Ineffective communication between direct manager, employee and low promotion satisfaction at Melcosa VietNam Ltd.pdf

1. UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMICS HO CHI MINH CITY
International School of Business
------------------------------
Lâm Phương Thúy
INEFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION
BETWEEN DIRECT MANAGER, EMPLOYEE
AND LOW PROMOTION SATISFACTION
AT MELCOSA VIETNAM LTD.,
MASTER OF BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION
Ho Chi Minh City – Year 2019

2. UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMICS HO CHI MINH CITY
International School of Business
------------------------------
Lâm Phương Thúy
INEFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION
BETWEEN DIRECT MANAGER, EMPLOYEE
AND LOW PROMOTION SATISFACTION
AT MELCOSA VIETNAM LTD.,
MASTER OF BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION
SUPERVISOR: Ph.D. Trần Hà Minh Quân
Ho Chi Minh City – Year 2019

3. APPENDIX
SUPERVISOR’S REPORT ON THE FINAL THESIS SUBMITTED
FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER of BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION
Final thesis title: INEFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION BETWEEN DIRECT
MANAGER, EMPLOYEE AND LOW PROMOTION SATISFACTION AT
MELCOSA VIETNAM LTD.,
Student name: LAM PHUONG THUY
Supervisor name: PH.D TRAN HA MINH QUAN
1. General comments:
„ Remarks on the student’s attitude:
.......................................................................................................................................
.......................................................................................................................................
„ Remarks on the assignment’s academic quality:
.......................................................................................................................................
.......................................................................................................................................
2. Overall assessment:
„ Meet requirement for submitting.
„ Not meet requirement for submitting.
3. Other remarks:
- Did the student follow the report schedule?
„ Yes „ No „ Other..............................................................................
- The plagiarism percentage:„
Supervisor’s signature

4. CONTENTS
Acknowledgements……………………………………………………………………..1
Executive summary……………………………………………………………………..2
CHAPTER 1
1.1 Company overview………………………………………………………………….3
1.2 Necessary of conducting survey “Employee Job Satisfaction at Melcosa
office”………………………………….…………………………………………….3
1.3 Detail of conducting survey………….……………………………………………..4
SURVEY: Employee Job satisfaction at Melcosa Vietnam Ltd;………………...4
Research question…………………………………………………………………….4
Purpose of research…………………………………………………………………..4
Literature review to choose the suitable survey to conduct “Employee Job Satisfaction at
Melcosa office”………………………………………………………………………4
Job Satisfaction Survey (JSS) from Spector, P.E (1994)………………………....4
Questionnaire………………………………………………………………………...6
Pilot study……………………………………………………………………………6
Sample……………………………………………………………………………….6
Analysis and finding…………………………………………………………………7
1.4 Problem finding process……………………………………………………………7
1.5 Symptom…………………………………………………………………………….8
CHAPTER 2: PROBLEM IDENTIFICATION
2.1. Initial Identification of problem…………………………………………………12
Figure 1: Initial cause-effect map…………………………………………………..15
2.2 Problem identification…………………………………………………………….15
2.2.1 The first potential problem: Flat organization……………………………………16
2.2.2 The second potential problem: Personal favouritism from manager…………......17
2.2.3 The third potential problem: Ineffective communication between direct manager
and employee…………………………………………………………………………...18

5. Figure 2: Updated cause-effect map……………………………………………..21
2.3 Problem Definition………………………………………………………………..21
2.3.1 Communication definition………………………………………………………..21
2.3.2 Measure of communication……………………………………………………….22
2.4 Justify the existence of Ineffective communication between direct manager and
employee………………………………………………………………………………..23
2.5 Justify the importance of Ineffective communication between direct manager and
employee ……………………………………………………………………………….25
2.6 Potential causes……………………………………………………………………27
2.6.1 Lack of communication competency from manager……………………………..28
2.6.2 Lack of well comprehension from middle manager about HR policies or promotion
opportunities……………………………………………………………………………28
2.6.3 There is missing 2 way discussing between direct managers and employees about
promotion opportunities ……………………………………………………………….29
2.6.4 There was no organizational or HRM strategy ………………………………….30
2.6.5 Bad quality of information channels within office ………………………………30
2.7 Validation main cause and solution proposal ………………………………….31
Figure 3: Final cause-effect map ………………………………………………….32
CHAPTER 3: DESIGN SOLUTION FOR SOLVING PROBLEM
Figure 4: Solution map ……………………………………………………………33
3.1 The first alternative solution: Every direct manager is asked to build their own
strategy to improve situation with their own team ………………………………..33
3.1.1 Benefits………………………………………………………………………….34
3.1.2. Cost……………………………………………………………………………..34
3.2 The second alternative solution: Build up "My dialog" system and organize
workshop for all direct managers, employees ……………………………………..34
3.2.1. Definition of “My dialog” ……………………………………………………...35
3.2.2. Importance of Dialog …………………………………………………………..35
3.2.3. Different roles in performance review for different positions………………….36

6. 3.2.4. My dialog steps………………………………………………………………....37
3.2.5 Organize work shop……………………………………………………………..40
3.2.6 Benefits………………………………………………………………………….40
3.2.7. Cost……………………………………………………………………………..41
3.3 Solution comparison……………………………………………………………..41
CHAPTER 4: ACTION PLAN
4.1 Action plan………………………………………………………………………..43
4.2 Effectiveness measurement after taking action plan……………………………..46
Conclusion……………………………………………………………………….. 47
CHAPTER 5: SUPPORTING INFORMATION
Literature review to choose the the suitable survey to conduct “Employee Job
Satisfaction at Melcosa office” …………………………………………………….48
Analysis and Finding……………………………………………………………….51
Appendix 1: Questionnaire in English and Vietnamese……………………………..56
Appendix 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10: In-depth interview transcript……………………60
References…………………………………………………………………………...81

7. 1
Acknowledgements
I would like to say thank you to my Supervisor-Ph.D Tran Ha Minh Quan for his
detail guidance so that I can finish my thesis sucessfully. He is patient to give me detail
explanation for what to do and the requirements that helps me to start the right way from
beginning. I can not finish my master thesis without Mr Quan’s support. I have learned a lot
how to recognize problem and solve the problem. I also would like to thank you all lecturers
for every subject with a lot of valuable new knowledge.
In addition, I acknowledge and thank Ms Tram- Merchandising manager, Mrs. Tran-
merchandiser, Ms Thu-Shipping clerk and especially Mrs Bich Thuy-HR admin for great
support and spend time with me to discover further information until I can finish this Master
thesis with reasonable solution. Moreover, I highly appreciate to all of my Melcosa
colleagues that they are a part contribution for my survey result.
Lastly, I would like to extend my appreciation to most important people of my life-
my husband and my mother who stand by me all the time to help me overcome all difficult
issues in order to I can finish this Master thesis on time.

8. 2
Executive summary
This thesis aims to identify the root cause of ineffective communication between
direct manager and employee which lead to low employee’s promotion satisfaction at
Melcosa. It is necessary to take this into account because there are many consequences
of low promotion satisfaction such as: low job satisfaction and customer satisfaction;
low level of performance, responsibility, loyalty, and commitment of employees;
increase quit intention, expensive to replace qualified and long term employees, bad
effect to organization's reputation- employer of choice,…
By using in-depth interview with related person and literature reviews,
ineffective communication between direct manager and employee is defined as the
central problem which is actually existed at Melcosa and the consequences of this
problem is also analyzed. It is necessary to solve the problem because there are a lot of
significant benefits for improving the effectiveness of communication between direct
manager and employee such as: high employee performance and satisfaction; reduce
confusing and inconsistent understanding at employees, reduce disputes; increase
office's effectiveness; build trust, and increase commitment; effectiveness of work
place's environment; more interaction, relationship building and collaboration,…
Theories play an important role in finding all potential causes of ineffective
communication at Melcosa. But then further in-depth interview support to eliminate
some potential causes and clarify the main cause which should be paid attention in
priority. As a result, “There is missing 2 ways discussing between direct managers and
employees about promotion opportunities” is the main cause. Two alternative solutions
have been suggested and after clarifying the comparison of solutions about cost and
benefits, “Build up "My dialog" system and organize workshop for all direct
managers, employees ” is the better solution and a following implement action should
be approved as soon as possible to solve the problem and improve employee’s
promotion satisfaction at Melcosa.

9. 3
CHAPTER 1: OVERVIEW OF THE THESIS
1.1. Company overview
Melcosa Vietnam Ltd (Hermes-Otto International Vietnam) is a Representative
Office for textile, shoes and home products ex Vietnam for customers mainly in Europe.
Below chart is organization’s structure, author is a merchandiser at Garment
Department.
1.2. Necessary of conducting survey “Employee Job Satisfaction at Melcosa
office”
Author has been working as Merchandiser for more than 3 years and be one of
the youngest employees at office. It is about 80% of managerial position at Melcosa is
baby boomers who have been working for more than 15 years, and nearly 40% of total
employees have been working for more than 5 years. These evidences pointed out that
Melcosa may be a good place to work and maintain well long-term employees. But in
fact, it is easy to observe that within 9 first months of year 2018, there are totally 6
employees who are under 30 years old with less than 3 years working period at Melcosa,

10. 4
decided to leave while there is no restructure at office, and Melcosa had to replace all 6
those positions.
Author would like to raise the question mark, not to answer why some people left
but to answer whether current employees are satisfied with their job? It is extremely
necessary to take it into account because more and more young employees have been
recruited for 3 years. Will that be a big potential problem in the near future? After some
conversation with HR admin to check if they are alert of this and because our office
does not have any internal report about employee job satisfaction. And HR admin also
would like to investigate about it, author decided to conduct survey “Employee Job
Satisfaction at Melcosa Vietnam Ltd.,”
1.3 Detail of conducting survey
SURVEY: Employee Job satisfaction at Melcosa Vietnam Ltd.,
Research question
What is level of employee job satisfaction at Melcosa Vietnam office in general
and in every different aspect?
What is the current job satisfaction with demographic variable such as age,
gender, job position, working period?
Purpose of research
The purpose of this quantity survey is to evaluate the level of employees job
satisfaction at Melcosa Vietnam in general and in every facet like: Nature of work, Pay,
Benefits, Co-worker, Supervision, Contingent rewards, Operating procedures,
Promotion, Communication.
Literature review to choose the suitable survey to conduct “Employee Job Satisfaction
at Melcosa office”
Details of this part is at Chapter 5: Supporting information
Job satisfaction survey (JSS) from Spector, P.E. (1994).
The JSS is copyright from Spector (1) (2), this survey is suitable with human
service, it has total 36 sentences include positive and negative direction. Spector used

11. 5
Likert 6 scales from 1. Disagree very much to 6. Agree very much. JSS is divided to 9
aspects: Pay, Promotion, Supervision, Fringe Benefits, Contingent Rewards
(performance based rewards), Operating Procedures (required rules and procedures),
Co-workers, Nature of Work, and Communication.
Every aspect is with 4 sentences. A half amount of sentences with negative
direction such as: 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12, 14, 16, 18, 19, 21, 23, 24, 26, 29, 31, 32, 34, 36. The
scored of these sentences should be marked in reverse before calculate the total score.
Subscale Item numbers
Pay 1, 10, 19, 28
Promotion 2, 11, 20, 33
Supervision 3, 12, 21, 30
Fringe Benefits 4, 13, 22, 29
Contingent rewards 5, 14, 23, 32
Operating conditions 6, 15, 24, 31
Co-workers 7, 16, 25, 34
Nature of work 8, 17, 27, 35
Communication 9, 18, 26, 36
Total score of job satisfaction is sum of all 36 sentences, and score of every
aspect is sum of 4 sentences at that aspect.
Even the tool has been developed for more than 20 years but until now, many
researchers still use this tool to support for their research related to job satisfaction. For
example, (3) still use JSS to be a suitable tool for his/her research to demonstrate the
relative between Emotional intelligence, leadership style, and job satisfaction in
contrasting workplace environments. While this JSS is also has weakness like the
English question is not easy to understand. That is why author try to translate to
Vietnamese in really Vietnamese words to secure full meaning.
In research of (35), they has to adopt that JSS is still very useful until now but
only need to adjust if necessary for every situation and organization, before using this
measure, author has already interviewed with employee to confirm the relative.
Moreover, the instruction to analyze this measurement is clear and author can
base on that to calculate result to analyze correctly.

12. 6
Finally, author had to conduct in-depth interview with colleague to confirm the
relative between JSS tool and current thinking of employees about job satisfaction, if
using this tool now is still suitable and up to date.
Questionnaire
Author divided into 3 parts:
 Part 1 is introduction about the survey and made respondent feel comfortable
when answer the survey by informing to them all info is keeping secret and only
serve for research purpose.
 Part 2 is main questions with 36 items applied Likert scales 6 points which 1 is
Disagree very much to 6 is Agree very much.
 Part 3 is demographic questions like: gender, age, job position, working period,
working period in this current position, rank the aspects of job satisfaction from 1
is the most important aspect to 9 is the least important aspect.
Pilot study
Author prepared original survey in English for foreigner colleagues and
Vietnamese one for Vietnamese employees. The most important thing is that author
needs to translate all the sentences to become real Vietnamese sentences in order to
secure full meaning from English version.
After asking some friend to read and check if sentences are smooth. Then author
has to do some test with colleagues at office to make sure they read through all the items
and ask them if something is not clear and need to be explained or adjusted. Finally, no
big modifications were made to the actual process of sampling. However, minor
changes were made to the participant information sheet to increase clarity.
Sample
Author sent hard copy of survey to all employees of office about 60 employees,
except General Manager on 17-Aug-2018. With foreigner colleagues, author sent to
them English version, and Vietnamese version for all other Vietnamese employees.
After 3 days, author collected back all the surveys and after checking, 47
responses are qualified.

13. 7
Data and analysis
As data is not very complicated, then author decided to input data and analyze the
figure by normal Excel tool. Following is detail report with total score of job
satisfaction and job satisfaction base on every aspect. In addition, it is also showed some
relation with other variables such as: age, gender, working position, working period.
Total score of job satisfaction is 3.618 with minimum score is 3.14 and maximum
score is 4.28
Total score of job satisfaction
N Minimum Maximum Mean
Mean 47 3.14 4.28 3.618
Score of job satisfaction by aspects as below chart: with the highest score belongs
to Pay with 4.24, next is Supervision 4.18, third place is Operating Conditions 3.98 and
Nature of work is 3.97. In general, many aspects get good result while Promotion
Satisfaction has the worse performance, is only 1.97, about Contingent rewards
Satisfaction is only 2.79 compared with others.
Score of job satisfaction by 9 aspects
N Minimum Maximum Mean
Pay 47 3.25 5.00 4.244
Promotion 47 1.00 3.75 1.973
Supervision 47 2.50 5.00 4.180
Fringe Benefits 47 2.50 5.00 3.886
Contingent rewards 47 1.50 4.00 2.793
Operating conditions 47 2.75 5.50 3.989
Coworkers 47 2.75 5.25 3.769
Nature of work 47 2.75 5.75 3.978
Communication 47 3.00 5.00 3.751
Further analysis is at Chapter 5: Supporting information
1.4 Problem finding process
To finding central problem at Melcosa Vietnam office, author conducted below steps:

14. 8
 Referring the primary report from survey “Employee job satisfaction at Melcosa
Vietnam Ltd.,” made by author.
 Referring internal data from HR: turnover rate in year 2018.
 Conducting in-depth interview with Merchandising Manager, Merchandiser,
Shipping Clerk and HR admin to understand full information about symptom and
explore potential problems.
 Referring literatures to prove and update the cause-consequence relation between
potential problems,variables and symptom. Meanwhile, double check the actual
situation at Melcosa to understand correctly what happened.
 Conducting in-depth interview again to validate the existence of central problem.
 Referring literatures to understand the consequences of the central problem (the
importance of solving it) and continue using in-depth interview to validate the
actual importance of solving it.
1.5 Symptom
Low promotion satisfaction at employees is validated through survey result as
below
 Author analyzed survey result from survey “Employee job satisfaction atMelcosa
Vietnam Ltd.,”.
 Below table is the finding which illustrated the Mean score of job satisfaction and
satisfaction in every aspects from 6 point Likert scale.
Total score of job satisfaction
Mean score of job satisfaction is 3.618, is not that very high score, but as this is
the first time job satisfaction is conducted at Melcosa office, these figure could not be
explained as good or bad. Author has to go through the result by every aspect for further
investigation.
N Minimum Maximum Mean
Job satisfaction 47 3.14 4.28 3.618
Source: author’s survey result

15. 9
Score of job satisfaction by 9 aspects
N Minimum Maximum Mean
Pay satisfaction 47 3.25 5.00 4.244
Promotion satisfaction 47 1.00 3.75 1.973
Supervision satisfaction 47 2.50 5.00 4.180
Fringe Benefits satisfaction 47 2.50 5.00 3.886
Contingent rewards satisfaction 47 1.50 4.00 2.793
Operating conditions satisfaction 47 2.75 5.50 3.989
Co-workers satisfaction 47 2.75 5.25 3.769
Nature of work satisfaction 47 2.75 5.75 3.978
Communication satisfaction 47 3.00 5.00 3.751
Source: author’s survey result
Author has not compared these figures to any other reports or compared the
change year by year because of limited data. Author has just compared the average score
of every aspect from this result and found out that Promotion satisfaction score is 1.973
(6 point Likert scale) which is the lowest one compared to others. In addition,
Contingent rewards satisfaction score, 2.793 is not so bad but under medium score.
While employees voted Promotion satisfaction and Contingent rewards
satisfaction is at same 6th place of the most important aspects with them (1st: Nature of
work, 2nd: Pay, 3rd: Benefits, 4th: Co-workers, 5th: Supervision, 6th: Contingent
rewards and Promotion), but if promotion satisfaction score can be improved, it is also
good for general job satisfaction of employees (more detail at supporting information
part).
Moreover, contingent rewards satisfaction score is at 2nd
lowest level after
Promotion satisfaction. Author has conducted in-depth interview with manager-Ms
Tram to confirm that Promotion satisfaction is the symptom that need to explore further
and it is necessary for office to find out the solution for low promotion satisfaction. Low
contingent rewards symptom can be eliminated.
Therefore, Symptom “Low promotion satisfaction at employees” is defined.
From Job Satisfaction Survey (JSS) of Spector (1) (2) (3), Promotion satisfaction is
measured by 4 following sentences (1sentence is in negative meaning, when input data

16. 10
to analyze, author has already converted the correct score to describe about satisfaction
level).
Promotion satisfaction facet
There is really
too little
chance for
promotion on
my job
Those who do
well on the job
stand a fair
chance of being
promoted
People get
ahead as fast
here as they
do in other
places
I am satisfied
with my
chances for
promotion
Promotion
satisfaction
N
Valid 47 46 47 47 47
Missing 0 1 0 0 0
Mean 1.47 2.13 1.77 2.51 1.973
Source: author’s survey result
It is found that long term employees in service industry have less promotion
satisfaction with their job (4). It is similar situation when Melcosa has nearly 50% long
term employees, and the survey result also showed that the promotion satisfaction score
is lowest one compared with other aspects.
Consequences of Low promotion satisfaction at employees
Author reviewed literatures to have an overview about consequences of low promotion
satisfaction to prove that this symptom is necessary to analyze.
 There is significant correlation between promotion and job satisfaction (5). Low
job satisfaction effects to quit intention lead to high turnover rate. And HR has to
invest more money for recruitment, also pressure to HR that they has to replace
employee as quick as possible to avoid emotional instability at office(6).
 Low level of performance, responsibility, loyalty, and commitment, high
turnover rate, absenteeism (7) (8).
 Low job satisfaction is one of the cause of low customer satisfaction (9) (Melcosa
is a representative office where we do services and make buyer satisfy about our
services, it is the most important that employees are happy can make customer
happy and always grow the business in win win condition).

17. 11
 Effect to productivity, creativity at work and organizational success. Once
employees feel that they are appreciated, they are willing to extend more efforts
(7).
 When baby boomers retire, there will be seriously lack of knowledge and skills
of managerial level. It is not only very costly to replace but mainly due to the
intellectual capital aspect(6).
 It is found that employees satisfy with their job and their organization, they often
speak well about company, it is good for organization’s reputation (9).

18. 12
CHAPTER 2: PROBLEM IDENTIFICATION
From Employee Job Satisfaction survey result and some internal data at HR
department, “Low Promotion Satisfaction” is defined as Symptom. In order to identify
the central problem which leads to low promotion satisfaction, author did not only
conduct in-depth interview with related person at office but also referred the literature
reviews to analyze the whole picture of the problems.
2.1 Initial Identification of Problem
In-depth interview is used to find out the potential causes lead to “Low promotion
satisfaction at employees”. Author conducted in-depth interview with 4 persons at
Melcosa as following:
 Merchandising Manager: Ms Phan Thi Ngoc Tram, 15 years working at Melcosa.
She has been in manager position for 13 years and built up successful business
and expand team to 7 staffs right now. She has committed to work for office until
she retired in 10 more years because she is one of the baby boomers at office
from the beginning.
 Merchandiser: Mrs Duong Bao Tran, 4 years working at Melcosa. She is a staff
of Mrs Tram’s team and take care 1 buyer directly from beginning until now
(buyer is Witt group in Germany, we are on behalf of buyer to handle all vendors
in Vietnam, export successfully garment to Germany).
 Shipping clerk: Ms Dang Anh Thu, 6 years working at Melcosa. She is a staff of
Shipping team and works directly with Buyer’s Supply Chain Department.
 HR admin: Mrs Nguyen Thi Bich Thuy, 18 years working at Melcosa. She is one
of the baby boomers as General Manager’s assistant position until now and
implement all H-OI new policies or changes to Melcosa office. She worked with
HR Hong Kong (Hong Kong is head office of Melcosa, and all the policies,
changes were issued from HongKong and Melcosa has to follow strictly).
After in-depth interview with 4 persons at Melcosa, there are 3 potential
problems that lead to Symptom “Low Promotion Satisfaction”: Flat organization of

19. 13
Melcosa office, Personal Favouritism from Manager and Ineffective communication
between direct manager and employee.
Mrs Bich Thuy-HR admin said that one of the reason for low promotion
satisfaction is flat organization, it means office is with horizontal structure and less level
of management, in addition office has a stable managerial position from beginning until
now with almost all managers are baby boomers with long term commitment. Therefore,
internal promotion to managerial position at Melcosa is very limited. Moreover, in
conversation with Ms Tram-Merchandising Manager and Mrs Tran-Merchandiser, they
are both adopted this issue and they understand the situation. Even in case of expand
business for old customer or new customer, Melcosa refers to recruit more employees
for current manager, they expand in horizontal, not vertical structure.
According to Mrs Bao Tran- merchandiser, favoritism from manager is
suggested as cause of low promotion satisfaction, she said that favoritism happened in
“less fair recognition opportunities” like unfair evaluation and rewards because it only
base on direct manager feeling, observation and decision themselves and unfair in
recognition opportunities from manager. Because of this issue, employees will not be
happy. On the other hand, Mrs Tram adopted that one of her staff is her brother’s wife,
family relation also happened at work, and somehow it is also difficult for her to make
punishment for unexpected case. This relationship maybe an issue for other team
members when they thought that favouritism is already there and increase their doubt
about the fair within team. Besides that, currently Mrs Tran feel that the new comer at
her team receive new challenging and new responsibility at work while she also wishes
to do and has chance to show up herself, Mrs Tran said “I think the main reason is
about unfair in recognition opportunities from manager, favoritism. Somehow I feel that
I deserve to get more promotion opportunities than my colleague, and I should get more
challenging work instead of them”.
From conversation with Ms Tram, she is unpleasant to confirm that her team
members seem not perceive that she already offered a lot of promotion opportunities for
her team members such as: salary raise, promote for business trip to Europe, opportunity

20. 14
to work independently and let them make decision. Once she is convinced that her team
member has enough competence and qualified for more difficult job, she is willing to
offer challenging work and new task to motivate them, and allow them to support one of
her task to increase their competency.
Meanwhile, Ms Tran is also her team member, she said that with her work, she
has to go for business trip twice a year to handle well the job, no one else can support
her and she feel very less promotion opportunities, she got salary raise very difficult and
she feel that she is not appreciated in team and office while she confirm that she is over
qualification with current job. She said that “Sometimes I feel that I am overqualified
with current job, I would like to do more to see maximum competency but it seems my
manger did not recognize that, it makes me feel less challenging at work. Also somehow
it is not fair in evaluation and reward. You know, when you work much and talk less, it
also get opposite result when people feel that you are not so nice with them”.
On the other hand, there is “mismatch perception about promotion opportunities
at employees and managers”. This variable is proved after analyzing comment from Ms
Anh Thu-shipping clerk and information from Mrs Bich Thuy about what manager did
for Ms Thu. From Ms Thu side, she pointed out that she gets no promotion for 2 years
and not satisfied about that, no raise and no new responsibility at work. She thinks that
there is very less chance for promotion at office and does not know about the standard to
get promotion opportunities, it seems her manager is not clear as well. After checking
with Mrs Bich Thuy-HR admin, she has mentioned that recently Ms Thu has a trip to
Germany together with her manager to contribute the network and meet customers, this
is also the breakthrough for her career after 6 years working here. Moreover, Ms Thu
has an priority to go home earlier to arrange for her individual course after work. So
there is some misunderstanding and communication from manager is not really effective
that makes employees did not satisfy with what managers did for them.
Both Mrs Tran and Ms Thu also said that they received no clear career path from
their managers. From that they do not know what is manager’s expectation and how
they can grow up at Melcosa office. This leads to low promotion satisfaction and the

21. 15
cause is that employees does not have official communication with their managers to
discuss further this important matter.
From above depth information found, “Ineffective communication between
direct manager and employee” could be another cause of low promotion satisfaction at
employees.
Figure 1: Initial cause-effect map
2.2 Problem identification
Potential problems, variables and symptom have been clarified at Initial cause-
effect map. In order to prove the actual correlation of variables and update some new
variables, author has reviewed many theories. After that, author has to define the central
problem by using in-depth interview again combine with literature review to eliminate
some potential problems. Then, Central Problem in term of Existence and Importance is
validated.

22. 16
2.2.1 The first potential problem: Flat organization
Flat organization is understood is less managerial layer in organization, it is in
horizontal management structure (10).
According to Mrs Bich Thuy, she informed that Melcosa has existed with this
structure for 25 years, and all 20 other H-OI offices in the world with similar flat
organization like this. It is adopted that there are a lot of benefits from this structure
such as: more team work, less bureaucracy, better communication, force employee to
have better performance, push for individual responsibility (10).
In addition, Mrs Bich Thuy mentioned that with flat organization structure,
employees have chance to make decision themselves and take responsible for their
decision. So the fewer managerial layers, a greater number of employees enjoy success
in their career. She mentioned“I mean you can see that our office has less opportunity to
promote internal employee. Every team has manager who is baby boomer from
beginning until now and structure of organization is stable from the past until now.
Even business expansion, manager can recruit more employee to in charge or sharing
work in case of overload. In my point of view, maybe because there is really no place to
move forward, because this is structure of our office already. If there is no big change in
the future, every thing will run smoothly as before. But then employee can work
independence in comfortable environment, flexible hour working time, …and they can
be themselves at work”.
It is said that managerial promotion opportunity is one of the factors has a
significant effect to promotion satisfaction and job satisfaction (11) (12). But as in-depth
interview with Mrs Bich Thuy, she trusts top management were not afraid of it, she said
“in fact, nearly 50 % of our employee are more than 36 years old and work here more
than 7 years. I think they are ok with our structure, policies and other benefits. Maybe
your result shows that they are not satisfied with promotion but they have less choice to
other companies. For these employees, we do not worry much. Just 3 years recently, we
have recruited more and more young employees under 30 years old, perhaps we should
pay attention on this group”.

23. 17
Melcosa’s other benefits and salary is at good level to employees. Survey result also
showed quite high satisfaction at Pay and Benefits aspects,…
Pay is at 2nd
place of importance of job satisfaction, and Pay has occupied the
highest score in 9 aspects: 4.2. It means almost employees are satisfied with their
current pay and they understand that Melcosa could not offer them managerial position.
On the other hand, to change the organization structure is not that easy that Melcosa
Vietnam can implement, because it is global organization. Therefore, Potential problem
“Flat organization” should be eliminated.
2.2.2 The second potential problem: Personal favouritism from manager
It is stated that favouritism means managerial people intend to treat one better
than others or given unfair advantage to employees. From that, they evaluate some
favour employees base on their perception or feeling, not from official performance
evaluation. Favouritism makes employee feel that they are not treated fairly to others
lead to low satisfaction (13).
This term “favouritism” has been mentioned by Ms Tram and Mrs Tran, from
their perspective, they suggested this maybe a cause lead to low promotion satisfaction,
because employee feel unfair in recognition opportunities, and they also get less chance
to handle challenging and new responsibility (14).
After some more in-depth interview with Mrs Tram to explore what is happening
related to favouritism, she said that she often base on her experience to observe and
evaluate employees herself for daily working. She is not sure if this action can be
called” favouritism” but she is result oriented manager, she drive the team successfully
for 15 years therefore she think that she is a fair manager. Besides, she feels that there
are some employees who are easy to talk and she often asked them for support in
unforeseeable case. In contrast, Ms Tran said that somehow she is not treating fairly as
others while she did a great job and only did the same task for 4 years but other new
comers do have a chance with many new tasks.

24. 18
But author has an evidence to prove that favouritism is not important cause at
Melcosa because from the survey result, Supervision Satisfaction aspect is measured by
4 following sentences, one of them is “My supervisor is unfair to me”. Author has
already converted the score to satisfaction, and with score 4.574 is the greatest score
within this aspect, it means employee are satisfied with supervisor, especially seems
very less favouritism from managers.
Therefore, second potential problem: Personal Favouritism from Manager is also
not important cause lead to low promotion satisfaction and should be eliminated as well.
Supervision Satisfaction aspect
My supervisor
is quite
competent in
doing his/her
job
My
supervisor
is unfair to
me
My supervisor
shows too little
interest in the
feelings of
subordinates
I like my
supervisor
Supervision
Satisfaction
aspect
N
Valid 47 46 47 47 47
Missing 0 1 0 0 0
Mean 4.106 4.574 3.851 4.212 4.180
Source: author’s survey result (score has already been converted to satisfaction score).
2.2.3 The third potential problem: Ineffective managerial communication to
employees
“Ineffective communication between direct manager and employee” is not
nominated directly by interviewee- Ms Tram, Ms Tran and Ms Anh Thu. But from Mrs
Tram’s point of view she has listed out all promotion opportunities which she tried to
offer to her employees as mentioned above but employees seem not recognize that or
they recognize incorrectly, that is why they are not satisfied with current promotion
opportunities.
From managerial side, Ms Tram is confident that they did a good job and
understand well how to make employee satisfy in promotion aspect while from
employee’s side, Ms Anh Thu, she complained about communication of her manager
which are not clear and persuasive to her. And she did not recognize any promotion

25. 19
opportunities for 2 years while she has been doing for more work and been in business
trip for to Germany, free to leave office earlier for personal purpose.
Moreover, Ms Thu received new task or new responsibility via email forwarded
from her manager, and very less explanation for the need and the importance role with
the new tasks. Once she asked for further detail, then her manager try to answer as quick
as possible because she is very busy. It is demonstrated that open talk between manager
and employees also help to increase employee’s satisfaction (15).
Ms Tram also said that “well, I see that there is less communication frequency
between managers and staffs, from my side, we are so busy with daily work and solve a
lot of issues every day, I do not have time to talk directly with my staffs, normally I use
email to assign the work, email is the main tool in communication at work. I see other
managers did the same like me. But I have to adopt that this ineffective communication
effect to relationship with employees, the trust and increase the gap between manager’s
perception and employee’s perception, we are thinking and doing in 2 different ways
and of course, the business goals can be reached better if we can solve this”.
It is indicated that employee’s perception about fairness also the consequences of
the ineffective communication from the manager (16). This is similar situation which
Ms Tran has already mentioned.
Therefore, author has studied for this mismatch problem between managerial side
and employees side and problem can be called as “Ineffective communication between
direct manager and employee”. Mrs Tram has pointed out that main cause maybe
employee did not recognize that they are in promotion already. And information from
Ms Anh Thu, HR admin and author’s primary data from survey result, it showed that
they are not satisfied with promotion opportunities but then asking for quit intention,
they do not have that intention. Almost employees still have long term commitment with
office, they decide to stay, not intend to leave because of other aspects: Pay, Benefit,
Work, Supervisor is good.
Ineffective communication between direct manager and employee lead to no
clear career growth path is clarified to employees. Mrs Tran said “I would refer to have

26. 20
a clearer career growth path when I commited for a long time with Melcosa”.
Employee did not understand well the job requirement and in case like Ms Tran, she
thought that she is over qualification with her current job, that leads to low satisfaction.
Moreover, incorrect perception of promotion opportunities also consequences from lack
of information or ineffective communication, and make employees feel that they get less
challenging and less new task at work (16). All of these existing variables effect
negatively to promotion satisfaction.
Once this central problem has been solved, communication between direct
manager and employee can be improved, employee will have more open talk with
managers to share their expectation, aspiration. All information was informed to all
employees in the right way and suitable for every individual, employee can perceive
correctly promotion opportunities at office. It will improve their satisfaction, limited
confusing communication and understanding, increase office’s effectiveness, build up
the trust and increase commitment of employee, transparency and reduce favouritism
treating.
Mrs Bich Thuy has pointed out her idea regarding to central problem “all offices with
horizontal organization, therefore we have less chance to offer managerial promotion.
So ineffective communication between managers and employees could be a central
problem because at Melcosa office, even I am HR admin but manager will be the person
who communicate with employee regularly and solve all the problem related to work
and promotion. Their communication is very important, and manager can help to
improve employee satisfaction. But I have to adopt that every manager has their own
way about leader ship and communication. I usually see that they evaluate the
performance very short, without discussing together to understand deeply the problem. I
am not sure if employee has chance to talk with their manager about their thinking and
expectation”.
In conclusion, the first and second potential problems: Flat organization and
Personal Favouritism from manager has been eliminated after author validated
information from interview data and literature review. Ineffective communication

27. 21
between manager and employee is a Central Problem that lead to Low Promotion
Satisfaction which need to be solved.
The cause-effect map can be updated as below
Figure 2: Updated cause-effect map
2.3 Problem Definition
Ineffective communication between manager and employee is a Central problem. It
is necessary to have comprehensive understanding about this problem by understanding
the definition and the measurement of it to double check if communication is
ineffective.
2.3.1 Communication definition
Communication is a process which information is transmitted and it is operative
management process (17). Communication is a tool to make sure that managers can
create, maintain and manage meaning of decisions to employees. Effective
communication will help to avoid mismatch between intended and implemented (18).

28. 22
It is stated that if communication is ineffective, it leads to confusing and
misunderstanding (19). Therefore, manager should deliver communication to every
individual employee in suitable method, then make employees feel satisfied. With
continual change, effective communication plays a huge role for effective process in
every organization (20).
2.3.2 Measure of communication
 Communication quality is the outcome of the communication, as the gap between
employee’s perspective and the information manager would like to inform.
Normally employee’s perceive performance mismatch with manager’s actual
performance, lead to not satisfy at employees (21).
 When communication is effective, it will build up employee’s trust, satisfaction,
loyalty, productivity in organization. Communication quality is supported by
clear communication content (22).
 Instead of communication is just the tool for manager to find out the problem and
solution, (23) suggested that managers should concentrate on individual
development and the strengths of each to build strong relationships, task
orientation and increase employee’s satisfaction.
 Communication frequency is amount or the duration of contact via
communication channels that will be mentioned as following. And frequency of
communication will effect to employee’s perception and climate of trust in
organization (18).
 Messages’ repetition lead to increase accuratecy of the information and
verification of the content lead to reduce the bias in the message. (24) found that
managerial communication frequency contributed to employes’s level of
satisfaction. And that effective managerial communication practices had many
influences on employees including job satisfaction.
 Communication channels: there are many communication channels such as: via
email, face to face, phone, writing documents and other technological tools
which can be used in organization. (25) pointed out that the most effective

29. 23
channel is face to face interaction because of 2 way dialogue and emotional
engagement and effect best to employees’s satisfaction.
 In contrast, managers see that email communication is easy to use, more efficient
and less time consuming (26). This communication channel can be called as 1
way communication. It is explained that email communication normally with
very short and less words lead to limited communication and make employees
feel stressful, lead to negative feedback (27).
 Effective communication should be launched by suitable channels (28).
2.4 Justify the existence of “Ineffective communication between direct manager
and employee”
Author had to come back for further in-depth interview with HR admin-Ms Bich
Thuy and Merchandising Manager- Ms Tram to confirm if this problem is actually exist
at Melcosa.
From above measurement, Ms Bich Thuy has pointed out that direct managers are
viewed as communicator at Melcosa, they are the person who transmitted all HR
practices, changes or new information to their employees and absolutely their
communication has significant effect to employee’s perception. And communication
from every manager is different, it depends on their management style. She recognized
that annual appraisal is usually done without discussing directly between managers and
employees, somehow they discussed and agreed themselves very quick via short talk
and no meeting to confirm for evaluation. Moreover, almost managers are baby-
boomers who have great experience at work but still limit in communication
effectiveness.
Mrs Bich Thuy said that, office organized the workshop with attention of HR
Chief from HongKong office and all managers once a year, and every manager with
differences in personal experiences and idiosyncratic preferences perceive information
in different way, this lead to employees for every team has different perception of a
change or new information (29) (30).

30. 24
According to ms Tram, she already mentioned that employee maybe did not
recognize what she did for them,( 29) has also explained that employee’s perception
were frequently in contrast to managers’ perceptions of their practices with employees.
Ms Tram mentioned the reason maybe her communication skills or her competency is
not so good that make employee feel unsatisfied or she has limited well comprehension
about HR practices or promotion opportunities from work shop, then maybe she could
not bring the idea from top manager to all employees. In addition, she seldom explain to
team members for her decision, she just ask her team member for the confirmation, then
proceed immediately without explanation for the need, the benefits and the reasonable
of her decision to employees.
Moreover, it seems promotion opportunities has been implemented for a long
time, then now employees feel that it is normal, they are not happy anymore because
their requirement is becoming higher. Promotion opportunities should be faired to
everyone to push for their efforts and they deserve to get officially compliment while it
is seldom happen at office
Less communication frequency between manager and employees, therefore
information flow is not completed and inaccurated. That makes employees feel unfair
and not well informed about what happen with their colleagues or with themselves (29).
MsTram said that her employees are growing up with more experience, they can work
independently and would like to separate from management lead to less interaction with
manager and the situation passed day by day. Moreover, every employee at Melcosa can
log in themselves at H-OI website to see what happened in H-OI global offices instead
of asking manager as before.
In addition, Tram has advised that she normally used email is the main tool to
communication with her team members, just in case she need to clarify something or
need explanation from employees, then discuss face to face. She knows that discuss
directly is better than email because she can explain better and make sure that
employees understand correctly, but if to increase this communication tool, she has no
time. And every employee are busy in their daily own work as well.

31. 25
Tram believed that she can drive better communication process with support from
HR and upgrade her communication skills because direct managers at Melcosa usually
play an important role to react with employees, issues and perceptions of employees
while HR admin were left outside the process. Mrs Bich Thuy is just HR admin and
General Manager assistant, her responsibility is taking care about operation at office,
official benefits for employees. Besides, Tram pointed out that many policies were not
consistently applied or interpreted and not well communicated. This inconsistency leads
to unfairness and lack of trust.
Tram adopted that every managers at office have their own background to
approach different HR base and will bring different information to their team.
Therefore, conflicting and confusing happened between employees when
communication between manager and employee is poor. Finally, Tram confirmed that
ineffective communication between direct manager and employee is the major problem
at Melcosa that lead to low promotion satisfaction at employees.
2.5 Justify the importance of “Ineffective managerial communication to
employees”
It is proved that “Ineffective communication between direct manager and
employee” is the major problem at Melcosa that lead to low promotion satisfaction at
employees. It is also reported that managers are still not communicating effectively with
their employees, just 10% of managers are effective in communication (31). Supervisors
and direct managers should understand the importance of communication effectively to
employees because they can influence, build up relationship with employees. In
addition, effective communication can reduce the gap between manager’s perception
and employee’s perception for what managers did that lead to increase employee’s
satisfaction and commitment with office, especially for young employees in order to
increase success of organization.
Effective communication is as a required function of leadership. Moreover,
effective communication to employees, manager can connect employees to the
organization’s vision and goals and connect employees to each others, improve the

32. 26
working environment where employees feel they are respected and work in trusting
environment and treat fairly with each other (25).
Middle manager is always important in front line when inform and implement
HR practices and changes from top management to all employees, therefore effective
communication can help manager transfer information in suitable way and make sure
the information will be understood consistently. In contrast, if communicate between
manager and employee is ineffective, author would like to analyze the impact in 2
aspects: employees and organization.
Employees
 Middle managers are usually is a official connection line between organization,
HR practices and employees, they are the key channels in the two-way
communications and make sure information was moved forward in sufficient
way. Therefore, if manager can not communicate effectively to employees,
confusing and wrong understanding will happen, lead to lack of trust and low
commitment from employees (29).
 Fail in increase employee’s work skills, not improve employees morales or
commitment. Negatively to employees’ sense of membership and job satisfaction
(29).
 Lack of transparency and perceived unfair distribution of promotion lead to low
satisfaction, effect negatively to employee performance and retention (29).
 Little interaction, relationship building, collaboration makes experienced
employees intend to separate from manager more regularly (20).
 Lack of two way communication, listening lead to lack of trust to manager,
organization and the lack of effectiveness of the workplace’s environment.
 Quit intention and Turnover rate, if employees are not satisfied with their
promotion opportunities, their job, then young talented employees will leaves
office within five years. And when long term employees retired or high potential
employees decided to leaves, it is very expensive to replace because almost
knowledge and skills will go with them (32). It is about 73% of baby boomers in

33. 27
managerial position at Melcosa will retire in 10 more years and will widen the
gap between talent availability and supply.
Supervisor/Manager (merchandising, QA&QC,
accounting, shipping, HR,…).
Age N Percentage
From 35 years old to 45 years old 3 27%
More than 45 years old 8 73%
Total 11 100%
Source: Internal information from office
Organization
 Employees is the most important factor for success or fail of every organization,
with all above consequences which ineffective managerial communication effect
to employees, it leads to disputes which reduced organization's effectiveness.
 Productivity and organizational success (20).
 Lack of interaction listening, speaking effect to workforce productivity,
satisfaction which impacts to the organization negatively (20).
 Reputation of organization- employer of choice: Employee perceived limited
information will effect reputation of organization in the recruiting market with
untrustworthy information, lead to less potential candidate. And words of mouth
become ineffective method to introduce high potential employee successfully to
organization.
2.6 Potential causes
To avoid missing any potential causes lead to central problem: ineffective
communication between direct manager and employee, author had to review theories. 5
potential causes have been investigated such as:
 Lack of communication competency from middle manager
 Lack of well comprehension from middle manager about HR policies or
promotion opportunities

34. 28
 There is missing 2 way discussing between direct managers and employees about
promotion opportunities
 There was no organizational or HRM strategy
 Bad quality of information channels within office
2.6.1 Lack of communication competency from manager
According to (29), if organization has the best HR practices but if direct manager
does not have enough communication competency, they can not move forward
information to their employees effectively. Moreover, it is questioned that does manager
has enough knowledge and ability to communication and transfer the correct idea,
perception from HR department to employees (21) (33)?
Mrs Bich Thuy said that this cause can effect to ineffective communication but
she mentioned that “ I see every manager has their own management and drive business
growing year by year very successfully, I think their communication competency is not
that important right now”. And Ms Tram explained that this cause is not important
cause, but maybe the difficulty for her and other managers is lack of well
comprehensive HR policies and promotion opportunities that they can not move forward
correct information to motivate their employees.
2.6.2 Lack of well comprehension from direct manager about HR policies or
promotion opportunities
Ms Tram said that normally she received new changes or new policies via email
from HR admin and she seldom study well on it, normally she forward email
immediately to her team member and they can study themselves. This actual situation is
not that good enough and Tram adopted that almost middle managers at office has
limited comprehensive about HR policies and promotion opportunities. Therefore, it is
also difficult to explain to team members for better understanding, while office only has
1 HR admin and HR department is at Hong Kong head office and work shop with Chief
HR is organized a half day, once a year. Tram wishes she get more often HR training

35. 29
and workshop about the changes in organization, HR practices, promotion opportunities.
Then information will be understood and applied consistently (29).
Moreover, Tram mentioned that she was confused because a lot of information
available and many update policies and changes for promotion opportunities and
somehow it is not clear enough for her understanding via email announcement or just
very short work shop once a year as mentioned above.
As organization structure at office, she understand well that she plays an
important role in communication and take care many responsibilities of HR department
like recruit, inspire, develop, motivate employees, evaluate performance, create
requirement, build close relationship, build loyalty for employees in order to they are
happy to work for a long term to reach business goals, but she needs support from HR
since she has limited ability to do all responsibilities in professional way without
understanding well the HR practices, opportunities and the benefits from that.
2.6.3 There is missing 2 ways discussing between direct managers and employees
about promotion opportunities
After in-depth interview with employees: Ms Thu, Mrs Tran. In fact, they do not
have a chance to talk about their career expectation, and their development in the future
at office. Because, normally, manager evaluate and set up same target as previous year.
Mrs Tran has said that “I have been working here for more than 4 years and my
managers have not asked me for my career aspiration here even one time, I really does
not have chance to mention or talk about this. Even I tried to talk one time and got the
increasing salary after that, but then manager are not curious in discussing my further
career aspiration”.
Ms Thu understand well that there is no upper level to move but she also would
like to grow her career at office somehow and need chance to discuss with her direct
manager about the possibility to grow up.
Mrs Tram-merchandising manager said that she only can support in increasing
salary and create independent environment for her employees to work, there is no
needed further discussion about other promotion opportunities because she understand

36. 30
that Melcosa office can not offer. She is manager and said that if her staff are not
satisfied with that, she has no choice and really can not offer more. She already tried her
best to protect her employee’s benefits at office.
From HR point of view, Mrs Bich Thuy saw that both direct managers and
employees seems not spend time for open talking to understand better the aspiration
from employees and possibility support from direct managers, then employees will
satisfy with their career development and know how to get support from direct
managers.
2.6.4 There was no organizational or HRM strategy
(18) has mentioned “no organization or HRM strategy” can be a cause of
ineffective managerial communication to employees because of without clear strategy or
instruction, it is not that easy to comprehend and implement correctly from beginning.
From in-depth interview with Ms Tram, it is recognized that office has HRM
strategy it is established from HR head office and every change, it was announced via
email or intranet to every offices in the world. And Chief HR will travel to offices once
a year for workshop to managers and general employees.
Therefore, this cause “There was no organization or HRM strategy” can be
eliminated.
2.6.5 Bad quality of information channels within office
It is found that “perceptions of satisfaction in information may be related to the
technology used to transmit the information” (21).
After in-depth interview with Ms Tram, she said that at the moment, information
flow can be distorted by inappropriate channels because almost managerial position
intend to communicate via email and intranet that information flows was not fully
explained to all employees. This is also can be a cause of ineffective managerial
communication to employees.
She suggests to using both formal and informal channels to build relationship and
network across organization. (33) nominated the similar suggestion in order to

37. 31
information can be communicated in 2 way dialogue more regularly and receive
feedback as soon as possible.
2.7 Validation main cause and solution proposal
After analyzing all in-depth interview information from Ms Tram, Mrs Tran, Ms
Thu, Mrs Bich Thuy, author was convinced to confirm “There is missing 2 way
discussing between direct managers and employees about promotion
opportunities” is the main cause lead to ineffective communication between direct
manager and employee that lead to low promotion satisfaction at employees. This main
cause can be proved as following:
 This main cause is actually happen at Melcosa office
 This main cause is top urgent matter which need to solve immediately to improve
the situation, because direct manager is the person who communicate directly
with employees for all aspects from work until HR practices. It is necessary to
realize this cause, take an improved action to avoid all consequences as
mentioned above.
 This main cause can be started to solve as soon as possible without spend a lot of
time and budget.
 It demonstrates the importance of informing, engaging and empowering
managers in order to they can take responsibility as a part of HR team as quick as
possible to improve the situation.
 According to MsTram, she pointed out that it is very importance of providing
workshop more regularly and training, support from HR department so that
manager can be confident to develop their management skills, knowledge in
consistently translating strategy into practices effectively.

38. 32
Figure 3: Final cause-effect map

39. 33
CHAPTER 3: DESIGN SOLUTION FOR SOLVING PROBLEM
From all previous analysis, main cause “There is missing 2 ways discussing
between direct managers and employees about promotion opportunities” lead to Central
problem: Ineffective communication between direct manager and employee that lead to
Symptom: Low promotion satisfaction at employees. Alternative solutions will be
designed to solve problem at this chapter. Author has designed solution base on in-depth
interview with Ms Tram, Mrs Tran, theories and personal experience.
Figure 4: Solution map
3.1 The first alternative solution: Every direct manager is asked to build their
own strategy to improve situation with their own team
Direct manager is the person who understands their team best and has their own
way to handle team from the past until now. Manager understand the personality and
know the situation of every team member, therefore different solution will be followed
with every individual team members. After in depth interview with merchandising
manager-Ms Tram, she said that maybe she will organize an internal meeting with all

40. 34
members at her team, then discuss together for the actual situation, then she would like
to collect advice, solution from her team members, what she can do to make her
employees happy about promotion opportunity at work.
3.1.1 Benefits
 Both direct managers and employees are free to find the way to solve the
problem together in the suitable way to save time.
 Different solution for different individuals which manager is the person to
understand best.
 Be proactive in solving the problem
3.1.2 Cost: total cost of this solution is 1,000 USD
 Depend on every team (contingency cost: maybe for lunch break if necessary):
100 USD/team, 7 teams with total 700 USD and 1 big team of QA: 300 USD.
(Source: Suggestion comes from Manager-Ms Tram)
3.2 The second alternative solution: Build up “My dialog” system and organize
workshop for all direct managers, employees.
Mrs Bich Thuy- HR admin pointed out that the open discussing between direct
managers and employees are very necessary to solve this problem and increase
employees promotion satisfaction at Melcosa.
She has been working for Melcosa for 18 years, it is enough time for her to
observe and had to adopt that there is very less official discussing between managers
and employees, they ignore the important process to evaluate and build up the right plan
to develop their employees. Besides, office also can not find out and track the potential
employees for further investment.
Let employees raise their voice to show their interest, their expectation,
aspiration, then can find the suitable plan to grow up together with direct managers.
Open talking also support employees to look back themselves carefully before asking
for any promotion and they need to prepare themselves to qualify for the things they

41. 35
want and let their managers recognize their competency. This will create the fair
promotion opportunities to every employee.
 Melcosa can not offer for many available managerial promotions but Project Leader
is concerned now from the top-management. There are many projects in the future,
therefore qualified, potential employees can become leader in 1 project, employee
will have a space to growth.
 Change department for further learning and growing.
 Become a speaker in some training and development.
 Current promotion: salary adjustment; opportunity to go for business trip to open
mindset and expand knowledge; trust to give more challenge tasks; let employee
become leader themselves; chance to work independently and take responsibility
themselves; favor for individual needs: flexible time per day or per week, work at
home;…
Author and Mrs Bich Thuy has discussed together to develop for My dialog.
3.2.1 Definition of “My dialog”
It is a dialog involving a structure evaluation, recognition and measurement of
performance and a chance to have transparency on individual development and
potential. Besides the meaning of itself “dialog”, it stands for Development,
Improvement, Aspiration, Learning, Opportunity, Growth.
Direct managers and employees should discuss directly together to: plan,
monitor, review an employee's work goals and overall contribution to the office.
A good dialog is based on the fact, action oriented, constructive and challenging,
targeted
3.2.2 Importance of dialog
The dialogue is the most important part to manage performance, set expectations
and proceed in two way dialog. Both direct managers and employees have to do dialog
as a official procedure to avoid sign of for confirmation without discussing. Dialog
creates official opportunity for employees to raise their voice in their performance,

42. 36
understand direct manager’s expectation and possible opportunities at office. At the end,
the dialog is focusing on development of employees.
3.2.3 Different roles in performance review for different positions
Direct manager roles
 Set and clarify expectations and make sure that employees understand correctly
 Motivate employees
 Support for development of employees
 Frequent feedback to employees
 Give specific and frequent feedback to employees
 Ensure realistic goal setting
 Follow-up on performance and development
Employee roles
 Set and clarify expectations and make sure that direct manager understand
correctly
 Asking for feedback from direct manager regularly
 Reflect on past performance and focus on career development in the future
 Share aspirations and understand strengths/development areas
 Take accountability and be open to feedback
 Follow-up on development and report challenges to direct manager as soon as
possible for advice.
Author and HR roles
 Support and guide manager on preparation, process and expectations in dialog to
make it very open and more effective.
 Support development actions by guiding possible promotion opportunities at
Melcosa office (details are following)
 Share best practices for tough cases.

43. 37
3.2.4 My dialog steps
There are 5 steps in My dialog:
 Step 1: Preparation
 Step 2: Review on targets/goal achieved and overall performance
 Step 3: Development and goal setting
 Step 4: The behaviors that indicate the “Potentiality” of employees
 Step 5: Ending the dialog and next steps to take
Step 1: Preparation
Direct managers and employees should think about development such as:
attainable goals, needed skills, aligned with business and potential challenges.
To make dialog is more effective, employees and direct managers should prepare
before and during the dialog carefully. There are some suggestions to think about by
answer below questions.
Employees should think about
What is your career aspiration?
How to achieve it?
What support would you need?
Are you achieving your goal or your job performance according to the leadership
competencies?
What is your overall job performance in the past year?
How have you accomplished the target that you have set for the goal?
Managers should think about
What are the areas that you think he/she can develop further?
How would you support her?
How should she achieve it?
Did he/she show the behavior as expected in the leadership competencies?
What is his/her overall job performance in the past year?

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Has he/she shown potential behaviors as identified by you and Melcosa office? How
Frequently?
How did he/she accomplish the goals that direct you two have set together?
During the dialog, both direct managers and employees should be open minded,
active listening, giving positive and constructive feedback, asking if something is not
clear immediately for further explanation.
Step 2: Review on targets/goal achieved and overall performance
Direct managers can conduct performance review by stay focused to discuss and
develop specific solutions, always encourage two way discussion and let employees feel
comfortable to talk or sharing their review, listen and prepare to change mind if necessary,
maintain every discussion is confidential. Moreover, manager can explain by giving
example but it should be specific, behavioral not personal.
Step 3: Development and goal setting
Strengths and improvement opportunity; performance goals and competencies;
career objectives, organization requirements-present and future skills gaps; available
developmental resources; reasons for performance gaps are considered when setting
development priorities.
For development and goal setting talk, it is necessary to conduct enough for 4
below stages: How to start a development talk; How to get into more detail during the
development talk; How to conclude a development; How to organize follow-up?
Some questions can support to start of dialog
Have you thought about your career aspirations?
How can you improve your current performance to be able to reach your career
aspirations?
Are your career aspirations aligned with your performance and ability?
Have you considered roles outside of your department/function?
Some questions can support to get into more detail during the development
talk

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What skills do you need to build on, to take up the role you aspire for?
What are some projects, assignments, committees, job roles, that would make the
most of your strengths and help you improve upon your development areas?
How will your strengths help in the roles you want to take up in the future?
What support do you need, to build on/work on, for you to reach your long-term
goal?
Some questions can support to conclude the development
What skills do you need to develop to perform better in your current role?
What areas do you need to develop to prepare you for the roles you want to take
up in the future?
How do you want to develop these skills/competencies? Does training help? What is the
best way for you?
Have you considered any other ways to develop?
What timelines do you want to consider for these development actions?
Some questions can support to follow up accordingly
How often would you like to meet to discuss progress on your development actions?
Do you anticipate any obstacle or challenges to development?
How will you overcome these obstacles/challenges? Do you need any support to
overcome them?
How will you continue to practice the skills you have learnt and review your
progress?
Step 4: The behaviors that indicate the “Potentiality” of employees
There are different behaviors that indicate potential employees such as: Insight,
Commitment, Motivation, Curiosity, Aspiration.
Manager should base on their objective, real facts and not influenced by personal
beliefs, judgment or feeling to evaluate employees by rating to all 5 behaviors. The
rating scale is the frequency of that behavior: rarely, sometimes, usually, always.
Step 5: Ending the dialog and next steps to take

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After going through all previous steps, it is time for ending the dialog with an
agreement and confirmation clarity by both direct managers and employees. In addition,
employees know well the accountability, action plan to follow up, ask and answer
question if any.
Getting an agreement play an important role in My dialog because if without
agreement, there is no improved performance or motivated employees that can not
increase employees satisfaction at Melcosa office.
Both direct managers and employees can manage and adjust the development
goal if necessary by keeping two way open communication.
3.2.5 Organize workshop
2 work shop will be conducted after that: one is for all direct managers at office,
another one is for all employees at office to introduce about new system “My dialog” in
order to all direct managers and employees can understand what is it and know how to
apply correctly.
3.2.6 Benefit of this 2nd
solution
 “My dialog” can be applied immediately easily. Office can arrange workable
time easily for 2 work shops, then expand to whole office.
 This is official opportunity for employees, managers to have open two way
discussing. And all expectations, aspirations, challenges, ..and many other
aspects are clarified, measured and recognized. Then specific planning is made
for every employee to increase their promotion satisfaction.
 All employees can evaluate themselves more accurate base on the facts, actual
situation by discussing directly with their direct manager. It helps to reduce the
gap between impossible expectations and reality, then promotion satisfaction can
be increased.
 Many question marks between direct managers and employees were answered in
constructive way, build up relationship.
 Motivate employees and asking for fair treating from direct managers.
Tải bản FULL (90 trang): https://bit.ly/3BpHXf9
Dự phòng: fb.com/TaiHo123doc.net

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 Break the limit and find out potential employees to develop for future sustainable
business.
3.2.7 Cost: total cost for this project is 1,210 USD
 Fruit and water for 2 work shop: 100 USD
 Place to organize workshop: Melcosa’s meeting room.
 IT to set up the “My dialog”: 1,000 USD for this project (Source: Vietnam 2018
salary guide first alliances).
 Contingency cost: 10% of total direct cost: 110 USD
3.3 Solution comparison
After introducing 2 above solutions to merchandising manager-Ms Tram, she
said that it is better to have general standard for all people to conduct in the same way
like “My dialog” instead of every managers has their own way to deal with. Then maybe
someday, the conflict will happen again because all managers do not sing the same
song, and employees will perceive information in many different ways. And “My
dialog” has a clear instruction, she suggested to do a testing in small group and let’s see
the outcome and if something need to adjust for better result, then expand to whole
office for this Sep-2019 evaluation.
Mrs Tran and Ms Thu who are at employee position, they are so excited with
“My dialog” because at least right now they have an official open two way discussing
with their direct manager, the chance for them to raise their voice. Moreover with clear
guide, they think that there will be some bright point in their career in the future.
On the other hand, for the first solution which let all direct managers build up
their own strategy for their own team, there will have favouritism from direct managers
for different individuals, and it is not sure that every employee is happy and satisfied. In
addition, it will create the chance for employees to keep silence, seems agree everything
but in fact it does not. Every direct manager has their own leadership styling, their own
way to solve problem and office can not follow the status for the improvement.
Costing: 1,210 USD is affordable to get benefits from My dialog system.
Tải bản FULL (90 trang): https://bit.ly/3BpHXf9
Dự phòng: fb.com/TaiHo123doc.net

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In conclusion, there are many reasonable reasons to implement the solution
“Build up My dialog system and organize workshop for all direct managers and
employees”. This will help to improve communication between direct managers and
employees, the communication about promotion opportunity will be more effective, that
support to increase promotion satisfaction at employees.
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