Difficulties in speaking with foreign suppliers the case of Purchasing Department staff in Red River Manufacturing Joint Stock Company

Difficulties in speaking with foreign suppliers the case of Purchasing Department staff in Red River Manufacturing Joint Stock Company Difficulties in speaking with foreign suppliers the case of Purchasing Department staff in Red River Manufacturing Joint Stock Company Difficulties in speaking with foreign suppliers the case of Purchasing Department staff in Red River Manufacturing Joint Stock Company Difficulties in speaking with foreign suppliers the case of Purchasing Department staff in Red River Manufacturing Joint Stock Company Difficulties in speaking with foreign suppliers the case of Purchasing Department staff in Red River Manufacturing Joint Stock Company Difficulties in speaking with foreign suppliers the case of Purchasing Department staff in Red River Manufacturing Joint Stock Company Difficulties in speaking with foreign suppliers the case of Purchasing Department staff in Red River Manufacturing Joint Stock Company Difficulties in speaking with foreign suppliers the case of Purchasing Department staff in Red River Manufacturing Joint Stock Company Difficulties in speaking with foreign suppliers the case of Purchasing Department staff in Red River Manufacturing Joint Stock Company Difficulties in speaking with foreign suppliers the case of Purchasing Department staff in Red River Manufacturing Joint Stock Company Difficulties in speaking with foreign suppliers the case of Purchasing Department staff in Red River Manufacturing Joint Stock Company Difficulties in speaking with foreign suppliers the case of Purchasing Department staff in Red River Manufacturing Joint Stock Company Difficulties in speaking with foreign suppliers the case of Purchasing Department staff in Red River Manufacturing Joint Stock Company

ABSTRACT This thesis was conducted to find the difficulties in speaking with foreign suppliers of Purchasing Department staff at RRMC To suit the target of the present study, the author uses two main research methods respectively questionnaires and interview questions Nearly Purchasing Department staff at RRMC participated in the questionnaires The data and results were showing that Purchasing Department staff does recognize the importance of using English in the workplace However, they still face some difficulties in speaking English with their suppliers Hopefully, this study will become a good source for business staff while using English to speak and negotiate with their foreign suppliers and use for further studies i ACKNOWLEDGEMENT Working with this thesis has been hard but deserved There are many people who have accompanied and supported me during this time First of all, I owe the deepest thanks to my supervisor My conscientious and thoughtful supervisor Nguyen Khac Nghia has encouraged and supported my ideas from beginning to end He has constantly checked all numerous drafts of my work and it has been an amazing chance to learn from his open-mindedness Secondly, I am thankful to all staff and managers in Purchasing Department at RRMC who have made this study possible Moreover, I would like to acknowledge all the authors of the books, magazines, and other materials listed in the reference part for my ideas that have been reflected and developed in the study I am in my classmate’s debt for their encouragement during my study Last but not least, I would like to thank my family and my close friends who got my back to support and cheer me to successfully complete this thesis ii TABLE OF CONTENTS Diagram 2.1 Summary from chapter .13 Table 4.1: Staff’s working years 20 Table 4.2 Years of learning English of staff .20 Table 4.3 Staff’s attitude towards the importance of speaking English 21 Table 4.4 The ability to speak English of staff 21 Table 4.5 The general opinion of staff about difficulty in English speaking 21 Figure 4.6 Aspects of difficulties affect speaking with foreign suppliers of Purchasing Department staff 22 Difficulties in pronunciation of staff when speaking with foreign suppliers 23 Figure 4.7 Difficulties in pronunciation of staff when speaking with foreign suppliers (%) 23 Figure 4.8 Difficulties in vocabulary of staff when speaking with foreign suppliers (%) 24 Figures 4.9 Difficulties in knowledge of staff when speaking with foreign suppliers (%) 25 Figure 4.10 Solutions to improve speaking skills of Purchasing Department staff (%) 26 iii LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS No Abbreviations JSC English meaning Join Stock Company RRMC Red WTO Company World Trade Organization Hồng Tổ chức Thương mại PD SLA Purchasing Department Second Language Acquisition Thế giới Phòng mua hàng Sự tiếp thu ngôn ngữ TOEIC thứ hai Test of English for International Bài kiểm tra tiếng Anh IELTS Communication giao tiếp quốc tế International English Language Hệ thống Kiểm tra Ngôn HR KPI Testing System Human Resource Key Performance Indicator US-UK công việc United Stated – United Kingdom Mỹ-Anh 10 11 River Vietnamese meaning Công ty Cổ phần Manufacturing Công ty sản xuất Sông iv ngữ Tiếng Anh Quốc tế Nhân Chỉ số đo lường hiệu LIST OF TABLES AND DIAGRAMS No List Diagram 2.1 Table 4.1 Table 4.2 Table 4.3 Table 4.4 Table 4.5 Figure 4.6 Figure 4.7 Figure 4.8 10 Figures 4.9 11 Figure 4.10 Content Page Summary from chapter 13 Staff’s working years 20 Years of learning English of staff 20 Staff’s attitude towards the importance of speaking 21 English The ability to speak English of staff 21 The general opinion of staff about the difficulty in 21 English speaking Aspects of difficulties affect speaking English with 22 foreign suppliers of Purchasing Department staff Difficulties in pronunciation of staff when speaking 23 with foreign suppliers Difficulties in vocabulary of staff when speaking 24 with foreign suppliers Difficulties in knowledge of staff when speaking 25 with foreign suppliers Solutions to improve speaking skills of Purchasing 26 Department staff v CHAPTER 1: OVERVIEW OF THE STUDY 1.1 Rationale of the study English is the dominant business language and it has become almost a necessity for people who want to enter a global workforce, research from all over the world shows that cross-border business communication is most often conducted in English English also considered as a means to promote mutual understanding and cooperation between Vietnam and other countries, especially since Vietnam became an official member of WTO Therefore, there has been an increasing number of people desiring to know English with the hope of keeping up with the latest modern technology in the world In this globalization, all of the companies will hire a candidate who has excellent English skills Speaking English opens up thousand of new opportunities Being able to communicate with foreign clients or business partners will provide you a more challenging position in your career Moreover, being able to use English in your researches will give you unlimited access to knowledge Today, English is used in every aspect of life Adopting a global language policy is not easy at all especially in the business world Many employees may feel at a disadvantage if their English isn’t as good as others, team dynamics and performance also can suffer In order to survive and thrive in a global economy, companies and employees must overcome language barriers and English will always be the common ground, at least for now In Vietnam, there are still many employees who can’t speak English properly due to condition, context, workload especially staff in Purchase Department at Red River Manufacturing JSC when they communicate with foreign customers Purchasing staffs need to be good at negotiating, networking and dealing with numbers, as well as dealing with other factors such as scarcity, risk management and quality evaluation, negotiate price, purchase agreement, payment and delivery date Purchase Department staffs frequently speaking and negotiate with customers in and outside the country in English However, their communication suffers from complex jobs are assigned, and intercultural misunderstandings significantly It slows down productivity and undermines the capacity of employees to develop their skills All of the above reasons have inspired me to the research on “Difficulties in speaking with foreign suppliers: the case of Purchasing Department staff in Red River Manufacturing Joint Stock Company” with the hope to make a small contribution to the quality of changing speaking skills of Purchasing Department staff at Red River Manufacturing Joint Stock Company After reading and watching by many means and aspect of life, I realize that there are three main difficulties almost every employees or learner face when speaking English The first one is the fear of committing mistakes Most students or workers hesitate to speak English because of what others may think if they find a mistake They can laugh or insult them, they prefer to keep quiet or speak as little as possible The second one is the non-availability of words to express feelings A nonnative speaker of English wants to say something but doesn’t get words to express them in English The third is the difference in syntax The arrangement of words in the mother tongue is different from the syntax of English People can’t translate a sentence from their mother tongue to English in the same manner There are many studies about the difficulty in speaking English Lawtie study pointed out that, emotional state affects learners speaking English skills These emotions are unconfident, shy, nervous Emotional become an important factor when speaking with other people While Hinkel (2005) stated that problems occur when communication is possible because they don’t understand the meaning of a word or can’t express their meaning This also prevents communications between people from successful Several causes of difficulty in practicing speaking skills such as pronunciation, semantic errors, lack of vocabulary, lack of interest or lack of environment for practice have been shown in Mustafa Mubarak Pathan’s (2014) research studies While in Samira Al Hosni (2014) research, she lists three main difficulties when speaking English, they are linguistic difficulties, mother tongue, inhibition Students have an inadequate vocabulary and weak sentence building skills The findings also showed that the main factors that contributed to the existence of these difficulties are teacher’s perceptions and tacit belief of teaching speaking, teaching strategies and assessment regulations Besides studies on English speaking which were done by foreigners, there were also have a number of studies of researchers in Viet Nam about the speaking ability Cao Dinh Duc (2018) “a study on some problems in using spoken language at the workplace of fourth-year students in the English Department, Thuong Mai University and suggested solutions” The results indicated that oral communication is important and the most used forms of it are persuading customers, informal workrelated discussion The research of Nguyen Hoang Tuan and Tran Ngoc Mai (2015) “The factors affecting student’s speaking performance at Le Thanh Hien School” has revealed a lot of problems that the students have to deal and factors that affecting students speaking performance of listening ability, motivation to speak, teacher’s feedback during speaking activities, the pressure to perform and time for preparation These studies above have pointed out the problems of using English speaking skills of students They are typical subjects who regularly using English This is a comparative study that covers neither universities nor high schools or even employees This study also takes place in a company where I was an internship within a month It explores old problems – English speaking skills, but with a new subject – the Purchasing Department staff at a company, based on the literature reviews from the relating previous studies and data analysis 1.2 Aims of the study Based on the reality in how Purchasing Department staff at RRMC use and what their difficulties they have to face while using English, this study is conducted with the aim to identify common difficulties in speaking English when speaking with foreign suppliers of Purchasing Department staff at RRMC 1.3 Research Subjects This research is designed with the participation of six staff including four staff and two managers at Purchasing Department at RRMC All of the staff are different in English speaking levels, they are willing to complete questionnaires Moreover, the director also feels comfortable to share information and takes part in the interview question This research is carried out by answering two following research question: What are the difficulties in speaking English with foreign suppliers of Purchasing Department staff at RRMC? What are the solutions to improve speaking skill? 1.4 Scope of the study Due to the limitation of time and knowledge, this thesis only focuses on analyzing and emphasizing the main difficulties in speaking English with foreign suppliers, the case in Purchasing Department staff at RRMC This thesis is also expected to be a helpful reference to people who are weak in speaking and motivate them to confident speaking when communicating with others I hope that this study will be a useful document for readers or employees to find out the biggest challenges while speaking English at the workplace 1.5 Research methodology A questionnaire was designed based on what Purchasing Department staff need to while speaking with foreign suppliers in RRMC and to discover problems they encountered The questionnaire was sent to Purchasing Department staff They were requested to provide samples of difficulties in speaking with foreign suppliers for a study A contribution of samples in English was thus collected It was decided that sample of respondents should be classified and analyzed Apart from the questionnaire, also staff (concluded managers) representing the main Purchasing Department were selected to provide further information in interviews question to gather more details on certain issues derived from the questionnaires 1.6 Organization of the study My graduation paper is divided into five main chapters as follow: Chapter 1: Overview of the study This chapter provides an introduction which includes the reason for conducting the study, the aims, the subject research, scope of the study and research methodology Chapter 2: Literature review This presents a review of the literature with theoretical and fundamental principles Chapter 3: Methodology of the research It explains detailed about the research strategy, research methods, research approach, research process, data collections and data analysis Chapter 4: Main findings and discussion It is the main part of the study, based on the results of research and investigation Point out the collected data after applying the research method to the investigation Chapter 5: Recommendations and suggestions The final chapter provides some implications, limitations and recommendations for further research Besides, the study also consists of other parts: abstract, acknowledgement, table of content, list of abbreviations, list of figures and conclusion, references, appendices In the first question, most of them think that pronunciation to be the most frequent kinds of problems they had experienced They indicated that some English word was hard to pronoun, they usually mispronounce, lack of word stress or be affected by Vietnamese accent A specific example was told that the supplier from China interested about the product of RRMC company and ready to make a deal with Purchasing Department, however, Ms Lien was not an excellent English speaker, she affected by Vietnamese accent and sometimes mispronounce some word, therefore, she made the suppliers hard to hear what she said then the negotiate failed Another problem they experienced when speaking with foreign suppliers was vocabulary As the author mentioned above, RRMC producing various types of rescue equipment, uniforms and labor protection accessories for the production of water sports and general sports activities When Mr Quang negotiated with Japan supplier about the rescue equipment, he couldn’t remember the word “Thiết bị dập cháy hỗn hợp” in English and in Japanese due to the difficult word and hard to remember In English, “Thiết bị dập cháy hỗn hợp” was “Miscellaneous putting out fires gear” and in Japanese was “複複複複複” both were very long Mr Quang has to find another way to express this word, stated the characteristics of this equipment, however, it was very time-consuming In addition, the Japanese supplier speaks English quite poorly, which made Mr Quang even confused and didn’t know what to to make the supplier understand the product he conveyed, apart from using Google translate In the second question, some staff in Purchasing Department had solutions by learning new words every day, especially words about rescue equipment, uniforms and labor protection accessories of sports They plan to learn five or ten daily words at home while speaking with suppliers, new words appear, they will note and learn later Some staff uses full dictionary definition in order to educate themselves about antonyms, root words, and related words, which is another way to learn vocabulary effectively For Ms Hanh, she improves her speaking skills by listening to US-UK music, pays attention to the lyrics and takes note of the words Another staff solves their speaking problem by participating in public speaking events Due to their workload time, they would attend workshops in theaters and 27 culture societies organize events about open debates, spoken word readings or improvised communication with suppliers on the weekends These are places where they can come and mingle with like-minded people and practice speaking English Many places are now hosting an English business workshop where they can register to participate and share their innovative ideas Some also shared that they felt frustrated or lack the motivation to learn high English level but they thought about their work, their family, they continued to try and overcoming Timepass by, they felt that it was not difficult to speak English fluently with foreign suppliers, they just had to make effort and patient day by day The last question was for managers in Purchasing Department, the author gave them one question “for managers, what the company should to improve speaking skills of Purchasing Department staff?” Firstly, the managers showed a very high appreciation for this study Because, thanks to this study, they could know the current ability of their staff, what their staff has to face while speaking with suppliers, then having a suitable way to develop HR as well as suppliers quality of the company Secondly, they gave the author some ways such as create more opportunities for employees to have an important requirements or took part in international tests like TOEIC, IELTS were offered to staff Finally, the managers express that it was not easy to become a professional Purchaser, but you would never be successful if you did not try 4.2 Discussion 4.2.1 Current situation of Purchasing staff’s English speaking skill in RMMC From the results of the data collection process through the survey questionnaire and interview above, the researcher could withdraw some comments below: The first situation is that most of the staff have been working at RRMC from to years (34%) which means they have a certain experience in working at their position in RRMC Moreover, most of the staff have been learning English for to years but surprise that the number of staff who could speak English fluently in their job still low account for 35% according to the statistic above 28 The second, as evidenced by the data obtained from the survey questionnaire and the interview questions, there was a great deal of difficulty in speaking English with foreign suppliers of Purchasing staff The last, staff had an expectation of improving their ability to speak English This was evidenced by the data collected from Table and Figure which showed most of the staff were aware of the importance of speaking English and wanted to improve their English speaking skills to successfully communicate with foreign suppliers In short, the use of English speaking skills of Purchasing staff at RRMC was uncommon and their English speaking skills quite limited even when they were aware of the importance of speaking English, they use speaking skills most at work and hoped to enhance them 4.2.2 Difficulties in speaking with foreign suppliers: the case of Purchasing Department staff at Red River Manufacturing JSC After analyzing the figures and table above, some prominent difficulties in speaking English with foreign suppliers of Purchasing Department staff has been found out by the researcher According to the results of the questionnaires, in general, most of Purchasing Department staff have difficulties while speaking with foreign suppliers There are two staff can communicate English fluently with suppliers due to their experience in foreign purchasing field as well as master their difficulties in speaking foreign languages Moreover, they all agree that English is essential for both businesses, workers and also daily life There are three main difficulties Purchasing staff at RRMC encounter when speaking with foreign suppliers: pronunciation, vocabulary, knowledge These difficulties are stated as follow a Difficulty in pronunciation Due to their workload in Purchasing Department, they don’t have time to really improve their speaking mistakes Some specialized words they usually mispronounced (account for 30% as statistic above) but they don’t know how to fix it Besides, English word stress is hard and they usually affected by their mother tongue Vietnamese which contributes to pronunciation problems Even though their 29 work is to speak and deal with suppliers almost every day, they speak tongue twister and not fluently at all b Difficulty in vocabulary When the conversation happens, the Purchaser sometimes forgets the name of the specific words, difficult words about sports, rescue equipment or labor protection accessories, etc which account for 19,8% as Figure above They claimed that sometimes when negotiating with suppliers, they had to mention Vietnamese cultures but there are many words they did not know how to explain in English, which lead to rambling conversation Moreover, sometimes the suppliers speak slang, dialect or idioms which they don’t even notice This also makes the conversation inefficiency While in Vietnam there are also have particular customs or vocabularies so employees don’t know how to explain these word properly to make their suppliers understand best, which leads to rambling (32% as statistic above) c Difficulty in knowledge All of the staff state that knowledge is important but they still cannot catch up with the giant amount of knowledge in the modern world Purchasing staff doesn’t update their knowledge frequently therefore they convey knowledge without a coherent arrangement which made suppliers hard to understand Moreover, the sources of knowledge are countless which account half of the statistics above (51%) In addition, they need to select the right source to tell to suppliers but they don’t know which source is the most accurate They also lack knowledge about the global market and cultural differences which made them feel hard whenever dealing with foreign suppliers Apart from the above three main difficulties of staff when speaking with their foreign suppliers, the researcher also found some other one such as: Lack of grammar usage: Some staff said that they thought that they did not use grammar properly while speaking with foreign suppliers In reality, they did not realize or pay attention to the grammar usage therefore they speak not coherent or not arrangement, sometimes making the suppliers frustrated and can not understand what they mean 30 Lack of confidence: Confidence plays an important role in the development of speaking ability Some staff said that they were not confident at all while speaking with suppliers which made them fail in the negotiation To sum up, due to the job, Purchasing Department staff have to speak English most of the time but they still encounter difficulties in speaking such as pronunciation, vocabulary, knowledge or lack of grammar, lack of confidence when speaking with their foreign suppliers 31 CHAPTER 5: RECOMMENDATIONS AND SUGGESTIONS 5.1 Recommendations and suggestions After this study, the author recommends some for staff & managers in Purchasing Department at RRMC The author will divide the solutions respectively related to the three main problems staff encounter which already discussed above a Solutions to difficulty 1: Pronunciation To solve this problem, according to the results from the questionnaire, 34% of staff said that they had to listen and speak more about sports, rescue equipment, accessories manufacturing And according to 80% of interviewees agreed that they need to observe how others speak and listen to their pace and intonation They also offered some solutions that if they have problems pronouncing certain words, they will observe how native speakers specific their foreign suppliers say or watch how they form the words with their mouths and then practice Moreover, they suggested that they should practice pronunciation and intonation correctly and adapt to different accents from all over the world by listening to English every day In addition, in their free time, they listen to worldwide news channels such as BBC, VOA to enhance their accent and speaking skills b Solutions to difficulty 2: Vocabulary As stated in the figure and interview about solutions for staff above, 16,7% of staff suggested learning new English words every day, especially words related to their company products or their manufacturing fields Moreover, staff should read English books, foreign magazines or books related to their fields to boost their vocabulary which contributes a huge part to speak English fluently and smoothly Based on the interview questions, 35% of staff suggested that they should search for a full dictionary definition both offline and online in order to educate themselves about antonyms, root words, and related words, which is another way to learn vocabulary effectively c Solutions to difficulty 3: Knowledge Lack of knowledge was a difficulty for staff because most staff at Purchasing Department thought they did not have enough knowledge to speak English and deal with suppliers 32 To solve this difficulty, up to 34% of staff chose the solution to recommend their managers to have rewarding policies such as bonus extra or surprise travel tour vouchers for individuals who have good performances or reach company monthly KPI or organizing training sessions about purchasing knowledge 70% of staff in the interview questions suggested that managers should create rewarding policies to reward staff have benefit contribution knowledge to the company In brief, it is crucial for staff and managers to overcome difficulty and facilitate their ability to contribute to the success of Purchasing Department in particular and RRMC’s success in general 5.2 Research limitations Although this research carefully prepared, still aware of the limitations and shortcomings First of all, questionnaires and interviews are designed to measure the staff difficulties in speaking English, it seems not to provide enough evidence of the staff’s actual behaving to speaking skills In addition, because of the shortage of knowledge and time in doing research, the study cannot cover other difficulties affecting English speaking of staff at RRMC 5.3 Suggest for further studies Because of limitations, this study could not cover all of the aspects of the research Besides, the study only focuses on the difficulties in speaking of Purchasing Department staff at RRMC For further research, to get better results the researcher should find and analyze more solutions for the difficulties in speaking English of staff Together with using survey questionnaires, interviews should thoroughly be analyzed in order to get more persuasive conclusions All in all, the research has been completed under the guidance of the supervisor and the author’s greatest efforts Shortcomings are evitable, thus any comments and criticism will be highly appreciated for better further study 33 CONCLUSION Nowadays, English is widely popular in every corner of the world especially in multinational corporations However, English language should be used properly in business communication It is common that employees encounter difficulties while using English to speaking with native-speakers or their foreign suppliers However, if they try to improve English speaking, their emotional concerns decrease and they start to enjoy learning English Moreover, improving English speaking skills can contribute to their career development Therefore, studying English can be considered a beneficial investment in both career and life English speaking skills can secure one’s position in the field of international business or offer capabilities to perform international tasks effectively Competency in English speaking skill is reported to be one of the crucial skills for employability and gain better recognition in society However, the majority of the respondents rated average when they asked to rate their fluency when speaking English Thus this research was presented with the aims to illustrate the difficulties in speaking English and give the solutions for employee specified Purchasing staff at RRMC The research based on the survey question and interviews The results of the research made it possible to come to the following conclusions Despite all staff understood the important role of English speaking skills in their career as well as in their daily life, they could not enhance it Therefore, the researcher pointed out the difficulties which staff encounter when speaking English The research found out that staff had a positive attitude towards acknowledging the importance of English in the workplace yet in real life they are still faced with difficulties in speaking There are many difficulties when speaking English but the author just points out three main difficulties in speaking English to emphasize the problem of purchasing staff at RRMC encounter when speaking with foreign suppliers It is pronunciation, vocabulary, knowledge problems and other difficulties such as or lack of confidence, lack of grammar usage, etc Each of the difficulties was showed by tables and figures to illustrate also combine specific explanation to make the research more coherent and precise Moreover, from the 34 statistics, the researcher hope staff can know which difficulties they faced in order to find suitable solutions Based on the findings of the study, solutions to each difficulty were given Among them, the researcher suggested that the employees should turn learn English into their interest If English became one of their interests, they would not feel bored or pressures and achieved what they wanted quickly The researcher also advised the employees to find a strong motivation during learning English as working abroad, attend English workshop Lastly, the employees had to be proactive in learning a foreign language, explore new learning methods and create an effective way of learning English All difficulties and solutions withdrawn were the results of the study basing on the data in the researching process In short, this study illustrates the difficulties when speaking English of Purchasing Department staff at RRMC Accordingly, it is evident that results highlight different problems of staff toward English speaking skills and solutions for each problem The researcher discovered the key points of the answers to the questions: what difficulties they had when speaking English with foreign suppliers in order to offer solutions to improve English speaking skills for staff Due to limitations in time and the scope of the study, the author does not research more about other difficulties in speaking English of Purchasing Department staff at RRMC It is hoped that the study may be useful to find out difficulties in speaking English with foreign suppliers of Purchasing Department staff at RRMC in particular and to all employees in Vietnam in general 35 REFERENCES Thanks to these researches for providing me such useful information sources that I could complete this study: https://hbr.org/2012/05/global-business-speaks-english#:~:text=Like%20it %20or%20not%2C%20English,English%20as%20the%20corporate%20language https://shiftworkplace.com/employees-dont-speak-english/ https://area.dge.mec.pt/gramatica/whatspeakingis.htm https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED523922.pdf https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED523922.pdf https://scientifictext.ru/images/PDF/2018/DNO-2-24/characteristics1.pdf https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/154178299.pdf https://www.allgraduates.com.au/5-issues-when-dealing-with-non-englishspeaking-customers/ https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/33516315.pdf https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e3/Speaking_Skills.pdf https://www.researchgate.net/publication/336556602_EFL_Learners'_English _Speaking_Difficulties_and_Strategy_Use https://zoek.uk/job-seeker-blogs/the-importance-of-communication-skills-forcareer-development https://virtualspeech.com/blog/importance-of-communicationskills#:~:text=Being%20able%20to%20deliver%20messages,term%20success %20of%20the%20company https://ukdiss.com/examples/foreign-language-front-office-staff.php https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2452315116301540 https://scientifictext.ru/images/PDF/2018/DNO-2-24/characteristics1.pdf https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1877050920314848 http://repository.sustech.edu/bitstream/handle/123456789/14065/Investigating %20Speaking%20Difficulties%20 %20.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y https://www.espressoenglish.net/english-speaking-tips-for-4-commondifficulties/ http://eprints.radenfatah.ac.id/1395/1/HANUM%20MUFIDAH %2013250031.pdf https://www.researchgate.net/publication/270956555_CHAPTER_3 RESEARCH_METHODOLOGY_Data_collection_method_and_Research_tools https://www.librarianshipstudies.com/2017/11/knowledge.html https://www.academia.edu/32526755/aspect_of_speaking_skill_pdf https://livelearn.ca/article/language-training/speak-better-5-easy-ways-toimprove-your-pronunciation/ https://www.masterclass.com/articles/how-to-improve-your-vocabulary#7ways-to-improve-your-vocabulary https://www.researchgate.net/publication/325965102_Knowledge_Sharing_an d_Barriers_in_Organizations_A_Conceptual_Paper_on_KnowledgeManagement_Strategy https://www.researchgate.net/publication/320981156_The_Acquisition_of_En glish_Word_Stress_by_Mandarin_EFL_Learners http://ielts.com.vn/vi/bai-viet/Top-4-ki-da-can-tro-ban-giao-tiep-voi-nguoinuoc-ngoai_45.html https://nghetienganhpro.com/6-thoi-quen-nghe-tieng-anh-that-bai-va-khacphuc-p1/ http://luanvan.net.vn/luan-van/a-study-on-the-problems-in-teaching-englishspeaking-skills-to-the-minority-students-at-sonla-ethnic-boarding-high-69065/ https://123doc.net/document/5973828-a-study-on-the-difficulties-in-learningenglish-speaking-skills-faced-by-the-first-year-international-students-at-tmu-andpossible-solutions.htm https://e-talk.vn/cac-loi-ich-cua-viec-hoc-tieng-anh/ http://luanvan.net.vn/luan-van/de-tai-difficulties-and-suggested-solutions-inlearning-english-vietnamese-consecutive-interpreting-for-the-third-year-71644/ APPENDICES Appendix 1: Questionnaire Appendix 2: Interview questions APPENDIX 1: Questionnaire Dear Purchasing Department staff, This questionnaire is designed with the hope of finding what difficulties you have to face while speaking with foreign suppliers The results gained from this questionnaire will help the author in investigating the reality of using English speaking in your work and suggesting some solutions to improve these difficulties Thank you for your cooperation! How many years have you been worked at RRMC? A Less than year B 1-3 years C 3-5 years D More than years How long have you been learning English? A Less than year B 3-5 years C 5-7 years D More than years How you think English speaking skill is important in the workplace specifically in the Purchasing Department? A Extremely important B Quite important C Important D Not important How you evaluate your speaking ability? A Extremely fluent B Fluent C Extremely not fluent D Not fluent Do you have difficulty in speaking English with foreign suppliers? A Yes B No What aspects of difficulties you encounter when speaking English with suppliers? A Pronunciation C Knowledge B Vocabulary D Others When you speak English with foreign suppliers, what difficulties related to pronunciation you have? A Affected by Vietnamese accent B Mispronunciation lead to misunderstanding C Lack of word stress D Others When you speak English with foreign suppliers, what difficulties related to vocabulary you have? A Suppliers speak slang or dialect which you don’t understand B You forget some specialized words, difficult words about manufacturing fields C You don’t know how to explain Vietnamese cultures or customs in English to suppliers D Others When you speak English with foreign suppliers, what difficulties related to knowledge you have? A The source of knowledge are countless B Don’t update knowledge frequently C Lack of knowledge about the global market and cultural differences D Others 10 What are some suggestions to improve your speaking skill? A Listen and speak more about sports, rescue equipments, accessories manufacturing B Studying vocabulary about manufacturing fields C Recommend managers to have a rewarding policies such as go on business abroad, give extra bonuses, organize English workshops D Others APPENDIX Interview questions Could you tell me some specific situations/examples which you have difficulty in such as pronunciation, vocabulary, knowledge or other difficulties when speaking English with foreign suppliers at RRMC? What did you to solve the problem of speaking? What the company should to improve speaking skills of Purchasing Department staff?” ... Department staff in Red River Manufacturing Joint Stock Company? ?? with the hope to make a small contribution to the quality of changing speaking skills of Purchasing Department staff at Red River Manufacturing. .. experience in purchasing in English with foreign suppliers therefore they encounter less difficulty in speaking than other staff (32%) 21 In general, most of the staff in the Purchasing Department. .. undermines the capacity of employees to develop their skills All of the above reasons have inspired me to the research on ? ?Difficulties in speaking with foreign suppliers: the case of Purchasing Department