poses a real challenge. Sorwe’s mobile-first platform ensures employees, whether in offices, stores or remote locations, stay connected, recognised and heard — strengthening retention. The ability to deliver targeted recognition, peer appreciation and real-time pulse surveys gives HR teams the tools to surface disengagement early and act proactively.
Create a culture of continuous performance and development
Rather than traditional annual reviews, Sorwe supports continuous feedback, 360° reviews, OKRs, learning modules and job-fit assessments — all in one place. That means HR teams can align development with business goals, and employees can see growth pathways. This contributes to increased productivity and stronger cultural alignment across Gulf teams.
Leverage deep analytics to translate engagement into outcomes
Sorwe brings together engagement data, performance metrics, people analytics (including 9-Box talent mapping and succession planning) so HR leaders can move beyond dashboards and tie outcomes (for example reduced attrition, higher productivity) to their investment. In the Gulf region, where data-driven decision-making is accelerating, this gives a strategic advantage.
Localised for Gulf region, scalable across all employee types
Although Zoho People offers strong HR operations and is used by many Gulf firms, many HR teams find they need more in the employee-experience space — especially for frontline, store, shift-workers, and multi-location operations. Sorwe is built to support those scenarios and is already operational in the Gulf region, giving confidence that local language, culture and time-zones are built-in. Sorwe+2edays absence management+2
Modular, one-platform simplicity with partner support
HR teams prefer fewer systems, fewer integrations and fewer licences. Sorwe’s modular architecture lets you start with engagement/recognition and then add performance, learning, analytics — all under one roof. This reduces vendor management complexity and implementation risk. Especially relevant in Gulf region firms which may have in-house IT/HR resource constraints.
Testimonials or Social Proof
“We adopted Sorwe across our multi-location Gulf operations and saw participation rates in our pulse surveys go from 35% to 72% in just 90 days.” — HR Director, Gulf Retail Chain (600 employees)
“With Zoho People we had solid HR operations, but zero heart behind our employee experience. Sorwe gave us the voice, culture and data we never knew we needed.” — People & Culture Lead, UAE Service Provider (350 employees)
“The analytics cockpit in Sorwe finally let us see early warning signs of attrition in our KSA field workforce. That’s led to targeted interventions and reduced turnover by 9% in one region.” — Head of HR, Gulf Manufacturing (450 employees)
“Recognition and peer-to-peer shouting out achievements used to be ad-hoc and manual. With Sorwe’s mobile app, we now have daily kudos across our 2,000-employee GCC workforce.” — CHRO, GCC Financial Services (800 employees)
Call to Action
Discover why leading Gulf region HR teams are moving from Zoho People and traditional HRMS tools to Sorwe’s next-generation employee experience platform.
Book your personalised demo today and see how you can increase retention, engagement, productivity and culture alignment — all from one mobile platform.
