Organizing Business Field Trips for Lecturers of the Faculty of Business Management

Dr. Than Thanh Son, Dr. Vu Dinh Khoa - Faculty of Business Management

With the aim of improving the quality of training in the direction of linking theory and practice, the Faculty of Business Management annually conducts planning, organizes many field trips at enterprises and socio-economic organizations for lecturers. Thereby, lecturers get the chance to exchange knowledge and update information; as a result, they can make their lectures more lively and effective.

Higher education nowadays has made increasing demands on both learners and teachers. Teaching is not only aimed at developing learners' knowledge but also must be associated with the practical requirements of professions and job positions, especially application-oriented training programs.

Recognizing the importance of the above-mentioned issue, one of the key tasks of the development strategy of the Faculty of Business Administration in the period 2016 - 2020 is to continue to improve the teaching capacity of the lecturers. This requirement is not only specified by the criteria on quantity and scientific content of published research works, the percentage of lecturers with doctoral training qualifications and standard foreign language ability meeting international standards but also requires lecturers to always update new knowledge both theoretically and practically.

Therefore, the Faculty of Business Administration has organized field trips for departments to exchange practical knowledge at enterprises and socio-economic organizations in Hanoi and neighboring provinces twice a year.

Table 1: Summary of business field trips of the Faculty of Business Management in the period 2016-2019

(Source: Report on business field trips in 2016 – 2018 of the Faculty of Business Management)

According to the statistics of business field trips, in the academic year 2018 - 2019, the Faculty of Business Management organized a total of 14 field trips to enterprises with the participation rate of lecturers reaching 91%. A small number of lecturers could not participate due to studying abroad or during the leave of absence. Organizations which are selected are closely related to the expertise of departments. The number of enterprises in which departments had field trips tended to increase in the whole period of 2016 - 2018. At the end of the field trips, departments all had in-depth discussion reports on applications in teaching. (Source: Report on business field trips in 2016 – 2018 of the Faculty of Business Administration)

This periodic activity of the Faculty of Business Management shows the efforts to link teaching activities with the practice of production and business activities of enterprises by the benefits that this program has.

+ Most lecturers are aware of the usefulness of business field trips, not only that, lecturers actively discuss before, during and after the field trips in order to improve the quality of practical lectures, and they also link theory and practice in teaching.

+ For enterprises, thanks to detailed and specific working plans in advance, the exchange and sharing of information related to the subject takes place smoothly and in-depth.

+ Help lecturers improve the effectiveness of lecture implementation through typical situations in which they have actually been involved or management applications of human resources, finance, marketing strategies are implemented at participating enterprises. This is useful knowledge for both learners and teachers.

Business field trips have had a positive impact on teaching and scientific research activities, specifically stated as follows:

- The level of student satisfaction about the aspect that “Teachers have good ability to connect theory and practice in teaching" has improved over the years (see figure 1):

Figure 1: Student’s evaluation of the aspect that “Teachers have good ability to connect theory and practice in teaching”

(Source: Graduate Student Survey Report 2017, 2018, 2019)

- The quantity and quality of scientific articles associated with practical activities have always remained at a high level, with an average of 1.3 articles per permanent teacher, exceeding the goal of science and technology development of the Faculty of Business Management period 2015-2020. In terms of the quality of scientific articles, the number of high-quality scientific articles published in international journals in the SSCI has continuously increased over the years (see Figure 2).

Figure 2: Growth rate of scientific articles published in international journals in the SSCI

(Source: Report on scientific research activities for the academic year 2016-2017, 2017-2018, 2018-2019).

- According to the survey results on the percentage of students who have a job after one year of graduation by the Business Relations Center, this rate of students of the Faculty of Business Management is relatively high and has been continuously increasing over the years.

Figure 3: Employment rate of students after a year of graduation

(Source: Employment survey report after one year of graduation, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019 (preliminary results) – Business Relations Center)

(*. As of 2018, the Faculty of Business Administration has 2 majors (Business Management, Banking and Finance) whose graduates participate in the employment survey after one year of graduation).

Figure 4: Lecturers of Faculty of Business Administration in a field trip

Here is an experience of effective practical work:

(i). Before each academic year, departments have a discussion to determine the topic of practical research used in the academic year, make a list of suitable enterprises, then contact and exchange topics of field trips with the enterprises.

(ii). The departments and lecturers search for the background of the enterprises in advance, as well as topics of exchange, and draw up an outline for the field trips

(iii). During the field trips, lecturers focus on clarifying the similarities and dissimilarities between theory and practice.

(iv). At the end of the field trips, departments organize discussions to bring practical content into the lectures and consider activities to assess learners.

In the near future, field trips will still be one of the activities to improve the professional qualifications of the lecturers of the Faculty of Business Administration, and they are considered a solution to improve the quality of the lecturers and improve the quality of training in the direction of linking theory and practice.