Ineffective leadership style in sale department at CADIVI company

3 1.2 Symptoms of problem in Sale Department at CADIVI company: high turnover rate .... In this thesis, leader personality, lack of soft-skill training, leadership- followers relationsh

UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMICS HO CHI MINH CITY

International School of Business

-

PHAN NGUYEN THU HANG

INEFFECTIVE LEADERSHIP STYLE

IN SALE DEPARTMENT

AT CADIVI COMPANY

MASTER OF BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION

Ho Chi Minh City – Year 2018

UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMICS HO CHI MINH CITY

International School of Business

-

PHAN NGUYEN THU HANG

INEFFECTIVE LEADERSHIP STYLE

IN SALE DEPARTMENT

AT CADIVI COMPANY

MASTER OF BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION

SUPERVISOR: Dr Pham Phu Quoc

Ho Chi Minh City – Year 2018

TABLE OF CONTENT

ACKNOWLEDGE 1

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 2

CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION ABOUT CADIVI COMPANY AND RECOGNISED SYMTOMS WITHIN SALE DEPARTMENT 3

1.1 Background of CADIVI company 3

1.2 Symptoms of problem in Sale Department at CADIVI company: high turnover rate 5

CHAPTER II: PROBLEM IDENTIFICATION IN SALE DEPARTMENT AT CADIVI 8

2.1 Potential problems in Sale Department 8

2.2.1 Interview results 8

2.2.2 Initial cause- effect map 11

2.2.3 Theoretical framework 13

2.2.4 Updated cause- effect map 14

2.2 Problem Justification 16

2.2.5 Central problem: Ineffective leadership style 16

2.2.6 Definition of central problem- ineffective leadership style 17

2.2.7 Justify the existence of problem: ineffective leadership style 18

2.2.8 Justify the importance of problem: ineffective leadership style 19

CHAPTER III: CAUSE VALIDATION 23

3.1 Identification of potential causes 23

3.1.1 Poor attitude and personality of leaders 23

3.1.2 Soft-Skills shortage 23

3.1.3 Poor leader-follower relationship 24

3.2 Final cause-effect map 25

3.3 Causes validation of real problem: ineffective leadership style 26

CHAPTER IV: SOLUTION ANALYSIS 28

4.1 Theoretical framework 28

4.2 Short-term solution: Improving leader-follower relationship 29

4.3 Long-term solution: Solution for training, emphasizing soft skill and enhancing leader relationship 31

4.4 Solution Comparison: short-term solution and long-term solution 32

CHAPTER V: SELECTED SOLUTION AND CHANGING PLAN 34

5.1 Selected long-term solution 34

5.2 Details plan for long-term solution 34

5.2.1 Criterion set of this plan: 34

5.2.2 Action plan 35

5.2.3 Cost-benefit analysis of this comprehension plan 37

5.3 Changing plan 38

CHAPTER VI: SUPPORTING INFORMATION 40

6.1 Questionnaire development to justify central problem 40

6.2 Questionnaire development to justify causes 41

APPENDIX 43

REFERENCES 61

LIST OF FIGURE

Figure 1: CADIVI structure 4

Figure 2: Turnover rate in Sale Department from 2015 to 2018 6

Figure 3: Turnover rate of 4 main departments at CADIVI in 6 first months in 2018 7

Figure 4: Initial Cause- Effect Map 12

Figure 3: Updated Cause-Effect map 15

Figure 6: Customer Satisfaction 22

Figure 7: Final Cause-Effect map 26

LIST OF TABLE Table 1: Turnover rate in Sale Department from 2015 to 2018 6

Table 2: Turnover rate of four main departments at CADIVI in 6 first months in 2018 6

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ACKNOWLEDGE

I would like to express my great appreciation and endless thank to my supervisor, Dr Pham Phu Quoc, who has kindly supported, guided, motivated, and given me loads of advances during the time writing this thesis His encouragement and comments significantly help me to fulfill this Without his support and instructions, this thesis would have been impossible to be done effectively

In addition, I would like to approve my special gratitude to my family and all friends in MBUS 7.1 for encouraging me, caring and giving me strength in all the time writing this thesis

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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

This study has talked about the case in Sale department within CADIVI with the symptoms of the high turnover rates in the first six months in 2018 Based on the interview result and theoretical framework, ―ineffective leadership style in Sale Department at CADIVI‖ is the central problem that sale department needs to solve Ineffective leadership has been the great attributes to retention rate because of significant role of the leader in the way their staff devote their time, efforts, commitment and extend their support to achieve organizational goals Therefore, if turnover rate reduced, it could help to increase employee satisfaction, high performance and productivity In this thesis, leader personality, lack of soft-skill training, leadership- followers relationship and gender-related leadership are listed as potential causes of the problem in Sale Department According to cost-benefit analysis between two solutions

as short-term and long-term, long- term solution selected as suitable solution, which could improve soft-skill of leaders and enhance leadership relationship in sale department With the detailed action plan and combination between sale department and

HR department, the situation of sale team is expected to be solved in near future The cost for this plan is approximately 80 million VND each year but it expected to reduce the cost for recruit and train news replaced and the lower customer satisfaction

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CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION ABOUT CADIVI COMPANY AND

RECOGNISED SYMTOMS WITHIN SALE DEPARTMENT

1.1 Background of CADIVI company

This section aims to point some features of the Electric Cable Industry, especially CADIVI

1.1.1 Overview of Electric Cable Industry

In this constantly changing world, Vietnam is also entering the accelerated stage with the fast development of technology According to investors, Vietnam is highly considered as one of the most attractive market Modernization applied for all industries from manufacturing to business, the main wire and cable industry is in the fast-growing stage with the development of power generation, the construction of transmission and distribution networks from high voltage to low voltage networks and consumption The demand for electric wires and cables for power network construction expected to increase rapidly in the coming years Therefore, wire and cable products are considered

as one of the most important contributors to the value of the industrial sectors in Vietnam There are more than 200 enterprises engaged in the production and export of electric wires and cables Some typical companies in the industry can be named as: Vietnam Electric Wire & Cable (CaDiVi), Tran Phu Electric Company, LG Vina Cable Joint Venture Company, TaYa Vietnam Company, Cable and Telecommunication (SaCom),

In recent years, Vietnam's electric wire and cable industry is facing a great opportunity, but there are also many challenges to overcome The recovery of the real estate market has led to the demand for residential wires serving the infrastructure of industrial zones, new urban areas and office buildings CADIVI is the main unit supplying power cables for many projects in Ho Chi Minh City Based on General Department of Vietnam Customs‘ statistics, the group of electrical wires and cables of Vietnam exported to dosmetic markets in March 20118 reached $ 140.1 million, up 50.5% over February 2018, total export value of this group in the first quarter of 2018

is 388 million, up 47.0% over the same period in 2017 Vietnam's electrical wire and cable are mainly exported to China, Korea, Thailand, France, Malaysia

Page 4 General meeting of Shareholder

Based on the analysis above, electric cable industry is really an interesting market and attracts a large number of work force

1.1.2 Overview of CADIVI company

Vietnam Electric Cable Corporation (CADIVI) is established in 1975 as a state- owned enterprise and specializes in manufacturing various kinds of electric wire and cable CADIVI has five factories and two branches, distributing through more than 200 agents in Vietnam CADIVI is considered as one of the leaders of technology in wire and cable manufacturing in Vietnam After several times of rename and transforms, on August 08, 2018 CADIVI transformed as a Joint-Stock Company With more than 40 years of development, CADIVI has owned machinery and equipment from Europe, USA, and other developing countries in the region and maintained the business philosophy that ―good quality is the key factor to the development of CADIVI‖ With the vision of ―being one of the leading electric wire and cable manufacturers in the Southeast Asian region by 2020‖, CADIVI attempts to produce more high quality products, increase the revenue, meet more demand and build the workforce to be union, active, creativity, professional and highly responsible

CADIVI‘s structure is shown as the chart below:

Figure 1: CADIVI structure

Finance&

Accounting Dept

Technology Dept

Human Resources Dept Sale Dept

Board of director Board of management

Manufacturing Dept

Quality Assurance Dept Board of supervisor

Western Factory Eastern

Factory

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1.1.3 Sale Department in CADIVI company

With 32 people including 01 manager, 01 assistant manager, 02 deputy managers,

4 supervisors who have been responsible in agency, tender, exported, project and 24 employees, sale department have to:

- Be responsible for looking all sales opportunities to sell cables and wires with the existing and new customers, presenting effectively to the customers regarding the requested product, keeping contacts with the customers to understand their needs and requirements, identifying the target budget, classifying different business opportunities for each customer to plan comfortable target budget or forecast list

- Be one of the key department affecting the success of company

- 4 supervisors are responsible for exporting area, contributor area, power corporation and project

Despite of the important role, high salary and fast staff growth, symptoms of high turnover rate may be a big worry needed to be concerned to sustain long-lasting development for sale team in CADIVI

1.2 Symptoms of problem in Sale Department at CADIVI company: high

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Figure 2: Turnover rate in Sale Department from 2015 to 2018

Table 1: Turnover rate in Sale Department from 2015 to 2018

Comparing with other departments in company, although sale team is the most important department in the company with various priorities, it had the highest turnover rate

HR Sale Quality Management Procedure Technology

Figure 3: Turnover rate of 4 main departments at CADIVI in 6 first months in

2018

In addition, CADIVI is as the first leading of cable in Vietnam, therefore, it is important to make sale teams more professional, stronger and create great image in customer Thus, sale force would need to have large special concerns However, in reality, salesmen at CADIVI tend to quit job than others It can be threat to company performance and productivity News replaced with fewer experiences not only can negative impact on customer satisfaction but also increase the recruitment and training cost Therefore, it is necessary to analyze and find out the cause, then propose solution

to solve the current struggling situation of Sale department at CADIVI

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CHAPTER II: PROBLEM IDENTIFICATION IN SALE DEPARTMENT AT CADIVI

2.1 Potential problems in Sale Department

Potential problems in Sale Department are determined through interview and theoretical framework

The second group of three employees who are currently working in sale department: Ms Nguyen Thi Hoang Anh, Mr.Nguyen Hoang Vu and Mrs Nguyen Thi Thuy Trang

The third group of three people who left CADIVI and work for another company The first one is Mrs Doan Thi Tuyet Mai, she used to be a salesman at CADIVI Mr Nguyen Nam Cuong who used to work in sale department at 2 different positions: salesman and sale admin The last interviewee- Ms Pham Le Anh Van- who used to work in exported area

By the initial interview, there are some dissatisfaction happened among employees and company due to the higher turnover rate Choosing these people with different features for each group will make various perceptions and perspective The first group

is specialists in HR department, so they understand well about the reason and problem that makes high turnover rate The second group is all currently working in Sale Department but different positions so they can point out the problems and difficulties when working at sale and marketing department The third group includes ex-worker who clearly understood the inside problem in sale team The last group with their real experience will gives various viewpoints and make recommend then

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According to the interview with Mr Phuong- deputy of HR department, the higher turnover rate because of higher dissatisfaction about training program for Sale team, high workload, unclear career path and motivation, conflict between manager and staffs Therefore, most of employees do not have enough necessary motivations, knowledge and skills to be sale to CADIVI Some salesmen are in charge of looking for new customers and organizing effective presentation to the customers regarding the requested products but they do not know how to attract and present to customer That reason led to sale team feel difficult to seek new customers Besides, there are some differences of opinion between the leader and employees, which made the low employee satisfaction in team

Sharing the same perspectives, Mrs Le Thi Huong Giang stated that, most of young talent people in sale department feel stress because of being difficult to work with customers, lost energy to work Besides, young salesmen feel unclear about their career path and motivation to contribute, they just do their work by themselves without mentoring or coaching from manager

Deeper discovering with Ms Hoang Anh, who is employee in Sale department, it was found that she has worked in this department for 6 years with the Economic background In her current position, the work procedure, which she has to do, includes four steps: Seeking customers, attracting and negotiating them, suggesting suitable price, making contact and maintaining relationship with customers She felt that she had

a high workload but no have enough skill, understanding about CADVI‘s product and lost direction Therefore, it made her meet a large amount of stressful and difficult to do her job, low satisfaction but her supervisor and sale manager also did not give her necessary advances, instruction and suitable training program

Alongside with the same perspectives, Mr Nguyen Hoang Vu shared that Sale team was facing the fact that huge number of key salesmen left because of the lack of energy to work and concentrate, lack motivation to contribute, low productivity, unfair assign task and sympathy from the manager He also said that a large of new salesmen recruited to replace ones but the lack of knowledge about the product and complicated procedure makes difficult to maintain customer and lower customer satisfaction This

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confusion made a lot of difficult for sale team to work together and reach the target, they need time to understand and combine However, the manager forced the employees to align to do task without understand their problem and not agree to use any new ways Mrs Mai, who used to work in CADIVI Sale team confirmed that she left CADIVI because of lack of promotion opportunity and motivation, stress, pressure and ineffective leadership style To satisfy the high demand of market, the managers and supervisors put the higher target without taking more care about the inside problems, it makes sale team not happy to come work, unclear orientation She also said that in her team it did not have any activities to build up relationship or enhance team-work, the manager just wanted them to focus on working She felt that it was difficult to share her feeling and ideas to her manager or supervisor They just want to put target and high pressure to have high turnover She also needs to do many jobs without understanding about the benefit

On the other hand, when being asked about current situation in Sale Department, Mrs Trang stated that she has to work overtime and sometimes needs to work at home She felt stressful and did not have time for herself and her family According to Mrs Trang, the manager did not check the results from employee and usually blame for them

if having the mistake

Furthermore, according to Mr Cuong, in sale department, there are a large of unfair assignments between man and woman The manager usually decided based on her emotion In addition, department manager was the one who decide all work in the department but she he had no initiative to remind, understand her employee‘s demand, inspiration to push up motivation of team and follows their work It seems to be the weak management method to control her department

Regarding about the high turnover rate, Ms Pham Le Anh Van shared that there was also no internal database system, working delegation board, meeting and team building to make everyone in department know clear about the information In other hand, sale manager and supervisors supervised all sections but the work in each section had no management by person in charge and no record It is the reason why they could not remember how many works needed to solved to urge everyone and support sale team

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as soon as possible It led to the low performance for whole department Besides, due to the unattractive salary policy, it makes the salesmen lower efforts and be bored to work

2.2.2 Initial cause- effect map

Collecting all the information, initial cause – effect map showed as below:

Figure 4: Initial Cause-Effect map

Lack of clear

information

Bad management relationship

High workload Lack of experienced salesman

Difficult seek new customers

HIGH TURNOVER RATE

Unfair work assignment Lack of Mentoring and coaching

Be confused with the job Unattractive salary policy

Organizational Symptom

High Job stress Complicated Procedure

Low job performance Difficult to work with customers

Long working time

Lost energy and motivation

Poor teamwork activities

Conflict between manager and staff Poor Management

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There are many scholar studies regarding about the cause of high turnover rate This part outlines some main causes that most of finding stated

Employee satisfaction impact on turnover rate

Nowadays, employee satisfaction plays an important role for the development of organization‘s workforce Employees give more care with their jobs now, greatly expect

to get more satisfaction likely criteria to stay or leave the current company (1)The lower job satisfaction, the lower commitment to organization It also affects to resignation thoughts, job search behaviors and actual turnover (2) Workers most would like to commit with an organization if they have highest levels of job satisfaction, while ones who were overwhelmed by demanding work environment will increase desire to

leave(3)

Inverse relationship of leadership on turnover rate

Between, the quality of leader-employee relationship and retention of employee related significantly(4) Managers impact on employee turnover through meeting employee job expectations, beliefs, environment, counseling and behaviors(5) It demonstrates social-cognitive theory of bi-directional influence where, in organizations, managerial environment bi-directionally influences workers Leader who have good skills such as interpersonal communication, listening skill, recognizing employees, training workers, sympathize and managing job can have positively direct impact on employee turnover (6)

Training program and development opportunities impact on turnover rate

Employees‘ satisfaction and long-term commitment will be greatly increased if they are highly trained more (7) The more concern to training content, the more decreasing turnover risk and time management (8) Besides, the employees can work effective, believe and commit with the organization if they have a plenty of development opportunities(9) In contrast, staff will quit the job if the company cut down training and development plans(10)

The effect of recognition, rewards and salary satisfaction to turnover rate

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Recognition and reward of workers can significantly affect to employees retention, reduce stress and raise business effectiveness (11-13) Turnover intention can be decreased if have an effective recognition and reward systems(14, 15) In addition, salary levels, salary system, salary structure and salary satisfaction also can positively impact on employee‘s behavioral satisfaction is often thought to affect behavior, business commitment and turnover intention (16-18)

Job stress correlation with turnover rate

Job stress can result in poor employee‘s satisfaction which result in reducing productivity and increasing high job turnover(16, 19) Moreover, job stress and burnout highly related to decisions as intent or leave company(20)

2.2.4 Updated cause- effect map

According to initial cause effect map and theoretical framework, there can be five potential problems in Sale Department: Ineffective leadership style, complicated procedures, unattractive salary policy, low employee satisfaction, lack of information They will be shown and generated in the following initial cause – effect map:

Figure 5: Updated Cause-Effect Map

Poor sale skill

HIGH TURNOVER RATE

Unfair work assignment Poor support from manager

Be confused with the job Unattractive salary policy

Organizational Symptom

High Job stress Complicated Procedure

Low job performance

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2.2 Problem Justification

This section aims to justify the central problem, the existence, the importance and causes of problem in Sale Department at CADIVI

2.2.5 Central problem: Ineffective leadership style

This part explores the central problem that makes the high turnover rate in Sale team Like being shown in initial cause and effect map and based on the interview results and other secondary data, a plenty of issues is collected to contribute as the factors of high turnover rate Factors like unattractive salary policy and complicated procedure are the company policy so it is difficult to change or improve if chosen them as central problem

In other hand, based on the interview result, most of applicant stated that the job stress come from ineffective leadership style, therefore, if greatly increased the effectiveness of leadership style, the problem could be solved Regarding low employees‘ satisfaction, it needs more time and resources to solve, so it is not suitable to see as central problem The problem of ―lack of information‖ mostly comes from the lack of guidance from managers and supervisors, thus, if improve leadership effectiveness, that problem can be limited Moreover, the result of interview showed that ineffective leadership style is the deeply effective factor which most of people mentioned Mr Cuong and Mrs Mai shared that they left company because of plenty reasons, but problem about ineffective leadership style is the key to this issue From Mrs Mai‘s perspective, employees did not leave their company, they left their manager, she stated that her manager did not understand her feelings and made team feel lack of energy and enthusiasm to work She did not receive any support or guide from manager to do well Similarly, Mr Cuong shared that the manager just cared about herself and her feeling without build a good relationship with employees or give them opportunity to share opinions

There are numerous previous studies showed that leadership style is the reason for the choices of employees staying or leaving their job Effective managerial leadership is the main reason for employee‘s to decide staying or leaving(21)

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Therefore, the way how managers lead can decide staff‘s retention (22) “Turnover

experts, both academic and practitioner, have asserted that supervision plays a meaningful role in employee turnover decisions” To reach the company target, increase inspiration

and motivate employee, the leader plays as an important role Besides, with the highly comparative, retention becomes a big problem that manager need to care, especially leadership style(23)

Sales manager and supervisors, who are responsible for giving counsel, guiding, building strategies, encouraging, having far vision, motivating to make salesman feel full

of energy, are greatly contributed and well-performed It means that leadership behavior needs to be concerned more A salesman usually not only faces much pressure from working, external environment but also needs to be clever to interact inside and outside the company, deliver and sell products They also have to collect all data related the market, gather and analysis competitor‘s characteristic Besides, nowadays with the fast development of Internet, it is easier for finding employment information sharing and job postings, well performing salespeople are in demand and are able easily access other company Thus, if the manager can satisfied the staff they can retain the talent

Salesperson‘s actions, performance, turnover can be effected by sales manager leadership or the type of leadership behavior, turnover (23-25).The higher addressing on the leadership skills, the higher maintaining top performing employees in the organizations

It also helps to attract more other top performers and increase global competition

In conclude, according the collecting information and analysis above, ineffective leadership style is highly considered as central problem need to solve in this scope of this thesis

2.2.6 Definition of central problem- ineffective leadership style

Leadership is defined as an influence process in which the leader can be delegates or assign others to reach some specified objective and reach organization goals(26), maximizes the interests of leader over the interests of the company Leadership is also the

to achieve common goals(30-32) In contrast, ineffective leadership styles are seen to have

a negative impact on individuals and organizational performance; motivations to attain common goals(33) Ineffective leadership is also a set of negative characteristics or inadequate capacities in the leadership that make the bad results in effectiveness, ethics, accomplishment and the staff development, harms an organization in the long term(32)

2.2.7 Justify the existence of problem: ineffective leadership style

This part helps to validate whether ineffective leadership style really likes a central problem in sale department in CADIVI based on theory inform and interview results

Theory inform

The ineffective performance management can be showed through increasing turnover, using false or misleading information, lowing self-esteem, wasting much time and money, damaged relationships, reducing motivation to perform, increasing burnout and job dissatisfaction, being difficult to determine demands on managers‘ and employees‘ resources(34) Ineffective leadership can have two broader dimensions as the ineffective side and immoral side(35) It means that ineffective leadership can be both unethical and inefficient

Effective leaders is the person who had strong character, cared for their employees, worked hard, and were successful communicators while ineffective leaders had questionable character, neglected the needs of workers, displayed a poor work ethic, lack

of compassion, lack of training; lack of leadership experiences, education, mentoring, networking, incorporating and failed to communicate(36)

Quantitative research

Result of this justification process illustrated that ineffective performance management does exist in this department

Based on identifying ineffective leadership style really exists in managers and supervisors in sale department at CADIVI, this part will help to determine the consequences which central problem made

2.2.8 Justify the importance of problem: ineffective leadership style

A large number of consequences has been found from low job performance and productivity, low customer satisfaction, low profit, higher recruitment and training cost

The higher turnover rate the higher recruitment and training cost

The high turnover rate can increase the need to recruit, onboard and train new talent

as well as the diminishing productivity because of the time that new employee accustomed; the rising of work stress for ones who pick up the additional duties during the transition(6) Managers plans to limit the budget for training to save the cost to bring more profit However, in real, it can bring the higher cost to recruit and train for news, waste more time and money to wait them accustomed with the job responsibility It not only makes the productivity is decreasing but also makes the sale team lost market share The

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organizational costs of turnover can makes the higher actual costs of replacement, short- term fill-in costs and productivity during the transition(37) The new employee would require training and time to fully replacing the workload of the original employee, resulting

in additional costs and loss of productivity for the organization as well as potential consequences to those whom the original employee served

The higher turnover rate the unhealthier workplace image

The organizations which had a high turnover rate were generally not healthy workplaces because of the decreasing interpersonal trust negative attitudes in the workplace and they might not want to contribute to achieve organization goals(38, 39) In whiles, salesman who working in an organization where have a high level of confidence, being valued and important part of the organization, come to work with more enthusiasm, and are happier with their jobs(40)

The lower working satisfaction the lower individual performance and low company performance

Leadership is generally considered as a source of competitive advantage and need to invest in developing future leaders Without effective leadership, productivity, innovation, and profits will likely suffer The way in which sales management leadership style can positively or negatively influence the ability of a sales person to perform at optimum levels The leaders of the departments with a great knowledge and skills can enables employees

to take on new challenges, achieve business results, enhance productivity, motivate staff to meet organizational goal(41, 42) Therefore, sales managers need to find the way to lead personnel to increase sales performance Turnover rate has been linked to productivity, employee retention, quality of work, and strategy for organization(43) The more the employees are satisfied with their leader, the more efforts they want to contribute for achieving business objectives, positively effect on the success of the organization(44, 45)

(46) “How a salesperson operates, and to what extent the salesperson is successful,

may depend heavily on the actions of the sales manager” The better salesman-manager

relationship, the higher trust can have the higher honest of staff to the company If

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employees are unsatisfied, they usually reduce their contribution and personal commitment, working together, their improving and easily to conflict each other to gain benefit(47) Thus, to increase profitability and be success, leaders need give more encouragement, inspiration and good understanding of the daily cooperation operation to their followers When being asked about the consequences of high turnover rate, Ms Hoang Anh shared that since Quarter 1/2017, sales decreased in Agency Area (from 3,212 billion VND

in 2016 to 2,707 billion VND in 2017) Besides that, products were higher cost than other competitions, nearly 30-40% CADIVI lost some market share, especially exported area decreased 30% as 2016

The lower working satisfaction the lower customer satisfaction

If employees are dissatisfied with their leader it will badly effect to behavior, increase cost, low profits and finally low customers‘ dissatisfaction(48) In most sales organizations, sales managers and their teams are responsible for ensuring the success of the organization

by encouraging and facilitating the sale of the organization's goods and services The bad ability to perform, greatly affects the company‘s bottom line revenues(49)

According to Mr Nam, who sometimes buys cable of CADIVI, it took him a long time to receive reply his problem and clear up his queries He also needs to wait to have quotation and technical specification On the other hand, when being asked current loyalty customer- Mr Dan, he showed that although competitor simple the procedures day by day, CADIVI sale team have a shortage experienced employees and the low employees‘ productivity

Besides, based on the result of Customer survey, the rate of customer satisfaction is significantly decreased

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CHAPTER III: CAUSE VALIDATION

3.1 Identification of potential causes

Reasons for the failure of ineffective leadership to achieve desired targets can be from the poor traits of leaders through poor leader attitude and personality, skills shortage and poor leader-followers relationship (35)

This section will provide theoretical framework and the result of qualitative research

to strength the status above

3.1.1 Poor attitude and personality of leaders

Personalities of leaders, which are qualities, dispositions, attribute or features, assertiveness, persistence, social initiative Leadership ability can effect daily to employees, relationship, action, strength and willingness to work with staff, forceful behavior ( an individual exercising power and authority to push for performance)(50) The personality traits of the leader decided how they make decisions as well as influence to their ability to lead and leadership effectiveness Moderate levels of forceful leadership behavior are more effective than low and high levels of forceful leadership behavior (51)

According to Ms Pham Le Anh Van, the manager in Sale Department was usually quick temper, impatient and uncomfortable Discussing about this issue, Mr Nguyen Nam Cuong said that the manager always decided and did everything by her emotion and did not listen her staff‘s opinion In this department, it always had unfair assignment

In addition, attitude which seem to be a state of mind, feeling, a way of thinking or behaving, or an opinion of a leader have ability to enable the achievement of goals and objectives The knowledge, characteristics and attitudes of the leader can have more influence to followers and the achievement of common goals and objective (52, 53)

3.1.2 Soft-Skills shortage

Soft skills competency positively impact on leadership effectiveness(54, 55) Managers with a large of soft skills can positively affect to employees‘ job satisfaction,

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encourages personal development and displays commitment to a standard (56, 57) In particular, soft skills help to enhance leadership effectiveness and bring more success in project coordination and management (58) A project manager can be successful depending

on the motivation and contributions(59).It also can make the effectively self-managed work teams(60).Team may be successful when leaders have ability to observe, evaluate exactly present situation of working environment and propose suitable strategy

“Self-leadership comprises a combination of behavioral and cognitive disciplines including intrinsic motivation, constructive thinking, and positive perception for individual success The three general self-leadership strategies consist of behavior-focused self- regulation and awareness, seeking out naturally enjoyable and rewarding work, and creating constructive thinking through positive mental imagery and self-talk Self-talk is a powerful way of enabling one to change the way one thinks and feels and to take charge of one’s own emotions and actions”(61, 62)

Good leader is the person who can assign mission to right people, think outside the box, encourage staff to complete common goal He also can fulfill intrinsic staff needs, such as: reward, friendliness, camaraderie, respect, trust, supportiveness, and recognition need to complete When being a top performer simply means fitting in or surviving long enough for the leader to rotate to another assignment, the desire to think outside of the box Good leaders know it takes dedicated employees to complete the organization‘s mission (63) Leaders also know that to motivate employees, they need to fulfill their (64).When being asked about soft-skill training, most of attendance stated that from supervisors to the manager lack of soft-skill, they are really not have ability to motivate, encourage employees They also cannot propose clear strategy for team, communicate with staff and enhance teamwork spirit in team

3.1.3 Poor leader-follower relationship

Leader-follower relationship play an important role to help leader develop their skills

as well as enhancing followers‘ ability to reach the goals (60) The higher quality relationships can make the higher organizational results such as company performance, job

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satisfaction and low turnover ratios (65) The knowledge of the important role of leader- follower relationships may support leaders to propose organization‘s strategy, inspire followers through strengthening those dynamics, extent people feel cared about and supported, people will go to extremes to help those who help them (66)

In this term, Mrs Mai shared that she did not have a good relationship with her manager She felt tired, loss energy, stressful because of working style of the manager Agreed with Mrs Mai, Mr Cuong stated that he could not share anything with manager and supervisors They also did not guide and support him in his job

Higher quality relationships between leaders and followers are advantageous which based upon a positive dyadic interaction built between leader and follower over time The leader-follower relationship evolves from contractual to mutually beneficial The goal is to develop and maintain high quality, mature relationships that will be beneficial at the dyad level, the team level and the organizational level (67)

3.2 Final cause-effect map

Based on above analysis, final cause-effect is presented as below:

Figure 7: Final Cause-Effect map

3.3 Causes validation of real problem: ineffective leadership style

Based on the previous part, there are many causes that make the ineffective leadership style Using theoretical frame combine with in-depth interview result to the same respondent, this section will be validated the main causes in Sale department of CADIVI

Poor leader-followers relationship

A good relationship between leader and member can have great impact on organizational commitment, job satisfaction, absenteeism and turnover, job performance,

Ineffective leadership style

Low Customer dissatisfaction

High turnover rate

Low job performance

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empowerment, career progress, promotion opportunities and organizational support.(73) (74)

Leadership soft-skill shortage

Great leader is the person who has ability to use talent and allocate assignment to properly people It requires leader need to have leadership skill to organize resources, encourage staff be willing to follow, be responsible to complete their task efficiently(75) Leader skills include facilitation of learning, knowledge development, engagement skill, coaching skills or communication skills to maintain workforce

(76) ―There are four styles of leadership: supportive leadership, a supportive leader

creates a friendly work environment by considering the needs of his/her follower and showing concern for their welfare; directive leadership, a directive leader lets followers know what specific work needs to be done and at what specific times, directive leaders provide schedules, guidance and rewards as incentive to get tasks accomplished; participative leadership, a participative leader takes the ideas and recommendation of followers into account when making organizational decisions; and achievement oriented leadership, an achievement oriented leader demonstrates the ability to accomplish complex tasks by setting high standards and challenging goals for his followers both in work and in self-improvement.”

Poor attitude and personality of leaders

It is original nature of people Therefore, it is not easy to change, it just improve through soft-skill training

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CHAPTER IV: SOLUTION ANALYSIS

According to Ms Hoang Anh that sale department need to spend more time to discuss, listen feedback to understand others problems It also helps manager understand more their employees not just focus on daily tasks, small mistakes And it is also critical to enhance teamwork spirit by celebrating more teambuilding activities

Therefore, there are two solutions to improve that central problem in sale department

Enhancing communication between leader and followers

Communication is one of the important elements to enhance leadership relationship Through communicating with employees, leaders can make employees build trust and feel the leader‘s care(77) Besides, the leaders who concern more about the importance of employee‘s feedback, guide and provide useful information to staff immediately can make employees feel like they are a part of the organization(78) Then, they can want to give more contribution to achieve the goal Leaders can use tools such as surveys or suggestion boxes to obtain employee feedback or encourage employee voice and share their opinions (79) It is a good method to create a vision to inspire employees, gives them an opportunity

to express their wants and needs The higher understand and guidance from leader, the lower turnover rate and great change for a better In addition, teamwork activities can influence on the performance of the employees and the leadership relationship(80).Team building activities can help teams to develop skills such as: identify the full problem‘s dimensions; predict alternative possibilities; have openly different sharing, views and concern and enhance relationship of team.(81)

Increasing soft-skill training for leaders

―Leaders would be successful if they displayed the following competencies: effective, open, honest communication, previous knowledge of job function, organizational and project planning skills, empathy/caring for team members, good listening skills, a focus on motivating the team, time-management skills, goal oriented, and a passion that was

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infectious and the ability to convey that passion to other team members‖(82) Therefore, giving training courses emphasize learning experiences, discovery questions to stimulate thinking, and a self-testing approach can guide and help leader to master in soft- skills Besides, using Knowledge for Leaders (KFL) tool can appropriately testing performance skills in tasks before and after training designed as well as define the skills which are lack in leader performance The KFL includes 120-item questionnaire pretest and post-test assessment tools, which measured six leadership skills: coaching and counseling, communicating effectively, influencing and negotiating, managing change, setting goals and standards, and managing conflict (83) The question in this KFL report would based criteria-based training (the training differs from other kinds of training, measures leadership

in specific performance skills areas selected as those needed by high-performing leaders The training program is given, included six domains: managing change, communicating effectively, setting goals and standards, coaching and counseling, influencing and negotiating, and managing conflict) to have effective results (84)

Through KFL assessment, HR specialist can understand leadership needs, design criterion-based training, evaluate training as well as determine suitable method to have best leader performance In term of increasing soft skill training for leaders, video training (leadership training, which provide a wide array of valuable resources), laboratory training, intergroup training, coverdale training ( build a system where trainee can learn from actual experience) would be used to have great effectiveness

4.2 Short-term solution: Improving leader-follower relationship

Firstly, it is important to reschedule time to set fix time for weekly internal meeting

It is suitable time for being face to face, increasing engagement, reviewing what and how job have done all week, giving feedbacks in time, exchanging opinions to improving skills, enhancing internal communication and supporting in need In each meeting, the manager also clearly identifies the role and responsibility of individual with each project or weekly goal Secondly, to improve relationship between leaders and team as enhancing teamwork spirit, it is necessary to have more outdoor activities and teambuilding By reinforced

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leader-employees relationship, employees will not only have more motivation to contributing for business success but also help employees feel more comfortable to share opinions and exchange ideas with leaders

The better leader-follower relationship, the higher satisfaction of followers Therefore, they would be willing to put more extra effort to increase the quality and the quantity of their performance (85) It means that leader-follower relationship can affect to employer satisfaction, retention, loyalty, commitment and individual performance Besides, leader-follower relationships can influence to the ability, contribution of the staff to achieve common goals and develop leadership skills (86)The high-quality relationships can help leader shape exactly organization strategy as well as greatly improve organizational results such as company performance, job satisfaction and especially reduced turnover ratios.(87, 88)

Thirdly, manager need to create working environment based on mutual goal setting, sharing and supporting, not just receiving request and adhering from top to down

In other hand, in each team, supervisors need to build mutual goal and team spirit to motivate team contribute ideas and efforts They also need to spend more time caring and understanding salesmen‘s desire

With building up this short-term solution, the benefit and cost like analysis below

Benefit

- It can make manager and employees get closely, increase engagement among salesmen

- Staff can have opportunity to share idea, difficulty, learn and gain experience

together and from the manager

- It can give employees great chance to perform their better

- Managers not only can have more time to care and understand their staff but also give feedback in time to enhance team effective

- Giving staff opportunity to share their perception, accept or refuse assignment immediately and creating openness and comfort atmosphere in sale team

4.3 Long-term solution: Solution for training, emphasizing soft skill and

enhancing leader relationship

Besides internal meeting and team building activities like short-term solution, Human Resources Department will work with Sales Department to give more training issues to improve soft-skill and working performance of manager, supervisor and salesmen Especially, according to Mr Phuong, in sale department, because of the high pressure and volume of work, managers and supervisors rarely join some soft-skill training issues They just updated new products, policy It is also crucial to set up common box mail for managers and supervisor can get daily feedback and respond as soon as possible to staff

Discussing with Ms Giang, benefit and cost analysis like below:

Benefit: Besides some benefit like short-term solution, long-term benefit can give:

- This comprehensive solution can improve lack of soft-skill training and leader- employee relationship issue

- Managers and supervisors can enhance their management skill from practical and