About a typical morning, an interview with Markus Baur, and a savings account which deserves its name
My morning and an additional remark regarding lunch
Well, I don't know how your mornings usually start, but my mornings in Vietnam are pretty much the same as in Switzerland when it comes to unpleasant incidents. Luckily, it happened in the hotel so I was still able to change:)At this point, I would also like to make a little addition to the lunch section of yesterday's post.
As you might imagine, lunch for around 100 employees isn't created magically out of nowhere. So I would like to show you the people who put a lot of effort in the delicious food we enjoy every day!
In the morning, there was no meeting planned so I was able to check what my classmates had done the last days while I am here at Vietnam. Well, I seriously shouldn't have done that... I guess I'll need more than a day to catch up again. But thank you guys for sending me all the info!
The meeting with Mr. Markus Baur, CEO of Axon Active Vietnam
Daniel told me, that Mr. Markus Baur (CEO of Axon Active Vietnam) was currently in the office. He immediately agreed to have a meeting with me. This meeting was incredibly interesting.
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| CEO of Axon Active Vietnam source: http://www.axonactive.com/company/#management |
company up in Ho-Chi-Minh City and also in Danang. The setting up of the company itself (with government regulations etc.) was not the main challenge as he had the chance to see into another company which was set up by Vietnamese people and then even improved this process.
What was really tough, however, especially when he was setting up the second branch in Danang, was to transfer the working culture from Ho-Chi-Minh to Danang. He called this task a back-breaking work which needed a lot of time, energy and resources.
Markus pointed out, that it is not possible to just come here and set up a company with no knowledge and connections. He also mentioned some company managers which opened a branch in Vietnam, stayed here some months and then tried to manage the branch remotely. As you probably can imagine, this didn't work out well.
The different branches of Axon Active Vietnam
For Axon Active Vietnam, however, things are obviously working quite well as they are expanding their office spaces and will even open a new branch in Can Tho. The map on the right shows the three locations of Axon Active Vietnam (Can Tho will go into operation soon).
You might be wondering why the company would want to open a new branch in Can Tho as from a geographical perspective it would maybe make more sense to focus more on the north of the country.
Markus told me, however, that in the very south (Can Tho region) of Vietnam the existing industry consists mainly of farming and no qualified jobs are available. Therefore, a lot of young, well educated people go to Ho-Chi-Minh City to make a living whilst their families stay in the south. As the Vietnamese culture has a strong focus on family, the plan is to find new, highly qualified employees, which may have left the region of Can Tho and eventually would want to live closer to their families again. Like this, the company can improve its employer branding and get access to more qualified workers.
You should be aware, that most of the people do not really want to live in Ho-Chi-Minh City. For a foreigner like me, of course it is exciting for some time but after a while I can understand that the busy, loud, and smoggy city is not the place of dreams for many people. Especially not if you want to start a family.
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| https://www.facebook.com/search/top/?q=axon%20active%20vietnam |
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| https://www.facebook.com/search/top/?q=axon%20acive%20can%20tho |
This is why Axon Active Vietnam has started a campaign to attract new workers for their Can Tho branch. I guess you can tell that the picture suggests that it is actually possible to combine nature, family and work. I personally think that this is a very clever approach to attract qualified employees. Markus mentioned also that the war for talents is very intense in Vietnam (as it is almost everywhere in the world). This leads me to my next topic.
Employer branding, benefits, and the search for new talents
As mentioned above, the war for talents is quite harsh and the fluctuation rate in Vietnam is pretty high. And with a high fluctuation rate I mean really, really fast changing conditions. Nathalie once told me that one developer had left their team to start in another company. He then worked there for not even a week (!) and again switched to another employer. And the case described is nothing unusual here. Of course, this is also due to the fact that there is a very high need for developers and they are always able to find a new job. Therefore, companies have to stay in the minds of potential future employees. This aspect is basically no different than in Switzerland. How Axon Active Vietnam is tackling this issue, however, was amazing to hear for me.
They are having several events and a very close cooperation with the universities. Apart from doing the usual sponsoring and seminars (as Swiss companies do as well) they do also provide actual courses for the students. These courses are a win win situation for both, the company and the students. The students get a practice oriented development course while the company is able to detect outstanding students early and keep in touch with them.
Furthermore, Axon Active Vietnam is hosting the biggest IT event in Vietnam once a year. It is called DevDay Danang and in 2016 there were about 1'200 participants.
source: http://devday.org/
Markus told me, that the expenditures in employer branding are as high as for the sales marketing of their products and services.
Benefits for employees
As the competition between the employers is quite harsh, the companies have to provide various benefits for the employees. In Vietnam, however, this is normal if you want to attract and retain highly qualified employees. When I asked Markus about this, he said that to some people it may not appear like a job but more of a stay with Club Med if one has a look at the "What we offer" section on their website. After my experience here, I can surely state that it is definitely no holiday to work for Axon Active Vietnam and all the people put a lot of effort into their work. From a Swiss perspective, however, I have to agree with him somehow :)
One difference to Switzerland that really strikes me is that there are a lot of team activities provided. Markus also told me that they also need to provide for weekend trips and dinners for the teams. If I think of teams in Switzerland, I would say that it is rather difficult to convince most of the people to spend their week ends with co-workers. This can surely be considered a huge cultural difference.
The free Kindergarten for the employee's kids may be considered special also in Vietnam. The company does that, in order to attract also more senior employees.
The free Kindergarten for the employee's kids may be considered special also in Vietnam. The company does that, in order to attract also more senior employees.
Markus also informed me, that the whole personal costs cover about 50% of all costs here in Vietnam. Even though employee retention and employer branding are very expensive compared to Switzerland, what a company gets out of it is worth the pain.
Axon Active is considered a very good employer and does also organise career days. They usually receive then around 300 CVs of which 100 are invited to a full assessment day (which consists of technical tests, intelligent tests, English tests, and some social games).
After this, around 40 people will be invited for interviews. From these 40, 10 to 15 eventually start to work for Axon Active Vietnam.
So we can say that out of 300 applicants, 10 to 15 are actually getting a job.
When browsing the Facebook page of Axon Active Vietnam, I came across the following post which may be an indication of how the company is perceived by graduates:
The wedding example, power distance and what Vietnam could learn from Switzerland and vice versa
During the meeting with Markus, we of course also got into the topic of differences between the Vietnamese and Swiss culture. He then gave me a very nice example of a wedding in Vietnam compared to Switzerland.
In Switzerland, I think all my Swiss readers would agree, you'd communicate the date of the wedding as early as possible in order to make sure that the majority of the people is able to visit the day of your life. This is quite different in Vietnam. He told me, that if you would invite the people even just 3 weeks before the wedding you'd probably have no visitors at the wedding because they would already have forgotten it again. This is why, in Vietnam an invitation to a wedding is communicated somewhat 5 to 7 days before the actual event takes place in order to make sure that someone even shows up.
Another example of cultural differences may be the fact, that most of the people cook with gas in Vietnam. But... NOBODY has a second gas bottle at home. This would not be imaginable in Switzerland. So if you run out of gas you'd just call the "gas delivery service" (even though it might be 2 a.m. on a Monday morning) and have your gas delivered.
Markus made a very true statement I think when he said:" Vietnam is an instant culture". Planning a long time in advance is not something which is done here and it also doesn't need to be done because everything works somehow out.
When I asked Markus about the leadership skills in Vietnam he said that you have to lead them more tightly. This goes into the topic of power distance which is in Switzerland, depending on the company, quite low but kind of high in Vietnam. But, compared with other Asian countries, the power distance in Vietnam is still one of the lower ones.
Daniel once told me, that in the beginning, the teams at Axon Active Vietnam always told the POs on what tasks they are currently working. Daniel then informed them that they don't need to do this as they trust that the outcome would be fine. If they had any questions, however, they could always ask. This was very difficult for some employees to understand as it is usually not the case in Vietnam.
Markus also pointed out that self-motivated working is not something which is usually the case in Vietnam. From what I saw at Axon Active Vietnam, I would not agree to that but I guess it needed a lot of effort until the working culture arrived at the outstanding level as it can be observed today.
When I asked Markus what Vietnam could learn from Switzerland and vice versa he said that it would be nice to have any legal certainty in Vietnam as corruption is still an issue. For example, as of 2015 foreigners are officially allowed to buy a house (this was not the case before) and all the newspaper were writing about it. Well, there is actually no foreigner owning a house in Vietnam so far, because even though the law exists, the detailed process has never been defined. He put the situation as follows: In Swiss law, we try to eliminate as many uncertainties as possible when implementing a law. In Vietnam, they try to maximize the scope of interpretation within their laws.
About what Switzerland could learn from Vietnam, he said, that this would most probably be the spontaneity and the short-term thinking to not over plan everything which in the end leaves to no, or very clumsy outcomes. I personally couldn't agree more.
This reminds me of another story about the instant culture. Sebastian (CIO) told me, that on a Sunday evening, around 10 p.m. he had a problem with his motorbike. In Switzerland it would be quite difficult to find someone fixing your bike at such a time. Well, in Vietnam he just drove to the official representative of his motorbike brand and got the bike fixed immediately.
The different adaption phases of an expat
As written before, Markus has lived in Vietnam for 8 years now. Quite surprisingly for me, however, was the fact that he had his crisis after 3 years' time which seemed quite late to me. He said that the crisis phase was triggered by a chain of events which just hit him more or less instantly.
My classmates should know the graph on the right. I wasn't aware, however, that the crisis phase may strike after such a long time. I thought that the whole transition stages were taking place in a shorter timeframe. Markus also informed me, that most expats he knows, respectively knew were leaving the country after 5 years again.
When browsing the Facebook page of Axon Active Vietnam, I came across the following post which may be an indication of how the company is perceived by graduates:
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| https://www.facebook.com/pg/AxonActiveVietnam/reviews/?ref=page_internal |
During the meeting with Markus, we of course also got into the topic of differences between the Vietnamese and Swiss culture. He then gave me a very nice example of a wedding in Vietnam compared to Switzerland.
In Switzerland, I think all my Swiss readers would agree, you'd communicate the date of the wedding as early as possible in order to make sure that the majority of the people is able to visit the day of your life. This is quite different in Vietnam. He told me, that if you would invite the people even just 3 weeks before the wedding you'd probably have no visitors at the wedding because they would already have forgotten it again. This is why, in Vietnam an invitation to a wedding is communicated somewhat 5 to 7 days before the actual event takes place in order to make sure that someone even shows up.
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| At least in my hotel I don't have to worry about not having enough fire-extinguishers at hand even though they are all located in the ground floor |
Markus made a very true statement I think when he said:" Vietnam is an instant culture". Planning a long time in advance is not something which is done here and it also doesn't need to be done because everything works somehow out.
When I asked Markus about the leadership skills in Vietnam he said that you have to lead them more tightly. This goes into the topic of power distance which is in Switzerland, depending on the company, quite low but kind of high in Vietnam. But, compared with other Asian countries, the power distance in Vietnam is still one of the lower ones.
Daniel once told me, that in the beginning, the teams at Axon Active Vietnam always told the POs on what tasks they are currently working. Daniel then informed them that they don't need to do this as they trust that the outcome would be fine. If they had any questions, however, they could always ask. This was very difficult for some employees to understand as it is usually not the case in Vietnam.
Markus also pointed out that self-motivated working is not something which is usually the case in Vietnam. From what I saw at Axon Active Vietnam, I would not agree to that but I guess it needed a lot of effort until the working culture arrived at the outstanding level as it can be observed today.
When I asked Markus what Vietnam could learn from Switzerland and vice versa he said that it would be nice to have any legal certainty in Vietnam as corruption is still an issue. For example, as of 2015 foreigners are officially allowed to buy a house (this was not the case before) and all the newspaper were writing about it. Well, there is actually no foreigner owning a house in Vietnam so far, because even though the law exists, the detailed process has never been defined. He put the situation as follows: In Swiss law, we try to eliminate as many uncertainties as possible when implementing a law. In Vietnam, they try to maximize the scope of interpretation within their laws.
About what Switzerland could learn from Vietnam, he said, that this would most probably be the spontaneity and the short-term thinking to not over plan everything which in the end leaves to no, or very clumsy outcomes. I personally couldn't agree more.
This reminds me of another story about the instant culture. Sebastian (CIO) told me, that on a Sunday evening, around 10 p.m. he had a problem with his motorbike. In Switzerland it would be quite difficult to find someone fixing your bike at such a time. Well, in Vietnam he just drove to the official representative of his motorbike brand and got the bike fixed immediately.
The different adaption phases of an expat
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| http://blogs.angloinfo.com/expat-living-in-the-hague/2015/11/20/ expat-transition-stages-from-entering-to-adjusting/ bildschirmfoto-2015-11-19-um-11-20-48/ |
My classmates should know the graph on the right. I wasn't aware, however, that the crisis phase may strike after such a long time. I thought that the whole transition stages were taking place in a shorter timeframe. Markus also informed me, that most expats he knows, respectively knew were leaving the country after 5 years again.
I would like to thank Markus Baur for the very interesting and valuable meeting and the time he took to give me an insight into the life as an expat and CEO in Vietnam! And I am also very happy about the merchandising products he gave to me from Axon Active Vietnam. On Friday, my last day at the office I will certainly wear the polo shirt with the Axon Logo :)
Lunch and getting a loan in Vietnam
After the interview it was almost time for lunch. Lunch was again delicious and fast :)
On the way back to the office, some guy stopped me (just like the guys of Greenpeace do at Zurich Main Station) and said: " Sir, would you like to have a loan or a mortgage from ANZ?" (ANZ is a Vietnamese bank). I was quite confused by this question and told him that I am a student and that they would probably not want me as a debtor. He then told me that he is studying economics as well and we had a really nice conversation. Turns out, in Vietnam you get 5 to 7% interest on your savings account. When I told him about how much we would get in Switzerland (and Europe) he laughed and said that he thinks that the plan of the European Central Bank was doomed to failure in his opinion. First of all, I was impressed that he knew so much about the European fiscal policy and second of all, that I couldn't agree more with his statement :)
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