French firm to revolutionise staff training in Vietnam

Can you share with us your plans in Vietnam? How will the programme be tailored to the Vietnamese market?

Vietnam is a vast and growing market with 92 million people. We can see that demand for staff training in Vietnam is booming, and thanks to our global experience, we can meet these needs efficiently.

Our solutions will reduce training costs for enterprises, as they do not have to fork out money for costly overseas trips. The entire course is online with internationally-certified content, ensuring that a lot of employees can participate at the same time, at a much lower cost. Moreover, evaluation is straightforward through an online monitoring system. Our solutions, which are highly flexible, can also be tailored to any changes in any market.

Online training is the latest educational trend worldwide. For example, in 1999, 75 per cent of companies in the US sent their staff away for offline training, and this figure dropped to 40 per cent in 2004 and even further to 25 per cent in 2017. Other countries are also following suit.

Our programme in Vietnam, in collaboration with our local partner MVV Education, is not just a translation of course documents from English to Vietnamese. The coursework has been reviewed by 20 specialists to make sure that it adapts to the Vietnamese culture and responds to the training needs and educational levels of Vietnamese employees. This is our localisation strategy for any market that we operate in.

Is the programme exclusively for managers and high-level executives? How can you ensure that the knowledge and skills from Crossknowledge are applied at the clients’ workplace?

No, our programme can be used by all levels of employees from all departments, from the sales team and the services team to senior executives. We believe that the entire workplace must be involved in implementing change, not just the managers—this idea breaks away from the hpopular misconception that only high-level leaders need to be trained.

I need to highlight that there is a big difference between Crossknowledge, an educational solutions provider, and other e-learning systems, which leads to how the skills will be applied in the clients’ workplace. E-learning is passive, sporadic, and one-way, discouraging interaction, practice, and real-life application. Meanwhile, Crossknowledge, with our 17 years of experience on the global scale, provides solutions tailored to each corporation, based on their unique situation and needs.

At Crossknowledge and MVV Education, we make sure that our programme can identify and solve clients’ problems, as well as stay readily accessible via mobile applications. We constantly monitor the implementation progress and make changes right away if needed.

When the clients see major improvements at their workplace, they will be committed. This is the reason why 92 per cent of our global clients choose to re-sign with us every year.

Do you plan to target small- and medium-sized enterprises in Vietnam, besides major corporations?

Our solutions are suitable for both major firms and smaller ones, including those with fewer than 50 staff members. Our partner MVV Coaching has been working with various small- and medium-sized companies in Vietnam, and we will continue to build new solutions for them based on this experience.

We are really excited to work with local businesses in Vietnam, as these clients bring in a different set of opportunities and challenges. A smaller group of employees, around 200 or 300 people, mean that there are fewer differences in functions, knowledge skills, and schedules, all of which makes it easier for us to implement the programme.

As the majority of Vietnamese businesses are in the small- and medium-sized bracket, we hope that our solutions can help them improve productivity, increase output, and enhance their competitiveness in the market. We want to bring them new solutions that are different from the usual academic programmes that tend to emphasise rote learning and neglect the implementation process.

How strong is competition among providers of educational services in Vietnam? What are the unique challenges that you may face here?

There are many providers, but not everyone is solution-based like us. As I just mentioned, most of the staff training programmes in Vietnam are quite academic and non-specific to any organisation. The same problem applies to overseas master’s programmes or other industry qualifications.

Having said that, demand is rising while supply is limited, which is why I believe the education sector is still big enough to accommodate all players.

Regarding risks, I believe that all companies face similar risks when launching a new product in the market, including how the market will respond to this product, how consumers will embrace our offers, and how well our solutions can penetrate the market. Timing is another crucial factor. This is the same across all markets.

We are highly optimistic about Vietnam and so far, as our Vietnam-based clients have been satisfied with our solutions. This is the great encouragement for us to continue tailoring our programme to the Vietnamese market.

To lower risks, we have done extensive market research, entered into collaboration with local partners, and employed the most qualified people for the job. Flexibility is our strength, and we have adapted very well to any market we operate in—we believe Vietnam will be the same.