The forty-two-year establishment and development of Song Thu Corporation (October 10th 1976 – October 10th 2018), which is under the direct leadership of the General Department of Defence Industry, have been inextricably linked to the leadership and instruction of its higher party executive committee and commanders; and the solidarity, unity, support, and resolve of its cadres, staff and workers in the process of overcoming difficulty, active innovation and development to affirm the status of a heroic unit.
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| The technical contest |
Nowadays, the Corporation is tasked with shipbuilding and repair, small steel work fabrication, oil spill response, fuel oil tanks cleaning, transportation, providing port services, cleaning oil tankers, providing commercial services and accommodation, and so on. To satisfy task requirements in the new situation, the Corporation has taken initiative in working out its development plan and identifying plans to establish and develop its trade name in a sustainable and highly competitive manner. More importantly, it has considered human resource development as a major breakthrough of both short and long-term significance.
First of all, the Corporation has attached special importance to human resource generation and recruitment. In the context of its ongoing efforts to comprehensively carry out development solutions to affirm its trade name as one of the leading enterprises in shipbuilding and repair in the country and the region, the cultivation of a highly qualified human resource has become ever urgent. Meanwhile, local supply of human resources suitable for shipbuilding and repair is very limited. Subcontractors’ capacity to provide services is still weak. Consequently, the Corporation has proactively created a long-term human resource through an appropriate recruitment policy. Accordingly, it has actively worked with universities, colleges and schools in central provinces to train and recruit labourers to meet its demand for production and business; generated its human resource from workers’ offspring; and so forth. Apart from high requirements for qualifications, skills, experience, and health, the Corporation has paid attention to bettering employees’ salary, allowance, policy, working environment, and future promotion. This represents the basis for attracting a competent and dedicated human resource.
Additionally, the Corporation has well conducted human resource training and development, which focuses on cultivating a pool of leaders and management officers with political steadfastness, good professional etiquette, knowledge, and technical and economic management skills. At the same time, it has also paid attention to developing a corps of good technical officers and workers to opportunely satisfy the development of science and technology as well as its mission in the new situation. To achieve that goal, the Corporation has sent its officers and staff to vocational schools both inside and outside the military; provided support in terms of time, tuition fees or salary to encourage people to pursue further study, work in accordance with their knowledge, take postgraduate courses, and so on. Furthermore, the Corporation has opened foreign language and information technology classes to improve people’s knowledge of these fields. In addition, it has coordinated visits to learn experience, models and technologies from other enterprises and dominant shipbuilding countries. The Corporation combines purchase with transfer of technologies used for shipbuilding and repair. To meet the demand for a highly qualified human resource, it has successfully conducted training through best practices in scientific, logical production. There is a mixture of senior and junior, old and new, skillful and less skillful workers, etc., in each production team to ensure collaboration, mutual assistance and training. In the evolving development of the Corporation, the workers have always given prominence to self-study, experience accumulation and knowledge development to better satisfy the Corporation’s demand for production and operation in the process of international integration.
Being a military enterprise, the Corporation has constantly attached importance to promoting political steadfastness, revolutionary and business ethics in each worker, military man and party member, most notably the enhancement of education quality in the realms of politics, ideology, defence and security, and law as well as awareness of its mission in the new situation. Additionally, the Corporation has grasped thoroughly the higher echelon’s resolutions and directives on military and defence tasks, combining economy with defence and security; aligned the implementation of resolutions, directives and movements, especially Resolution of the 4th Plenum of the Party Central Committee (tenure XII) on Party building and Directive 05-CT/TW of the Politburo (tenure XII) on studying and following Ho Chi Minh’s ideology, morality and lifestyle, with the unit’s reality. Moreover, it has attached importance to concretising the followings according to responsibilities, functions and missions of individuals and organisations; establishing scientific, effective working methods; practicing thrift; promoting idea generation and technological innovation; and concentrating on addressing shortcomings and weaknesses to build the Corporation comprehensively strong, particularly in political area, and capable of fulfilling the assigned missions.
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| The launch of Vietnam Coast Guard Ship 8002 |
Sticking to its development strategy, the Corporation continues to strengthen the management and effective use of its human resource through organising, commissioning, promoting, and assigning people according to mission requirements, qualifications, skills, and majors. During the production process, workers are properly tasked in line with their majors to enable them to do highly specialised jobs. Accordingly, those who are skillful take responsibility for major jobs or jobs requiring professional qualifications. Those who are fairly good are assigned to auxiliary jobs to learn experience from their seniors. When planning, training and appointing leadership and management positions, the Corporation Party Executive Committee and Board of Directors have always paid attention to and developed a long-term strategy; set up standards for each title and objective assessment; promoted and appointed officers publicly, transparently and convincingly. Consequently, the promotion, appointment and assignment of leading cadres in organisations and units are always correct, compatible with cadres’ competence, professional skills and fortes, and appreciated by people. Additionally, the Corporation has conducted regular job rotation to give momentum to officers and workers. In fact, breakthroughs and turning points in the Corporation’s development process are inextricably linked to breakthroughs in the employment of people, especially in key positions.
To preserve a stable human resource, the Corporation has paid constant attention to improving working environment, making investments in infrastructure and modernised equipment, and having synchronous and appropriate compensation and benefits policies. One of its major breakthroughs in recent years is to make a synchronous, selective and careful investment in technologies, ensuring a great leap in shipbuilding technology. That outcome is attributed to its long-term development strategy and selection of really competent, reliable partners and customers. By means of purchasing designs and technology transfer, the Corporation has been able to send its officers, engineers and workers to foreign countries to study and learn experience from its partners. In addition, it has brought into play people’s right to mastery, stepped up movements and programs, and incentivized technological innovation in production, thereby unearthing people’s potential, self-consciousness, creativity, and effervescent emulation. A great deal of technological innovation has been extensively applied in management and production, which has brought about high economic values for the Corporation.
Furthermore, the Corporation has constantly concentrated on building strong organisations; brought into play its role in guiding ideology; encouraged and assisted people in their work; attached importance to building pure, robust Party Committee, laying the groundwork for making the Corporation comprehensively strong; taken the building of politically, ideologically, organisationally strong party executive committees and party organisations as the basis for cultivating solidarity and unification in the whole unit; and properly addressed relations within the leadership, between the higher and lower echelons, as well as between the unit and local authorities, partners and customers. Moreover, it has promoted good order, discipline and occupational safety; regularly set their mind to ensuring a safe working environment, employment and income; improved people’s material and spiritual life; fairly and publicly carried out policies regarding military families to make workers keep their minds on their jobs, minimising the flight of human capital, especially the highly qualified human resource.
Through sound policies and practical, effective actions, the Corporation’s human resource is increasingly stabilised, making essential contribution to production and business performance over the past few years while laying the groundwork for the Corporation to exploit its potential and advantages to better itself.
The forthcoming time will witness numerous challenges and changes. However, by means of a sound development guideline, a highly qualified human resource, solidarity and enthusiasm, can-do thought, dynamism, creativity, and responsibility and accountability of the Board of Directors, Song Thu Corporation will ceaselessly promote solidarity, creativity and development, contributing to establishing potential of defence industry capable of meeting the requirements of national construction and defence in the new situation.
Senior Colonel Bui Hoang Hai, Chairman of the Board of Directors