Building a positive company culture is not only building a business brand and a national image, but an effective bridge for local enterprises to sustain development and integrate successfully into the global economy.

This is the consensus among experts and business leaders at a conference on building corporate culture in nine provinces and cities in the Red River Delta on Tuesday in Ha Noi.

Nowadays company culture is not only a buzzword but an important differentiator to set a company apart from others. It is the “soul of a business”, deciding the long-term success of enterprises. It is what attracts talents and customers.

Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc in 2016 launched the campaign on building business culture among Vietnamese enterprises and decided to name November 10 annually as Vietnamese Business Culture Day.

The campaign aims to raise awareness of the role of the company culture as a basic and critical requirement for sustainable development and enhancing competitiveness.

According to Mac Quoc Anh, vice chairman and general secretary of the Ha Noi Association of Small and Medium Enterprises (Hanoisme), Vietnamese enterprises have long-standing tradition with key products bearing Vietnamese culture.

Business leaders are paying higher attention to building culture through setting up labour regulations, organising training and corporate social responsibility programmes.

“We must build our own identity or people don’t know that is a Vietnamese enterprise or a Vietnamese product,” Anh told Viet Nam News.

Many countries and territories are investing in Viet Nam and they all want to cooperate with companies with good culture, he said, adding that if companies did not have their own culture, they would be influenced by foreign culture when receiving foreign investment.

“Technology and products are changing rapidly to be competitive but culture must always be maintained and developed,” Anh said. As the whole economy is advancing into the digital age, Anh suggested companies use technologies to build and advertise their culture to the world.

Dang Thuy Ha, director and client leadership of Northern Region Nielsen Vietnam, also raised a question: “Business leaders always think about business strategy but have you thought about the culture strategy?”

Corporate culture had been proven to positively impact business results, Ha said, emphasising the companies with high scores in the set of indicators measuring corporate culture (strategy, market adaptability, intrinsic values, leadership style, enjoyment and solidarity) have better business performance.

“Everything in the company can be copied except for culture. It’s time for business leaders to pay attention to developing corporate culture,” Ha said.

Sharing experience in developing company culture of FPT Corporation, Bui Nguyen Phuong Chau said to go global, Vietnamese companies needed to determine the core values of the company, promote outstanding characteristics of Vietnamese people (smart and high adaptability) and absorb international standards to apply at work.

Speaking at the conference, vice chairman of Ha Noi People’s Committee Le Hong Son said the city was exerting efforts to promote investment, improve the business environment and develop businesses.

In the later months of this year, the city would continue improving the quality of business culture and hoped to get enthusiastic response from the business community in the locality and nine other provinces and cities.

The conference also witnessed the signing of cooperation agreements to implement the campaign to build Vietnamese business culture between the campaign organisation and nine provinces and cities in the Red River Delta.

They include Ha Noi, Thai Binh, Hung Yen, Hai Duong, Nam Dinh, Ha Nam, Ninh Binh, Bac Ninh and Hai Phong. – VNS