The art of keeping the talented people at viet hoa joint stock company

HCMC UNIVERSITY OF FORREIGN LANGUAGES AND INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY DEPARTMENT OF INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION " GRADUATION PAPER TOPIC: THE ART OF KEEPING THE TALENTED PEOPLE AT VIET HOA JOINT-STOCK COMPANY Student's name Class Advisor • JULY 2007 : Nguyen Thi Phu Thu : KD030l : Hoang Huan, MBA -I ACKNOWLEDGEMENT First of all, I would International like to spread me gratitude Business Administration Languages and Information Department Technology to all lecturers of of HCM city Foreign University (HUFLIT) who supplied me with invaluable knowledge as well as experience during the past years More sincerely, I would like to express my deep tribute to my lecturer Hoang Huan, who have constructed and provided useful suggestions to help my research be implemented perfectly My topic is that "The art of keeping the talented people at Viet Hoa Global Joint Stock Company" aiming to discover the reasons for the employees' leaving work as well as the retention policy the company overcome the alarming high turnover; applied to at the same time, my giving evaluation and some suggestions to this art at Viet Hoa Co By this paper research, I have not only gained environment, more understanding about working business way, and corporate culture, but put my knowledge learnt at school in practical situations, creating the most stable steps before debuting into the school of hard knocks Besides, I also show my thanks to the board of directors, and all the staff of Viet Hoa Co who supplied all materials as many as possible for me to perform the work reasonably Finally, I would lik~ to pay the highest respect to my mother, relatives, and close friends who have encouraged and supported me to this work ADVISOR'S ASSESSMENT Although in general school (HUFLIT) considers its students' research papers a form of upgraded essay or just a compendium of what they have •• read and then collected, I found that there is a great strive on the part of the students involved for their elaborate work of research By strive, I mean that they carry out the work - their research papers - in a very hard way for the fact that they have to work in a very difficult situation: the school's humble library, both in size and in space, and their being busy (almost HUFLIT's all students are rather busy - fulfilling their studies as well as making their living at the same time) and therefore preparing their papers in haste From such an understanding, I not see any reason to make the students work harder for a better paper In other words, striving in such a difficult situation, they can not avoid any shortcomings and limitations And, this literary work of Nguyen Thi Phu Thu, the writer of the paper you are reading, makes no exceptions In my eyes, her work should be regarded as 'good' for the reasons already mentioned here above So, please read Phu Thu's work and think of her strive in an understanding manner instead of her being required to have a perfect research study Anyhow, hers is a work of order, diligence, patience, and dedication, which I feel admiration for Hoang Huan, MBA Lecturer 11 COMMENTATOR'S ASSESSMENT • 111 VIET HOA JOINT-STOCK CO'S ASSESSMENT • During the apprentice time at Viet Hoa Global Joint-Stock Company for two months, Miss Nguyen Thi Phu Thu has got her best shot to inquire, attended all apprentice days, and fulfilled tasks assigned by the company In particularly, she has written a graduation paper with the topic "The art of keeping the talented people at Viet Hoa Global Joint-Stock Company" that has been high appreciated The studied topic is practical to the company's human resource position She found out some main reasons that made Viet Hoa Company's employees quit their jobs As for evaluation and suggestions, the company has realized that they can be put into practice to improve and enforce the performance of the company If possible, the company would like her to stay and work at the company in order to collaborate with us for long time, pushing the company up to the best place HCMC, July 11 th, 2007 Director IV ABSTRACT To evaluate a business or an organization to see if it is operating effectively and successfully, • we commonly rely on its assets These assets might include capital, land, plants, facilities, profits per year, and so on This has become an ingrained viewpoint We will, however, make a big mistake if we ignore a determinant That is HUMAN, regarded as the key to innovation that sets up competitiveness accounting for the survival and growth of the organization Taking care of people is a critical way of taking care of the business to measure a certain organization's performance Therefore, we must consider its managerial technique, the art of keeping talented people in an organization And through the report with theme "The Art of Keeping Talented People at Viet Hoa Joint-Stock Company", I have discovered this area more comprehensive The report is divided into chapters: Chapter 1: Literature review & Management Overview- I identified some authors who had studied several issues related to my field of study Next, I supplied some major definitions and functions of management, especially of Human Resource management Chapter 2: Viet Hoa Global Joint-Stock Company- presenting information about my studied company to help readers know particularly its backgrounds, services, past and current business activities Chapter 3: Why people leave work- after conducting the survey to gather the opinions of leaving staff as well as the existing workers, I show the most common reasons leading to the state of giving up jobs of Viet Hoa's employees that becomes a burden to the company Chapter 4: Retention and the art of keeping talented people at Viet Hoa Company- Some overviews referring to Retention, and from this, I detail the methods of keeping skillful workers that the company has applied v Chapter 5: Evaluation and some Suggestions- looking carefully at the above arts of the tie-up of talented people I make some assessment of them and offer some suggestions with the purpose of enhancing the company's performance VI THE LIST OF FIGURES, ILLUSTRATIONS Page Figures Figure : Job Description of Viet Hoa Figure : Structured verus Unstructured Inteview 11 Figure : Exempt Job and Non-exempt Job 13 Figure : The Organization Chart 23 Figure : Profit Comparision of Logistics Team in 2006 24 Figure : Sales Performance in 2006 27 Figure : Income Statement of Viet Hoa from 2004 to 2006 30 Figure : Expectations of Manager and Employees 36 Figure : The Turnover of Viet Hoa Co 41 Illustrations Illustration :Viet Hoa Company's Profile 17 Illustration : Logistics Departmant 25 IIIustration : Marketing Department _ _ 26 Illustration : Account and Finance Department 26 Illustration : Sales Department 27 VII CONTENTS Page o Acknowledgement _ o Advisor's Assessment o Commentator's o Viet Hoa Joint-Stock Co's Assessment IV o Abstract v _ 11 Assessment _ o The List of Figures and Illustrations _ _ V11 Contents V111 INTRODUCTION o o o o o 111 Introduction Research paper objective Scope of the research Research method Structure of research CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW & OVERVIEW OF MANAGEMENT I LITERATURE REVIEW II MANAGEMENT OVERVIEW Part 1: Management _ Part 2: Human Resource Management Definitions Functions CHAPTER 2: BACKGROUND INFORMATION 16 A.About Viet Hoa Global Joint Stock Company 16 I Company Profile 16 II Achievements 18 III The Corporate Culture 18 V111 IV The Meaning of the Logo 18 V Functions of Viet Hoa Co 19 VI Main Services of Viet Hoa Co 20 VII The Organization Chart 23 B The Business Activities in The Past Three Years at Viet Boa Co 28 I The SWOT Analysis 28 II The Business Situation of the Company from 2004 to 2006 30 CHAPTER 3: WHY PEOPLE LEAVE WORK 32 I Disengagement Process 33 II The Essential Needs of the Staff 33 III The Reasons for Leaving 34 CHAPTER 4: RETENTION AND THE ART OF KEEPING THE TALENTED PEOPLE AT VIET HOA CO 39 Why Retention is a Needed Issue 39 II The Art of Keeping The Talented People At Viet Boa Co 41 CHAPTER 5: EVALUATION & SUGGESTIONS 52 Evaluation 52 Some Suggestions 53 IX Advisor:Hoang f Huan,MBA Job and Workplace + • Conduct realistic job previews with every job candidate Interviewers should be trained to first ask the candidates about their expectations, it is only too obvious that they would not fit the job or the culture • Be careful how to describe the negative aspects because they can become challenges to an applicant So, employers need to be honest, but not necessarily alarming, to say to them about warts + Create a realistic job description with a short list of most critical competencies needed for success; preferably stated motivated talents, not as technical or knowledge natural, requirements Managers should be aware of this to avoid narrowing their pool of candidates, since fewer candidates screening that lists job requirements could possibly pass the and competencies that the "ideal candidate" must have + Allow candidate's future interviews: This method candidate's questions coworkers allows forthrightly them to participate In job free to answer Likewise, the candidate the is likely to feel less inhibited about asking questions of peers that might be uncomfortable to ask if the boss were present + Make a significant percentage of hires from pool of current employees: When the firm hires or promote from within, it is taking less of a risk of turnover because the inside candidate is already wise to the ways of the organization It's also a great way to increase morale by encouraging all workers about their career prospects within the company However the managers still need to give current employees the same realistic job preview they would give to outside candidates 48 Student: Nguyen ThiPhu Thu-KD0301 Advisor:Hoang + Survey new-hires with written Huan,MBA questionnaires, personal interviews, or both, to learn during their first thirty to ninety days on the job, what they expected and had not received, and things that were not discussed in interviews that should have been Thanks to this, we can find out how to minimize new hire surprises in the future g Job and People + Conduct "Entrance Interviews" with All New-Hires: As managers, we should meet with the new-hires during the first week on the job with the specific purpose of uncovering their greatest strengths and talents by asking statements like: "What you consider your greatest strengths? What you consider your greatest weaknesses? Let them know that we value their talents and look forward to helping them succeed Invite them to come and let them know if they begin to feel that their best talents are being underused by asking: "Which of your talents was most under-utilized in your last job? Which of your talents would you most like to use in this job? Which of your talents would you most like to develop further?" + Work to enrich the jobs of all employees: • Skill Variety: A desired mix of skills and activities • Task Completion: The job is undertaken as a whole • Task Significance: Job has a recognizable impact on the overall mission or on other people inside or outside the organization + Autonomy: the company gives its employees substantial freedom, independence, and discretion in scheduling the work and in choosing the procedures to be used in carrying it out + Feedback: get responses from customers, managers to judge the work more efficiently 49 Student: Nguyen Thi Phu Thu-KD0301 coworkers, and Advisor:Hoang + Huan,MBA Placing workers into teams or natural work units organized by the types of clients, industries, geographies they serve Very few jobs are fixed as they used to be These days' jobs constantly change, and the opportunity to enrich them will be there if we choose to take it This also means that once a job has been enriched it will not stay enriched without manager and employee working together to make it happen h Enhance Teamwork + Ask employees to get up and go speak to one another more often, or take each other to lunch more frequently instead of depending on emails as their primary mode of communication + Encourage several employees to join professional associations and attend meetings together + When an employee seems bogged down trying to solve a difficult problem, bring together several coworkers to brainstorm new ideas and possible solutions + At staff meetings, themselves ask each member of the team to introduce by mentioning one fact about themselves that most people would not know + Take your team to a local park for a volleyball game and picnic lunch + Periodically reward the group with free passes to the theater, museum exhibits, and other cultural events 50 Student: Nguyen Thi Phu T:.;h::;u:.-.:;K=D:.;;O;;;:.3.:.01~~~~~~~~~~~~ Advisor:Hoang Huan,MBA Chapter 5: EVALUATION AND SOME SUGGESTIONS TO THE ART OF KEEPING THE TALENTED PEOPLE OF VIET HOA GLOBAL JOINT STOCK CO I Evaluation The company basically is conducting effective retention, improving the poor stage of human resource in 2005, decreasing the turnover from 45% down to16%, and the most highlight is that the company puts the slogan "Money is not the most effective tool to keep staff and attach them to the business" on the first rank in the art of keeping competent people Of course, the material factor like a competitive salary compared to employee's position is necessary, but rewarding their achievement by money accidentally lifts staffs physical demand, and they are displeased if next time they are not prized in money or the prize is lower than the previous one It still, however, is not complete in some aspects The main problems are that shortage of finance, experience and credential staffs The board of management needs to continuously upgrade the art of keeping talented people by creating the competitive advantages to survive and grow in the near future 51 Student: Nguyen Thi Phu: T.:.h::u==-~K:;D==O;;,;3:.;O~1~~~~~~~~~~~~ Advisor:Hoang Huan,MBA II Some Suggestions Firstly, the human resource and business strategies: As we know, business strategies of the company are to set up in line with each major sector that makes their products or services satisfy all their customers That field itself needs to establish reasonable strategies for the purpose of identifying competitive edge in the marketplace the company needs to gain As for Viet Hoa Corp, it is initially necessary to put low cosst and differentials as the competitive edges of the company For this, the company should set the strategy of human resource, which is as follows • Attach special importance to both internal and external employee resource • Seek for professional and creative people • Large-scale decentralization • Result-based appraisal • Competitive pay Company culture: The company should starts with its miSSIOn and values, which should be well thought-out and articulated in writing A mission statement and a set of guiding principles should be typically developed by the company's owner to reflect his business philosophy Input should also be solicited from key employees When hiring new employees, it is essential to confirm their understanding of and agreement with the company philosophy Values must not merely be lip service, but should be internalized and practiced daily by all employees As an employer, we must set the standard for our people We aren't allowed to forget the company culture that affects the appealing to the types of employee the organization wishes to attract as well as retain As for Viet Hoa Company, it has yet to show this key factor In my opinion, 52 Student: Nguyen Thi Phu Thu-KD0301 Advisor:Hoang Huan,MBA Viet Hoa Company with its young, active, initiative staff really want an informal, comfortable, and modem culture Through this kind of culture, we will certainly establish the needs and hobbies to attract and retain them as follows: • Respect, information circulation policy and self-control culture • More frequently discuss hot issues such as movies, fashion, travel, etc • Permit flexible schedules that are eligible for them to overtime work at times of high-pressure projects and to have a more rational working hours as hard stumbling blocks solved or reach the objectives, even let them have a good slack • Challenging work • Favorable compensations and benefits • Set a particular day per week or month to hold face-to-face, friendly, warm small social gatherings between seniors, managers and employees, for example to have a picnic, go fishing and go hiking • Good working environment • Set up clubs, matches, teams such as football team, volleyball team • Uniform is limited • More feedback • Empowerment • Plenty of excursions and so on How to identifY the talented people: They are those who have sufficient EQ (Emotional Quotient) consisting of self-assertion capacity, self-regulating communication capacity, motivation capability, empathy capacity, social capacity 53 Student: Nguyen Thi Phu Thu-KD0301 Advisor:Hoang Huan,MBA How to detect potential Defectors: + A decline in performance + A change in behavior • Come late and leave early • Reference to other companies by vague words • Suddenly stay at back site in participating or giving ideas at meetings The company minds the management, particularly about the methods of selecting managers, supervisors those who are suitable for the expectations of the workers To meet the ends, the organization should select the managers, supervisors with both management abilities In reality, the present managers and leadership almost have management ability but lack leadership one The business should train its managers according to the following characteristics: • Integrity: always tell the truth and always keep promise, even if it hurts to so • Trust: A manager must demonstrate his trust in people by making himself vulnerable before he can expect employees to place their trust in him • Respect: If he really dose not care about his people they will sense his lack of concern and will not have respect for him • Fairness: Treat all employees fairly and equally (including family members) regardless of his personal feelings • Vision: To be a true leader, a manager must have an unfaltering vision, be able to communicate it to his people, and get them to understand and share in his excitement for the vision • Optimism: He must always be positive and confident that the company will succeed; but he should also be realistic 54 Student: Nguyen Thi Phu Thu-KD0301 Advisor:Hoang • Huan,MBA Decisive: A leader must make decisions and stick to them as long as they make sense Consensus is not always better than an individual decision, particularly in a crisis situation Remember, the buck stops with him! Trust his intuition Intuition draws upon his experience, stored knowledge and information he may not even realize he has in his head Example: He must practice what he preaches or he will have little credibility • Teamwork: Insist on mutual respect, courtesy and cooperation among his people This fundamental attitude was crucial In shaping our nation and is also essential to build his company • Authority: Remember that authority is not vested in his position as the boss Authority resides with the people who report to him and they have the power grant it to him or not Social Responsibility customers' satisfy and Teamwork: As the director ever said that satisfaction is the corporation's a social need Therefore, success, company exists to a business should also have responsibility to society and communities However, the employees will take pride and feel meaningful if they contribute their achievements to society, and deeper goal of this is to consolidate and tighten the teamwork among them The company should hold charitable activities that involve its staffs join This is the occasion for them to chart to more understand each other and express their good-hearted act The business would not suffer any losses for the charitable getting activities, the trust from support from communities instead of In addition, this gradually establishes the good corporate culture Recruitment: the company should carry out selecting employees those who want to cooperate with the company in long term and not a job skipping biography 55 Student: Nguyen Thi Phu Thu-KD0301 Advisor:Hoang Training and Development: development Huan,MBA The company can impact training and significantly through the responsibilities in its employee's current j ob by: • Expanding the job to include new, higher level responsibilities • Reassigning responsibilities that the employee does not like or that are routine • Providing more authority for the employee to self-manage and make decisions • Inviting the employee to contribute to more important, department or company-wide decisions and planning • Provide more access to important and desirable meetings • Providing specific more mailing information lists, by including in company the employee briefings, and on in your confidence • Providing more opportunity to establish goals, priorities, and measurements • Assign reporting staff members to his or her leadership or supervIsIon • Assigning the employee to head up projects or teams • Enabling the employee to spend more time with his or her boss • Providing the opportunity for the employee to cross-train in other roles and responsibilities The company should not only give training and development programs to staff, but to seniors, managers, supervisors and even directors It is ridiculously as the level of knowledge and capacity of employees are improved while their high rankers still stay at the same stage Nevertheless, share in the training and development opportunities the company should with them in order by looking outside organizations to gain the experience it wants The company can choose one of these methods: 56 Student: Nguyen Thi Phu Thu-KD0301 Advisor:Hoang • Huan,MBA Provide management assistance to other organizations as long as they handle the operation of the company effectively and efficiently • Be member of a committee or working groups outside the organization • Be a mentor for a new management in another organization Job and Workplace: the company can surmount mismatches with two more following methods: a Allow the new-hires to get the opportunity of contacting the job on temp or part-time basis Thanks to this chance, they can have experience of the ups and downs of the jobs Then, they will decide whether they make the commitment with the company The company also to a full-time work needs to limit the adjunctive period to rid the wasting of time and effort of both b Hire from current employee referrals: the current employees are easy to describe job and workplace realistically to those who are referring, simultaneously, they can uphold the friendship And if the referrals are successful, the manager provides them with monetary incentives or certain rewards To gain full benefit from these referrals, a formal process should be put in place to regularly identify candidates and keep the pipeline full The employees should know the story they can tell about the benefits, working environment, perks, or advancement opportunities the department offers To help them identify what the department benefits are, ask them to help the company make a list of why they like working at the agency and what they appreciate about their jobs or their co-workers 57 Student: Nguyen Thi Phu Thu-KD0301 , - - - Advisor:Hoang Huan,MBA to.As for the Job and People: the company offered some methods to get over as a whole The company, however, ignored a few prerequisite steps in the process of selecting the Right Talents for the Job Before conducting assigning the right jobs for the right people with the beginning of "Entrance Interview", the company has to emphasize the continuous upgrading talent to improve the jobs It should not keep a long time on carrying out the same talent to one job The managers must perform a talent forecasting process and a success factors analysis in accordance with the company's objectives They ought to pay attention to the talents of the best staff, keep their minds ways how those get jobs well done; watch in good books employees' daily business and ask them advice to understand thoroughly their action The analysis to raise a higher level of talents is based on these tips Then, the company should widen the recruiting network in order to access best-fit candidates by loosing Job Restrictions, brainstorming a new way of doing the job aiming to attract more applicants, or seeking new sources of talent such as asking current employees to introduce their friends or relatives whom they believe would be promised employees, working out a contact database of the best talents in the same industry Next, trying to get to rub shoulders with them through e-newsletters or phone so that in some moment they think of becoming staff as they intend to change their jobs The company forgot an at hand resource it can make advantages, which is hiring former/leaving employees We see that they own a significant advantage over outside or new hire for knowing the company and how to get things done instead of spending months to learn apparatus and work effectively One more, they could get new and widened skills helping the tasks to be done efficiently May be the most advantage, in fact, is that they will send a good message to others that the company is the best choice It is wise for the company to follow the steps below: 58 Student: Nguyen Thi Phu Thu-KD0301 Advisor:Hoang • Huan,MBA A detailed exit interviews and probes to find out the inside causes of leaving • Keep the close track with the leaving people by communicating regularly, asking their friends for information and making them consider job openings of the company • Eliminate hesitant or uncomfortable feelings as well as sorrow things of the rehiring people through the public statement: "You are always welcomed, we cheer appreciate your return" as an example And a vital final step of assigning the right talents for the right people is evaluating the hiring process' results The managers should regulate limitedtime for reviewing quantifiable achievements whether reach the performance goals of the new hiring have reached They can observe the first year retention ratios, bottom line at the end of the relevant year 11 Keep Employees in the closed Circle: the company should open up the company's operations data and financial information and teach his workers to understand it, thereby empowering them to make decisions based on it Openly discuss the company's strategic plan and what it means to each department and employee, share articles that managers read about the company, industry trends, and competitors The company should encourage and support its employees with such statements as "Don't worry, you gave your best shot, as error is human, for sure next time you will win" instead of stressing on the mistakes of the employees Offer favor to them, ask them requirements if they need at any time By this way, we present our willingness and concerns to worker's job, trigger them to think that "You are deserved to be my boss" "J 59 Student: Nguyen Thi Phu Thu-KD0301 Advisor:Hoang Huan,MBA 12 Don't let employees be Yes-man If the company allow them always to agree upon any its ideas and suggestions, just the company turns them to be passive, at their loose end, get rid creativeness out of them, less feedbacks Therefore, the company should find out means to get their ideas or ignite their initiatives so that they see their important roles in the company's success 13 Restrain employees from their designs that shoot the moon Explain to them that their ideas sound great, but are not the best opinions to this plan, let aside for another one And if they draw up a plan, help them see if that plan is suitable for the company's objectives As good managers, not let the employees create limits that keep business' goal in a circle 14 When conducting a vacation for employees, it is not very expensive to make paid vacation plus expenses for them In many cases, they can't spend the good times with the all staff to tie more close relationship as well as loose stress because they can not afford expenditure of the journey They are grateful to receive the paid vacation plus expenses from the business Besides, the managers should set a general regulation that it will not refund to any case of absences in the excursion 15 Overcoming the Sleepiness: People get sleepy at work, with potential negative impacts on productivity What can we to help alleviate this problem? encourage The company nutrition ought to install nap rooms to boost higher energy levels at work and Staff might be relieved through computer games or snacks time or cups of coffee Normally, the length of this time lasts about 20 minutes • • 60 Student: Nguyen Thi Phu Thu-KD0301 Advisor:Hoang Huan,MBA 16 Taking Care of People: The employers ought to remind employees to take notice to the breath, physical activities and diet police Due to secretarial environment, staff usually have to contact computer, fax, J print, telephone what affect the health, causing diseases such as headache, fatigue, tightness Moreover, "one-seat" life and activity lack are easy to become obese, high blood pressure, diabetes There are more and more trends to keep the body shape of employees, especially for woman staff More people are concerned about nutrition, exercise, stress management and avoiding bad habits like smoking so much or consumption of alcoholic beverages As sensitive managers, we are finding ways to support those employees' initiatives In particular, we actually initiate the higher attention to wellness, encouraging the employees to invest more time and attention in keeping health life and his or her body in shape o 61 Student: Nguyen ThiPhu Thu-KD0301 Advisor:Hoang Huan,MBA CONCLUSION Though my study is not anything great, it did help me solve two things First, it gave me the opportunity to make some contributions status of management of the personnel at Viet Roa to improve the Global Joint-Stock Company Second, this is an invaluable opportunity for to put the insights I have picked up from school into practice Of course, doing the research in a state of being really busy and in haste, my present work will no be able to avoid some shortages But, I see some form of consolations - this first research work of mine will help me the work of this kind more improved in the future 62 Student: Nguyen Thi Phu Thu-KD0301 , ~., " t •••