How to attract and retain Gen Z in Vietnam

When asked what industry they want to work in, they ranked entertainment & media, and creative industry the highest, giving each 19% of the votes.

By 2025, Gen Z (born after 1997) is expected to take up 25% of the total workforce in Vietnam. Understanding them and designing a workplace experience that taps into what makes them tick, could help companies become much more successful in both attracting and retaining these young, creative, worldly employees.

As such, Decision Lab & Dreamplex set out to survey 260 Gen Z-ers and Millennials in Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi, to gain a deeper understanding of this group that is still such a mystery to many employers, HR leaders, and managers.

Here are three findings on how to attract and retain Vietnamese Gen Z-ers from the study:

#1 Understand what sectors influence their dream job

Gen Z’s experience growing up with social platforms is visible in their dream jobs. When asked what industry they want to work in, they ranked entertainment & media, and creative industry the highest, giving each 19% of the votes. Compared to Millennials, Gen Z are much less interested in pursuing careers in technology, education, industrial, and retail.

In a nutshell, the following are Vietnamese Gen Z's dream industries to work in:

• Entertainment & media
• Creative
• Technology
• Finance

Evidently, the trend towards entertainment and creative jobs explains TikTok’s appeal to Gen Z in Vietnam, which has had a quick rise in Vietnam, according to another study by Decision Lab. It showed that 30% of Vietnamese now use the video-sharing app on their phones, up from 15% just six months prior to the study.

In comparison, the following are Vietnamese Millennials' dream industries to work in:

• Technology
• Retail
• Finance
• Creative
• Education

#2 Understand what motivates them to take up a new job

Only two in 10 Gen Z-ers say that income and benefits are the key motivation to take a new job. Learning new skills and knowledge are much more important. Learning new skills (44%) and acquiring new knowledge (21%) beat earning salary (18%) when it comes to making Gen Z excited about starting a new job.

The following is the list, in order of priority, of why GenZ-ers in Vietnam are excited to take on a new job:

• Learning new skills >40%
• Learning new knowledge >20%
• Earning salary ~20%
• Meeting new people ~10%
• Building in a new office space <10%

This list is very different from the expectations of Vietnamese Millennials; who see earning salary as the most exciting part of a new job. This is perhaps unsurprising given their age, as they carry more responsibilities such as providing for their families or saving for big-ticket items.

#3 Understand what kind of skills they want to learn

When asked what they expect to receive from a company during their first month on the job, Gen Z made it clear that they preferred technical job skills. However, per employers, in their first year, fresh graduates need to expand their knowledge beyond just the job skills and quickly gain industry insights, understand the company culture, and acquire soft skills.

What GenZ-ers say they need in the first month of a new job:

1. Technical job skills
2. Person to contact for help
3. Conversation about what I want
4. Meeting new coworkers
5. Guidelines and training

What GenZ-ers say they need in the first year of a new job:

1. Industry knowledge
2. Technical job skills
3. Company mission and values
4. Soft skills training

Overall, when it comes to what they want to learn, networking and communication are deemed the most important skills to learn for Gen Z (31%). Languages follows as the second favorite, but is far less popular than with Millennials, who choose languages as their number one skill to learn with 30.6% of them choosing it. Technical skills are the third most popular choice

Photo / Dreamplex & Decision Lab report

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