Nguyen Si Hiep (from Thanh Hoa), a worker at an electronic component assembly company in Thang Long Industrial Park (Hanoi), just left his hometown to work in Hanoi. This is the first time Hiep has been away from his family, so everything is still very unfamiliar.
Studying one year later than his friends, this year Hiep just completed his high school program. Instead of continuing to study further, the male worker chose to work to have a stable income, save some money and later consider vocational training.
Currently, Hiep works the night shift from 10 pm to 6 am the next morning. During the shift, workers have one hour of rest and the company arranges night meals. Hiep's basic salary is about 6.3 million VND/month. If there are extra working hours, the income can reach nearly 10 million VND/month.
In a foreign land, I just hope for stable jobs and health to work. Later, if I have the conditions, I want to learn more skills, improve my skills so that I can stick with the job for a long time and have the opportunity to increase my income" - Hiep shared.
However, the young male worker's desire to learn a trade is still accompanied by many worries. Shift work, overtime, and costs of renting accommodation, food, and travel make it difficult to arrange time and expenses to participate in a course.
Hiep hopes that vocational training programs will have short-term courses, flexible times, suitable for workers' work schedules. In particular, out-of-province workers like Hiep need to be supported with a part of their tuition fees so that they can boldly improve their qualifications.
At the age of 26, Mr. Tran Van Minh, a worker working at a hard drive component company in Thang Long Industrial Park, has been attached to work at the factory for several years.
The main job is to stand on the line, inspect, and package products in stages. Although familiar with the job and with a relatively stable income, Mr. Minh admitted that if only based on current labor and experience, long-term development opportunities are limited.
“We general workers are the ones who directly stand the machine, make products, but when businesses change technology, we are also the group that is easily affected. If machines can do the jobs they are doing, workers must have other skills to continue to stay” - Mr. Minh said.
According to Mr. Minh, he wants to learn a trade, but if he learns it in the evening, it will be overtime or overtime. Taking a break from work to go to school also means reducing income.
If businesses and trade unions can organize courses right in the industrial park, at a time suitable for the shift, or have tuition fee support policies, workers will be more likely to participate" - Mr. Minh proposed.
According to Mr. Nguyen Huy Sang - Chairman of the grassroots Trade Union of Yamaha Motor Vietnam Spare Parts Production Co., Ltd. (Thang Long Industrial Park, Hanoi), the requirements for the workforce are increasingly high as technology is strongly changing production methods.
In addition to vocational skills, workers need to have the ability to access technology, improved thinking and quickly adapt to the new working environment.
Mr. Sang believes that workers are the force that directly brings technology and initiatives from ideas into production practice, creating quality and competitive products in the market. Therefore, improving the quality of human resources not only brings benefits to workers but also contributes to strengthening the competitiveness of businesses.
At Yamaha Motor Vietnam Parts Manufacturing Co., Ltd., training and skills improvement activities for workers are maintained regularly.
Vocational training classes are organized to help workers update knowledge and meet job requirements. Along with that, Kaizen competitions on production improvement are launched monthly by the Factory Improvement Board, with the advice of the Trade Union Executive Committee.
