Interro de marketing en anglais.

Question 1 :

The main idea of the case is the cross-cultural challenges in a project management process between different partners (both from the North and the South).

The countries involved are France and Vietnam. They are part of a cooperation in different projects managed in Vietnam by a French non-governemental organization (GRET).

This cooperation is working in the agriculture sector offering collective services to farmers (seed-production and selling, fish breeding, animal insurance for stockbreeders). Then they operates in the agroalimentary sector to reduce chronic malnutrition by creating production sites and distribution networkds of quality infant food. The last one is about micro-finance from the financial sector.

Question 2 :

Cooperation difficulties :

French people criticize the difficulties of mimicking their practices in Vietnam.

• The problem here is that they do not try to adapt to the new environment because they think that they can just move their practices to naother country without considering the differences between cultures.

Vietnamian people complaining about French people for their lack of experience in the field, they concentrate only in the office work

• The technical experience (working in the field) is very important but in fact, if there is a lack of experience in the field which affects the results,  that will be considered as a problem but if the efficiency of French people is the same, then, it is not considered as a problem but just as a difference in working.

French people complain about the Vietnamese partners’ lack of initiative

• We consider that is a problem for both parts because French people will consider the inequity of work always thinking that they have to do the job themselves.
• It creates a time consuming problem with both parts expecting something from with other part. The French are expecting Vietnamese people to be autonomous and do their work themselves because they are working in an individual autonomy system with each worker redefining its own work whereas the Vietnames are expecting the French to give them explanations about what they have to do because they work in a social network with specific hierarchy, obligations and tasks.

French people feel betrayed from Vietnamese partners during meetings because they change their mind compared to what they had earlier agreed upon

• It can be considered as a problem because it creates misconfidence. French people support each other in a team while Vietnamese people do not attach too much importance in the team partners’ relations.

Individual autonomy versus social network :

For Vietnamese, it is difficult to express their real opinion to a higher manager position if they have a different opinion. Contradiction is really delicate for them whereas for French people, it is not difficult to express their real opinion.

• We think it is a problem because it affects the transparency of the relationship between employees and also with their managers. French people consider Vietnamese people as incoherent in their convictions.

Work ethic :

We found differences in their way to implement tasks. French people just care about to do the mission and not about how to do it. If the French manager tries to explain the work with overly detailed instructions, it could be considered as a lack of confidence. On another hand, Vietnamese expect very detailed instructions from their manager. They care about doing well the tasks.

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