The Dutch Vietnam Management Supporter

In this issue:

The 40th Dutch Vietnam

Management Supporter

This magazine was first

published in March 2007. It is

digitally distributed among

my Vietnamese & Dutch

business & private associates.

Purpose: to keep you

informed about my activities

in Vietnam and overseas

This amazingly attractive and

energetic country has rapidly

conquered my soul. It is my

home away from home.

Loek Hopstaken

Pr o f . L oe k H o ps t ak en

Em a i l :

l o ek . h o ps t ak en @ gm a i l .

c om

C e l l : 0 9 0 8 8 8 9 4 5 0

December 2015

9th year, no. 6

Your rear view mirror

My business partners

1

2

Developing Leader-

ship skills

Uplift your HRM Dept.

3

4

Accountability

The Event for startups

& SMEs The Vietnamese life

5

6

7

Clients, services &

contact information

8

Do you ever look in

your rear view mirror? Do you feel sometimes that your past is catching up with your present? Like an unresolved problem you had forgotten about? When you drive it is recommended to frequently look in your rear view mirror. However, due to the hustle & bustle of traffic in front, doing this is not easy. So you miss that fast approaching truck or bus. Or that reckless motorbike driver behind you, causing panic & near-accidents. As soon as they catch up with you: shock. Instant response: save my skin. Half a second later you curse yourself for not looking in your rear view mirror. Lesson learned? Sure, next time ...

And so it is with running a business. Just apply those lessons learned in the present and, while focusing on your mission, do what needs to be done today. Easily said. Yet, the everyday mayhem we call work often absorbs us. No time to look back. What do you mean, prioritizing? Goals? Im just trying to survive Not looking in the rear view mirror may be fatal. Almost as fatal as assuming that the future will be like the past. Some people tell me there is only now. No past, no future, its all now. I disagree. What you do today does have an impact. On tomorrow. On your family. On Vietnam. On the world, 25 years from now.

Do you feel buried in unresolved problems of the past? Does it keep you from dealing with the present? No idea about the future? Contact me.

Have you ever noticed that anybody driving slower

than you is an idiot, and that anyone driving faster is a

maniac? George Carlin

2 9th year, no. 6 The 40th Dutch Vietnam


Saigon, December 1, 2015

Business is a constant, creative ef-fort to successfully bridge the gap between customers needs & suppli-ers offerings. Condition: win-win. Dream: a 100% smooth ride. Some-times this dream comes true. Reali-ty: no pain, no gain. The invest-ment in time & energy can be such that you start doubting the real meaning of profit. Doing business is like driving a truck: before you ar-rive at your destination to deliver the goods, you have to face all kinds of traffic. Often you feel like its all up to you: business can be lonely. Perhaps this is one reason why we have business partners & associates: co-drivers. Im fortunate to have several. This month I have been driving with Spectra for 7 years. My latest co-driver: TV Rheinland Vietnam. LH

Business partners: you never drive alone

When people seek to undermine your dreams, predict your

doom or criticize you, remember they are telling you their

story, not yours. Cynthia Occelli

Completing the tailor made Allround

Manager Program at Control Union &

Eco2

After the Motivational Performance

Appraisal (public) course



9th year, no. 6 3

Recently Navigos Search published a survey among their clients from Singapore, Thailand, Japan & Vietnam. Lets look at what Mr. Hong Phuc wrote in the November 10 Saigon Times: () Vietnamese managers have insufficient leadership skills. Only 9% of the respondents said they are satisfied with leadership skills of Vietnamese middle and senior managers at foreign firms. Vietnamse managers also lack creativity and loyalty to their employers. Disloyalty to employers results from better renumeration by industry peers, a lack of career development opportunities, employees feeling the need to change and inability to cooperate with line managers. The biggest challenge for foreign companies in retaining managerial staff is to stay competitive in terms of salaries and employment benefits, which is different from Japan where the three most important incentives to attract and retain managers are a clear career path, a higher salary and the employer having a strong brand name. Vietnamese managers are also said to have low adaptability to change, insufficient professional and technical skills, and low cultural fit. According to 41% of the respondents the major difficulty in recruiting middle and senior positions () is that there are not enough qualified candidates. Training is regarded as an effective solution. Respondents from all four countries pick leadership skills as the major content for upcoming training, with on-the-job training as the most commonly applied form. According to ms. Nguyen Thi Van Anh, managing director at Navigos Search, the lack of skilled and middle and senior managers has long existed in Vietnam, which is a disadvantage when attracting foreign investments and a barrier when AEC [Asean Economic Community] is set up later this year. She said firms should continue to provide training in leadership, management, professional and technical skills via different programs and approaches. Firms should

also ensure the quality and competence of managers as they have the most influence on

the quality of staff training.

2016: Time to develop leadership skills

If each of us hires people who are bigger than us,

we shall become a company of giants.

David Ogilvy



9th year, no. 6 4

In Supporter no. 39 you can find an overview of what I observe as the current tasks of the average Vietnamese HR departments. For the near future, with AEC & TPP [Trans Pacific Partnership] around the corner, you will need to uplift your HRM department. Why? Companies will soon face an increasing demand for talented staff. It will become even harder to retain talents. On top of that, managers will need to get better at capacity planning, at engaging staff, at coaching & mentoring, and at increasing both production & quality. Organizations need to become more cost-effective & deliver excellent customer service. If they dont, their competitiveness will turn out to be insufficient, and they will be unable to survive. The biggest barrier to uplift HRM however, is top management. In Vietnam HRM is seen by too many as a necessity to arrange recruitment & labor contracts, and troubleshoot the companys people problems. As most HR staff have their hands full with these operational tasks, this only confirms top managers fixed ideas about HRM. What to do?

All change needs to be initiated & supported by the top. As long as top managers continue to focus on short-term profit & ignore long-term business success, they will always be confronted with unexpected setbacks. Business is people. Customers & staff. When an organization is money-focused, people come second (last?) place. Its an established fact: people dont leave jobs, they leave their managers. Or: companies denying them growth or a good workplace. Many top managers do not realize this, They see HRM as a cost factor, sometimes even as a luxury. And with Vietnamese who find it difficult to communicate upstream the situation remains unchanged. HRM has a mission; boosting business. Uplifting HRM: develop your HRM staff & hire true pros. Start investing in your people. Start today!

When top managers realize uplifting HRM is a corporate need, and both feel & share the sense of urgency to prioritize fortification of HRM, the next step is facilitating further education & training of their HRM staff. However, thats not enough. Its important to spot & hire Vietnamese HRM talents. They exist. I have met several Vietnamese HRM professionals over the years. They share the view that top managers often have fixed ideas about HRM, lack a clear vision, rarely define HR policy, and only occasionally invest to develop their staff. They see training as an incentive, not as a staff development action.

In 2016 I will focus on the development of a series of HRM training courses to help Vietnamese HRM staff to be ready for the coming changes. No lets do another fun game-workshops. No waste of time, empty shells, copy & paste jobs & recycling of outdated or impractical models & tools. The general objective is to develop fully equipped HRM managers & staff, who understand business, who know how to improve the organization across the board, who promote both leadership development & effective communication, and who know how to create & maintain a great workplace. Lets uplift your HRM now!

Why to uplift your HRM department now?

The bottleneck is always at the top.

Peter Drucker

All change needs to be initiated & supported by the top.

5 9th year, no. 6 The 40th Dutch Vietnam


Accountability vs. the Blame Game

If you can face problems in life without putting the blame

on anything or anybody else, you have brilliant

perspectives of success. Napoleon Hill

Over the years I have witnessed several traffic accidents where the obvious culprit went to great lengths to point fingers at the weather, the system, the motorbike, the government, someone's hormones or his DNA, the police orlast but not leastthe vic-tim. Its not my fault, its his!

Not realizing that blaming others for own mistake means losing face, many feel its better than admitting it, accepting responsibility for it, and repairing the damage. In Vietnamese there is no word for accountability: the duty to take full responsi-bility for ones actions. Apparently preventing loss of face is senior to taking responsibility.

In business this creates a serious problem. Customers suffer when those in charge of Cus-tomer Service have a habit of pointing fingers. Team work suffers when team members (sometimes a whole team!) blame others for their collective failure. Staff suffers when a mis-managing manager punishes them for inefficiencies caused by that same manager. Manag-ers suffer when staff deny every responsibility for losing a client and blame the client.

In an organizational culture where this Blame Game is the norm, it requires exemplary leadership & persistence to terminate this non-productive attitude.

The saying goes: you get what you measure. I recommend including accountability as a per-formance appraisal criterium. Reward staff taking full responsibility for own mistakes. Stimulate learning from mistakes by asking for the lesson learned. Admit your own mis-take, apply the lesson, and repair the damage. Perfection is a noble goal, but it cannot al-ways be attained.

You can make

mistakes, but you

arent a failure until your start blaming

others for those

mistakes. John Wooden



9th year, no. 6 6

Pray as if God will take care of all; act as if all is up to you.

St. Ignatius of Loyola



9th year, no. 6 7

Tran Trong Van graduated from Dutch Delta University in June 2006. It was wonderful to see this fine guy at his wedding with his beau-tiful wife, Ngoc Thu. Its also an opportunity to reunite with other alumni, and catch up on their life & career. Organizations should provide career manage-ment. But in the end it all comes down to the fact that we are all our own career manager. And so it goes with my alumni: there is seldom a smooth ride to the top. Even when they have a bachelors degree in international business administration or an MBA, plus lots of experi-ence. Most have chosen jobs, some entrepre-neurship. Its great to see them doing well.

Vietnamese LifeDutch Life

Twice a year I spend time in The Neth-

erlands. To catch up with developments in my professional field, and with friends & family. Eating typical Dutch food. Drinking Jopen beer: a top brand still unavailable in Vietnam. The final two weeks of November were everything one may expect from Dutch Autumn turning into Winter. Strong, icy windsthe kind that makes +5 C feel like 5. Heavy rain. Only one sunny day. Before the return flight I experienced the new automatic baggage drop-off at Amster-dam Airport. Where max. 23 kg is max. 23 kg. In other words, 25 kg = 2 kg overweight. No longer friendly airline staff who accept 2 kg overweight. Pay please. On top of that, security is maximized. Officers open & check every piece of cabin baggage. The world after Paris, November 13, 2015.

My favorite bookstore Allert de Lange has turned into a cheese shop for tourists.

8 9th year, no. 6

In Vietnam: a.o. business field

Tan Thuan IPC Industrial development HCMC University of Technology intern. MBA program RMIT (HCMC campus) Pro Comm faculty Royal Business School Courses & seminars Int. Business & Law Academy (IBLA) Training & consultancy Vietnam Airlines (RBS; ISM) International airline Vietnam Singapore I.P. (SPECTRA) Industrial park Petronas (SPECTRA) Chemical factory Petronas Carigali (PACE) Oil & gas Nike (Tae Kwang Vina) (SPECTRA) Shoe factory Le & Associates Training & consultancy Sacombank (Training House) Training & consultancy Ministry of L.I.S.A. (RBS) Civil Servants SONY Vietnam (RBS) Consumer electronics CapitaLand Vietnam (SPECTRA) Real estate Institute for Potential Leaders / PACE Courses & seminars Dalat Hasfarm (Agrivina) Pot plants, cut flowers Hoanggia Media Group Key to Success TV Show Fresh Green Earth Hi-tech agriculture Unique Design Interior Design/archit. ERC Institute Vietnam Business school Schoeller Bleckmann Vietnam Oilfield Equipment Robert Bosch Vietnam (PACE) Electronics De Heus Vietnam Animal food Control Union Vietnam (SPECTRA) Quality inspections Centre for Tropical Med.Oxford Uni. Clinical research Khue Van Academy Courses & seminars CARE Vietnam (AIT) NGO Asian Institute of Technology (AIT) Training & consultancy HCMC Fin. & Invest. Company (AIT) Investments Academy of Finance MBA (Un. of Gloucester) ITEQ Vietnam Mono-parts/assemblies Vietnam Breweries Ltd (Heineken) Brewery VietJet Air (ISM) Airline In The Netherlands, a.o.

ING Bank Financial services Philips Electronics Heineken Brewery Yamaha Musical instruments

The 40th Dutch Vietnam Management Supporter

Loek Hopstakens Clients

The single

biggest problem

in communica-

tion is the illusion

that it has taken

place.

George B. Shaw

There are no

unintended

consequences.

Only unwanted

consequences.

Slim Fairview

The DVM Supporter is published by

Prof. Loek Hopstaken

Email: [email protected]

Cell Vietnam: (84) 090 888 9450

Cell The Netherlands: 06 510 97328 Assistant: Ms. Vo Ngoc Lien Huong

Email: [email protected]

Cell: (84) 090 888 9451

Profile: http://www.linkedin.com/in/loekhopstaken

Wisecracks

You cant stop the arrival of

history, only

delay it.

History is

coming.

Slim Fairview

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The Dutch Vietnam Management Supporter