Poor performance of business development team at outsourcing department in first alliances ltd

UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMICS HO CHI MINH CITY
International School of Business
------------------------------

PHAN KIM KHANH

POOR PERFORMANCE OF BUSINESS
DEVELOPMENT TEAM AT OUTSOURCING
DEPARTMENT IN FIRST ALLIANCES LTD.

MASTER OF BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION

Ho Chi Minh City - Year 2021

1


UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMICS HO CHI MINH CITY
International School of Business
------------------------------

PHAN KIM KHANH

POOR PERFORMANCE OF BUSINESS
DEVELOPMENT TEAM AT OUTSOURCING
DEPARTMENT IN FIRST ALLIANCES LTD.

MASTER OF BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION

SUPERVISOR: PROF. TRAN PHUONG THAO

Ho Chi Minh City - Year 2021

2


Table of Contents
LIST OF TABLES .................................................................................................................................. 5
LIST OF FIGURES................................................................................................................................. 5
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY ..................................................................................................................... 6
1.

COMPANY OVERVIEW............................................................................................................... 7

1.1

Vision: ......................................................................................................................................... 7

1.2

Mission: ....................................................................................................................................... 7

1.3

Company structure ...................................................................................................................... 7

1.4

Main business: ............................................................................................................................. 9

1.5

Strength ..................................................................................................................................... 11

1.6

Weakness................................................................................................................................... 11

1.7

Target customers ....................................................................................................................... 11

1.8

Main competitors....................................................................................................................... 12

2.

PROBLEM CONTEXT ................................................................................................................ 12

2.1

Symptom ................................................................................................................................... 12

2.2

Potential problems ..................................................................................................................... 16

2.2.1

Potential problem 1: Client’s business planning .................................................................. 17

2.2.2

Potential problem 2: Poor performance of Business Development team ............................. 17

2.2.3
Potential problem 3: Ineffective cooperation between Business Development team and
Marketing team ..................................................................................................................................... 18
2.2.4
2.3

Potential problem 4: Undiversified service offers ................................................................ 18
Validate potential problems....................................................................................................... 19

2.3.1

Client’s business dealing planning ....................................................................................... 19

2.3.2

Poor performance of Business Development team................................................................ 20

2.3.3

Ineffective cooperation between Business Development team and Marketing team ............. 21

2.3.4

Undiversified service offers ................................................................................................... 22

2.4
3.

Main Problem ............................................................................................................................ 22
CAUSE .......................................................................................................................................... 24

3.1

Potential causes......................................................................................................................... 24

3.1.1

Poor annual sales strategies ................................................................................................. 24

3.1.2

Weak sales force .................................................................................................................... 25

3.1.3

Unsuitable training schedule ................................................................................................ 26

3.2

Real causes validation ............................................................................................................... 27

3.2.1

Poor sales planning................................................................................................................ 27

3.2.2

Weak sales force.................................................................................................................... 28

3.2.3

Unsuitable training schedule ................................................................................................. 29

3.3
4.
4.1

Main cause identification .......................................................................................................... 29
SOLUTION SUGGESTION ......................................................................................................... 31
Alternative solutions: ................................................................................................................ 31

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4.1.1

Increasing the workforce capacity ........................................................................................ 31

4.1.2

Enhancing internal training .................................................................................................. 38

4.2 Solution selection ............................................................................................................................ 39
5.

ACTION PLAN ............................................................................................................................ 40

CONCLUSION ..................................................................................................................................... 49
6.

SUPPORTING DOCUMENT....................................................................................................... 50

4


LIST OF TABLES
Number

Detail

Page

Table 1

Main business at First Alliances

9

Table 2

First Alliances Revenue from 2018 to 2020

15

Table 3

The status actual allocation of human capital of the
Outsourcing Department

30

Table 4

Cost breakdown for solution 1.1

34

Table 5

Cost breakdown for solution 1.2

37

Table 6

Proposed Business Development Manager recruitment
planning

46

Table 7

Interviewee’s Demographic

50



LIST OF FIGURES
Number

Detail

Page

Figure 1

Company Structure

8

Figure 2

Business Development Team’s standard process for
new client

12

Figure 3

Outsourcing Department’ revenue summary from 2018
to 2020

15

Figure 4

Problem mess

16

Figure 5

Initial Map

24

Figure 6

Final Cause-and-Effect Map

27

Figure 7

Outsourcing Department Career Road Map

28

Figure 8

Proposed Business Development Manager recruitment
planning timeline

48

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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Nowadays, in Vietnam, there are many companies operating in the field of
Human Resources services. Established in 1998, First Alliances is one of the largest
Human Resource consultancies in Vietnam specializing in Executive Search &
Selection, Human Resource Outsourcing, which includes payroll, staffing, and
Recruitment Process Outsourcing. With the increasingly fierce competition, in order to
keep a firm's competitive advantage, the company needs to not only better serve the
needs of customers, but also to build up its sales activities. However, First Alliances Ltd.
has not yet built up a viable effective long-term sales strategy. Conversely, the sales
performance has reduced in the past year, which leads to a drop in revenue for the
corporation. According to the company's data, the number of clients who successfully
signed service contracts after bidding with First Alliances decreased, leading to a
decrease in the company's revenue. The sales of Outsourcing Department's services are
carried out by the Business Development team. The purpose of this study is to
investigate why the sales of this team decreased recently. Therefore, the topic Poor
Performance Of Business Development Team At Outsourcing Department In First
Alliances Ltd. is raised to evaluate the performance of the sales team, offer solutions to
contribute to maintaining sales activities, increase competitiveness and promote the
development of the company.
Based on the analysis as well as the company view, it is recommended that the
firm should target its human capacity. On this basis, an increasing in headcount of the
team is proposed, as this aligns with the company’s key needs. Furthermore, an
enhancement in internal training is proposed to improve the necessary knowledge and
skills in sales activities. By adopting these recommendations, the key issue of Business
Development team is expected to be resolved.
Last but not least, a completed implementation plan for the most alternative

solution is proposed, which is hiring a Business Development Manager. As such, the
performance of the team is expected to be improve, and of a similar time, driving the
success of First Alliances in the near future.

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1. COMPANY OVERVIEW
Established in 1998, First Alliances is one of the largest Human Resource
consultancies in Vietnam specializing in Executive Search & Selection, Human
Resource Outsourcing, which includes payroll, staffing, and Recruitment Process
Outsourcing.
In 2016, First Alliances became a member of PERSOLKELLY – a joint venture
between PERSOL Holdings (previously Temp Holdings) and Kelly Services, to provide
end- to-end workforce recruitment services. It has nearly 1,800 employees in 42 offices
spanning across 13 markets in Asia Pacific.
Combining the strengths of both PERSOL Holdings - Japan’s second largest
recruitment firm, and Kelly Services - a global leader in workforce solutions with a
strong track record in Asia Pacific, First Alliances bring the best of both cultures and
the full spectrum of our talent recruitment services, providing clients with seamless,
cross-border Human Resource solutions.
1.1
-

Vision:

Recognizing the growing need for workforce solutions in the emerging APAC
market

-

Become the number 1 Human Resource Service Provider in the region

-

Revolutionize Human Resource infrastructure and impact social workforce
practices
1.2

Mission:

-

To be the industry leader

-

To provide customers with "world best practice" standards

-

To be recognized as a company with the highest standards of business ethics and
professionalism

-

To attract and retain the best available talents

-

To establish a happy, professional, & performance-driven workplace
1.3

Company structure

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Figure 1: Company structure
Source: First Alliances Internal Data 2020
Director: is the person who is in charge of all aspects of the company operations,
directs and makes decisions and carries out plans, determines and coordinates finances,
assigns duties and administrative responsibilities, establishes the policies of the
company, exercises discipline, and appoints or dismisses officers, and rewards
employees.
Associate Director: is the person who mainly directly support Director in
managing the business of the company in HCMC.
The firm has its head-office in Ho Chi Minh City and one branch is in Hanoi. We
will concentrate on resolving the issue at the headquarters in this article. In Ho Chi Minh
City, the organization employs over 120 consultants who specialize in three areas:
search-recruitment services; human resource outsourcing services; and compensation
services. For the Executive Search & Selection service, the organization is presently
divided into 11 distinct industry segments, including information technology,
healthcare, finance, and industrial, etc. with a total of approximately 90 employees.
Head of Recruitment and Head of Department; the team leader is the leader of each
recruiting team. On Outsourcing service, each department employs approximately 30
people and is led by a department manager, supervisor, human resources consultant, and

8

human resources workers. Additionally, the administrative department consists of
administrative personnel, data entry personnel, and financial accounting personnel.
At First Alliances, in Headhunting Department, each head-hunter is a salesman
who specifically links applicants with customers. However, there is a reversal for the
Outsourcing Department that this Department has no or less opportunities to approach
clients. Therefore, the firm set up a “Sales team” called Business Development Team,
which will sell Outsourcing products/services to clients.
1.4

Main business:
The Executive Search and Selection team consists of more

Executive Search than 120 consultants with at least 20 years of senior recruitment,
& Selection
(Headhunting):

Human Resource and talent management experience and indepth industry knowledge, specialize in the following fields:
- Accounting

- Human Resources & Legal

- Banking & Financial Services

- Manufacturing & Industrial

- Consumer Goods

- Real Estate

- Construction

- Supply Chain

- Healthcare

- Japanese Speaking Jobs

- Hospitality

- Korean Speaking Jobs

- Information Technology &
Telecommunications

Temporary/Contract Staffing:
Outsourcing

First Alliances’ staffing expertise extends to a wide range of

(including 3

industries. The specialists connect employers with highly skilled

services)

job seekers.
First Alliances is one of the leading employee leasing
services in Vietnam, offering a full service, cost-effective, and
efficient

Human

Resource

Management

services

to

organizations that may not have the necessary infrastructure or
inclination to perform these labor-intensive tasks.
The company provides reliable temporary staffing solutions

9


that offer their clients the ability to build their staff strength
without absorbing them full time, assist overloaded employees
during critical times, and keep projects moving. They act as a
3rd party employer to assist companies who wanted to hire
temporaries, part-time or full- time staffs or on a project basis.
They undertake in handling labour contracts and payroll
processing for our clients for them to meet employment needs at
peak and retain good employees during their absence or leave.
When the client hires them as a temporary staffing agency, they
would work just like a company's own Human Resource
Department, minus the hassles and tediousness that the client
otherwise have to deal with.

Payroll:
Payroll Services is a global trend is becoming so popular,
with many reasons but usually that benefit of Payroll Services to
help their client keep confidential in payroll and saves cost and
time, no need to invest in payroll software, ensuring the full,
smooth, and accurate, on time payroll.
Payroll is not just about calculating simple payment. There is
annoying paperwork and undesirable cost derived from it. First
Alliances’ payroll administration service helps the clients to
relieve the unbearable administration burden. Enhanced by new
model Human Resource solution Software with employee selfservice function, the company guarantee to provide the most
privileged practice which combines expertise, technology and
outstanding service performance. First Alliances helps to
manage the monthly payroll calculations and other payroll
administration tasks including leave recording and reporting.
Recruitment Process Outsourcing (RPO):
RPO is the act of delegating the responsibility to execute core

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and non-core activities. This refers to back and front office
services such as: Finance, Human Resource, Customer
Relationship Management and others. First Alliances provide
solutions for their clients to outsource a whole or part of their
entire business process, enabling them to better focus on their
business operations goals.
Table 1: Main business of First Alliances
1.5

Strength

With a reputation as PersolKelly's representative company in Vietnam, First
Alliances has received high industry recognition. In particular, First Alliances is
recognized as one of the leading companies in headhunting and payroll services. In
addition, based on the recruitment meeting with Ms. Tu Bui, it is clear that the clients
of the paid service are quite satisfied and tend to refer to other units.
In particular, First Alliances also receives strong support from the parent
company not only with investment capital but also a large source of customers. It is of
course that regional firms will receive from the parent company a sizable number of
corporate customers that attempt to access the Vietnamese market.
1.6

Weakness

One of the weaknesses that have existed for a long time, especially in
Outsourcing Dept. at First Alliances is the low ability to proactively find new clients.
This also means that First Alliances currently depends on its main client sources from
the Parent company. In addition, the marketing activities is focusing only on branding
in order to reach clients for Headhunt services which limited opportunities for
Outsourcing Department to approach its customers. In particular, First Alliances has not
built a separate marketing team or department in HCM office, so most of these activities
are unprofessional, lack of orientation and lack of strategy. All of these are weaknesses
that lead to limitation in the number of new customers in First Alliances.
1.7

Target customers

11

Identifying customer as a target customer is important to determine the demand
for, and to appropriately allocate resources for services. First Alliances are currently
providing services to a variety of companies in need. In particular, they focus on the
following 2 main groups:
- Foreign direct investment (FDI) companies
- Foreign companies do not have yet an entity in Vietnam

1.8

Main competitors

Competitors are defined as firms offering products or services that are close
substitutes, in the sense that they serve the same customer need. The purpose of a
competitor orientation is to provide a solid basis of intelligence pertaining to present and
potential competitors for executive actions [1]. First Alliances' direct rival is Talentnet.
Originating from the Human Resources Services unit of PricewaterhouseCoopers
Vietnam, Talentnet is now also acknowledged as the one of leading Human Resource
consulting firms in the country, with nearly 20 years of experience in the local labour
market. This company provides similar services with First Alliances at almost equal
costs.
In addition, First Alliances also have some indirect competitors such as Human
Resource to Business, Adecco, Manpower, etc. They offer some of the services that First
Alliances currently have for a slightly lower fee.

2.

PROBLEM CONTEXT

2.1

Symptom

To begin, a description of Business Development team's standard working
process and how it generates revenue for the company is as below.

Figure 2: Business Development Team’s standard process for new client
Step 1: Qualifying

12


In this step, Business Development team will qualify a quality of walk-in clients to filter
whether they are potential (based on payment capacity, the level of corporate risks, etc.).
Walk-in client is defined as a company that has a demand for Outsourcing services and
has directly approached or been contacted by First Alliances to exchange some
preliminary information about their needs. They have not yet been an official client of
the company.
Step 2: Proposal
After step 1, Business Development team will prepare and send a draft quotation which
includes a standard fee for the based-on clients’ requests.
Step 3: Being shortlisted
In this step, walk-in client will qualify and shortlist which HR company is qualified with
their demands. From that, a bidding meeting will be arranged.
Step 4: Negotiating
After having the successful bidding and First Alliances is decided to be their business
partner, Business Development team will review the final contract and negotiate for
balancing risks of both sides. In this step, final Initial set-up fee is defined and agreed.
Step 5: Contracting
Service contract is prepared with 2 copies, 1 for the client and 1 kept in First Alliances.

After signing the contract, the walk-in client will be officially be a client of the company.
In this step, the client is required to settle the payment for set-up fee, which is determined
as a revenue which is gained by Business Development team for the successfully signed
client.
Step 6: Closing
Based on the agreed service from Service contract, Business Development team will
assign and transfer successfully signed client to Payroll consultant for their next step
and track all bidding process into the internal system.
In a standard process, after completing step 5 – Contract which means the client
accepted to use the Outsourcing’s services, there is an “Initial set-up fee” that the client
is required to pay. This amount is mentioned in the quotation (Step 2) that the client is
requested to paid after signing contract with First Alliances. This fee is charged as a

13


“commitment amount”, to ensure that walk-in client will use the services offered in the
contract, and will not withdraw during the contract period, except for any violation from
First Alliances or any other reasons arisen but it is required to be accepted by both sides
after discussion. This cost is calculated based on the annual estimated fixed cost of the
offered service in the contract, which is considered the revenue of the company brought
by team Business Development team. The exact percentage of fee is determined during
Step 4 - Negotiating and is usually based on the size of the clients.
Based on the data from Business Development team, it is easy to witness that the
number of walk-in clients that the company successfully signed contract after bidding
were decreased dramatically from 42 to 23 in 2020. As a result, the company's revenue
is decreasing.

Figure 3: Number of walk-in clients which is successfully signed contracts after
bidding from 2018 to 2020

Targeting and productivity measurement play a key role in popular management
theory, in words like "what gets measured, gets done” [8]. Depending on the previous
performance and on the company's forecasts for the coming year, the target revenues are
set at the management level at the beginning of the business year. Targeting revenue is

14


forecasted based on two main factors: the revenue from selling activities of Business
Development team and the revenue from ad-hoc services offered to clients of
consultants when they are occurred. According to data provided by Finance team
regarding revenue of Outsourcing Department in the period from 2018 - 2020, it is
shown a dramatical drop from 31,674 mil VND to 26,701 mil VND. Despite sales
revenues from the selling activities of Business Development team still being the
primary sources of total revenue, there has been a significant decrease in this statistic,
around 40% drop.

In which

Year

2018

2019

2020

Targeted Revenue (mil VND)

25,000

35,000

30,000

Actual Revenue Achieved
(mil VND)

31,674

42,528

26,701

From Business Development team

26,487

30,656

18,436

From Ad-hoc services
(offered by Payroll Consultant)

5,187

11,872

8,265

Table 2: First Alliances Revenue from 2018 to 2020
Source: First Alliances Finance data

Figure 3: Outsourcing Department’ revenue summary from 2018 to 2020

15


An examination of the drop in the number of walk-in clients who are successfully
signed contract with First Alliances after bidding is extremely important to the company
as it is directly related to the gained revenue which supports both benefit and avoids the
survival of the company. If the sale decrease, there is a direct consequence of a drop in
revenue which leads to the decline of profit or even loss. In the next part, several theories
are applied, and the involvement of interviews will support to discover the primary issue
behind the declining sales.
2.2

Potential problems

An Initial cause-and-effect map is a diagram which can be used to gain an overall
image of the company's problems, that can be used to represent, analyze, evaluate and
then to choose sensible actions for further steps. Relying on the symptom discovered
with several intake meetings provides an overview picture of the problems that the
company is facing, a problem mess has been established as follows:

Figure 4: Problem mess
Human Resources service companies have been used by several organizations to
briefly fix shortages, to easily deal with new and/or backlog positions while workers

take short-term leave and holidays, etc. Moreover, The Human Resource Service is
designed to respond to the business' acute need with financial and time advantages. The
human resources suppliers will have procedures and manners to ensure that all workers'

16


amount and efficiency are properly provided according to particular enterprises or
organizations, their attributes and specifications. Outsourcing has become increasingly
attractive for many organizations. In such relationships, a company contracts with a
vendor that rents its skills, knowledge, technology, service and manpower for an agreedupon price and period to perform functions the client no longer wants to do [2].
2.2.1 Potential problem 1: Client’s business planning
As suggested by most sources, a first and relatively obvious criterion to look for
when contemplating termination is symptom decrease [3]. As figure 3, in 2020, First
Alliances witnessed the drop in number of successfully signed contract after bidding.
The globalization of COVID-19 pandemic and its economic impacts is set to run
across all economies in the world, it has seriously affected the financial health of every
company. The consequences of COVID-19 placed financial situations at high risk. From
minute to minute, companies strive to find solutions to their financial problems.
Recovery from such pandemic-driven recession may be difficult and may continue for
an even longer period, particularly because there is a lack of experience among
policymakers, institutions, and researchers on how to fight a pandemic-driven recession
[6]. From minute to minute, companies strive to find solutions to their financial
problems.
Each industry and market have its own characteristics, and no company has the
authority to decide on another's business. As a result, First Alliances has no control over
whether a client continues to want to expand their business in Vietnam. Due to the
COVID-19 pandemic, Human Resource service consumers will steadily cease usage to
minimize costs. From there, both parties cannot end up with the signed contract as
several walk-in clients decides to save their capital for priority business activities.

2.2.2 Potential problem 2: Poor performance of Business Development team
The interview reveals many challenges in attracting new clients in 2020. The first
mentioned thing that the Business Development manager position is empty which led to
the lack of lead personnel and strategies of whole team. Furthermore, although the
company has specified the ideal headcount numbers for Business Development team is

17


5 people, the current official headcount is only one junior staff who used to be an
assistant for the former Business Development manager. According to Ms. Ha Anh,
“I usually face several challenge questions regarding the Vietnamese
regulations, and no one has supports me on this. Although there still exists the help from
Ms. Tu Bui but I mostly have to do some research by myself and this takes me a lot of
time”.
Moreover, the serving capacity of this team is low as not only due to the shortage
of members but also the low knowledge level regarding Outsourcing market.
2.2.3 Potential problem 3: Ineffective cooperation between Business
Development team and Marketing team
First Alliances has been working hard for the past two years until now, not just
depending on their Head Office to find its own client sources. In order to find potential
clients, it is necessary to advertise the Outsourcing services so that the customers can
identify the provided services. In this phase, a clear relation must be formed between
the Business Development team and marketing activities. Of all marketing weapons,
advertising is renowned for its long-lasting impact on viewer’s mind, as its exposure is
much broader [5]. Advertising represents a most potent source of brand identity. It has
two major functions, namely, to present and thereby position the brand attributes against
consumer expectations and to imbue the brand with values symbolically attractive to the
target market [5]. Brands with greater industry awareness will be more likely to be
existing and prospective customers as opposed to unknown brands. They will eventually

be chosen and respected. Only a few selected companies will be "top-of-mind" as
prospective successful options if the service provider is needed.
However, First Alliances HCMC does not currently have a Marketing team. All
marketing activities on the website and related fields are done by Hanoi Marketing team.
The problem is that the Hanoi Marketing team does not cooperate closely with the
Business Development team and therefore does not understand the nature of work of
each other. Since then the Outsourcing team has not had a proper marketing plan.
2.2.4 Potential problem 4: Undiversified service offers

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Currently, Outsourcing Department is providing two main services which are
Payroll Services and Temporary/Contract Staffing. Regarding Payroll service, there is
irritating reporting and unnecessary expenses from this process. The payroll services are
to alleviate the intolerable pressure of administration. Improved with the latest Human
Resource solution platform, First Alliances ensures the most advantaged activity,
integrating experience, technologies and excellent quality efficiency, with employee
self-service applications. It assists the monitoring of monthly wage calculations and
other salary management activities, including the documentation of leave and reporting.
About the Temporary/Contract Staffing, First Alliances is a leading leasing firm in
Vietnam, delivering complete, cost-effective and reliable Human Resource services for
businesses that do not have the infrastructure or inclination to carry out these workintensive activities. The company offers reliable temporary personnel solutions, which
enable workers to gain power without fully absorbing them, help overcharged
employees in difficult moments, and keep projects on track. First Alliances operate as
an employer with third parties for helping businesses who wish to hire contractual, parttime or full-time jobs or on a project basis. The company manages terms and wages to
satisfy the employee requirements on a high level and retains excellent staff during the
absence or leave of its customers.
However, the company currently lacks several ad-hoc services, which is the main
reason for the failure of biddings.

2.3 Validate potential problems
2.3.1 Client’s business dealing planning
As the world are in the middle of a pandemic outbreak, it is very difficult to
estimate its long-term effects. Although society has been hit by several pandemics in the
past, it is difficult to estimate the long-term economic, behavioral, or societal
consequences as these aspects have not been studied to a great extent in the past. The
COVID-19 pandemic outbreak has forced many businesses to close, leading to an
unprecedented disruption of commerce in most industry sectors [7]. According to the
Bidding result record from Business Development team data, 23% of unsuccessfully
signed contracts is due to the client’s financial decision which is in response to the
19


COVID-19 pandemic that has negatively affected their business. After having a short
talk with Ms. Van Le – HRBP of company A. about the reason why at the end the
company A did not choose First Alliances for their HR service needs:
“…the Covid-19 hit us so bad. Our business in UK did not run well and we had
to withdraw financial capacity from other activities for our main business in UK.
Therefore, we had to stop the HR service demands for Vietnam office. … Our priority
now is to invest our capital for critical financial activities…”
It is clear to see that the biggest explanation in previous years for the decline in
number of successful signed contract after bidding was that clients stop running the
business in Vietnam due to their business nature and especially by Covid-19. According
to a recent survey, 41.3% of businesses reported that they were temporarily closed
because of COVID-19 [4]. To save cost, they switch to internal capital or select lower
price enterprises if necessary. Should they lose profits to cut costs, they transfer their
internal resources, or else choose a lower-priced rival if necessary. It is understandable
that some walk-in clients cannot sign contract with First Alliances for HR services after
bidding. From that, there is no Initial set-up fee generated. The dilemma is clearly taken
as a consequence of a downturn in revenue of previous years.

2.3.2 Poor performance of Business Development team
Better market and target customers understand their needs and take action to limit
the gap between what a brand promises consumer and what the brand continuously
receives [9]. Under the standard business plan, Outsourcing Department should
concentrate on FDI clients, or foreign firms with no entities in Vietnam. However, the
customer's existing source remains high, Business Development does not screen but
welcomes all customer types. Since the Business Development team capacity is not
strong enough to serve all clients in one time, it will put the pressure on Business
Development and occur several risks of being concentrated on improper customers and
leaving potential customers.
There is much concern about the success of organizations in the public and
private sectors around the world about their performance measuring methods. They're

20


having a hard time coming up with cost-effective, meaningful measures that drive
performance improvement without having unintended negative consequences [14].
It is clear to see that the serving capability is limited, given the ideal number of
Business Development headcount, it is evident that the actual number of staff is smaller
than it would be needed.
2.3.3 Ineffective cooperation between Business Development team and
Marketing team
Except for the client source from the Head Office - PersolKelly, following the
vision of Become the number 1 Human Resource Service Provider in the region, in
recent years, the company is trying to actively approach and search for new customers
in Vietnam. However, this is not done effectively as the company does not have the right
approach method. Marketing is one of the effective ways to let the market know what
products and services First Alliances are offering. As new and improved means of
promotion make it possible for authors to build brand awareness, contributors can

benefit. For starters, anyone like that, a single customers' feedback may have several
different results because their response rate is likely to be very low but is an
individualized look into the minds of many consumers, which affects others as well.
Confirmed by Ms. Tu Bui that:
“The company is not promoting much of the Outsourcing service. There are still
ads on the company's website and currently by the Marketing team in Hanoi in charge.
However, they do not often work with our team often, so they still do not fully understand
their services to have reasonable promotion plans.”
Marketers therefore necessitate an enhanced brand image defined by social
media; it is critical to know who the target audience is before building a social media
campaign. [9]. Currently, marketing activities are handled by Hanoi team. Online
meetings, conference calls are held sporadically every month between HCMC
Outsourcing team and Hanoi Marketing team. As there is no Outsourcing service offered
in Hanoi so in general, Hanoi Marketing team understands not very clear regarding the

21


services and activities that HCMC Outsourcing team is doing so they do not have
appropriate marketing strategies, which assists in the popularization of the outsourcing
service.
2.3.4 Undiversified service offers
Brand equity is valuable in commodities markets in particular as the effective
brand not only creates a solid identity for the products of the business, but also affects
preferences that favor marking differentiation as a result of which it has a competitive
advantage. First Alliances realized the strong increasing in demands in Ad-hoc services
from clients during the last two years. According to Ms. Tu Bui:
“We used to have great prospects clients with very high percentage of bidding
winning. However, they are large corporations, though, they request to stabilize the
daily business activities, which always need the back-office team always be available.

First Alliances has not yet provided this ad-hoc service as we have no troops for these
staffs”.
Clearly identify the lack of ad-hoc services will limit the potential resources of
the company. However, according to the company's growth plan, First Alliances is still
focusing on building existing services more firmly. From June 2020, the company aimed
to revolutionize digital technology, apply home-made Human Resource software to
replace all current excel manual operations. Deploying new service packages takes a lot
of time to discuss, plan and analyze whether the existing system can meet the new needs
when they arise. This is perceived as a potential problem, but First Alliances are still
decided to let it pend and will resolve in the near future.
2.4

Main Problem

After analyzing and validating based on several interviews as well as theories
reference, inefficiency in approaching to new clients due to the poor performance of
Business Development team is identified as the main problem that the company is
facing.
Employee performance reflects the efficiency of the service sales to clients. The

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term "performance" comes from the words "job performance" or "actual performance,"
which refers to someone's work or accomplishments. The quality and quantity of work
accomplished by an employee in carrying out his function in accordance with the
responsibilities assigned to him is defined as performance (work performance) [1].
Regarding the performance evaluation for Business Development team, despite the
Head-office and its subsidiaries in other countries already had the performance metric
for Sales team, First Alliances has yet to implement any method. Ms. Tu stated that:

"Right now, there is no performance or measures for the team… However,
compared with previous data in the past years, in 2020, we clearly see that we do not
serve much walk-in clients"
Firstly, the human capacity cannot this team's size has shrunk from five to one
employee. This results in a shortage of consultants to be able to consult and serve when
walk-in clients need. Consequently, the company has lost some potential clients since
they were satisfied with the service provided by another competitor and hence chose
that company instead of First Alliances. Furthermore, this team also lacks a leader,
someone who can provide a clear development direction for the entire team as well as
evaluate and measure the performance of each individual member of the team, allowing
for the arrangement of the most appropriate training programs that are most closely
aligned with the team's orientation. At the moment, the members of the team work
independently and naturally without any professional knowledge and background. As a
result, the team did not perform well in recent years and potential clients are missed or
lost.

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Figure 5: Initial Map
3.

CAUSE
3.1

Potential causes

Poor performance of sales team, in this case is Business Development team is a
common problem that any firm may face with. In this part, the potential causes are listed.
Then, by referring the theories and the data presented in First Alliances will support to

conclude the main cause which directly leads to the inefficiency in sale activities of
Business Development team.
3.1.1 Poor annual sales strategies
Companies now recognize the importance of having a long-term, profitable
relationship instead of simply focused on acquisition. Understanding the performance
structures within a sales department is thus critical, because if used for forecasting is a
means of obtaining better-quality sales forecasts [11]. Salesperson performance is
determined by measuring how effective the salesperson is in doing duties such as those
which require effort [16]. From the interview, Ms. Tu Bui said that “The company
actually did not prepare any proper sales strategy and almost all sales activities of
Business Development team are entirely arranged by Business Development Manager.
As you can see that in 2020, we do not have Business Development Manager, so I have
to take charge and it seems our company has to start from scratch in building up process
for Business Development operation”.

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Moreover, compared with other teams such as Consultants from Outsourcing
team or Headhunter from Team Headhunt, each employee is assigned a KPI level for
everyone to strive to be incentive. Despite the fact that, however, there were no sales
targets for Business Development team that the team is only told to serve as many as
clients that they can. Not only is there no longer a single target to strive for, but also
there is no clear purpose for the sales team, therefore their effectiveness has diminished.
3.1.2 Weak sales force
The sales force is a key source of sales, not only regarding return on sales, but
also regarding future market intelligence, apparent market trends, and business forecasts
[12]. The potential value of using salespersons is to supply information useful to
management decision making as they are familiar with their territories, their customers'
needs and sources of information inside customer organizations, their competitors'

marketing activities, and trends in product acceptance [11].
For the time being, Business Development consists of only of one employee, with
the assistance of the Associate Director. Generally, both is likely to have less experience
in Business Development activities, which sales Human Resource services, there is
likely to have a bit of confusion about how to go about things. The role ambiguity that's
ascribed to it includes anxiety. The ambiguity arises from the demand for more
complexity and growth coming from without an individual's understanding. Those
menial tasks are better tackled if you have good guidance to begin with. Wherever they
are called upon to make an action or to accomplish something, individuals find
themselves in an uncertain or ambiguous situation [13]. It is assumed that the reason for
high stress on employees is if they are made to work at the speed and pressured to finish
their assignments quickly is because of their employers' or superiors' expectations. For
an organization, which receives many tasks or project assignments and expects the
worker to finish everything in a certain amount of time, it seemed that the level of
turnover would spike [13].
Both sales force and the company's services knowledge are insufficient to meet
expectations, which means that First Alliances has failed to earn the revenues they
would have obtained had their business not been strong. Even though the company

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