BACKGROUND
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Personal Edge is organized around six essential skill sets that you continue to develop after university and throughout your working life.
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An co-curricular program held by RMIT University Vietnam each semester to help students develop a wide range of knowledge and skills alongside their formal academic study to enter the workplace environment firmly.
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Due to the lack of attendance in workshops and the lack of engagement with the target audience, we expect to make a campaign to raise awareness and promote Personal Edge from June to September 2021.
SWOT ANALYSIS
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RMIT students are amongst the most aware about ‘soft skills’ and career future.
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Students are engaged in experiential learning from experience and reflection from PE workshops.
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Having digital credentials which are evidence in a digital portfolio of students (Brown et al, n.d).
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In Vietnam, more soft skills often mean higher employability when entering the workforce (Minh Thao & Hong Van 2020).
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As globalization continues to develop and more foreign companies are coming into Vietnam, good soft skills are a must (Tam 2019).
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PE workshops are not mandatory
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Lack of engagement on social media platforms.
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Internal competitors attract RMIT students: events from clubs during week 7, which students would prefer to join.
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The competition between internal and PE that the clubs at RMIT can invite KOLs either to attract students.
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Problem statement
The problem we are trying to solve is the low attendance rate of the students. This is a problem for Personal Edge is that the target audiences do not think about career planning early in their degree because they think focusing on getting good grades at school is enough. Upon graduation, they wouldn't have a clear direction for their career and confidence in their soft skills.
Context analysis
THE PERCEPTION OF VIETNAMESE STUDENTS ABOUT SOFT SKILLS
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Students are weak in presentation skills, expressive skills, interpersonal communication skills, teamwork skills, the ability to apply knowledge in practical situations, and professionalism (Quynh Hoa 2019).
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Phan and Wongsurawat (2016) point out that English skills and soft skills (communication, teamwork, professionalism, problem-solving, and lifelong learning) are determinants of the recruitment ability of Vietnamese graduates.
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Soft skills are considered the key to getting a good job, especially for fresh graduates, but Vietnamese students are very indifferent to soft skills (Quynh Hoa 2009).
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A survey found that 50% of graduates had to retrain, of which 36.3% of employers answered that students lack soft skills to develop at work (Luong 2010).
Limited skill development during college is considered one of the biggest barriers preventing college graduates from smoothly transitioning to the workplace (Tuyet 2013).
Vietnam has the largest number of employees lacking soft skills among internationally linked firms, especially cognitive, social and behavioral skills (Bodewig & Badiani-Magnusson 2014).
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Both students and graduates are aware that soft skills are essential for companies to recruit them. However, they all blame their lack of soft skills due to the situation in Vietnamese universities, where students often focus only on scores in their exams.
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The emphasis on exam results and academic performance in Vietnam (Kelly 2000) may be one of the main reasons students misunderstand that only good grades are the determining factor of being a good student and will be successful in the future.
It created the passive learning style of Vietnamese students, they are not actively trying to improve their skills but putting a lot of expectation on the universities to equip them with those skills. It led to a lack of responsibility for managing their own career choices (Mallon 1998).
Textual & sentimental analysis
The main keywords that RMIT students discuss on social media.
The data collection and analysis process was conducted with the help of Nvivo, Ncapture, and the Facebook search function.
Firstly, in terms of data collection, PE Saigon, PE Hanoi, and RMIT Confessions were the Facebook pages used. Keywords like “future career”, “jobs”, “work” or “intern” were entered into the Facebook search box to filter out the specifically related posts to be used for this research, and from that, 50 comments in those posts were collected.
Amongst the 50 analyzed comments, the most frequently mentioned words are: “grades”, “study” or “course”. It can be indicated that students like to talk about grades when discussing their future careers. Furthermore, a very low percentage of students were certain about their future careers, and the number of neutral and uncertain ones was almost the same. This means that students either don’t know yet about their future careers or don’t talk about it with their peers.
The percentage of RMIT students about future careers.
Amongst the 50 analyzed comments, the most frequently mentioned words are: “grades”, “study” or “course”. It can be indicated that students like to talk about grades when discussing their future careers. Furthermore, a very low percentage of students were certain about their future careers, and the number of neutral and uncertain ones was almost the same. This means that students either don’t know yet about their future careers or don’t talk about it with their peers.
REFERENCE
Bodewig, C, Badiani-Magnusson, R, MacDonald, K, Newhouse, D & Rutkowski, J 2014, Skilling up Vietnam: preparing the workforce for a modern market economy, International Bank for Reconstruction and Development.
Brown, F, Asato, E & Tran, T, M, H n.d, ‘SEAMEO International Conference on Leadership and Management in Higher Education: Driving Change with Global Trends’, VNSEAMEO, viewed 15 April 2021,<http://www.vnseameo.org/InternationalConference2019/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/Ms.-Felicity-Brown-Ready-for-Work-and-Life-How-RMIT-Vietnam’s-Personal-Edge-program-prepares-graduates-for-success-in-an-increasingly-competitive-jobs-market.pdf.>.
EU-Vietnam Business Network 2018, EDUCATION IN VIETNAM, EU-Vietnam Business Network.
Ibrahim, R, Boerhannoeddin, A & Bakare, KK 2017, ‘The effect of soft skills and training methodology on employee performance’, European Journal of Training and Development, vol. 41, no. 4, pp. 388–406.
Kelly, K 2000, ‘The higher education system in Vietnam’, World Education News and Reviews, vol. 13, iss. 3, pp. 1-13.
Luong, B 2010, ‘Students in Ho Chi Minh City Are Weak in Soft Skills’, Vietnam Talking Points, 16 February, viewed 15 April 2021,<https://talk.onevietnam.org/students-in-ho-chi-minh-city-are-weak-in-soft-skills/>.
Mallon, M 1998, ‘The Portfolio Career: Pushed or Pulled to It?’, Personnel Review, vol. 27, iss. 5, pp. 361-377.
Minh Thao, L, Hong Van, P 2020 ‘Businesses in Viet Nam are looking for creativity, teamwork and active listening skills in their Future Young Employees’, Unicef, viewed 15 April 2021,<https://www.unicef.org/vietnam/press-releases/businesses-viet-nam-are-looking-creativity-teamwork-and-active-listening-skills>.
Phan, V, M, T, Wongsurawat, W 2016, ‘Enhancing the employability of IT graduates in Vietnam’, Higher Education, vol. 6, iss. 2, pp. 146-161.
Quynh Hoa, 2009, ‘Graduates need more ‘soft skills’, says expert’, VietNamNews, 11 December, viewed 15 April 2021,<https://vietnamnews.vn/society/employment/194852/graduates-need-more-soft-skills-says-expert.html>.
Tran, T, T 2013, ‘Limitation on the development of skills in higher education in Vietnam’, Higher Education, vol. 65, iss. 5, pp. 631-644.
Yao, W, C, Tuliao, D, M 2018, ‘Soft skill development for employability A case study of stem graduate students at a Vietnamese transnational university’, Higher Education, vol. 9, iss. 3, pp. 250-263.