My Ivey Global Lab placement has been in Vietnam for 2 months, living and working in Hanoi. During this time I've experienced many culture shocks, met interesting persons, and have had many adventures. Vietnam now holds a special place in my heart.
I have been working at VNP Group, a leading e-commerce company in Vietnam. My classmate Yao and I, are in the fundraising team under the direction of the CSO, Mr.Long. Our objective is to raise $500,000 USD dollars for a start-up project that has huge potential. We are also helping the project with its operation process and risk management serving as financial consultants for the company.
Staff lounge for some time to relax and take naps (after work)!
Life as a consultant - "is it MECE enough?"
One of the biggest challenges we faced after starting the project was to learn how to use the MECE principle. MECE is the abbreviation of Mutually Exclusive Collectively Exhaustive. It is a logic framework that’s conducted by Barbara Minto at McKinsey & Company. It is a great way to break down problems into a logical and clean bucket of analysis, to allow for work streams to be decided accordingly and handed out to consultants. It would save time and energy for the work required later if the logical framework is used properly from the start.
Since our director Mr.Long had worked closely with McKinsey, we first expected him to just show us how he used this principle to break down work and we would just complete work streams. We soon realized what we expected was too good to be true. My teammate and I would be the ones conducting the logic tree and action plan for the whole team and Mr.Long would provide instructions only when necessary. We started the loop of conducting the logic tree, submitting it to Mr.Long, getting denied because it’s not “MECE” enough, and re-editing the logic tree again. In this situation, Yao and I had to challenge one another to think more logically and more “MECE”. We were required to think critically about the problem and find blindspots of our thoughts and judgements. Sometimes it felt like we were walking in a dark alley, with only a silver shine (some instructions and help from Mr.Long) because we are learning how to do this on our own with no prior experience. After 2 weeks of intense discussions and many revisions, we finally finished the logic tree and work plan that’s “MECE” enough and could move on to the next stage of work.
It was frustrating at times during the process, but in the end, I truly appreciated being taught this way. Our director really pushed us out of our comfort zone to revise our logic. It was very exciting when we could see our thinking becoming more clear and reasonable in line with the framework.
The fundraising team – no poker face after work.
Life as an entrepreneur
Working in an e-commerce/Internet/high-tech company means everything happens quickly and can change within seconds. The CEO of our company asked us to prepare a presentation on a company/industry we are not necessarily familiar with and present on the second day morning. We had to learn as much as we could about the company/industry in a short period of time, prepare for any possible pushbacks and questions about the presentation from the CEO and the project leader. Sometimes in the middle of work, our CEO would ask us to give him a short but comprehensive brief to whatever problem we were working on at the moment because investors would like to know. This dynamic of work requires us to have a really deep understanding of the project’s problems and at the same time the whole picture of the project. We had to keep us updated pretty often about the newest progress of the project to make sure our information is not out of date.
Moreover, when we were in the stage of helping the start up project with its operation process and risk management, we had to hammer out solutions to the problems that actually happened in real life and usually, these solutions cannot be found in the book. In order to solve these problems, we had to be down to earth.
Going through all of these experiences at work, I gradually got the taste of what it feels like to work in a start up company or to be an entrepreneur. Everyday is challenging but at the same time very exciting. I’ve asked a lot of my local coworkers the reason to stay in this company. Surprisingly, their answers are the same: because they can have a say to their work regardless of their positions. It’s the same for me. There are so many times I and my team could just walk into the CEO’s office and discuss about our thought on the project. There’s one time we even negotiated with the CEO to make sure our project could gain enough support from the parent company.
Life in Hanoi
Two months does not seem long enough, but it has been enough to make a lot of good memories. My coworkers, especially my director, CSO, Mr.Long and the project leader Mr.Son, were very nice and friendly to us. In Vietnam, the most common mode of transportation is by motorcycle. Our work was often intense, so sometimes Yao and I did not have enough time to explore the city as much as we would have liked. Mr. Long and Mr. Son took us out to one of the best pizza places in town, toured us by Motorcycle around the west lake and the French colonial areas on Mr Son's Harley Davidson. Needless to say, a ride on a Harley is a great way to see the city! I could feel the speed with the wind blowing through my hair and can understand why so many people ride them.
We also had some local buddies, who showed us around Hanoi. During the World Cup, we went to the busiest beer street to watch the football match and experience Vietnamese nigh life. The beer street was very crowded and each pub was full of people. Local Vietnamese and foreign tourists were all mixed together, sitting on plastic chairs set up along the street. Everyone was chatting, laughing, drinking and sometimes cheering for the game! We also had the opportunity to try some local BBQ, which reminded me of home, China because of the similar flavors.
There are so many other good memories and adventures I could go on for hours. Unfortunately, all good things had to come to an end. Two months passed by like two seconds. I am truly grateful for having this journey and for those people who helped me get through everything in a country I had never lived in. I will keep all those memories and happy moments in mind. Thank you, Vietnam, just like the slogan of my company: it’s been a ride that’s BEYOND EXPECTATIONS.
Until next time,
Xiaojun Zhu