Strengthening the partnership of university and enterprises in Ha Noi, Viet Nam The case of university of labor and social affairs

STRENGTHENING THE PARTNERSHIP OF UNIVERSITY AND
ENTERPRISES IN HANOI, VIETNAM: THE CASE OF
UNIVERSITY OF LABOR AND SOCIAL AFFAIRS

___________________________

A DISSERTATION
Presented to the Faculty of the Graduate School
Southern Luzon State University, Lucban, Quezon, Philippines
in Collaboration with
Thai Nguyen University, Socialist Republic of Vietnam

___________________________

In Partial Fulfillment
of the Requirements for the Degree
Doctor of Business Administration

___________________________

By
NGUYEN XUAN HUONG (RICARDO)
December 2013
i


APPROVAL SHEET

The Dissertation of

NGUYEN XUAN HUONG

entitled
STRENGTHENING THE PARTNERSHIP OF UNIVERSITY AND
ENTERPRISES IN HANOI, VIETNAM: THE CASE OF
UNIVERSITY OF LABOR AND SOCIAL AFFAIRS
Submitted in Partial Fulfilment of the Requirements for the Degree
DOCTOR OF BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION
A program offered by Southern Luzon State University,
Republic of the Philippines in collaboration with
Thai Nguyen University, Socialist Republic of Vietnam
has been approved by Oral Examination Committee

JOANNA PAULA A. ELLAGA, DBA
Expert

NELLY I. MENDOZA, DBA
Expert

EDWIN P. BERNAL, DBA
Expert

ALICE T. VALERIO, DBA
External Panel

MELCHOR MELO O. PLACINO, PhD
Chairman
Endorsed by:

Recommended by:

CECILIA N. GASCON, PhD

Adviser

APOLONIA A. ESPINOSA, PhD
Dean

Accepted in Partial Fulfilment of the Requirements for the Degree
Doctor of Business Administration

_____________________
Date

WALBERTO A. MACARAAN, EdD
Vice President for Academic Affairs
ii


CERTIFICATE OF ORIGINALITY

iii


ACKNOWLEDGMENT

In order to complete this dissertation, I needed help from many people.
Their help provided great contribution to my work. I am deeply indebted to all
of them.
First, I wish to thank Dr. Cecilia N. Gascon, my advisor. Without her
very useful help and advice I would not be able to finish my work. Her very
high requirements have encouraged me to try my best.
I also want to thank all my professors and the staff of the SOUTHERN

LUZON STATE UNIVERSITY and THAI NGUYEN UNIVERSITY for their
interesting lectures, which provided me the necessary knowledge to write this
dissertation, as well as to work for my future.
In order to have a good dissertation with scientific quality and practical
significance, I needed to collect some information from employers and
graduates. Without their very useful ideas and information, my dissertation
cannot be completed. I want to give my sincere thanks to them for their
valuable cooperation and kind help.
I would like to thank all commentators who provided valuable
comments to improve my dissertation.
I wish to express my special thanks from bottom of my heart to honor
my dear departed parents who brought me into this world and raised me.
Also, I am indebted to all the members of my family, who kept encouraging
and providing me favorable conditions when I was taking this course.
I am grateful to all my classmates and my friends who helped me
collect materials in the preparation of the dissertation. Their assistance helped
me to save my limited time to focus on writing.
iv


Lastly, I am indebted to many other people, especially the writers of
useful materials in books, internet, and newspapers

NGUYEN XUAN HUONG - RICARDO

v


DEDICATION

In order to complete this dissertation, I needed help and supports from
many people. Their supports provided great contribution to my work. I am
deeply indebted to all of them.
I wish to express my special thanks from bottom of my heart to honor
my dear departed parents who brought me into this world and raised me.
Also, I am indebted to all the members of my family, who kept encouraging
and providing me favorable conditions when I was taking this course.
I am grateful to all my classmates and my friends who helped me
collect materials in the preparation of the dissertation. They also encourage
me when I faced difficulties. Their assistance helped me to save my limited
time to focus on writing.

NGUYEN XUAN HUONG - RICARDO

vi


TABLE OF CONTENTS
PAGE
TITLE PAGE ………………………………………………………………..

I

APPROVAL SHEET ……………………………………………………….

Ii

CERTIFICATE OF ORIGINALITY ………………………………………..

iii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT …………………………………………………..

iv

DEDICATION ………………………………………………………………

vi

TABLE OF CONTENTS …………………………………………………..

vii

LIST OF TABLES ………………………………………………………….

ix

LIST OF FIGURES ………………………………………………………...

x

LIST OF APPENDICES …………………………………………………...

xi

ABBREVIATIONS …………………………………………………………

xii

ABSTRACT …………………………………………………………………

xiii

CHAPTER
I

II

III

INTRODUCTION
Introduction ………………………………………………….

1

Background of the Study …………………………………..

4

Statement of the Problem ………………………………….

8

Research Questions ….…………………………………….

9

Research Objectives ……………………………………….

10

Hypothesis of the Study ……………………………………

11

Significance of the Study …………………………………..

11

Scope and Limitations of the Study ………………………

12

Definition of Terms ………………………………………….

13

REVIEW OF LITERATURE AND STUDIES
Related Literature and Studies ………….……...…………

18

Theoretical Framework ………………...…………………..

20

Conceptual Framework ……………………………………

36

METHODOLOGY
Research Design ……………………………………………

vii

42


Population and Sampling Design ………………...……….

43

Research Instrument ………………………………...….….

44

Data Gathering Procedure ……………….........…….……

32

RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS ………………………….

35

Profile of ULSA ……………………………………………...

48

Policy Relating to University - Enterprise Partnership ….

50

`

Data Analysis and Interpretation ………………………….

51

V

SUMMARY OF FINDINGS, CONCLUSION AND

IV

RECOMMENDATION
Summary of Findings ………………………………………

77

Conclusions …………………………………………………

80

Recommendations …………………………………………

82

BIBLIOGRAPHY …………………………………………………………..

91

APPENDICES ……………………………………………………………...

96

CURRICULUM VITAE …………………………………………………….

124

viii


LIST OF TABLES
TABLE

PAGE

1

Kinds of Enterprises

14

2

Types of CRM

32

3

Population and Sample of the Study

44

4

General Information of Surveyed Leaders and Enterprises

52

5

General Information of Graduates

53

6

Reasons for Not-Employing Bachelor’s Degree Graduate
from ULSA

57

7

Activities that Enterprises have Cooperated with
Universities

64

8

Activities that Enterprises will be willing to Cooperate with
ULSA

66

9

Solutions to Ensure Harmonious Benefits for Enterprises

71

ix


LIST OF FIGURES
FIGURE

PAGE

1

The Triple Task of the University

27

2

Triple Helix Model

29

3

QCi model of CRM

33

4

The CRM value chain

34

5

Payne’s Five-process Model of CRM

35

6

The Gartner Competency Model of CRM

36

7

University-Enterprise Relationship

38

8

Conceptual Framework

40

9

Job Characteristics of Graduates

54

10

Working Weaknesses of Bachelor’s Graduates from ULSA

59

11

Solutions to Acknowledge the Contribution of Enterprises

74

12

Cooperating Framework for ULSA`

83

x


LIST OF APPENDICES
APPENDIX

PAGE

1

Letter of Invitation to Participate in the Survey

97

2

Questionnaire for Leader of Enterprise

98

3

Questionnaire for Graduates of ULSA

103

4

Surveyed Results of Leaders of Enterprises

108

5

Surveyed Results of Graduated Students

116

xi


ABBREVIATIONS

ULSA :

University of Labour and Social Affairs

CEO :

Chief Executive Officer

CRM :

Customer relationship management

EUE-Net:

European Programme of Entrepreneur’s mobility within
Universities

MOET :

Ministry of Education and Training

MOLISA:

Ministry of Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs

xii


ABSTRACT
Title of Research

: STRENGTHENING THE PARTNERSHIP OF
UNIVERSITY AND ENTERPRISES IN HANOI,
VIETNAM: THE CASE OF UNIVERSITY OF
LABOR AND SOCIAL AFFAIRS

Researcher

: NGUYEN XUAN HUONG (RICARDO)

Degree Conferred

: DOCTOR OF BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION

Name and Address
of Institution

: Southern Luzon State University Lucban, Quezon,
Philippines and Thai Nguyen University, Socialist
Republic of Vietnam

Adviser

: Dr. Cecilia N. Gascon

Year Written
: 2013 – 2014
______________________________________________________________

Creating and strengthening the university - enterprise partnership is a
very important strategy for universities to achieve the goal of “improving the
training

quality

to

meet

labor

demands

for

the

socio-economic

development…” Like other universities, strengthening the university enterprise partnership plays a very important role for the future development
of the University of Labors and Social Affairs (ULSA). This study is expected
to make some small contributions for the future development of the university.
The main objective of this study is to develop strategies that will
strengthen the partnership of ULSA and enterprises in Hanoi that will improve
the training quality provided by the university.
In this study, 117 leaders or chief executive officers (CEOs) of
enterprises and 147 graduates were surveyed using two types of
questionnaires for each group of respondents. These two questionnaires were
semi-structured and used both open and close questions. CEOs were
surveyed to find out among other things whether they are willing to participate
xiii


in training activities in ULSA, in which activities they can participate, and what
they want to receive in return. Graduates were surveyed to collect information
about their jobs, their needed skills and the acquired knowledge after
graduation, their recommendations for improving the training quality of ULSA,
among others.
There were five major findings in this dissertation. First, current training
programs of ULSA have low quality. This due to the mismatch between the
formal training acquired from schooling versus the actual skills required in
their jobs.

Second, ULSA has little experience in cooperation with

enterprises. Third, there are many potential opportunities for ULSA to
strengthen its partnership with enterprises that have not been tapped. It was
found that enterprises are able and willing to cooperate with ULSA in many
activities. Fourth, enterprises will be willing to create and maintain their
partnership with ULSA if the university offers appropriate policies. These
policies include those for ensuring harmonious benefits for enterprises in such
a way that can create an “equal and mutually beneficial” cooperation, those
acknowledging the cooperation/ distribution from enterprises, and some
supplementary activities. Fifth, although the central Government of Vietnam
realized the significance of university-enterprise relationship on the training
quality, there are not enough policies to create favorable conditions to
promote university-enterprise partnership in Vietnam.
After all, some important recommendations can drawn for ULSA for
strengthening its partnership with enterprises. ULSA should design and
implement activities to improve its training quality. These activities need to
focus on improving and upgrading the training curricula as well as changing
xiv


teaching methods. The university should devote more of its resources to
create and strengthen the partnership with enterprises. There are many
potential opportunities for ULSA to create and strengthen its partnership with
enterprises in the areas of in training, services and research. In order to
realize these potential opportunities, the university should implement a set of
suitable policies/ solutions. These policies need to ensure harmonious
benefits for enterprises in such a way that can create an “equal and mutually
beneficial” cooperation, acknowledge the cooperation and distribution from
enterprises. ULSA should cooperate with the Vietnam Network of Economic

Universities to design policies for promoting university-enterprise cooperation
in Vietnam which may then be submitted to MOET and other relevant
authorities.

xv


1

Chapter I
INTRODUCTION

In the Strategy for Education development of Vietnam in 2011-2020,
the Government exposed seven limitations in the current educational system
of Vietnam. This showed that Vietnamese educational quality is low, the
training curriculum contents are heavily theoretical, and universities have not
adjusted their training programs based on demands of the society
(Vietnamese Government, 2012, pp. 4-5). In this Strategy, the developmental
goal for vocational and university training is “improving the training quality to
meet labor demands for the socio-economic development…” (Vietnamese
Government, 2012, p. 9). To achieve this goal, the Vietnamese universities
need to fulfill many activities to improving their training programs, of which,
creating and maintaining a close partnership with employers is an important
one.
Employers are regarded as “indirect” customers of universities because
they do not “buy” training services (main products of universities) provided by
universities but they “buy” working ability or skills of graduates. This means
they will buy the “outcomes” of training services. Thus, if employers do not
hire graduates because they have inappropriate working abilities, it may be
worthless for students to attend training courses provided by universities. For

this reason, universities should create and maintain relationship with
employers to collect information about labor markets, such as which skills and
knowledge do employers want their employees to be trained, future. Based on
the collected information, universities can change the contents of their training


2

programs, teaching methods, and other aspects, in such a way that these
programs provide knowledge and skills that are most-needed by the students.
By doing so, it will be easy for their graduates to find jobs in which they can
apply what they have been trained on.
Thus, we can say that it is very important for universities to manage a
good partnership with employers, of which most are enterprises. However,
very few Vietnamese universities have regular relationships with enterprises
(Vietnamese Government, 2012, p. 7). It is a fact that Vietnamese education
in general and at university level in particular has many weaknesses. One of
these weaknesses is that graduates lack the skills and knowledge required in
the labor markets. There are many reasons for this weakness. One is the old
way of thinking. Many universities think that they can teach what they want
and students must study what the universities provide. Moreover, most
Vietnamese universities focus too much on the short-term goal that is to
attract students taking their current training programs, but too little on whether
students can find jobs after graduation. As a result, universities do not often
pay much attention on the relationship with employers because this needs
time and money. With regard to Vietnamese enterprises, most of them are not
interested in establishing relationship with the university because they gain
very few benefits from this relationship
The University of Labor and Social Affairs (ULSA) is a state university
under the control of the Ministry of Labor, Invalids, and Social Affairs of

Vietnam. It has four training programs at the bachelor level1. They are Human
Resource Management, Accounting, Insurance, and Social Work. Annually,

1

The university will start the fifth program (business administration) in October, 2013.


3

about two thousand students graduate from the university. The statistical data
of the university shows that only about 70% of the graduates can find jobs
within a year from the time they receive the bachelor degree, and of which,
less than 50% can find jobs in their chosen fields of study. Most graduates,
including those having jobs in their selected fields, gave the feedback that
many topics they had studied at the university were not useful in their work
and they needed to be retrained when starting their jobs. This shows that a
current training program of the university does not match the demands of
labor markets. There are some reasons for this problem but the main one is
that there is almost no participation of employers in designing training
programs of ULSA. The university does not have any network of cooperating
employers. When the university designs or adjusts training programs,
normally, there are only one or two representatives of employers. Moreover,
drafts of training programs were given to them just at the beginnings of
meetings. In addition, these drafts consisted of only names of subjects in
training programs without detailed description of contents in each subject.
Hence, their ideas about training programs did not contain much value.
The last survey undertaken by ULSA to collect information about labor
demands and comments on its training programs was in 2005 with the
participation of about three hundred employers. Since then, the university has

adjusted its training programs several times without the involvement of
employers. As mentioned earlier, this is one (main) reason why ULSA’s
training programs are somewhat inappropriate, and, as a result, graduates
face difficulties in finding jobs.
Realizing the importance of ULSA’s partnership with employers, the


4

researcher chose the topic “Strengthening the Partnership of University and
Enterprises in Ha Noi, Viet Nam: The Case of ULSA”. The researcher hopes
that the results of this study can contribute to the future development of the
university.

Background of the Study
In modern business philosophy, the customer is regarded as the only
boss of any organization. Producers should produce and sell products or
services that are most appropriate to customers’ demands. All decisions of
firms should be made in order to attain the ultimate goal, that is, to meet
customers’ needs. In other words, we can say that firms should try their best
to satisfy their customers’ desires. In order to achieve this goal, organizations
should create and manage a good relationship with their customers.
Although the term “customer relationship management” (CRM) has
been used since the early 1990s, recently, it received more and more
attention by not only firms but also many other kinds of organizations. CRM is
an integrated approach to identifying, acquiring, and retaining customers. By
enabling organizations to manage and coordinate customer interactions
across multiple channels, departments, lines of business, and geographies,
CRM helps organizations maximize the value of every customer interaction
and drive superior corporate performance. (Buttle, 2009, p. 4).

A university can be thought as a “special” kind of business. For
universities, there are two groups of customers. The first group consists of
students who are immediate customers who directly contact and buy training
services provided by universities. As mentioned earlier, universities should


5

provide those training services, namely knowledge and skills, that students
want to receive. However, students do not “consume” training services as
“final goods” but as “intermediate goods”. This means that they absorb
training services provided by universities for creating their “working ability”,
and then they will sell it to employers. Thus, universities can be regarded as
intermediaries between students and employers. In reality, students are
young and have very little information about labor markets. Very often,
students do not know what employers want them to do, or, in other words,
which skills and knowledge they should receive when studying in universities.
Thus, what students want to study may probably not coincide with what they
should study. If universities provide only knowledge and skills that students
want, in the short-run, they will attract many students to participate in their
training courses. However, in the long-run, fewer and fewer students will enter
these universities if what they provide to students (also what student want to
study) are not fit for what employers want them to study. Or we can say that
students will not want to take training courses provided by those universities if
they can not find jobs in the future.
The second group of university customers consists of all kinds of
employers, including firms, government agencies or any organizations.
Sometimes, employers can be directly buy services provided by universities,
such as technical advice. However, this group is normally considered as
“indirect” or “ultimate” university customers.

Universities should create and maintain relationship with employers to
collect information about labor markets, such as which skills and knowledge
the employers want their employees to be trained on in the future. Based on


6

the collected information, universities can change the contents of their training
programs and modify their teaching methods in such a way that the programs
provide knowledge and skills that are most-needed by the students. By doing
so, it will be easy for their graduates to find jobs where they can apply what
they have been trained on.
Relationship or linkage between universities and enterprises is a topic
which has been studied by foreign as well as Vietnamese researchers. This
topic has often been examined in one of three approaches. In the first
approach, universities were regarded as the main beneficiary from the
relationship, in which they received information from enterprises on how to
improve their training services. Conversely, in the second approach,
enterprises were regarded as the main beneficiary of the relationship, in which
they received advice and advanced technologies from universities for
improving their businesses. In the third approach, enterprises and universities
are supposed to be mutually equal beneficiaries from the relationship. This
relationship then becomes a partnership. In addition, the topic can be
examined at international, national or provincial levels. In the article, “Training
association between universities and enterprises in Vietnam,” presented in
Volume 4 of the scientific journal of Ha Noi National University, Trinh Thi Hoa
Mai discussed the objective demands to associate both universities and
enterprises. In this paper, Mai proposed eight recommendations for
universities and enterprises to promote their association, such as designing
curricula, creating a network of former students, and enterprises involved in

deciding marks to students. However, Mai’s study lacked evidence to support
some arguments.


7

The final report (2010) of the EUE-Net (European University Enterprise
Network) which is a project funded by the European Commission, presented
four main objectives, of which the first one was “Increasing the presence of
the entrepreneurs within the University by design, experiment and promotion
of innovative mobility schemes involving entrepreneurs” (EUE-Net, 2008, p.5).
This project produced eleven formal outcomes, including those related to the
development of framework documents at European level such as Quality of
Practical Placements in Enterprises (WP1), EUE-Net CDO Sub-Network and
European unified employment database (WP2), Teaching and Learning
Entrepreneurship in Europe as a general competence (WP3) and the
organization of a Workshop on “Entrepreneurship mobility” that resulted in a
set of Guidelines for a European Programme of Entrepreneur’s mobility within
Universities (EUE-Net, 2008, p.11).
In the dissertation titled

“The relationship between enterprises and

universities/ research institutes: A study in Vietnam” in 2010 by Nguyen Thi
Thu Hang at the University of Technology, National University of Ho Chi Minh
City, Hang surveyed 269 managers of enterprises, 32 university leaders, and
40 leaders of research institutes in Ho Chi Minh City. The main objective of
this dissertation was to identify factors that affect the relationship between
enterprises and universities/ research institutes, and the benefits that
enterprise can get from the relationship. In the study, she presented 15

factors affecting the relationship between enterprises and universities, and 10
factors affecting the relationship between enterprises and research institutes,
including those have positive and negative effects on these relationships. She
also proposed some sets of solutions for developing the cooperation between


8

enterprises and universities/ research institutes. These proposed solutions
were acceptable. Limitations of this dissertation included the low validity of
generalization because the survey was undertaken only in Ho Chi Minh City
and the absence of effects of macro variables.
In Vietnam, there have been very few researches about opportunities
and areas in which universities can create the relationship with enterprises to
improve their training “quality”. In other words, very few researches provided
answers to whether or not enterprises are willing to help universities and what
they want to receive in return. In addition, the results have a low validity level
of generalization.
In June 2012, ULSA highlighted its Mission “to provide high-quality
training ‘products’, contributing to the development of human resources for
industrialization, modernization, and globalization of Vietnam”. In order to
carry out this mission, as well as for the long-term development of ULSA, the
university committed to improve its training programs to cater to the demands
of the labor markets by creating and maintaining a good partnership with
employers. In this partnership, both parties are mutually benefited.
Statement of the Problem
It was earlier stated that ULSA has a very weak relationship with
enterprises. The university has not undertaken any survey to collect
information from employers about labor demands in order to develop effective
training programs. On the contrary, contents of its training programs were

decided based mainly on what it could provide. In addition, most of the
students had no opportunity to participate in practical visits to enterprises or to
fulfill trials when studying in the university. These can be some of reasons


9

why its graduates faced difficulties in finding jobs.
This study tackled the research problem of ULSA’s weak partnership
with enterprises leading to the incompatibility between what their graduates
have studied and what they need in their jobs.
More than ninety percent of ULSA’s graduates said that they lacked
practical skills and knowledge, and had low ability in using foreign languages
for their jobs.
Although there were some researches about improving universityenterprise linkage/ relationship, they often studied universities in general, not
any specific one. Moreover, there were very few researches about universityenterprise partnership (not relationship). Besides, each university has its own
conditions and may have different training methodologies. Some solutions to
improve university-enterprise linkage proposed in previous researches may
be useful for many universities but probably may not be useful for ULSA. In
addition, ULSA’s graduates can work for any kind of employers. However,
about ninety percent of them worked for enterprises. Thus, in this dissertation,
the ULSA-enterprise partnership, and not the partnership with employers in
general, was chosen as the topic of the study.
Research Questions
The following questions were addressed in this dissertation:
First, is there any opportunity for ULSA to cooperate with enterprises in
order to improve its training quality? To respond to this question, the
researcher tried to find out whether enterprises were willing to cooperate with
and help the university to improve its training services.
Second, in which areas can ULSA develop a good partnership with

10

enterprises? For this question, the researcher tried to find out the activities in
which ULSA can cooperate with enterprises and take advantage of its
operation.
Third, which solution can ULSA use to improve its partnership with
enterprises? For this question, the researcher tried to find out what
enterprises wanted to receive in exchange for helping the university improve
its training quality. In other words, the study determined which policies ULSA
can use to attract the enterprises to participate and establish a permanent
relationship with them.
Fourth, can ULSA improve its training quality through creating,
maintaining and taking advantage of its partnership with enterprises? For this
question, the researcher focused on finding out whether or not it was easier
for ULSA’s graduates to find their jobs; and whether or not the enterprises
gave priority to hire ULSA’s graduates if the university has a good partnership
with them.
Research Objectives
The main objective of this study was to develop strategies that will
strengthen the partnership between ULSA and enterprises in Hanoi that will
improve the training quality provided by the university. Specifically, the study
sought to:
•

Characterize and analyze the internal and external factors affecting

the quality of trainings provided by ULSA;
•

Identify, define and analyze the mismatch of the training courses

provided by ULSA with what is needed by the industries;
•

Identify approaches that will increase the training quality provided