Sales force competency of steels products and energy business division at mitsui co viet nam ltd

NATIONAL ECONOMICS UNIVERSITY NEU BUSINESS SCHOOL THESIS “Sales force competency of Steels Products and Energy Business Division at Mitsui & Co Viet Nam Ltd" SUPERVISOR: PHD NGUYEN QUOC DUY STUDENT: LE HA MINH CLASS: EMBA - 9C HANOI – 2013 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT In order to complete thesis “Sales force competency of Steels Products and Energy Business Division at Mitsui &Co Viet Nam Ltd”, I got supports from professors at Business school – National Economic University Especially is Associate Professor, Dr.DUY– my supervisor During the time for completing my research, he helped me by his best when necessary He gave me useful guidance and full information so that I can report my thesis on time He is really a professional supervisor with valuable supports Moreover, I also want thank to all employees Mitsui &Co Viet Nam Ltd, including: Board of Directors, all managers and staffs that helped me so much during time of studying my research I would like to express my thanks to Mr Motonobu Sato, General Director of Mitsui & Co., Vietnam Ltd and Mr Masayuki Nagasawa, General Manager of Steels Products and Energy Business Division because of their advice for me during my MBA course and research In addition, I wish to say thanks to Mr Asaga Minoru, General Manager of Human Resource Division, Mrs Chu Nguyen Thanh Thuy, Manager of Human Resource Division and her staffs to provide me lots of useful information about human strategy, salary policy, human management form, etc In conclusion, I would like to say thanks to all managers, staffs of EMBA program who helped all EMBA students in studying and research during years Thank you very much! TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENT .1 ABBREVIATIONS LIST OF FIGURES .5 LIST OF TABLES EXECUTIVE SUMMARY CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale 1.2 Research Objectives .11 1.3 Research Question .11 1.4 Research Methodology 12 1.4.1 Research process: 12 1.4.2 Collecting data: .12 1.5 Scope of research 14 1.6 Research structure: .14 CHAPTER 2: THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK ON COMPETENCY 15 2.1 Definition Nature of competency 15 2.1.1 Definition of competency 15 2.1.2 Competence model 18 2.1.3 Components of selling competence 20 CHAPTER 3: SALE STAFFS COMPETENCY IN STEELS PRODUCTS AND ENERGY BUSINESS DIVISION .28 3.1 Overview of Mitsui Vietnam: 28 3.1.1 History: 28 3.1.2 The business of Mitsui Vietnam: 30 3.1.3 Functions and duties of these Departments: 31 3.2 Business department of energy and steel products (Division) of Mitsui Vietnam 32 3.2.1 Functions and duties of the Department: .32 3.2.2 The goal of the Department in the coming years: 33 3.2.3 The organizational structure of SPEBD: 34 3.2.4 Sales Process: 35 3.2.5 Results of Mitsui Vietnam Business and Business Division sales of steel in the years 2008 – 2012 36 Table 3.3: Results of Mitsui Vietnam Business and Business Division sales of steel in the years 2008 – 2012 36 3.2.6 Characteristics of the Sales Force Sales Department: .36 3.3 The Sale staffs's competency requirement at SPEBD 39 3.4 Current competencies of SPEBD 48 3.4.1 Current knowledge of SPEBD 48 3.4.2 Current skills of sale staffs at Steels Products and Energy Business Division 52 3.4.3 Current attitude of sale staff at SPEBD 59 3.4.4 Overall assessment on the gap of competency .61 3.5 The strengths and shortcoming of sale staffs’ competencies in SPEBD 62 CHAPTER 4: SOLUTION RECOMMENDATIONS 65 4.1 Orientation of Mitsui business in the near future 65 4.2 Solution and recommendations to improve sales staffs’ competencies of SPEBD .66 4.2.1 Improving Training and Development 66 4.2.1.1 Most suitable training contents .67 4.2.1.2 On the Job Training method 68 4.2.1.3 Internal training .68 4.2.1.4 External training 68 4.2.2 Improving Non-Training and Development 69 4.2.2.1 Improving policy of Compensation 69 4.2.2.2 Developing Incentive and Bonus term and Consitions 69 4.2.2.3 Completing policy of Punishment 72 4.2.4 Improving Evaluation 73 4.2.4.1 Marking working evaluation 73 CONCLUSION 76 REFERENCES .78 APPENDIX 79 APPENDIX 80 ABBREVIATIONS SPEBD Steels Products and Energy Business Division MITSUI VIETNAM MITSUI & Co VIETNAM Ltd LIST OF FIGURES Diagram 2.1: Competencies 16 Diagram 2.2: Components of selling competencies .20 LIST OF TABLES Table 3.1: Structure of the SPEBD 34 Table 3.2: Sales Process of the SPEBD 35 Table 3.3: Results of Mitsui Vietnam Business and Business Division sales of steel in the years 2008 – 2012 36 Table 3.4: Members of SPEBD .37 Table 3.5: Basic salary of the Sales Department’s sales force: 38 Table 3.6: Responder of the deep-interview 39 Table 3.8 : Respondent rate 48 Table 3.9 : Knowledge on market and industry .49 Table 3.10: Knowledge on company and functions 50 of the Steels Products and Energy Business Division 50 Table 3.11: Knowledge on Product of the 51 Steels Products and Energy Business Division 51 Table 3.12 : Evaluation problem solving 52 Table 3.13 : Evaluation assesement skill 53 Table 3.15: Evaluation Planning 54 Table 3.16: Evaluation communication 54 Table 3.17 : Evaluation negotiation .55 Table 3.18 : Evaluation teamwork 56 Table 3.19 : Evaluation presenting 57 Table 3.20: Evaluation using computer 58 Table 3.21 : Evaluation foreign language 58 Table 3.22 : Evaluation taking responsibility 59 Table 3.23 : Evaluation Enthusiasm and quality sellers 60 Table 4.1: The contents of the training courses .67 Table 4.2: Commissions for employees monthly sales 70 Table 4.3: Redistricting bonus for employees .71 Table 4.4 :Weekly reports of sales representatives 74 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY From the 2000s, Vietnam’s construction industry has been developing rapidly In sustainable development, the urban environment is also take care It is the reason for the booming of Vietnam construction industry On the background of the market economy, especially after Vietnam’s entry into the World Trade Organization (WTO), the most important objective of the domestic economy is to enable local enterprises to sustain and develop in such a fiercely competitive market Enterprises must apply new technology and develops human resource strategy in order to survive in the competitive environment of both domestic and international market Among important strategies to keep local enterprises alive, policy of the human resource considered as the first and foremost factor to develop This thesis is written based on the fact of Mitsui Viet Nam is facing with the problem of losing competitive advantage in term of human resource’s quality for its future development to become a leading steel company in Vietnam This weakness induces Mitsui Viet Nam easily to lose potential business opportunities due to the lack of competent people who the job in the most effective way Therefore, the company is trying to overcome this bad situation by improving human resource specially managers that the company did not pay much attention before In the scope of my thesis, the study was conducted to identify required competencies Mitsui Viet Nam ’s sale office and assess their current competencies to determine the gap between requirements and their current competencies, thereby giving some implications for addressing that gap Based on literature foundation of the competency, competency model, job analysis, synthesis and qualitative analysis of primary and secondary data are used to test Primary data are collected by in depth interviews and questionnaire survey Secondary data were collected mostly from the company policies, regulations, reports From analyzing job performance and interview results, requirement of competencies required were identified for the sale staff including: (1) Knowledge; (2) Skills: Personal Skill; Interpersonal Skill; Work Skill;(3) Attitude Basing on given competencies criteria, the survey was conducted to assess the current competencies of the sale staff at Mitsui Viet Nam in Hanoi In this step, 360o evaluation method was used to identify their current competencies The questionnaire survey was designed and revealed some key findings as follow: The Score that people give for most of competency criteria were not high such as It means that the sale staff has some competencies not meet requiremwnts of the company and they should improve these competensies immediately The sale staff ’s evaluation on competencies of themselves is higher than managers and customers It proved that they are over confident in their competencies The gap between current and required managerial competencies for project officer of the company was identified This is a big gap problem that the company is facing and they should consider to take the right actions for addressing this gap and improving these competencies of the sale staff immediately Basing on these findings, the thesis suggested some solutions for addressing the gap between the current competencies of sale staff and the company’s requirements I would like to suggest REST progress, which improves the competencies of sale staffs, included four function need to be implemented carefully, and they are: Recruiting and selection, Evaluation, Succession planning, Tranning and Development The thesis focused only on two solutions including training solution and nontaining and development solution In training solution, the thesis suggestes internal training and external training plan In non-training and development solutions, the thesis focused on policy of Compensation, Developing Incentive and Bonus term and Consitions, policy of Punishment, Improving Evaluation to explore ways that can help the company achieve effectiveness of the solutions in improving of sale staff as well as human resource’s CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale Nowadays, the economic integration with the regional and global economy has recently accelerated in Viet nam, hence competition is fierce One of the measures for development of companies is improving its sales force because sales force can build long-term exchange relationships that bring benefit to their customers and the company it represents Sales force competency requires sales managers to attract and retain salespeople who can create a more value-added relationship with customers and play an important role in producing corporate’s revenue, especially in the context that products’ features and benefits are often readily available online Therefore competency for salesman in the company is an important issue Mitsui & Co.VietNam Ltd was established in 2006 The main business of Steels Products and Energy Business Division is that Import/ Export & domestic trading business on Iron & Steel material for various area, construction steel, automotive steel, plate for ship – building, home electronics, stainless and special steel for domestic market The Steels Products and Energy Business Division is working to improve the sales and distribution of steel products to market to customers and to system of businesses The turnover from Steels Products and Energy Business Division has accounted for about 80-85% total turnover of the Company This result is due to the following factors: The objective cause: According to the statistics of Vietnam Steels Association (VSA), the number of steels producers totals about 400 and there are nearly 600 steels trading companies in the industry whereas the real estate market is still in the slowdown period with plummeting demand The inequality between supply and demand has lead to fierce competition in the industry and make the market share of Mitsui to be downsized from 10% (2009) to 6% (2012)