No fear of failure
Dang Hoang Anh was born in 1998 and graduated from university with a major in marketing. After graduating, while working as a manager at a painting factory in Ha Dong district (Hanoi), Hoang Anh took advantage of the time to work and take online marketing courses.
After 2 years, Hoang Anh was recruited as the main sales staff for a high-end painting showroom located in a 5-star hotel in Tay Ho district (Hanoi).
“The starting salary is 1,000 dollars, the employer has very high requirements for dress and hair. They even require employees not to use perfume that is too strong. In addition, our team's KPI is very heavy, in addition to the sales index, customer growth through the brand's fanpage, we must have monthly reports on the general market level, the situation of competitor brands... So, a salary of a thousand dollars is really not high", Hoang Anh said.
After 6 months of working at the showroom, Hoang Anh quit his job because the job requirements were too strict compared to the benefits. According to this Gen Z employee, the working hours at the showroom were too restrictive, employees always had to meet the "5-star interface" such as always smiling, neat clothes, and having to give 1 week notice of leave.
Currently, Hoang Anh has opened a tile shop, doing her own marketing and sales. Although the work is hard, this Gen Zer still says she is satisfied with her choice. “I am not afraid of failure, Gen Zer is a completely different generation of candidates in the labor market, more proactive and not choosing the safe option like the previous generation,” Hoang Anh said.
Vu Kieu Tien, born in 1999 (Ha Long City, Quang Ninh), is a sociology student from the US. Returning to Vietnam in 2022, right when the COVID-19 pandemic was intense, Tien was unemployed for half a year. Then, thanks to a relative's introduction, Tien was hired as a social survey employee for an imported brand, headquartered in Ho Chi Minh City. With a fixed salary of $500 and additional bonuses for survey packages, Tien's total income is about 20 million VND/month.
However, this Gen Z quit his job after nearly 2 years of working with the reason of “no future prospects”. Tien said: “My boss is not permanent because of the company’s personnel transfer policy. When I worked in Ho Chi Minh City, my direct manager was in Hanoi, but when I moved to Hanoi, my new boss was a human resource officer in Ho Chi Minh City. Besides communication and minimal reporting at work, I did not see any connection between colleagues and did not see any opportunities for promotion”.
Quitting her job, Tien returned to Quang Ninh to start a fashion business. This Gen Z said that her store has not yet reached the break-even point, but she accepted this challenge because she truly finds joy in her work.
"Uneven" many factors
Mr. Le Minh Chung, General Director of Faster Company, specializing in high-end household appliances, said that 50% of his company's nearly 90 employees are Gen Z.
Assessing Gen Z staff, Mr. Chung said: “You are dynamic, good at foreign languages and have many ideas. At the end of the year, the staff who receive the most bonuses in my company are not the “veteran” group but this young group. However, I always face personnel disruption in this group because the job-hopping rate is very high, you often do not stay long when you are no longer interested in the job or see job opportunities with opportunities for promotion and higher income.”
Mr. Chung added that with many traditional employers, Gen Z employees can differ in many ways, from thinking, perspective to specific goals. To have a common voice, both sides must "harmonize" and balance to meet at one point. Most importantly for Gen Z employees, either high income or opportunities to learn and advance are needed to retain them.
Ms. To Thi Thu Thuy, human resources director of OPPO Vietnam, shared at a recently held workshop that she is seeing the rate of Gen Z workers gradually increasing in many businesses.
The advantage of Generation Z is that they were born in the age of technology, with a solid amount of knowledge and information; Gen Z is good at creativity and adaptation, learns new things very quickly, knows how to search for knowledge and filter information.
“However, an advantage that unintentionally becomes a disadvantage, the challenge for Gen Z is overconfidence, so it is difficult to recognize the points that need improvement. They also take soft skills lightly and do not focus on improving them,” said Ms. Thuy.
