Category: Christopher

When it came to reaching out to other coworkers for assistance and getting to know them better, I feel like I excelled heavily. Being an outgoing and active member of a company is something I noticed is very absent in Vietnam. For some reason, many workers here lack the social skills to completely get to know the people they are working alongside with. I grew up with the mindset that relationship building was a very important skill to have in order for the road to success to become much more accessible. These relationships will further drive a person’s growth towards improvement and help a person overcome obstacles they were unable to conquer on their own. If it were not for this skill, I would have failed miserably at my host company as a person and as an employee.

I did lack in the actual legal department of my position here at my job. I had never tackled legal matters before so it was difficult at first getting used to the lingo and technical aspects of the position. Overtime I became much more adept at completing my tasks which I have to thank my coworkers for. Without them I would have been lost throughout this entire process.

This job has taught me a lot about possible career options for me down the line as well as showing me some aspects of my current career path that now seem unappealing. I like to think that these new realizations will help me in making the best choices for myself as I grow older and have to start making decisions that will affect me for the rest of my life. I will cherish the key takeaways from the experiences working for my host company and they will be with me for the rest of my life. The main one would have to be the acknowledgment of a business environment. It is important to work in a space where you can feel comfortable and happy. If I had worked every day in a space where I didn’t enjoy myself, I would not have been able to get up every morning and drag myself to work for a full nine hour workload. Even one genuine conversation a day can make all the difference and I have found that to be very important in a person’s career.

I would have to consider the moment I submitted my first assignment to be the greatest moment of my internship. Not because I had done such a good job, but because there were so many errors in my final submission that I quickly realized my work ethic would have to change in order for me to perform at my best. Thinking back on it now, I had gained way more out of my mistakes than if I had actually completed my assignment with minimal errors.

From that first assignment I learned how to better interact with my coworkers and how to accurately extract only the most important information and present it in a format even a child could understand. That is why I do not regret submitting an assignment I deemed okay, but the company saw as incomplete or missing essential information. I learned much more from my failure than from a success.

I think my greatest professional accomplishment at my host company would be the attitude I present when I meet new partners for Emerhub. It is important to be confident in one’s ability to meet new people and make them feel welcomed and content in an unfamiliar environment. Many client’s Emerhub deals with are mainly foreign, so giving them a place that feels homely and comfortable is very important. We need them to trust us to do business with them and provide them essential services necessary for the success of their company. This is an important factor my boss expected of us when conducting interviews or just having a meeting with new businessman.

In my time living here in HCMC, I have learned that not everything will be served to us on a platter. Out here we are mainly on our own. If we want to talk to someone, we have to take the initiative. If we want something done, most of the times it has to be us to start the process for said task to be carried out. No one will hold our hands when we finally set out to live on out own in the real world. Living in HCMC has shown me that the real world will be what we make of it. 

During my time at Emerhub, I have learned that the consulting industry as been on the rise recently. With the trade war affecting many small and struggling business whom were getting by through outsourcing, Vietnam has been acting as a remedy for these companies. Vietnam is slowly becoming the new China as a result of their cheap labor and lack of taxes on foreign investments. The consulting industry has aided many new businesses unsure of regulations and policies in foreign countries establish their entities without having to deal with those obstacles. The increase in relocations from China to Vietnam has motivated consulting companies to take advantage of this situation and produce incentives for foreign companies to choose their consulting agency for partner up with.

The main strengths of Emerhub is that they’re a branch of an already existing HQ in Indonesia. My office is not the only location that can provide services to companies looking to enter Vietnam. This allows companies to acknowledge the experience that Emerhub carries with it. In addition, the company has partnered up with an ample amount of other companies that can provide foreign businesses with different services separate from just legal and financial consulting. This allows prices to be much lower than if these foreign companies went to independent companies that provided the same services. The head of the branch in Vietnam has been working with Emerhub even before it got its name. Therefore, she has the knowledge to help any new potential clients set up their businesses with ease.

Something the company does lack is informative articles or guides for foreign companies themselves to become knowledgeable on the subject. While it may remove some reliance on Emerhub the client’s success is Emerhub’s success.

An amazing moment I had was learning about the kindness everyone here in Saigon has. I can’t even begin to describe the number of times I had left something behind without even realizing it. Whether it was leaving a taxi or at a market, someone always came up to me and reminded me about the item I had left behind.

I found the most challenging aspect of my internship to be the lack of control put over all of my tasks. The moment I am assigned a task to complete I am given very little details as to the way it should be formatted or presented in its final form. I had been told that some people transitioning from the US to Vietnam would find this challenge very difficult to overcome. Unlike those people I found it to be a very unique experience I would not have gained otherwise. I think this challenge helps me become closer with my coworkers on a professional and personal level. I can engage with them every time I have a question or just need a different perspective on some task. They are like a library full of knowledge, but it is my responsibility to go forth and try to obtain that knowledge from them.

I think the best feature of my internship is the work environment. Coworkers are usually conversing among each other and trying to keep the mood light and warm. When it gets too dull and everyone is hard at work someone will usually bring up something funny or just try and liven up the room with some funny quip or banter. Even lunch time is something I found to be essential as we can choose to eat among each other or catch up on some necessary sleep through a nap. It is different from what I expected because I thought it would be a very work-consuming job. It ended up being the opposite. Work, even though I do make sure to complete my assignments on time, is probably the last thing on my mind while I am in the office. I expected to dread it, but it is actually something to look forward to during my time here.

I recently ate at an establishment near my office which I can’t remember the name of but had one of the best dishes I had ever stumbled upon. The dish was called takoyaki and I cannot express enough how much I am going to miss this dish when I move back to the states. The best way to describe it is squid or octopus enveloped in a ball of warm, creamy dough like a heated up mochi ball. It is lathered in mayo and another sauce.

Currently I have been compiling different legal projects and putting the necessary information for different clients into an easily understandable format. For one project, I am working with a client on helping them establish e-commerce here in Vietnam. Unbeknownst to most people, there are a lot of rules and regulations surrounding the entering of foreign invested companies into Vietnam. It is not as simple as just coming over here and setting up shop. This is where my job comes in. I help companies transition by creating a template for clients to follow\step by step to make establishment of their company smoother.

I have also been doing research on trends and factors impacting companies to move over to Vietnam at a much more rapid pace. I turn this research into Kadri so she can use that to help guide foreign companies towards investing in Vietnam. So far with the use of Export processing zones it has become much easier for Emerhub to guide foreign companies towards the path to establishment in Vietnam.

I think the relationship between my co-workers, and I is one of trust and hard work. I can come to them for legal help or if I have trouble understanding certain terms I a document I am reading. They have been super helpful on their part and I would be very lost without their guidance. Thankfully everyone can speak English so that is a barrier I do not have to try and overcome every day. Their English isn’t perfect however and that is where I can excel in the office. With clients that have trouble communicating in English, I can help my coworkers by interpreting as best as I can. They seem to really get a kick out of me trying my hardest to transcribe the gibberish that some people write. I have a good time though, nonetheless. One thing I have learned is not giving up too fast. I need to know that as long as I keep putting in the effort and work eventually things will work themselves out.

Kadri is the regional manager for Emerhub’s Vietnam branch. She supervises and oversees every task and obstacle that Emerhub is faced with. She talks to clients everyday and ensures that every employee is giving 110%. She does make time for her employees which helps lighten the mood at work. It is important to make your employees feel welcome and comfortable at work, and she makes sure that they feel that way every day. Do not let that fool you, she works around the clock and is very eager to expand Emerhub and make it bigger than as it currently stands. She is very kind and honest. Day one she greeted me and my coworker as if we were long time members of Emerhub. She’s taken us out to eat and has even had us tag along with her to important business conferences which were very enlightening. She placed me in the legal department alongside the corporate secretary and I feel right at home.

I have been tasked with helping the legal team welcome incoming foreign investors by making the transition from their country to here a breeze. Right now, we are helping a company deal with the regulations surrounding e-commerce so that they can focus on handling their business. So far, I have been reading many legal documents relating to entry requirements for companies wanting to enter Vietnam. I compile all the necessary information and put it into an easy to read document for the client to understand.

One interesting personal experience I had was during my visit to the markets. Watching the youtube videos on haggling does not do it justice. It feels like a video game where you have to figure out how the sellers think. Eventually it just becomes easier with practice. They also have their ways of making the consumers agree to their absurd prices. They make you feel good about yourself and raise your self-esteem by continuously calling you handsome or very pretty. This is so you try and feel bad for trying to lower the price, but it is just a scheme to make the consumer pay more. Overall, I am having a wonderful experience and am looking forward to what’s to come.

I am currently working for a company named Emerhub. They started in Indonesia but expanded their services to other southeastern Asian countries such as Vietnam. They help companies and other organizations set up their business or create transactions in Vietnam or wherever they are established. It is their job to help companies work in unorthodox environments without having to deal with difficult regulations. They can provide services such as accounting or legal advising to completely carrying out the delivery service for a company’s products.

The first day was very promising. I was able to meet many new employees and the branch manager. Each one was very inviting and welcoming. I got to learn about the different teams and their specific jobs. My coworker and I were also taken out to lunch by a few of the workers to help show us the best places to eat during lunch time. I am very excited to continue working with them. Day one was the slowest. We had not been described the tasks of our titles, but we were explained the actual job description later on during the day. Until then my coworker and I were basically just doing random busy work on our laptops.

Once we were given our roles everything changed. Instead of being told how to do something, we were given tasks and expected to communicate with our given teams. This as I have been told is much different from an internship in the states. My company is comprised of about 20 people and they are all expected to perform their tasks with the upmost urgency. We are also expected to perform with such urgency. This is not surprising but actually sitting down for 9 hours with my team depicts a picture unlike something someone would picture given that information. While they are expected to work around the clock, they still make time to converse among one another and share a few laughs. The office space is small, so everyone is basically in one large room separated by desks. This environment gives the office a more relaxing and comfortable feel to it. For my first internship I could not be happier.

Visiting the Vietnam War memorial museum was in my opinion one of the most informative and important sites we visited on our first week in Vietnam. The only real information I learned about the Vietnam war and its consequences were from movies and a brief chapter in my history classes. It is not until we got close and personal to the subject matter that the disasters of the war became even more real and impactful. It is hard to imagine that there was such chaos and atrocities committed during the war and the United States government only compensated those affiliated with America. Vietnam was left to fend for itself immediately following the war.

My expectations versus my first impressions were not as different as I initially thought they would be. I had visited the city of Mexico before so visiting the city of a developing country was not a new experience for me. The scenery and familiarity were very similar to my visit to Mexico City. The only drastic difference is the language barrier and shopping in the markets. This experience is one that must be obtained in person. In the U.S. everything already has a set price. In Vietnam however, this is not always the case. In many markets some products can be haggled down to a lower price if the right conversation is had with the seller. I recently purchased a snow globe for my little brother which at first was around 20 dollars. With a little bit of persuading, I managed to purchase it for less than 10 dollars after everything was said and done.

When it comes to the language barrier it can be a challenge in some situations but not in most. My parents were very worried that I would have trouble communicating with the local folk in case something went wrong during my time here. I made sure to let them know that with our current technology it has become much easier to get over the language barrier. It is a little bit awkward using google translate to communicate with some folks, but it will get a person’s ideas across.

I wonder how the locals here at Masteri apartments feel towards many foreigners visiting Vietnam.

Are the police here in Vietnam serious about their jobs?

Is it actually safer driving in the methods that most people do here?

Do merchants prefer selling to locals or foreigners?

I found Vietnam’s culture relating to their expressions was very surprising and fascinating. I lived all my life thinking that smiling and being outgoing was a portrayal of a good lifestyle and genuine happiness. As I just learned from reading material covering their customs, this is not the case in Vietnam. They prefer to keep a straight face and withhold their emotions to a greater extent than most Americans do. This is to show composure, which is valued greatly in Vietnam. Moving away from this behavior could even make a person seem foolish in the eyes of others. It is important to use traditional customs of greetings and interactions to get the best relationship from residents of Vietnam. A similarity I found between both countries was our mutual love for high name brands when shopping. In many markets in Vietnam similarbrands to the ones located in the US can also be found in Vietnam. While they may not be legitimate clothes and only highlight the logo, it still shows how highly valued these brands of clothes are in both countries. In addition, a drastic difference I found was the culture regarding traffic rules. In America traffic is much more organized and controlled. In Vietnam however, the case is very different. In Vietnam traffic guides are volunteers and everyone is really entrusted to be able to move with the flow of traffic regardless of a lack of tranquility and stability. This is something I will have to get used to immediately entering the country. I believe that the culture of Vietnam will vastly increase the experiences I would have obtained if I stayed here in the states for the summer. Moving away from my comfort zone and putting myself in a place where a majority of what I know can seem negative to others will challenge me to adapt to new situations. Not only will I have to cater to different tasks from a completely different perspective, I will mainly be completing these challenges on my own. This is the biggest obstacle I feel which will be the most difficult to overcome. I am not worried as I will not be the only one to take this journey alone. With everyone’s help I’m sure we’ll get by without a problem.