Translator: Gia Bảo Nguyễn Hữu Reviewer: Nguyen Trang
You could show me your hand if you have ever been in a maze. Wow!
So most people, maybe seventy percent of you
have been in a maze.
Well, look at the green dot at the corner.
Imagine you're there.
And you're in some kind of education program or system.
You may be at your university.
Maybe your training.
Maybe you've got an internship.
But your vision, really, is to get to the red dot.
What is that red dot?
Well that red dot is a career of your choice
in a sector that you enjoy and you're interested in.
And I think above all, a job that is meaningful
or a business that you start that is meaningful to you.
I think if we think about some of the really successful people
who've gone from university or education over to employment
actually not many of them started thinking,
"I just want to be rich"
Some of them did
but it was usually those people that didn't make it.
Usually the people with the real passion
like Microsoft and Google, starting in garages.
Yeah?
Think about that. And I want you just to think about
your journey from education through to employment.
Now there's one thing that we definitely know
about employment in the 21st century.
It's unstable. It moves.
Companies go to different countries to outsource their goods and services.
And that means that you have to be very dynamic.
And you have to really think about your journey through that maze.
Can you remember being maybe 4 or 5 years old
and your teacher or your mom and dad said,
"So, what do you want to be?"
Now put your hand up again if you ever said
"I want to be an astronaut."
Oh! Wow!
We've got at least 15 astronauts in the room.
My next question is are any of you astronauts?
(Laughter)
No. I'm sorry.
Well, that's kind of a dream that we have as a child.
Wonderful song from a UK singer.
And there's a line in it, and it goes,
"While we're living,
the dreams we have as children fade away."
Now I know we all experience that to some extent.
Things don't always work out the way we want them to.
But I think a way to view this is we're trying to go
from education into employment,
we have to realize our own limitations.
I just want to tell you about my brother.
Well, he's 2 meters and 10 centimeters tall.
And he's my younger brother.
Which is a bit embarrassing for me,
because I'm not as tall as him.
Because he's so tall, he's found it very difficult
to do something that's very simple in my country,
and that's learn to drive.
Beause all the cars are too small for him.
And he's having to learn to drive in a truck.
Now he can't change his height, he can't cut his legs off
or become shorter, so he has to accept that limitation.
But there are advantages to that, too.
He gets a huge amount of respect, especially in Vietnam for being so tall.
Think about yourself in your education setting.
There are some things you are simply not very good at,
and you have to work really hard to do, to be better at.
There are actually very few that you can't make better,
and I think that's proven by people
who do remarkable things with remarkable constraints.
How many of you remember the guy
that visited Vietnam last year?
Nick Vujicic, I hope I say his name right.
And, this man has no arms and legs,
yet has achieved incredible things.
But even he, I'm sure, would say
that there are some things that he couldn't do,
or that he's not good at.
But he can do remarkable things despite his limitations.
So I'm asking you, if you are over there,
you're in education at the moment,
and you want to be in the circle, which is where employment is and jobs are
maybe jobs you create, maybe jobs you do for other people.
Don't lose your dream,
but maybe accept that you might not become an astronaut.
It seems to me -
somebody here still wants to be.
(Laughter)
Keep going. It might happen.
So I'm trying to suggest, mold your dreams,
and let them be flexible,
and work to your strengths, give yourself room to grow.
Because what's happening now
is Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam [are] part of a global market.
Just in the last few months I've met people
from companies from Denmark, Spain, Sweden, Norway, Brazil.
All over the country, all over the world,
people are actually coming here.
And they're coming here because of the diversity,
the good standard level of education and the talent.
Because it exists here in Ha Noi,
and those companies are coming in,
and also Vietnamese companies are innovating.
The small private companies are innovating.
So the journey from education
through that maze we saw at the beginning,
is quite interesting and quite difficult.
Let's look at the handshake.
How many of you have shaken a hand today?
Give me your hand up
if you have shaken somebody's hand this morning.
Now that's interesting.
Well, I'm English,
and we don't really feel very comfortable,
unless we know somebody, having a hug.
Unless we really want to hug them, in case we might like it.
So, fortunately,
we like to shake hands.
And that's a formal way of introducing.
But in Vietnam, with my Vietnamese friends,
I've noticed that there isn't so much of formality
with the introduction.
I was speaking to one of the other speakers earlier,
and I was saying, "How do we actually greet each other in Vietnam?"
And I worked out that often that we nod.
"Chào anh." "Chào." "Xin chào." "Chào"
And we sort of keep a distance.
So I understand that reserve, because the British are like that,
and so are the Vietnamese, it's a shared habit.
Americans, on the other hand, any Americans here?
Lovely people.
"Hey, how are you? Good to meet you!"
They find meeting people so easy, don't they?
Well, a skill to be so naturally friendly.
Well, put yourself in one situation now.
I'm going to imagine that you are all people
who want to make that journey from university or training into a job.
Now, imagine you're in that situation.
And you're at home, on your iPad or on your laptop, typing away.
And you spot an opportunity.
You're a marketing student, and you think,
right, I've got to get a job in marketing.
I've got to do it, my parents are breathing down my neck.
They spent all this money on my education,
I've been studying English for years, I've just got to do it.
You're not really sure how to get there.
Well I'm going to give you 3 very simple tips that I think can help.
And I think they can help in context of Hà Nội, and context of Vietnam.
There you are, on your computer.
You find a conference.
It's on, for example, Giảng Võ Street.
You know, the conference center.
And it's a marketing trade fair, all marketers are going to be there.
All the big companies are going to be there
trying to get business from other people, from each other.
And you sat in your pajamas, drinking tea or coffee, on your laptop.
And you think, "Yeah, I want to work for one of those companies."
Well I think the first thing that perhaps needs to happen
is for you to move into your area of discomfort.
Haven't we just heard about that?
Getting uncomfortable.
Now one of the hardest things to do, and this is step 1, is to go to an event
where we don't know anybody,
where we know we've got less experience
than everyone else there,
and where we're not really sure what would happen.
Well my recommendation, and this has worked for me,
and it's worked for people I know, and I think it's helpful.
Go to that event on Giảng Võ Street.
Turn up and do two things.
Talk to strangers.
Meet them, and find out why they're there.
Don't go and ask for a job.
Don't go and say, "I'm looking for a job in this area"
Go and speak to people.
Go and ask them,
"Is the trade conference useful for you?
Did you find any new marketing partners?
Was it helpful meeting people?"
Because what we see at the moment is new companies coming in
as I've mentioned, to Vietnam, and new opportunities
for talented young people like yourselves.
But you have to make them aware of you
without just simply asking for work or sending a CV.
So go and speak and talk and ask questions.
Maybe you want a business card, and you see someone, you think,
"Oh, I recognize that person."
They're over there, they look very important.
You know, VIPs have a VIP look, don't they?
And you think, oh, how am I going to approach them?
And you know you need to get their information.
But you don't want to go over like this.
You know...
You want to go over and you want to get something from them.
So try this: don't go and ask for their business card.
Maybe you can ask them, "Oh, it was really interesting,
the event today.
How can I find out more about your project?
Is there any way I can have a tour or find out more about your company
and see if we work out more about what you do?"
Go in from a different angle, go in from an educational perspective.
Because the relationship between the employer and the employee
is also changing.
You are not just staff, as many as my Vietnamese friends "my staffs".
You're not just staff,
you are part and can be part of these new companies,
and innovative Vietnamese companies that are changing the way they work.
Because I think Vietnam has definitely got the potential to rival and to -
what we see is happening in Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand.
There's the passion here, definitely.
Now you've got the business card.
And you're feeling really really pleased with yourself,
because you've managed to speak to the VIP.
Well, what a lot of people do in this situation is after the event,
they go and have some coffee with their friends and they say,
"Oh, it was great. I learned so much. I met all these important people."
And then they go back to school or their internship or their work
and they don't follow it up.
There's your opportunity to make a connection with somebody in your sector.
And that's something you can do
so that you can move from the education area.
You can move from being an inexperienced trainee or intern
while making connections with people
that you previously felt were inaccessible.
It is a maze, it is definitely a maze.
I probably speak to,
maybe 50 or 60 people between the age of 16 and 35 each week,
sometimes more sometimes less.
And in my capacity, as somebody,
who has to try and give them something to take away that's useful.
The first thing I ask them is, "So what are you studying?"
"Finance", first answer. The next student comes in.
"So what are you studying Minh?" "Oh teacher, I'm studying Economics"
Oh, finance, economics.
Next student comes in. "Chao anh. Hello, nice to meet you".
"Hello. What are you studying now?" "Oh, Economics."
Oh, I heard that one before.
Next day a few more come in.
"Oh, it's Phuong Anh.
Hello, Phuong Anh. Nice to meet you Phuong Anh.
What are you studying now Phuong Anh?"
"Finance."
Oh, what a surprise.
Well, it is a surprise to me and something I was so shocked by.
After being here, about 3 years,
I realized that probably 80% of the young people I meet
are studying 3 subjects.
Right now let's try it.
Put your hand up if you studied Finance, or Economics.
And put your hand up proudly.
I would say, "Ối giời ơi" at this moment.
(Laughter)
I think I've proved my point somewhat.
Remember that with all these new companies coming into Vietnam,
and with all these interesting projects going on -
NGOs, private companies, global mutinationals,
small start-ups, tech start-ups -
you are in an opportunity to connect with all kinds of sectors.
OK. And when you're thinking about your journey from education
through to employment,
even if you are stuck with an Economics degree.
I wish I was stuck with an Economics degree. I'm not.
Even if you're stuck with it, you can always change direction.
So remember these things about your market.
Remember it's unstable, it's changing and the work will change.
Perhaps just have in mind previous generation's working habit.
My father's generation, and I think it's the same
for a lot of people in Vietnam.
Did your parents work for one company most of their lives?
Yeah? Did they perhaps have mainly only 3 different jobs during that time?
A junior job, a middling job.
And then maybe when they retired, the top job.
Yeah.
That's changing. And that's changing globally.
And you're now part of a mobile, talented, intelligent workforce
that spans the whole world.
And don't be shy to use a handshake like that with a stranger.
I wish you a lot of luck and good fortune
navigating the maze and try to network
in a way that takes you to new opportunities
that you previously didn't think existed.
Thank you for listening.
(Applause)