VietNamNet introduces the speech of Minister of Information and Communications Nguyen Manh Hung at the working session with the Academy of Posts and Telecommunications Technology, March 19, 2024.
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At a working session with the Academy of Posts and Telecommunications Technology on March 19, Minister Nguyen Manh Hung advised: If we want long-term success, we must build the foundations, do a good job of the foundation, and then build the first floors. Photo: Le Anh Dung

The Academy has a 70-year tradition, originating from the Postal School. The Academy has been under the Ministry of Information and Communications for 10 years. So it has both tradition and new requirements.

I appreciate the results that the leaders and the collective of cadres, lecturers, researchers, students and pupils of the Academy have achieved in the past time. The digital transformation of the university has had initial results. Expanding international cooperation has been noticed. The new leadership is highly combative, ambitious and determined. Congratulations and thank you for these contributions.

Universities are usually long-term organizations, hundreds of years, many hundreds of years. The Academy must think about that long-term existence. It must have a long-term vision for the future. It must have a guiding star. A long-term vision for the future will lead the Academy better. A long-term vision for the future will help the Academy ensure continuity and consistency in development, lasting through many generations. Only then can a university be built that will last a hundred years and longer.

Think big and far but take small steps. Small steps with a guiding star will get you there. Minister Nguyen Manh Hung

Long term, but also think about the bricks that this generation contributes to building the Academy. Think far and think big but take small steps. Small steps with a guiding star will reach the destination. Small steps without a guiding star will become a vicious circle.

If we want to last long, we must build the foundations, do a good job of the foundation and then build the first floors. The Academy's leaders must think about what foundations the Academy already has and what foundations still need to be built. What this generation builds, what future generations build. A good foundation will ensure sustainable development. An excellent leader always focuses on creating a foundation. Because the foundation will last long, after the leader. If we do not create a foundation, there may be a rapid development in the short term, but this development will also go away with the leader. Therefore, consider the Academy as a house built by many generations, each generation, each person will contribute their own bricks to build that house.

For an organization to survive in the long term, its mission, vision, and core values must be formed and maintained throughout. The Academy must formalize these. Consider them as the root, the thing that must be kept throughout the development process. It is the constant. Maintaining this constant is the only way to be able to change. Change to be flexible and adapt to this changing era. Without change, it is impossible to adapt, develop, and survive. But change without maintaining the constant will lead to disorientation and being engulfed in chaos.

To develop sustainably and long-term, we must build culture. Culture creates the glue that binds everyone in the Academy, creating a healthy environment. Culture is an unwritten law. It is deeply ingrained and self-conscious. Culture deals with things that are not in the regulations, which are everyday, numerous, and can easily lead to conflicts. Culture is the last thing left when there is nothing left. Culture is also what differentiates organizations. The Academy has declared its cultural values, and they need to be maintained throughout. The President of the Academy should take responsibility for building culture.

For culture to permeate deeply into an organization, cultural values must be installed into the operating system, into the organization's rules and regulations.

Digital technology (CNS) has a very strong impact on training. Perhaps never before has training changed so much. This fundamental change creates conditions for the following universities to surpass. Usually, only at this time does such an opportunity exist. Therefore, the Academy must be strongly determined to apply new technology to transform the way of training, called Digital Transformation of the Academy.

If we want to become a leading university in Vietnam and the region, the only way is digital transformation. Solving the long-standing problems of the Academy, overcoming resource limitations, creating new resources, creating differences, new problem-solving methods, and new approaches must be based on digital transformation and digital transformation.

One of the important characteristics of the CNS era is that digital human resources become the main productive force. This means that the main labor force of the Academy will not only be teachers but also digital human resources. Digital human resources in universities create digital training platforms, digital learning materials, online learning designs, and online exams. 20-30% of the Academy's human resources must be digital human resources. The Academy can establish a CNS enterprise to implement digital transformation first for the Academy and then for other training institutions.

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Minister Nguyen Manh Hung talks with students of the Academy of Posts and Telecommunications Technology, March 19, 2024. Photo: Le Anh Dung

CNS creates new professions. The Academy must focus on these new industries, considering this as the fundamental difference of the Academy. Because the Academy is the only university of the CNS industry, the only university of the Ministry of Information and Communications, the Ministry of State management of CNS. If the Academy cannot find the difference, find its own distinct strengths, it cannot rise up.

When training new jobs, pay attention to reskill and upskill. Vietnamese people learn quickly, so reskill will be suitable. It is also flexible. The demand for reskill is very high when a new industrial revolution appears. This should be considered a big market. The academy will be the strongest school in training reskill and upskill. In the near future, it can be reskill and upskill in chip design and semiconductor industry.

CNS and CDS are the most important characteristics, playing the most important role in the development of humanity in the next 30-50 years. The Academy has a very basic advantage of being in a ministry, a sector of CNS and CDS. The Academy has not taken advantage of this advantage. The reason for not taking advantage is because the Academy still thinks of itself as a normal university, like hundreds of other universities.

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According to Minister Nguyen Manh Hung, the demand for reskill is very high, so this is considered a niche market where the Academy can become a strong school in reskill training. Photo: Le Anh Dung

In digital technology training, university-enterprise cooperation plays a decisive role. Vietnam's CNS enterprises are nearly 50,000, with nearly 2 million workers. The Academy must have information and relationships about human resource needs with these enterprises. The ICT Industry Department is building a database of CNS enterprises, this is also an opportunity for the Academy.

The Academy cooperates with a number of large enterprises, both domestic and foreign, to form training centers for new professions. This is the trend. There is no better way to train quickly, with quality, updated knowledge, with output addresses, and have immediate working skills after graduation. Cooperating with enterprises means taking advantage of the resources of enterprises (learning materials, lecturers, experimental and practice facilities, ...). Many universities in other countries have done this model well. The Academy can learn and follow.

Modern universities also follow new training models and new business models. For example, training is based on the needs of businesses and businesses have to pay for universities. Innovation in creating new training models and new cooperation models is an important innovation of universities.

The Academy must give due attention to these innovations.

The important infrastructure of a university is its research facilities. The Academy focuses on investing in these facilities. Modern laboratories are a magnet for attracting research to the Academy. While investment is not yet available, it is possible to sign cooperation agreements to use the research infrastructure of enterprises. Accept research orders from enterprises, especially long-term, basic research, because enterprises are weaker than universities in this regard.

Why is international cooperation important to a university? Recently, the Ministry decided to appoint the Director of the Department of International Cooperation to the University Council. University training is global, with many global values. Universities have a high degree of autonomy and therefore need to cooperate more, learn more from each other. There is no prestigious university that is weak in international cooperation. The Academy of Information and Communications Technology can also take international cooperation expansion as a difference, a strength of its own. The Ministry of Information and Communications supports you in expanding international cooperation, but it must still be based on effectiveness.

The Academy must operate like a business, and must bring business management into the Academy. It is possible to develop according to the business model, but we are still teachers, still universities, still have to be transparent, still have to set an example. Minister Nguyen Manh Hung

The Academy must operate like a business. Business administration must be brought into the Academy. The most effective administration is that of a business. The bigger and more extensive it is, the better the administration must be. The mindset must be like a business. The immediate goal is to bring business administration systems into the Academy, and business administration software can be used in the Academy.

Finally, I would like to talk about the issue of ethics in universities. Recently, some Ivy universities in the US have been involved in ethical issues of their leaders, damaging the reputation of the university. The Academy should also learn a lesson from this. Be careful not to let unfortunate incidents happen. Universities are always clean and healthy environments. Teachers and university leaders are still moral examples for students and for society.

I wish the Academy to find its way and stay on that path, stay on it through the generations. Work with great passion. To do so, one must have great aspirations. Aspiration to be the number 1 university in CNS. Aspiration to be a university for hundreds of years, many hundreds of years.