Human Resources Development for E-commerce in Vietnam

A boom in the development of information technology, as well as telecommunication and communication services, including telephone, fax, the Internet and email have produced a significant impact on business development and activities of organisations and individuals, and the socio-economic development of countries. According to MSc Nguyen Van Thoan, head of the E-commerce Division at the Hanoi Foreign Trade University, e-commerce is the only way to improve the competitiveness for small and medium-sized ecommerce and to promote the integration into the regional economy and the participation in common markets.

 

The fact shows that in Vietnam when enterprises build their websites or join e-commerce portals with a target of developing e-commerce, they have not tapped fully the potential and strength of the Internet for the business model. Most local enterprises do not have a good understanding and knowledge about e-commerce, so it has become popular among local enterprises that they then ‘forget’ their websites on the Internet. Vietnamese enterprises have so far focused on traditional mortar shop business model, missing many opportunities offered by e-commerce. Many free training courses have been organised to help local enterprises to get access to the business model, but with a constraint understanding, enterprises have failed to get benefits from the training courses.

 

According to a survey on the present landscape of e-commerce development in Vietnam, which was conducted by the Department of E-commerce, the Ministry of Trade, most enterprises and organisations lack or have not have staff members specialising in e-commerce. To some extent, enterprises have few sales or information technology staff members joining short training courses on e-commerce only. In fact, the short training courses fail to provide enough knowledge and skills, necessary for developing effectively e-commerce. To develop the business model, it is necessary for e-commerce staff members to have good knowledge about trade, information technology and foreign languages. Therefore, it has been an urgent issue to develop qualified human resources for e-commerce in Vietnamese organisations and enterprises.

 

According to a report on the e-commerce development landscape in Vietnam in 2005, there have been following training courses on e-commerce:

Official long time courses	16 per cent
Official short time courses	33 per cent
On demand courses	37 per cent
Online courses	9 per cent
Other	5 per cent

 

According to the statistics, the number of enterprises sending their staff members to official long time training courses is lower than the number of enterprises sending their staff members on official short duration or on demand courses. This is because official long time courses have been offered since between 2003 and 2004. As a result, when the survey was conducted in 2005, there were only few graduates from the long duration training courses.

 

There are many short training courses for enterprises and management agencies. The courses are organised by the Institute of Information Technology for Business (ITB) under the Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry (VCCI), the Department of E-commerce, the Information Centre of the Ministry of Trade, the Hanoi Foreign Trade University, the management board of the E-commerce portal of Vietnam (ECVN) and GOL. In addition, some universities and schools have developed long, in depth training courses on ecommerce. These include a master decree training programme of the Hanoi University of Technology, training programme for students at the Hanoi Foreign Trade University.

 

These training units have various training programmes. The Department of E-commerce, for example, provides training courses for students from State management agencies. Accordingly, the department provides free training courses for officials from localities at the request with an aim of improving knowledge for managers.

 

Different from the Department of E-commerce, ITB has targeted enterprises, providing free or almost free training courses as VCCI has been assigned by the Government to improve knowledge for enterprises. Nguyen Thi Thu Hang, head of the Department of Consultancy and Training of ITB, said with training courses lasting between three and five days to provide basic knowledge and skills on e-commerce, ITB may charge each student between VND 50,000 and 100,000.

 

The Hanoi Foreign Trade University is highly appreciated with a full set of training programmes for students, postgraduates, officials and managers. As one of the first universities in Vietnam to provide training courses in e-commerce, each year, the Hanoi Foreign Trade University trains more than 800 students and hundreds of officials and managers. The university provides its own courses or have co-operated with other organisations, such as the Department of E-commerce and ITB, the Information Technology Institute of the National University to provide training courses nationwide.