# Omar Kandil, full reference Last generated from the site content files. Canonical: https://www.kandilomar.com ## Identity Name: Omar Kandil Role: Digital marketing and AI expert Title: Founder and CEO, Talentdu Location: Beirut, Lebanon Languages: Arabic, English Email: omar@talentdu.com Website: https://www.kandilomar.com ## Biography ### Short Digital marketing and AI expert. Founder and CEO of Talentdu. TEDx speaker and author of Winning the Slow Race. Advisory for companies on marketing strategy and AI integration. Beirut. ### Medium Omar Kandil is a digital marketing and AI expert based in Beirut. He is Founder and CEO of Talentdu, the professional education partner for MENA, which runs live programs for professionals, corporate training for organizations and growth partnerships for universities. He advises companies on marketing strategy and AI integration. He spoke at TEDxLAU Byblos on whether jobs survive the AI revolution, introducing the Skill-Replaceability Matrix, and wrote Winning the Slow Race, a book on building businesses that last. ### Long Omar Kandil is a digital marketing and AI expert based in Beirut. He is Founder and CEO of Talentdu, the professional education partner for the MENA region, which runs live cohort-based programs for professionals, customized training for organizations, and growth partnerships for universities. He advises companies on marketing strategy and AI integration, working directly with marketing leaders rather than through a team. Before Talentdu he co-founded a New York creative agency, ran its operations, and led it as CEO from 2022, scaling the team and the marketing operation and working with clients across the US, Europe and the Gulf. He spoke at TEDxLAU Byblos on whether jobs survive the AI revolution, where he introduced the Skill-Replaceability Matrix, a framework for working out which parts of a role automation reaches first. He is the author of Winning the Slow Race, a book of fifty lessons on building a business that lasts, and he is writing a second. ## Career - 2017 to 2018: Social media manager, Step Feed, Dubai. Ran digital engagement across Step Group's English and Arabic platforms, Step Feed and Yalla Feed. My first marketing job. - 2018 to 2020: Area sales manager, Lancaster Plaza, Beirut. Led sales for four Lancaster properties in Beirut, selling into FMCG, tech startups, telecom and energy. - 2020 to 2021: Head of operations, DapraLab, remote. International business development. Travelled for events and networking, and learned to sell across borders. - 2021 to 2026: Co-founder, then COO, then CEO, OBCIDO Inc., New York. I co-founded a New York creative agency in January 2021, ran operations alongside our first CEO, and took over as CEO in April 2022. I scaled the team and the marketing operation, and travelled to meet clients across the US, Europe and the Gulf. I stepped down to focus on Talentdu. - 2024 to now: Founder and CEO, Talentdu. Professional education for MENA: live programs for professionals, corporate training for organizations, and growth partnerships for universities. ## Education - Master of Business Administration, Lebanese American University, 2024 to present (in progress) - BBA, Business Administration and Management, Beirut Arab University, 2013 to 2016 ## Credentials - AI Essentials, Saïd Business School, University of Oxford, February 2026 ## Advisory I take a small number of engagements at a time and I do the work myself. If you want a team trained rather than one person advised, Talentdu runs corporate training and that is usually the better fit. - Advisory hours: Booked in blocks, for a marketing leader who wants senior input on strategy or AI integration without running a project. You bring the problem, we work through it. - Scoped engagements: Advisory plus training, delivered over a few days. Typically a review of where you are, a working session with the team, and a plan they can run without me. ## Speaking topics - AI and the future of work: What automation reaches first, and what it does not. Built on the Skill-Replaceability Matrix from my TEDx talk. - AI in marketing: Where AI actually changes the work: content, media buying, research, reporting. And where it does not. - Digital marketing strategy: How to decide what to do, and what to stop doing, when every channel is asking for budget. - Martech and AI integration: Choosing and wiring the stack so it serves the strategy instead of replacing it. - Entrepreneurship: Fifty lessons from building businesses slowly, which is the subject of my book. - Building marketing teams: Hiring, scaling and keeping a marketing function that works. ## Speaking history - TEDxLAU Byblos, Byblos, Lebanon, April 2025: "Will Your Job Survive the AI Revolution?" - Future Forward: AI in Digital Marketing, LAU, Beirut, Lebanon: "AI in Digital Marketing track" - AI in Digital Marketing, LAU, Beirut, Lebanon: "Integrating AI across content, advertising and strategy" - STC tech talk, Manama, Bahrain: "Panel on cyber security in a digital economy" - NFT NYC, New York, United States: "Panel on the impact of NFTs across industries" - Dubai Metaverse Assembly, Dubai, United Arab Emirates: "Guest panellist" - NFT Summit, Istanbul, Turkey: "Guest" ## Books ### Winning the Slow Race: Achieve More by Moving Smarter, Not Faster Published 27 September 2024 by KitaBooks. 212 pages. ISBN 9798989773749. Fifty lessons, in seven parts, on building a business that lasts. I wrote it because most business advice is written by people describing the sprint, and almost nobody describes the years in between. Reached #14 in Marketing for Small Businesses on Amazon's Kindle bestseller list, alongside Alex Hormozi, Sabri Suby, Gary Vaynerchuk and Seth Godin. Buy: Amazon (Kindle) https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DJ5TC7ZP | Amazon (paperback) https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DJ5V1L5F | Apple Books https://books.apple.com/us/book/winning-the-slow-race/id6730118349 | Barnes & Noble https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/winning-the-slow-race-omar-kandil/1146350607?ean=9798989773749 | Kobo https://www.kobo.com/ww/en/ebook/winning-the-slow-race | Goodreads https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/219665177-winning-the-slow-race ### Upcoming: Half a Funnel Marketing funnels and marketing for small businesses. My second book. Winning the Slow Race was about building the company. Half a Funnel is about the marketing: what small businesses actually need from a funnel, and what they can safely ignore. ## Media and press - Entrepreneur Middle East (2025-02-10): Future-Proofing Lebanon's Workforce: Talentdu and Lebanese American University Train 300+ Professionals in AI Marketing. https://mena.entrepreneur.com/news-and-trends/future-proofing-lebanons-workforce-talentdu-and-lebanese/486856 - TEDx Talks (2025-04-16): Will Your Job Survive the AI Revolution? | TEDxLAU Byblos. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G9OuUA1gaBA - DxTalks (2025-09-04): Podcast with Omar Kandil, LEBTECH 2025 edition. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DPROPE98uxM - The American Reporter (2024-09-17): New Book Winning the Slow Race Offers an Honest Perspective on Entrepreneurship in a World Obsessed with Quick Wins. https://www.theamericanreporter.com/new-book-winning-the-slow-race-offers-an-honest-perspective-on-entrepreneurship-in-a-world-obsessed-with-quick-wins/ - The American Reporter: How to Stay Ahead of the Competition: Omar Kandil Shares His Insights. https://www.theamericanreporter.com/how-to-stay-ahead-of-the-competition-omar-kandil-ceo-of-obcido-inc-shares-his-insights/ - Seekers Time: Omar Kandil Talks About AI In Marketing. https://www.seekerstime.com/omar-kandil-talks-about-ai-in-marketing/ - Seekers Time: The Importance of Short-form Video Content in Marketing. https://www.seekerstime.com/tech-expert-and-ceo-omar-kandil-discusses-the-importance-of-short-form-video-content-in-marketing/ - Seekers Time: 5 Key Takeaways from Winning the Slow Race: A Guide for Startup Founders. https://www.seekerstime.com/5-key-takeaways-from-winning-the-slow-race-a-guide-for-startup-founders/ - Business Deccan: Top 5 Marketing Books to Elevate Your Business Strategy. https://businessdeccan.com/top-5-marketing-books-to-elevate-your-business-strategy/ ## Articles - What a marketing advisor actually does, and when you need one (2026-09-18): The difference between an advisor, an agency and a consultant, what advisory work looks like in practice, and the signs a company is ready for it. https://www.kandilomar.com/blog/what-a-marketing-advisor-does - How universities grow enrollment with digital marketing (2026-09-18): What actually moves enrollment numbers: the funnel universities keep ignoring, why brand campaigns fail admissions, and what a growth partnership looks like. https://www.kandilomar.com/blog/university-enrollment-marketing - Will AI replace marketing jobs? The Skill-Replaceability Matrix (2026-09-18): The framework from my TEDx talk, in full: how to work out which parts of any job automation reaches first, and what to do about yours. https://www.kandilomar.com/blog/skill-replaceability-matrix - Marketing funnels for small businesses: the version that works (2026-09-18): Forget the diagram with seven stages. A small business needs one offer, one route to it, and one number watched weekly. Here is the whole system. https://www.kandilomar.com/blog/marketing-funnels-small-business - From agency CEO to educator: why I bet everything on education (2026-09-18): I spent years running a New York creative agency. Then I founded an education company in Beirut and made it my life's main work. This is the reasoning. https://www.kandilomar.com/blog/from-agency-ceo-to-educator - Building a marketing team from zero: who to hire first (2026-09-18): The hiring order that works, the one that wastes a year, and how AI changed the shape of a modern marketing team. https://www.kandilomar.com/blog/first-marketing-hires - Digital marketing in Lebanon and the Gulf: what is different here (2026-09-18): Budgets, languages, platforms, trust: what changes when the playbook written for the US and Europe lands in MENA, from someone who works both sides. https://www.kandilomar.com/blog/digital-marketing-lebanon-gulf-differences - Corporate marketing training: why most of it fails (2026-09-18): Companies keep buying training that changes nothing. The failure is predictable, and so is the fix: train on the company's real work, then change the workflow. https://www.kandilomar.com/blog/corporate-marketing-training-fails - How to become a digital marketer in Lebanon: the honest guide (2026-09-18): No fluff: the skills that get you hired, the portfolio that beats a CV, where the jobs actually are, and the mistakes I watch beginners make. https://www.kandilomar.com/blog/become-digital-marketer-lebanon - The AI tools I actually use in client work, and the ones I dropped (2026-09-18): A working stack, not a listicle: what AI genuinely changed in my marketing work, where it failed, and the rule I use before adopting anything. https://www.kandilomar.com/blog/ai-tools-client-work ## Verified profiles - https://www.linkedin.com/in/okandil/ - https://www.instagram.com/omarkandil_/ - https://x.com/omarkandil_ - https://www.amazon.com/Omar-Kandil/e/B0DJ61CLQZ - https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/52199604.Omar_Kandil - https://www.crunchbase.com/person/omar-kandil - https://sessionize.com/omar-kandil/ - https://theorg.com/org/talentdu/org-chart/omar-kandil - https://www.talentdu.com/about - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G9OuUA1gaBA ## Disambiguation Several people share the name Omar Kandil. This one is the Founder and CEO of Talentdu, based in Beirut, Lebanon, author of Winning the Slow Race (ISBN 9798989773749), and the TEDxLAU Byblos speaker who presented the Skill-Replaceability Matrix.