On October 27, 2021, UNIQLO Vietnam held an online lecture with the MBA program of VJU（http://mba.vju.ac.vn/）on the topic of “Business Launch and Human Resource Development”. This is the first session in the series of three lectures from UNIQLO Vietnam at VJU.
UNIQLO launched its business in Vietnam in December 2019 with its first store in Ho Chi Minh City. The expansion project to Vietnam began in mid-2018, and after a year and a half of preparation, UNIQLO finally came to Vietnam with anticipation of a positive customer response.
UNIQLO Vietnam’s Chief Financial Officer, Mr. Shota Miura gave his lecture via Google Meet with the attendance of VJU’s MBA lecturers and students, discussing on the new market entry and human resources development strategies of UNIQLO.
After a brief introduction about himself, he presented the overview of Fast Retailing Group and UNIQLO. He emphasized the “LifeWear” philosophy, which is one of the competitive advantages of UNIQLO. He also analyzed the difference of mission, vision and values, and he advised VJU students to consider their individual aspiration with the companies’ values for the culture fit.
In his lecture, Mr. Shota explained a common market entry framework in management theory and how UNIQLO applied it in the case of Vietnam market, including its important philosophy that “Being a part of local community where UNIQLO operates business”. Therefore, it reflects The unique features that UNIQLO has in Vietnam include store design collaborated with a famous Vietnamese architect, products with Vietnamese features and partner factories in Vietnam.
Regarding the human resources development, UNIQLO believes retail business is “people business”. Mr. Shota described the “Global One – ZEN-IN KEIEI” management principle of the company in which every employee is encouraged to engage in the decision making process. UNIQLO also embraces the diversity, culture fit and common respect in the workplace. Finally, Mr. Shota analyzed the difference between Manager and Leader. All employees at UNIQLO are expected to become a ‘Leader’.
During the lecture, Mr. Shota introduced UNIQLO Manager Candidate program in the lecture. This program recruits fresh graduate to come to UNIQLO’s Headquarter in Japan for training so that candidates are able to get closer to company vision and principles.
In each chapter of Mr. Shota’s lecture, he gave attendees time for discussion before he came up with the answers. The question and answer session also has some interesting questions from VJU’s MBA students and lecturers. Mr. Shota provided some valuable insights of the company entry strategies and some questions related to his next lecture on supply chain management and sustainability will be further discussed later.
Schedule of the next lectures of UNIQLO Vietnam:
Middle November: Supply Chain Management
Middle December: Sustainability
Student’s report (MBA website)
http://mba.vju.ac.vn/uniqlo-vietnam—the-journey-from-japan/