Sri R. ILR ‘25, Session with Ha Dang (Founder of Respect Vietnam)

On January 9th, we had an opportunity to hear from Ha Dang, the founder of Respect Vietnam, a non-profit organization dedicated to driving organizational transformation in Vietnam and other global settings. Respect Vietnam specializes in addressing inter-organizational conflicts and providing sustainable workplace solutions. One of the ways they achieve this is by providing strategic consulting and creative training, supported by informative infographics that address themes such as conflict resolution, organizational learning, and aligning workplace goals, to name a few. It was truly compelling to see how different visual designs and comics were able to effectively convey messages around labor rights, social change, and workplace inclusion. 

During the second-half of the session, Ha Dang also guided us through an interactive activity focused on the Business Model Canvas. This strategic management tool visually represents nine fundamental building blocks or core aspects of a business: key partners, key activities, key resources, value proposition, customer segments, customer relationships, channels, revenue streams, and cost structure (see infographic below). The activity was highly informative because we saw how the Business Model Canvas illustrates how bad labor relations impact the bottom line—enabling a human resources (HR) professional to better understand business operations. In short, this versatile management tool, which encourages a holistic and systematic approach to the business model design, provided a new perspective into effective HR and labor relations management. 

Overall, the session with Ha Dang was inspiring, to say the least. From hearing her passion for helping organizations recognize that human capital is the highest return on investment to working on an activity unpacking the Business Model Canvas, we learned about the importance of fostering people-centric strategies to drive sustainable growth.