Panelists talk about building workforce resilience at the Best Places to Work summit in HCM City on November 9. Photo courtesy of Anphabe

HCM CITY — Despite a challenging business environment, many companies have improved employee compensation schemes compared to 2021, according to the Vietnam Best Places to Work survey.

The survey was conducted by Anphabe, a consulting firm providing Employer Brand and Happy Workforce solutions, from April to September 2022 with the participation of 57,939 professionals, 515 companies and in-depth interviews with about 150 leaders and managers in 20 industries.

It showed that as of September, 56 per cent of the workforce reported increases in salary, 38 per cent remained stable, and 6 per cent of employees experienced salary decreases or unstable income.

This shows the great efforts of companies in the aftermath of the COVID-19, given that only 35 per cent of the workforce received a pay raise last year while those who suffered from instability or loss of income climbed to 15 per cent.

Human resource practitioners shared a more optimistic view for 2023, when salary increases are expected to be 12 per cent on average.

Beside salary, businesses have pushed hard to allow 90 per cent of employees to receive annual bonuses, with almost 70 per cent able to earn bonus as expected or higher than the average of 1.4 months of salary.

For the next six months to one year, the turnover rate is expected to drop to 17 per cent compared to a rate of 23 per cent right after the pandemic.

Many organisations have been doing better at strategy planning and future orientation, resulting in a rise in the Employees’ Trust Index from 44 per cent in Q3 last year to 75 per cent by the end of September this year.

Vietnamese employees are increasingly stressed-out, with 42 per cent of polled employees experiencing stress ‘often’ to ‘very often’, according to the survey.

The middle managers group and employee group with two to five years of tenure are the most stressed.

By industry, materials manufacturing and banking are the two industries that have the highest rate of stressed employees, following by chemicals manufacturing, pharmaceutical, and construction and architecture.

The increasing stress level has a profound effect on the quality of human resources, forcing companies to seriously review the current schemes that take care of employee well-being.

“The comprehensive health of the workforce directly affects the health of the organisation, from short-term business performance to sustainable development. Therefore, taking care of employees’ well-being is an essential strategy and should be focused on immediately,” said Thanh Nguyễn, CEO & Chief Happiness Officer at Anphabe.

Việt Nam Best Places to Work 2022 award

Anphabe and market research firm Intage Vietnam on November 9 announced the list of 100 Best Places to Work in Việt Nam.

Abbott Laboratories GmbH gained the top spot followed by Nestlé Việt Nam, Vietcombank, Viettel, Suntory PepsiCo Việt Nam, Coca-Cola Việt Nam, Samsung Vina, FPT, Techcombank, and Vingroup.

Companies that continue to lead their industries include Manulife Vietnam (insurance industry), PNJ Group (retail/wholesale/trading industry), Viettel Group (hardware technology/infrastructure/telecom industry), Samsung Vina Electronics (electronics/hi-tech/utilities industry), and Maersk Việt Nam (transportation/logistics industry).

Companies that made remarkable breakthroughs to be listed in Top 100 Việt Nam Best Places to Work for the first time include Pernod Ricard Việt Nam, Home Credit Việt Nam, VietinBank, DHG Pharmaceutical JSC, Masterise Homes, and Newtecons Investment Construction JSC. — VNS