MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMICS HO CHI MINH CITY --------------------oOo-------------------- PHAM HUU CHINH THE EFFECT OF WORKPLACE COACHING ON EMPLOYEE PERFORMANCE: THE CASE OF TRI AN FACTORY, NESTLÉ VIETNAM EXECUTIVE MASTER OF BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION HO CHI MINH CITY – 2018 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMICS HO CHI MINH CITY --------------------oOo-------------------- PHAM HUU CHINH THE EFFECT OF WORKPLACE COACHING ON EMPLOYEE PERFORMANCE: THE CASE OF TRI AN FACTORY, NESTLÉ VIETNAM Major: Business Administration (Executive Master of Business Administration) Code: 8340101 ECONOMIC MASTER THESIS SUPERVISOR: Prof. NGUYEN DONG PHONG, Ph. HO CHI MINH CITY – 2018 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com STATEMENT OF ORIGINALITY I confirm that this master thesis is based on my independent research. The figures and results presented in this thesis are real data from survey conducted by the author with assistance of employees of Tri An Factory (TAF), Nestlé Vietnam Company.
Proposals, solutions and recommendations were drawn from this study based on operation evaluation as well as on comments and advices of TAF Management Board. I am fully responsible for eventual errors or fault caused. Author of the thesis Pham Huu Chinh LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com TABLE OF CONTENT LIST OF FIGURES LIST OF TABLES CHAPTER ONE. About Nestlé Group, Nestlé Vietnam Company and Tri An Factory.
Objective of the study. Subjects of the study. Scope and limitation of the study. Framework of the study.
The origin and concept of coaching. Definitions and essential principles of coaching. Why workplace coaching?. Some key factors for coaching effectiveness.
Building the trustworthy coach-coachee relationship. Providing needed support to employees. Enhancing employee awareness. Promoting employee motivation.
Relationship between workplace coach and employee performance. 25 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail. Sample Size and Sampling approach. Common sources of error.
Construction of the questionnaire. Pre-testing and validation. Data Collection Method. Methods of Data Analysis.
32 ANALYSIS OF RESULTS. Evaluate the reliability of measurement scales. Critical factors of the coaching effectiveness. Coach – Coachee Relationship.
Support given to employees. The Effect of Workplace Coaching on Employee Performance. Correlation between workplace coaching effectiveness and employee performance. Management discussion about the findings.
53 CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS. Conclusion of the study. Limitations and suggestions for future research. 58 REFERENCES APPENDICES LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1.1: The relationship between dependent and independent variables.1: Role of employees in coaching practices at TAF .2: Status of employee training about coaching .3: Response frequency about coach-coachee relationship .4: Employee responding to question CR2 .5: Response frequency about employee awareness .6: Response frequency about employee motivation.7: Response frequency about support given in coaching .8: Response frequency about employee performance.
44 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com LIST OF TABLES Table 4.1: Distribution of Demographic Information .2: Employees who haven’t joined the training about coaching .3: The reliability of measurement scales .4: Detail results of relationship in coaching.5: Detail results of employee awareness.6: Detail results of employee motivation.7: Detail results of support given to employees in coaching.8: Employee performance results from coaching activities .9: Key factors of workplace coaching effectiveness and employee performance.10: Different demographic groups impacting to coaching. 47 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com ABSTRACT The purpose of this study was to determine how the use of workplace coaching as a human management and development tool can facilitate improvements to employee performance and in turn providing a platform to increase the competitive advantage of the organization. The study was carried out at Tri An Factory (TAF), Nestlé Vietnam company and it comprises of a literature review, which includes the concept and essential principles of coaching, some key drivers of effective coaching, the employee performance and the correlation between workplace coaching and employee performance. A quantitative research approach was used for this study with the participation of 190 employees from all working positions within TAF.
The findings of the study revealed that workplace coaching is an effective human management and development tool at TAF and it has positive impacts on employee performance. The key factors, which contributed to workplace coaching effectiveness, were building trustful coach-coachee relationship, enhancing the awareness and motivation of employees, and giving them the needed support. The employee performance was determined by employee work productivity, product quality and customer satisfaction. All were improved as the results of workplace coaching.
Whilst the study proved the effectiveness of workplace coaching and its positive impacts on employee performance, the findings also showed that there are opportunities for further improvements to workplace coaching at TAF. The areas of improvements identified are using appropriate approach for each individual/ group based on their preference, promoting employee understanding about purposes and benefits of coaching, spending more time to coach employees, building criteria and using those to measure the effectiveness of coaching sessions. LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com 1 CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION 1. Introduction In the present business environment, organizations are subjected to increased competition, fast-paced change, increased demands from customers and different stakeholders.
These factors are putting a huge pressure on organizations. To compete and take the lead, companies are more conscious of their need of a competent, motivated and productive workforce which is considered as a distinctive and inimitable advantage. Since the traditional employee development does not always deliver the desired results, organizations often use coaching as a way to develop employee self- confidence, self-efficacy, and contribute to actions that create results (Passmore and Fillery-Travis, 2011). The reason behind this trend could be that coaching is about helping people to improve their performance not by telling them what to do but by enabling them to learn how to change, making coaching a widely recognized tool.
Coaching is a well-established practice that researchers have defined in different ways. According to Smither (2011) coaching “is a one-to-one learning and development intervention that uses a collaborative, reflective, goal-focused relationship to achieve professional outcomes that are valued by the coachee” (Smither, 2011, p. Grant (2001) defined coaching as a collaborative, solution- focused, result-orientated systematic process, in which the coach facilitates the enhancement of the coachee’s performance in various domains and fosters self- directed learning, goal attainment and personal growth of the coachee. From a different angle, coaching is a term often related to the sports industry.
Athletes often pay astronomical wages to the best individuals in their field to coach them. In most of these cases, the coach does not manage them or tell them what to do but rather tries to get the best out of them by transforming physical and psychological strengths into competency. The coach’s job is to support, guide and motivate the coachee to gain a better understanding of themselves in order to enable them to reach the peak of their capabilities (Whitmore, 2004). LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com 2 By applying this philosophy in workplace coaching, it can help individuals to realize their strengths and weaknesses.
Enabling them to find the answer to what works better for them rather than giving them the answers ready on the plate. Coaching aims to empower people and help them to discover their potential abilities and talents instead of focusing on what they cannot do (Wright, 2005). After all, coaching is about unlocking people’s potential with the intention to improve/maximize their performance (Whitmore, 2004); a coach does not teach but rather helps the coachee to learn. Coaching can be a challenging endeavor for the coachee as well as the coach.
It is essential for the coach to have a clear understanding of their roles and responsibilities as well as being equipped with the desired behaviors and characteristics that can enable all parties involved to gain the best experience from the coaching sessions (Grant, 2006). Success of a coaching process heavily depends on the trustful relationships between the coach and the employee (Wu, Cheng and Huang, 2010). Thus while using coaching method, the coach first understands the cultural diversity of the individual employee (Serrat 2010). The cultural diversity such as religion, race, color, belief systems, gender, and ethnicity among others may considerably affect the coach and coachee relationships (Wilkesmann & Fischer, 2009).
The outcome of coaching for employees includes enhanced self-awareness, enhanced knowledge and skills, greater motivation and morale, improved clarity about career direction, increased innovation which all lead to improved performance (Stolmack and Martin, 2011). Despite the global popularity of coaching, there is a shortage in the number of empirical studies exploring the effects of workplace coaching on employee performance. More specifically, there is an absence of such studies in Vietnam, especially in the manufacturing sector. The typical respondents being surveyed in those researches were mainly managers or coaches who have delivered the coaching sessions but not coachees who have received the coaching sessions.
Therefore, the purpose of this study is to examine some key factors linking workplace coaching to employee performance, through analyzing the perception of coaches and coachees. The key factors investigated were the coach-coachee LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com 3 relationship, the awareness and motivation of coachees (employees), and the support given to them. The conclusion provided would offer the recommendations on how to better coach employees to enhance their performance. About Nestlé Group, Nestlé Vietnam Company and Tri An Factory Nestlé Group is a Swiss-based company specialized in manufacturing and trading of processed dairy and foods with famous brands such as NAN, Nescafé Milo, Maggi, and KitKat.
The company was founded in 1866 by Henri Nestlé, a Swiss pharmacist. Today, Nestlé has more than 10,000 different types of products manufactured from nearly 500 plants in 130 countries and each day Nestlé sells out more than 1 billion units worldwide. Nestlé has its presence at Saigon since 1912 and stopped doing business in Vietnam in 1972. In 1992, Lavie Company, a joint-venture between Perrier Vittel of Nestlé and a Long An Trading Company was founded.
In 1993, Nestlé officially returned to Vietnam and opened a representative office in Ho Chi Minh City. In 1995, Nestlé Vietnam was born and the construction of its first manufacturing site named Dong Nai Factory (DNF) started. Up to now, Nestlé Vietnam has four factories, three in Dong Nai province and one in Hung Yen province. Tri An Factory (TAF) as one of those, is located at Amata Industrial Zone, Bien Hoa City, Dong Nai Province.
The total investment of Nestlé to build TAF was nearly 300 million USD. The factory started to be built in March 2011 and put in commercial operation from December 2012 onwards. It is one of thirty-two Nestlé coffee manufacturing plants worldwide and is the largest factory in Southeast Asia with the most advanced technology in the world. So far, TAF has two processing lines being operated - Pure Soluble Coffee powder (PSC) and Decaffeinated Green Coffee bean (DGC), supplying semi- finished products to other Nestlé factories in Vietnam as well as other markets all over the world.
The PSC line was put in commercial operation in 2012 and the DGC line was commissioned in 2014. Currently the extension of TAF’s manufacturing capacity is ongoing by including a Nescafé Dolce Gusto (NDG) production line, which is put into commercial operation as of July 2018. The NDG LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com 4 plant will produce and supply premium coffee capsule products for 13 countries in Asia and Oceania (Australia and New Zealand), including Vietnam. TAF has a total headcount of 248 people in which 19 persons are at Management level and 229 persons are at Non-Management level.
The educational background of TAF workforce consists of 54% people graduated from University or higher levels, 21% graduated from College and the rest graduated from Vocational School or High School.