bai tap quan tri da van hoa tieng anh

INDIVIDUAL ASSIGNMENT
Subject: Intercultural management
Student name: Hoang Minh Tu
Theme: Select a corporate, which is well familiar to you, to analyze the cause and effect
relationships between the corporate success or failure and its culture. It can be a local or an
overseas corporate.
INTRODUCTION
In recent years, Viet Nam’s economy has witnessed significant progresses and many
Vietnamese corporations have gradually affirmed their position on the global stage. Among the
factors which have brought on the success, a distinctive culture has played an important role in
corporate developments.
In the past, culture was not attached importance in businesses. However, as the
globalization trends have taken place with increasing degrees, an enterprise should define its
own culture which is widely understood as all cultural factors selected and singled out, made
and applied in an enterprise’s business activities and helps create its business characteristics, to
ensure its existence and sustainable development. A system of cultural activities adopted by a
corporate is called organizational culture or corporate culture.
Being able to effectively adopt organizational culture theory in their operations has
helped a number of Vietnamese companies achieve business success. Trung Nguyen Coffee
Corporate, the first one in Viet Nam has brought local coffee products to the world markets and
has contributed to Viet Nam agricultural product brand building, stands out as a bright
example. Consequently, Trung Nguyen Coffee Corporate becomes my first choice to analyze an
organizational culture model as well as its impacts to the corporate.
I. Introduction about Trung Nguyen Coffee Corporate
Trung Nguyen is one of the leading trading and manufacturing corporations in Viet
Nam with a share capital of up to VND 150 billion.
Founded in mid 1996, Trung Nguyen was a young coffee brand in Viet Nam’s market,
the corporate has quickly established its position in the market. And for many local and


international coffee consumers, the corporate has become the most popular coffee trademark.

Within only 10 years, from a small coffee firm located in Buon Me Thuot, Trung Nguyen has
developed into a mighty corporate with other 6 member companies whose major businesses
include tea and coffee manufacturing, processing, and trading as well as franchising and
modern distribution and retailing.
Currently, Trung Nguyen has employed about 2000 staffs and the corporate has
indirectly created other over 15,000 jobs through its 1000 franchised coffee stores all over the
country. Most members of its manager team are young and well-trained, and all of the
consultative experts have experience working for overseas enterprises.
II. Organizational culture
Organizational culture is regarded as a combination of all cultural elements which are
selected, created and applied in a corporate by its members. Organizational culture plays a
certain role in all business activities of the corporate and it defines the corporate business
characteristics.
Organizational culture can be divided in 3 different levels:
- First level: tangible processes and structures
- Second level: accepted values
- Third level: general conceptions
1. Tangible processes and structures of the corporate: Including things and
phenomena can be seen, heard and felt such as the logo, symbols, and products etc.

•

The logo clearly expresses the General Director’s aspirations and

vision
+ The arrow logo represents a stylized Communal House – Rong House in Tay
Nguyen - the original land of coffee.
+ The upward position of the arrow expresses his desire and will to conquer challenges
and to make great progresses in the industry.
+ The three white lines represent the stylized ladder which is the entry to Rong House.

The lines show the corporate organizational culture which respects and preserves Tay Nguyen
culture’s character.
+ The brown colored background symbolizes color of earth and coffee.
• The story of Trung Nguyen Coffee’s trademark and its ongoing challenges
A well pre-study about civil law and culture before bring products into new or overseas
markets are an inevitable step for every corporation to expand its business into the global
market. When Trung Nguyen Coffee filed its trademark application in the United States, they
discovered an American corporate had also submitted an application for Trung Nguyen
trademark and was waiting for the license. “We determined to take back the corporate
trademark. Therefore, we hired professional attorneys and tried to find out the reasons behind
their action Then we found out that the corporate was a distributor specializing in food and
farm products which was well aware of the popularity of Trung Nguyen trademark in Viet Nam
leading to its application with hope to become an exclusive agent for Trung Nguyen products in
the United States”, retold by Ms Vo Thi Ha Giang, Head of Trung Nguyen’s Public relation and
Marketing. Later, Trung Nguyen had to authorize the corporate to exclusively distribute its
coffee products in the US market within two years in return to the corporate withdrawal. Not
only the Trung Nguyen trademark had been almost taken but the Trung Nguyen’s domain name
(Trungnguyen.com) had also been registered in Czechoslovakia by an overseas Vietnamese
whose purpose was speculation and this man was actually trying to sell the domain for a very
high price. In brief, a corporate low trademark awareness possibly results in hard lessons. Even
established trademarks in the local market are to restart when they begin to play in the global
stage. External consultancy only help a business design and develop its brand name upon a
certain contract framework, often limited to expressing the main idea, printing, making
signboards etc. The corporate itself is the one who is responsible for the brand name
development.
Not only having become a leading corporation in Vietnam, Trung Nguyen currently has
directly or indirectly managed a number of coffee houses in many countries around the world
through its direct investments or franchising licenses. Trung Nguyen has obviously transferred

into a multicultural corporation. The development of a universal and appropriate organizational
culture

which can unite and join the cultural differences across the corporation and the


distribution of top managers are the ongoing challenges that face Trung Nguyen.
• Products: Trung Nguyen has launched a series of diversified products including:
+ Trung Nguyen Coffees: creative coffee, mixed coffee, ground coffee, and Espresso
coffee.
+ G7 instant coffee – a know-how to create a novel coffee, they include Black G7
instant coffee, G7 3 in 1 instant coffee and G7 Cappuccino.
+ Tra Tien tea: Tinh Tam tea which helps bring peace and ease to mind; Vong Nguyet
tea which bears Viet Nam’s tea culture of soft sweetness and morishness.
• Slogan: Arouse creativity
• Trung Nguyen’s new employees are to be introduced to the Corporate history,
working culture, strategy, principles, and working procedure.
• The staffs are provided with opportunities to talk and discuss directly with the
Managing Board, meeting their managers as well communicating with the members of other
departments or units in order to be more informatorily updated and to build new working
relationships. They are paid in accordance with their working capacity. Therefore they have to
try their best and work in full capacity to give consumers best products and services if they
desire to have higher payment. Trung Nguyen encourages its staffs to work independently, too.
• Modern working and processing facilities are located evenly in cities and provinces
all over Viet Nam
• A system of franchised coffee shops which have outdoor spaces and elegant designs
with traditional lanterns hanging softly shining. Besides, Trinh Cong Son’s romantic music and
the moreish state of the coffee give customers pleasant and peaceful feelings. With the slogan
“arouse creativity”, Trung Nguyen expects its consumers, while sipping the coffee, come to
new and creative ideas which bring success to everyone and to the country.

Ditribution Center

Binh Duong Factory

Hanoi Branch Office


=> The visual structure in Trung Nguyen’s organizational culture demonstrates the
managing board’s interests in their employees as much as their expectation to bring Viet Nam’s
image to the world through the traditional cultures preserved in their organizational culture.
2. Declared values:
• Vision: To become a large corporate which plays a role in the emerge of Viet Nam’s
economy; to hold firm to the state’s independent economy; To demonstrate a Great Viet
aspiration to discover and to conquer.
• Mission: To build a leading brand name in the field of coffee products by bring
creative sources and a feeling of proudness to the consumers with their Viet Nam’s culture.
• 7 core values
+ Arouse creativity:
+ Develop and protect Trung Nguyen brand name
+ Consumers are centered
+ Cooperate with partners for mutually successes
+ Establish strong human sources
+ Measure by efficiency
+ Contribute to the social welfare and security.
* Development orientation
+ Develop into a large corporation with 10 corporate members; Operate in the eara of:
Cultivating, processing, exporting coffee and real estate business and media.
+ Aim at developing a local distribution network thoroughly (100 local leading
distributors) but the core business is coffee products.

+ Build an international coffee center in Buon Me Thuot which is as desirable as a
coffee paradise in the world.
=> Through the declared values, it is easy to realize that Trung Nguyen has paid much
attention to business ethics during its operation, at the same time, expressed Trung Nguyen’s
aspiration which is to build a Viet Nam’s brand name in the international markets.
3. Common concepts:


• The employees work under a spirit of “ Commitment – Responsibility- Honor”
• Trust: “Team spirit is always strong and firm”
=> In a word, the various levels of culture mentioned above have created differences
and distinctiveness for Trung Nguyen Coffee in term of a strong team spirit within independent
individuals and confidence with great aspiration demonstrated clearly in the General Director’s
speech when he talked about the world largest coffee corporation, Starbucks: “ We regard
Starbucks as a potential rival, yet we are not afraid to face them. We will gather our sources to
make Trung Nguyen become a typical Vietnamese corporate in the world. The nation’s culture
character is shown through our designs and service manners.”
* Trung Nguyen Coffee’s achievements
2005: Among Top 10 popular brands in Viet Nam
2004: Awarded ASEAN’s most excellent young entrepreneur prize
2003 – 2005: The “Yellow Star of the Vietnamese Land” prize awarded by the
Vietnamese Young Enterprises Association.
1999-2002: Voted four years in succession “Top Quality Vietnamese Goods” by
customers
III. The influence of the organizational culture on the Corporate success
1. Organizational culture creates a positive corporate attitude and helps distinguish
one corporate to others.
• Trung Nguyen Coffee is a pioneer in franchising business. With premium quality coffee
and a creative style in doing business, Trung Nguyen has coquerred local and overseas markets.
• The Corporate’s uniform in red and yellow colors shows some values that every

Vietnamese can understand.
• The services are excellent: customers receive a very caring and polite services from
the staffs. All of the shops have gentle style.


• All of the employees are proud to work for Trung Nguyen as they are provided a

very friendly working environment (They are able to directly discuss with the managing board
as well as with other staffs of different departments or units). They are encouraged to prove
their capacity and their contributions are recognized by the corporate. This is one of the factor
bring about Trung Nguyen’s success.
2. Organizational culture creates a centripetal force at all levels
• The mission of “build a top brand” and the thought of doing business not only for
benefits but also for building a brand for Vietnamese agricultural products have helped Trung
Nguyen’s members be more aware of their responsibility and understand each individual’s role
to dedicate to their jobs.
• With the understanding of “employees are driving force for development”, “human
resources development are critical”, “ employees are the most valuable asset to the corporate”,
Trung Nguyen has brought best working environments to its employees, they have also
undergone professional training courses to study and enhance their specialized knowledge.
Therefore, Trung Nguyen has attracted many talents and gained their trust and loyalty.
3. Organizational culture encourage innovative and creative process
• The Corporate heighten team spirit, meanwhile, they also encourage and require
their workers to be able to work independently so that each of them can generate their
creativity and activeness.
• They receive a competitive payment, the clear and close salary system and welfare
policies are annually revised to encourage and their working performance and their loyalty
toward the Corporate.
=> Thanks to this encouragement of creativity, Trung Nguyen has constantly launched
new product line with different tastes.

CONCLUSION
Whenever the Trung Nguyen brand is mentioned, people immediately visualize a strong
collective spirit, a friendly working environment for every employees, confidence in doing
business and great aspiration, etc. All of these factors are clearly shown in the organizational
culture of the Corporate. They are also factors which contribute to the development of Trung


Nguyen’s success.
The significant role and profound impacts of organizational culture towards corporate
development make it a priority to do in Vietnamese enterprises, especially in the time of
international integration. Building a healthy organizational culture has always been done so that
Vietnamese corporate can define their position in the global stage as well as establish a good
image for Vietnamese brands.