IT human resource remains a headache

Information technology (IT) is one of vital industries in the development of the national economy but this sector in Vietnam fails to play its leading role.

In a modern economy, IT is always attached much importance. The demand for IT human resources in Vietnam is now very high, with an estimated need 6,000 people by 2020 but the capacity is forecast to meet 4,000 people, said Dr Nguyen Thanh Tuyen, Deputy Director of Information Technology under the Ministry of Information and Communications at a national conference on IT human resource development held by Ministry of Education and Training. Thus, the human resource demand of the IT industry will continue to increase annually at least until 2020 and if there are no strong regulatory measures, qualified manpower will go short.

Mr Quach Tuan Ngoc, Director of Information Technology Department under the Ministry of Education and Training, said enrolments at IT universities and colleges rose 50 percent annually in the 2000-2003 period. From 2004 onwards, each year, IT training units recruit some 10,000 students. According to statistics released by the Vietnam Software Association (Vinasa), the Vietnamese IT workforce currently consists of 250,000 people, including some 50,000 people working in the fields of software and digital content.

However, Mr Nguyen Dinh Thang, Vice Chairman of Vinasa, said this number is still too small in relation to demand, especially high-tech manpower. Socioeconomic development demanding on more IT applications, expanding international cooperation, growing foreign investment cause high demand for human resources. Ho Chi Minh City – the largest economic centre in the country – reported that recruitments in IT, telecom and communications industries accounted for 3.73 percent of new recruitments in December 2009, up 48.47 percent from November, after several months of decline but new recruitments were mainly high-level staffs.

According to many industry experts, the current biggest problems of the Vietnamese IT industry are low professional level, limited teamwork capacity and poor English skills. In fact, only 10-15 percent of graduated IT students can read and speak English while the rest needs retraining, based on working requirements. Although IT training units increase enrolments annually, the output still trails the demand. Associate Professor Bui The Duy of Technology University under the Vietnam National University of Hanoi, said: Although IT human resources training is available everywhere, the output fails to meet the demand. For example, VTC Intecom Company has recently needed to recruit around 2,000 IT officers but only 100 candidates meet requirements. Markedly, less than 30 percent of recruitments are suitable for the jobs. According to employers, the most conspicuous weaknesses of Vietnam’s IT workers are poor foreign language skills and soft skills, including the ability to represent and independent thinking.

To give a lift to the Vietnamese IT industry, the country needs standardise training programmes and contents, make breakthroughs in cooperation and importation of training programmes and contents from world-leading universities, said Le Nguyen Bao, Vice Rector and Head of International Training Faculty, Duy Tan University.

The Ministry of Education and Training also proposed key solutions and tasks to improve the quality of IT human resources, with importance attached to building national standard programme for IT training at university, college and high-school levels, and referring to foreign elements to weigh up outputs. – VCCI

Tags: Vietnam IT human resource, Vietnam IT industry, Vietnam IT sector

Posted by VBN on Sep 10 2010. Filed under Technology. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry