People Matter EP05 | Bất cập của chuyển đổi số với nhân viên | Tracey Trang Đỗ - GĐ Nhân sự Shopee

As an employee of an e-commerce company, instead of giving you a vague recruitment criteria, you should eliminate the factors that you think you can train internally in the company. A company that invests in technology and HR management, the first thing I think of is the HR information system. The transfer period is the most time-consuming period. And if you don't go through that hardship, you won't achieve the results. Data is very helpful in HR management. A new content from Viet Success talks about the important themes of HR, including the closely related aspects of effective business operations with top experts and HR managers from leading companies in Vietnam. People Matter, the first season, covers the important themes in the field of HR, with the company's strategic partner, Uptrend, solving the first-class business space in Vietnam. I'm Minh Giang, the co-founder of Newin, and also the host of this show. And today, I'm very honored to welcome a guest, a friend that I've known for almost 5 years. And right now, she's the HR manager at Shopee, Tracy Do. Hello everyone, I'm Tracy. I've been working at Shopee for about 6 years. Before I joined Shopee, I spent a lot of time studying and working in Singapore. The 6-year journey back to Vietnam and working at Shopee is a very memorable time, and perhaps the most memorable time in my career so far. I'm very honored to be on the show today to be able to share my story and the stories surrounding HR. Thank you very much, Tracy. And I know that you started this job, this career, with the role of working at a leading consulting company in the US, right? That's right. Before I joined Shopee, I had a pretty long time, about 6 years, working for a consulting company in the US, and I also had the opportunity to work in many different offices in Vietnam, Singapore, and even for a short period of time, I worked in Africa until I moved to an e-commerce business like Shopee. A lot of people have asked, if my starting point was another job, management consulting, would it be difficult for me to move to the HR industry? Actually, when I was working at a consulting company, my role was to hire consultants for the company. It was very different from working in an e-commerce company. In the whole process, I only knew one type of profile, which was consultants, where they would learn from the best consultants, or have experience working in big companies around the world, and then they would go to the company and go all over the place to advise customers in many industries and places. So when you go through an environment like e-commerce, you will see that the jobs in an e-commerce company are very diverse. From those who do business, including marketing and business development, to those who are behind the operation of the supply chain, as well as how to ensure that the customers are taken care of and delivered well, there are many different positions at the beginning of the job. At the beginning, I had to spend some time to find out what each office was doing. The way I found out was very simple. I just talked to people. I talked to people who were in this office, who were doing business development. So business development in e-commerce is done with whom? It has to be done with e-commerce sellers. And marketing, with whom? It will be the people who buy, how to attract people to buy in e-commerce, and then run it. The people who run it are the ones who are behind the whole story. When you are in the position of an e-commerce user, you will not know those people. You just care about the fact that today I have an appointment. I want to have an appointment in two days. But to make that whole chain happen, there is a very large team that does the operation work. They ensure that each step, from the payment, from the packaging, the transportation of your product, it goes smoothly. So when I talk to the first step people, I try to understand what they are doing in those positions, those offices, and what factors, qualities, or requirements they are looking for, so that they can build a larger team day by day, according to the development of the company, from when the company was small to when it has a little bit of growth, and it becomes more well-known to everyone. So I can hear from what Tracy said, when you are a HR director for a company that develops fast, like e-commerce, like Shopee, then the HR person has to understand everything about the operations, as well as the business, the quality. For example, as Tracy said, you have to understand what is behind it. When a product is delivered, there is a whole operation behind it. Right? How to arrange, pack, and so on. So with the development, with the rapid development of e-commerce like Shopee, for Tracy, as a HR director, what factors do you think you need to have to ensure that you update and develop quickly? First of all, I have to be the user of the product. Because all technology companies have their own product. So in the position of HR, you have to be the user of that product, and you have to update the new features of that product to know how your company's product has developed. Secondly, I will accompany the company's leadership team to find the right people to develop our company. The e-commerce industry in Vietnam has been around for more than 10 years. But in fact, the human resources of this industry are not very abundant in the market. If you follow the universities in Vietnam, a few years ago, there were a few universities that included e-commerce in their teaching programs. However, the teachers seem to be taking materials from foreign books, or from what the teachers know. In fact, the speed of e-commerce development is much faster than a 4-year program of a university student. So even though there are training loops, but when you work in an e-commerce company, it's a shame that there's still a gap, because the speed of development is too fast. So when you graduate from that program, the outside world may be more developed, right? That's right. We don't have a lot of human resources to provide for the e-commerce industry. So, as a human resource of an e-commerce company, if you talk to the leadership team, to the management of the company, they will, instead of giving you requirements or requirements that are a bit far-fetched, like the 5-year e-commerce experience is hard to find, you should give up the elements that you think you can train internally in the company. And you should look for employees with their own potential. As long as they are able to learn, and learn quickly, and can work with numbers, so that when they join the company, they are placed in the right positions. And from there, you have training programs to have a human resource that is suitable for the company. Thirdly, with an e-commerce company or a technology company, the speed of development is also very fast. I see that I am a very lucky person. When I joined the company when it was still small, when people didn't know about it, and I developed with the company, besides that, I also built a team of people who worked with me and developed with the company. As a human resource, I also gave advice to the leaders and managers. At this time, when you are in a large company, it is much more difficult to find a suitable person compared to when I was small and there were people who had the potential to develop with me. On the other hand, I think one of the things that we need to pay more attention to is the problem of how to train people and create a path for them to develop or a business development path at the company. With the experience that Tracy has had, especially in the past 6 years at Shopee, Tracy has had the experience since Shopee was small, right? Until now, Shopee is very big. According to Tracy, what is the most important foundation for companies to start thinking about investing in technology? Because many companies, especially Vietnamese businesses, invest in technology in sales or management, but in fact, investing in human resources or management of people and human resources is still something quite far-fetched or people don't really invest and focus on it. If a company invests in technology and invests in human resources management, the first thing I think of is HRIS, HR Information System. When your company's scale is not too large, it will partly help you manage your employees. You will know how many employees you actually have. Your employees have their own personal information. And when the employees leave the company, you can get all the information from a small to large data set to analyze why employees quit their jobs. Why do they quit their jobs? Or which employees come from which schools or which fields that make them work in your company and succeed in your company more than others? Then, things like gender equality or gender in the company, those are the basic information about HR management. From the HRIS platform, companies can gradually add other parts, such as performance management, evaluation management, employee performance management, and management of employees who quit their jobs, or management of other things. Now, there are many companies in the world that provide softwares for HR management. It depends on the company's scale and the needs of the company. Companies can use the basics to create a complex system that can manage the whole life of an employee in the company. So companies will start thinking about digital transactions as well as technology applications. They will start with the HRIS system, which is the employee's information management system, right? The transfer period is the shortest. And if you don't go through that hardship, you won't achieve results. We will start from the leadership level. You can invest. Invest in the evaluation system and manage the efficiency of the company. What about Shopee, Tracy? I think we should talk about Shopee's story from 6 years ago. Now, after 6 years, Shopee is so big. Tracy, do you think the first steps, the first tasks to start bringing technology in at that time, faced with obstacles and disadvantages? Anyone who has been familiar with a process for a long time and they have done well with their process... They don't want to change, right? They are used to the process. And on the other hand, when a new system is born, it will always be flawed. It will not be perfect the first time it is released. Even if you are an employee or a producer, you make that product, that system, you may be very good, but there will always be this and that that needs time to be adjusted. On the one hand, I am doing my job well with the ready-made processes. I don't want to change. On the other hand, there are mistakes. And on the other hand, now I have to use this system, but this system is not perfect. It is always a battle between two sides. On the one hand, the side that has done well has no time. I am in a role, sometimes I am in the middle of those stories. And I will be in a role, I feel that if I look at the future, I need to do everything through the system. I can't do it manually like that with an Excel file. Because there will be errors from people. For example, if I was still young, I could still do that. But when it comes to the fact that my company has doubled or tripled, I can't just rely on Excel files. I have to go through the system. And in addition to reducing the risks, the errors caused by people, it will also save time for you. However, the initial phase, when the transfer phase is the most time-consuming phase. And if you don't invest time and don't go through that hardship, you won't achieve the result. There is a saying, No pain, no gain. If you don't go through the hardship, you won't succeed. So you have to go through the phase where you won't get used to the system. You will find yourself in a place that is not perfect. It's not perfect to go for a day. Everyone is used to the system. I've seen this happen a lot in my work. For example, in the past, I didn't have a system to store the information of the employees in the company. So each of my employees would store the employee's profile in their own machine. Then one day, the weather forecast said that from now on, everything would have to go through the system. All the employees would be recruited through the company's website. From then on, they would be transferred through the system. Anyone who interviewed them would have to go through the system to be evaluated. In the past, after the interview, the interviewers would return to their work. They would say, Okay, what do you think of the employee? Then the employee would write back the other person's comment. But now, we don't accept that anymore. After the interview, an email would be sent to remind them to fill in their comments. A few days later, they still haven't done it. There's still an email reminding them. Until when do they have to do it? They have to do everything to get to the final step, which is to invite the employees to work. In my company, we were also transferred at a relatively early stage. Although there were some difficulties, it was still early enough to be transferred in time before everything became a lot more complex. So what I've heard is if you have a chance, you should do it early, right? You can't do it when you have two companies, two or three, but you can still use it in a very manual way. I'm very curious about the journey that Tracy just shared. It's called no pain, no gain. It's not painful. So what are the pains that Tracy observed during the digital transformation or the application of technology in HR? What are the pains that Tracy thought she would always have to go through? And when you have such a pain, how do you get medicine to treat it? Most technology companies all have a messaging system so that employees can communicate with each other. Some companies will use the messaging system from an external partner, or some companies will do it themselves. Shopee, Shopee's mother company is Cirrus. Cirrus has developed an application called C-Talk which is a part for employees to communicate through messaging. It's an application that is both on the phone and on the computer. The transition period is a bit difficult because there are some people who work with internal people in the company, so they have to work with external people and they can't use the C-Talk because this is mainly internal in the company. But now, the C-Talk is available to external people. At first, they asked us to switch from a chat format that everyone can use to a company-only format. It takes a lot of time because we have to maintain both of them at the same time. When we chat with people in the company, we chat with external partners. It takes a lot of time because we use 2-3 different apps. There are also some more strict forms where if you still message from an external partner, the leader or manager will not reply and you don't have to use the company's app. You always start with the leader's team, right? If anything changes, you start with the leader's team. Later on, this app is getting better and better. It's not just simple, it helps you communicate with each other by sending e-mails or arranging a meeting. You can communicate with each other by sending e-mails or arranging a meeting. You can communicate with each other by sending e-mails or arranging a meeting. You can communicate with each other by sending e-mails or arranging a meeting. You can communicate with each other by sending e-mails or arranging a meeting. You can communicate with each other by sending e-mails or arranging a meeting. You can communicate with each other by sending e-mails or arranging a meeting. The IT team provides equipment for you when you need it to work or repair something. It has many more features. It's the first thing you can open when you start working. It's the first thing you can open when you start working. It's the first thing you can open when you start working. It's the first thing you can open if you build it as Shopee is doing it. Right. For businesses who don't have a home like Shopee and Tracy mentioned, what are the functions that you imagine in markets and you assume that turnover will bring a lot of value As far as chatting is concerned, the technology companies are young people and they tend to prefer to chat rather than answering the phone. Because you can chat with many people at the same time while you can only talk to one person on the phone, right? That's fast. Yeah. That's right. You can also chat on the phone. The problem with chatting is that if you have a chat app with a limited email address, only then can people log in. Each company will have a separate account. For example, this will help the company's security. For example, if an employee quits his job, he will automatically lose his job. It's better than using apps that anyone can sign up for. What if the company has 100 employees and you can't remember the name of the person who quit his job and there's still confidential information that you accidentally sent to a group of people to chat with many people, it's not good. When chatting, I see that learning online has changed everything after COVID-19. It makes people feel less frustrated about having to stay in the office all the time. It's definitely better to have direct meetings. But online meetings will give you an incentive. Even if your company is 100% working, there's no case where there's an employee or someone else in that meeting and for some reason, they can't show up at the company. You can still continue the meeting. It's not because of that reason that you have to cancel that meeting. It might affect other plans in your work. The third thing that I see in the management system is performance management. Performance management. Yes. Performance management. But before going to performance management, the company has to make a KPI or an assessment first before going to performance management. Why performance management? I mean the system. The system will help you keep up with the development process of the employee. If the company is small, you can still do it through Excel or through files that you store yourself. However, you have to make sure that you have a place to store an employee's work process to see how they develop and their work performance over time. If you can invest, invest in an assessment system and management system. Yes. I've heard that in any industry, the first thing is to make sure that you invest in communication, right? The second is online meetings. I think most companies are investing after COVID-19. But what's new here is that Tracy said that we should invest in performance management, which is the tool, the technology to manage output and the reason behind it. We can see the development process of that employee in history. Why should I invest in performance management? With fast-growing companies, there are more changes, which means more questions about your career. If you want to do something for the company, you have to get familiar with the HR department first. You have to get feedback from your team first. Why should I invest in performance management? Is there any difference in the use of technology to help your team work together in a clear and fast way? In Shopee, as Tracy said, we have a platform. But I wonder if there's anything different in Shopee to help you work together in a fast-paced way and meet the needs of the Gen Z generation and the young generation now. It's not a common model for all teams and departments of Shopee. It's different because of your work ethic. For example, those who specialize in technology will have their own systems to communicate on a product or a project that you're working on. For example, there will be a very clear timeline and you can all comment on your suggestions online so that other people can see them. After you complete the project, all of those comments will be saved. As for other departments, for example, the operations team, everything will follow the process. We also have a system of a partner outside to update the process. Every step, the process of processing customer's request or the process of processing customer's return will be saved on a system. This is a specialized system to update the process. Every time you change a product or a company's policy, the process will be updated very quickly. All the people working on the project can know what's going on and have the right to comment on the process. For HR, we usually write a lot of notes. We will put the notes on Google Drive. For example, everyone in the team can review the notes together to know who did what and how. This is the nature of a company. You can work anywhere because everything is done online. Now, I think technology companies will have to consider how to work anywhere to be able to work online and have enough technology or tools to support their work without being limited in geography or space. How do you apply successful technology, Tracy? What are the factors that you think people and culture need to prepare to ensure they don't go through the pain of breaking a record? What are the factors that people and culture need to prepare? First of all, employees always have a spirit of challenge with changes. Changes always happen. I think for fast-growing companies, the more changes there are, the more challenges they face. Secondly, when there are changes that are too big or because of pressure or because there is not enough time to make changes, try to do it with a small size, a small number. Test it. Try it with a small number, a small number of employees or a small team. If you think it's successful, or if there's anything you need to change, do it before you can use it for many people. Even if you change the number or deploy technology in HR, as Tracy said, you can start with a small team and test it first. For example, in Shopee, there are many different systems related to HR, related to people. Shopee also operates in many countries and many different countries. Sometimes, when deploying this or that, we will choose one or two countries to test it first before deploying it to many other countries. In terms of staff, or in terms of labor ethics, of course, each country is different. But try to find something that is the most common. Test it with a small number before you deploy it to everyone. Or if you do something that is big for the company, test it with HR first. Because you will be the main deployer. Test it with HR first. You have to get feedback from your team first. If you can, you will be the most loyal to each other in terms of feedback before you introduce it to the company. There is an opinion that at some point, HR will be the job that will be replaced by AI and new technology. But HR at that time may be unemployed or don't need much anymore. What do you think about this opinion? Especially in a company about technology, like Shopee. This question is very interesting because 2 or 3 weeks ago, I read an article by McKinsey about this topic. Will AI replace people in HR? Will AI replace people in HR? There is a postcard by McKinsey about this topic. I don't think so. But AI can help HR in some aspects. For example, if you need to use a position, with your job description, your job description will have 5 different requirements in your job description. AI can help you to find the right person to go to the next interview. But now, most of the recruiters have to read all the documents before deciding who to interview. before deciding who to interview. AI can help you in that process. AI can help you in that process. AI can help you in that process. AI can help you in that process. For example, recently, GPT is very famous for helping people to write GPT is very famous for helping people to write GPT is very famous for helping people to write GPT is very famous for helping people to write GPT is very famous for helping people to write GPT is very famous for helping people to write GPT is very famous for helping people to write GPT is very famous Do you have any comments about people? I think in the future people who work as HR have to be accurate and accurate for GPT When we change the number and especially when we are in the human management we are often told that humans are different from numbers numbers are too simple data is one to one but humans are not that simple So for you what are the challenges that you as a HR manager have to balance to ensure that you can maintain the human quality but still rely on data How do you balance that? Data is very helpful in the human management especially in a large company because we can't look at everything look at each person in detail we have to do everything in a systematic way but we can't ignore the human factor When it comes to when it comes to