managerial competencies of middle-level managers at viglacera corporation

THAI NGUYEN UNIVERSITY SOUTHERN LUZON STATE UNIVERSITY DOCTOR OF BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION DISSERTATION MANAGERIAL COMPETENCIES OF MIDDLE-LEVEL MANAGERS AT VIGLACERA CORPORATION TA PHUNG PHUC (LUCKY STAR) SUPERVISOR: Dr. Cecilia N. Gascon HANOI - 2013 ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENT This thesis is completed to fulfill the requirement from the Doctor of Business Administration (DBA) program, an international program between Thai Nguyen University (TNU) and Southern Luzon State University (SLSU). I would like to express my sincere thanks to Management Board of the TNU and the SLSU, who have been organizing such interesting programs. The improvement in our competencies will bring much more values to our work and social life. I would like to express my sincere thanks to all lecturers of SLSU, TNU and associates, who have equipped me with a lot of valuable knowledge and skills for my life. Especially I would like to express my exclusive thanks to my supervisor – Dr. Cecilia N. Gascon. Despite very busy with management and professional work, she has given me lots of valuable guidance and support during my job on completing this thesis. I also would like to express my thanks to Board of Management of Viglacera Corporation, who has encouraged me to complete the thesis and provide me a lot of support during the research. I would like to express my thanks to all middle managers and all of my colleagues in Viglacera for helping me with useful data for the thesis./. iii COPYRIGHT COMMITMENT I hereby declares that this is my own research. Also, all the information used in my research is trustful and totally reliable. The competency of Viglacera middle level managers yet to be studied in deep and at overall scale, furthermore their competencies have never been benchmarked against their job requirements. In late 2011, The Executive board decided to have a HR consultant to review Viglacera’ workforce and provide recommendations for improvement. However, the report of the consultant just has been considered as a 3 rd party reference, Viglacera must work on the project itself and create a strategic blueprint for HR development for the next 5 years at least. To retain its leading position in the market, it is a “do or die” project for Viglacera and this research, hopefully shall contribute a big picture overview of Viglacera workforce and recommend a good solution for Viglacera to achieve the target of the project. Having that idea in mind the author strongly believes that this research is the first one in Vietnam to construct the set of competency standards for Vietnam SOEs and it is also the first study to recommend its applications in a real situation. Once again I committed that all findings and conclusions of my research are not copied of any other work or paper. The whole or partly of this research never have been published in any kind of public media. The Author iv TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENT ii COPYRIGHT COMMITMENT iii TABLE OF CONTENTS iv LIST OF TABLES viii LIST OF CHARTS x ABSTRACT xi CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION 1 BACKGROUND AND RATIONALE OF THE RESEARCH 1 STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM 3 HYPOTHESES 7 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE RESEARCH 8 SCOPE OF THE RESEARCH 9 DEFINITION OF TERMS 9 CHAPTER 2. LITERATURE REVIEW 11 2.1. COMPETENCY – OVERVIEW 11 2.1.1. Competency and competency – base methodology 11 2.1.2. Competency component 15 2.1.3. Competency analysis process 19 2.2. MANAGERIAL COMPETENCIES 20 2.2.1. Functions of management 20 2.2.2. Managerial competencies 25 CHAPTER 3. RESEARCH METHODOLOGY 33 3.1. RESEARCH METHODOLOGY 33 v 3.2. STRUCTURE OF THE RESEARCH 40 CHAPTER 4. PRESENTATION, ANALYSIS AND INTERPRETATION OF DATA…………. 42 4.1. REQUIRED MANAGERIAL COMPETENCIES FOR MIDDLE-LEVEL MANAGERS AT VIGLACERA 42 4.1.1. Business awareness 43 4.1.2. Leadership 43 4.1.3. Setting priorities 44 4.1.4. Managing the team 44 4.1.5. Result orientation 45 4.1.6. Change orientation 46 4.1.7. Team working 46 4.1.8. Ability to influence 47 4.1.9. Developing others 47 4.1.10. Face to face communication 48 4.1.11. Interpersonal skill 48 4.1.12. Motivation skill 49 4.2. CURRENT MANAGERIAL COMPETENCIES OF MIDDLE-LEVEL MANAGERS AT VIGLACERA 51 4.2.1. Business awareness 51 4.2.2. Leadership 52 4.2.3. Setting priorities 52 4.2.4. Managing the team 53 4.2.5. Result orientation 54 4.2.6. Change orientation 55 vi 4.2.7. Team working 56 4.2.8. Ability to influence 56 4.2.9. Developing others 57 4.2.10. Face to face communication 58 4.2.11. Interpersonal skill 59 4.2.12. Motivation skill 60 CHAPTER 5. SOLUTIONS TO BRIDGE THE GAPS BETWEEN REQUIRED AND CURRENT MANAGERIAL COMPETENCIES OF MIDDLE MANAGERS 63 5.1. BASIS FOR THE SOLUTIONS 63 5.1.1. Viglacera direction to develop human resource 63 5.1.2. Reasoning the gaps between required and current competencies of middle managers 66 5.2. SOLUTIONS TO BRIDGE THE GAPS BETWEEN REQUIRED AND CURRENT COMPETENCIES OF MIDDLE MANAGERS 67 5.2.1. Training solutions 67 5.2.2. Non-training solutions 73 CONCLUSION 77 REFERENCES 79 APPENDIX 1 – QUESTIONNAIR FORM FOR IDENTIFYING REQUIREMENT ON MANAGERIAL COMPETENCIES OF MIDDLE MANAGERS 85 APPENDIX 2 – QUESTIONNAIR FORM FOR ASSESSING CURRENT MANAGERIAL COMPETENCIES OF MIDDLE MANAGERS 88 APPENDIX 3 – JOB DESCRIPTION SAMPLES 91 CURRICULUM VITAE 107 vii ABREVIATIONS AQL Acceptable Quality Level BOM Board of Management BSC Balanced Score Card CEO Chief Executive Officer CORP Corporate DEPT. Department EQ Emotional Quotient ERP Enterprise Resource Planning FM Finance Manager HR Human Resource HRM Human Resource Management JD Job Description R&D Research and Development SLSU SOE Southern Luzon State University State Owned Enterprise SWOT Strengths Weaknesses Opportunities Threats TNA Training Needs Analysis TNU Thai Nguyen University VIGLACERA Vietnam Glass and Ceramic Corporation viii LIST OF TABLES Table 1-1: Opportunities and Threats in HRM of Viglacera 6 Table 1-2: Strengths and Weaknesses in HRM of Viglacera 6 Table 4-1: required “business awareness” for middle managers 43 Table 4-2: required “leadership” for middle managers 44 Table 4-3: required “setting priorities” for middle managers 44 Table 4-4: required “managing the team” for middle managers 45 Table 4-5: required “result orientation” for middle managers 45 Table 4-6: required “change orientation” for middle managers 46 Table 4-7: required “team working” for middle managers 46 Table 4-8: required “ability to influence” for middle managers 47 Table 4-9: required “developing others” for middle managers 48 Table 4-10: required “face to face communication” for middle managers 48 Table 4-11: required “interpersonal skill” for middle managers 49 Table 4-12: required “motivation skill” for middle managers 49 Table 4-13: current “business awareness” of middle managers 51 Table 4-14: current “leadership” of middle managers 52 Table 4-15: current “setting priorities” of middle managers 53 Table 4-16: current “managing the team” of middle managers 54 Table 4-17: current “result orientation” of middle managers 55 Table 4-18: current “change orientation” of middle managers 55 Table 4-19: current “team working” of middle managers 56 Table 4-20: current “ability to influence” of middle managers 57 Table 4-21: Table 4.21: current “developing others” of middle managers 58 Table 4-22: current “face to face communication” of middle managers 59 ix Table 4-23: current “interpersonal skill” of middle managers 59 Table 4-24: current “motivation skill” of middle managers 60 Table 5-1: Training courses proposed for middle managers 68 Table 5-2: Solutions / Recommendations Matrix 75 x LIST OF CHARTS Chart 1.1: Viglacera Competitive Advantages 5 Chart 2.1: The iceberg model 12 Chart 2.2: Competency analysis model 20 Chart 2.3: Circle of management 22 Chart 3.1: Work frame of the research: 34 Chart 4.1: Required competencies for middle managers 50 Chart 4.2: Current competencies of middle managers vs. requirements 61 Chart 4.3: Viglacera Competency Needs Analysis 61 Chart 5.1: Viglacera business development strategy for 2010-2020 64 Chart 5.2: Viglacera Corporate Core Values 65 [...]... managers at Viglacera The outcome of the research will help clarify the gaps between current managerial competencies and the senior’s expectations; and what solutions should be applied to overcome the gaps; Research objectives: 1 To identify required managerial competencies from top managers on middle managers at Viglacera; 2 To assess the current managerial competency level of middle managers at Viglacera, ... strategy Deeply understanding this situation, the Top Management Board of Viglacera cared much about how to train and develop middle managers to fit with the development plan of the Corporation in the next coming years Viglacera placed middle 2 management force at the central point of long-term human resource strategy But, as a fact, performances of the whole Corporation as well as of the Middle Managers. .. strategy of Viglacera xi CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION BACKGROUND OF THE RESEARCH Established since 1974, Viglacera is a State Owned Enterprise (SOE) operating in construction industry under management of Ministry of Construction Viglacera is in the stage of organizational reengineering and privatizing to cope with the economy integration trend in the whole nation Changing to joint-stock from wholly state... 200 Middle level Managers working at Viglacera under supersision of 13 Top Managers, those in turn under management of Ministry of Construction Like other SOEs, at Viglacera Customer and Employee satisfaction; efficiency and productivity; stability and development of the organization are overall responsibilities of Top management board To do those, they normally delegate to middle-level managers, who... required managerial competencies of middle managers at Viglacera; The impact of each competency to Viglacera performance also be analyzed and weighted so that the later proposed solutions will be more concrete and effective 3 To recommend the solutions to bridge the identified gaps HYPOTHESES Despite the fact that middle-level managers at Viglacera are fulfilling well their current job, their competencies. .. current managerial competencies of middle-level managers at Viglacera and the requirement from the top managers of the corporation It then goes further to propose solutions to bridge those gaps According to theories, managerial competencies are skills, knowledge, self- concept, traits and motives of people in management aspect At Viglacera, they are represented by the 12 core competencies, which include:... that theory, Managerial competencies can be divided into Basic and Professional competencies All competencies are interlinked and there is a high corerelationship between Basic and Professional competencies 2.2.2.1 Basic (Generic) Competencies Basic competencies encompass mental ability, motivation, temperament and personality of an individual All individuals have basic competencies but the combination... businesses, middle-level managers at Viglacera are very important, which help to achieve strategic objectives Together with contributing valuable ideas to company’s strategies, middle managers lead the functional team to implement Corporation s plan to real life Therefore, managerial competencies are vitally important to middle managers This research focuses on the gaps between current managerial competencies. .. weight of each competency or in other words what are the key competencies that need to be addressed first This will make the later recommended solutions more convincible and help Viglacera to prioritize and implement the solutions much more effectively Being connected to human resource developing strategy of the company, the aim of this research is to analyze the managerial competencies of middle managers. .. the Corporation will be challenged by lots of difficulties: competition, social and political changes, inefficient working system and last but not least the quality of the workforce With over 15,000 emplyees, Viglacera is one of the biggest SOEs in Vietnam, following is the organizational structure of the Corporation: Board of Director Control Board Board of Management Admin IT Support Legal & Corporate . SOUTHERN LUZON STATE UNIVERSITY DOCTOR OF BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION DISSERTATION MANAGERIAL COMPETENCIES OF MIDDLE-LEVEL MANAGERS AT VIGLACERA CORPORATION . THE RESEARCH 40 CHAPTER 4. PRESENTATION, ANALYSIS AND INTERPRETATION OF DATA…………. 42 4.1. REQUIRED MANAGERIAL COMPETENCIES FOR MIDDLE-LEVEL MANAGERS AT VIGLACERA 42 4.1.1. Business awareness. level Managers working at Viglacera under supersision of 13 Top Managers, those in turn under management of Ministry of Construction. Like other SOEs, at Viglacera Customer and Employee satisfaction;