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SMU575

VINSCHOOL: THE TRIUMPHS AND CHALLENGES OF SCALING

VINGROUP’S NOT-FOR-PROFIT SCHOOL

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What does it take to set up the next level of schools that encourages academic excellence at an
international level in a developing country? How should the school brand itself to communicate that
commitment to excellence to prospective students’ parents? How could a school provide that level
of academic excellence at an affordable cost to the middle-income segment? What were the levers
that they could use to scale their school locations over the country? These were the questions racing
through Phan Ha Thuy’s mind, as she addressed the managing committee of Vinschool.

It was close to the end of school day at Vinschool, in Vinhomes Times City, Hanoi. The loud chatter

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of students heading home was music to her ears. As the noise faded, Thuy, CEO of Vinschool, ended
her speech with an enthusiastic appeal to the audience in the meeting room,

We would like to grow from 27,000 students as at date in September 2019 to 55,000 students over
the next five years. To formulate action plans to enable that growth, we must stand united in our
efforts to attain our organisation’s goals. We must all share the same vision, and most
importantly, we must all be ready to go that extra mile to make it happen. We have done it in the
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past, and I am confident we will do it again. Let’s brainstorm over some of the possibilities of
addressing the obvious challenges.

There was a hearty round of applause as the forum was opened for other members in the group,
including senior management from Vingroup, to propose ideas on mitigating some of the challenges
that faced the school’s expansion. The leadership was painfully aware that there had been attempts
to grow many international schooling systems in Asia like the United World College and Nord
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Angelica group of schools. However, while Vinschool could install some best practices from these
systems, the management committee realised that many other elements would not apply to them. The
scale that Vinschool needed dwarfed the scale that these international schools operated within Asia
- and yet, the scale was an essential component of Vinschool’s ability to deliver on its mandate.

Vinschool was established in 2013, as a directive of Vingroup – a real estate, retail and services
conglomerate in Vietnam, to provide schooling facilities for children residing at the Vinhomes real
No

estate complexes built by the group. The school had expanded rapidly since its establishment,
growing from one campus to 31 campuses by 2019. The student strength had also grown from a few
hundred to 27,000 in the same time frame. The school campuses were established across three cities
in Vietnam, namely Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC), and Hai Phong. The objective of the school
was to provide quality education based on the Vietnamese curriculum to its students. As the school
grew, it also established a second stream of curriculum – the Cambridge curriculum - that gave
students the opportunity to choose between a local and an international curriculum.
Do

This case was written by Professor Tan Chin Tiong and Lipika Bhattacharya at the Singapore Management University. The
case was prepared solely to provide material for class discussion. The authors do not intend to illustrate either effective or
ineffective handling of a managerial situation. The authors may have disguised certain names and other identifying information
to protect confidentiality.

Copyright © 2020, Singapore Management University Version: 2020-05-03

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 SMU-20-0004 Vinschool: The Vingroup’s not-for-profit school

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With a significant presence in Vietnam, Vinschool had further expansion plans chalked out for the
near future. It wanted to double its student size by opening 30 more campuses in the next five years.

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However, Thuy knew that for scaling across Vietnam, the business model and the academic model
of the Vinschool system would need to align with each other. The challenge was clear: Vinschool
had to provide an excellent academic experience with resources that could be supported by a growing
but as yet modest-sized economy. Aligning the academic objective with the business model would
need scale: Thuy had called the management committee meeting to brainstorm about ideas to achieve
that critical mass.

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Vinschool wanted to maintain its position as a top school focused on providing quality education,
and maintaining uniformity of quality as it established new campuses. This would require careful
planning and monitoring, in addition to added infrastructure support. Hiring foreign talent was an
option; however, government decrees restricted the number of international staff that could be hired
by institutions in the country.

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Against this backdrop of enthusiasm and scepticism, Thuy and her team met frequently to brainstorm
on ideas to address the challenges that lay ahead of their expansion plans. But were they ready for
the next phase of expansion? Thuy was pleased with the school’s journey so far, but understood that
a concrete decision about the actual growth plan could have consequences that could outweigh the
excitement. How could Vinschool scale effectively?
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Vingroup

Vingroup was a Vietnamese conglomerate focusing on three key areas: property and services,
industrials and technology. Established in 1993 by Pham Nhat Vuong, a Vietnamese student in
Ukraine at the time, the company began operations as a dried-foods producing company, selling
products like instant noodles. In 2000, it shifted its operations to Vietnam.
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After moving to Vietnam, Vingroup raised US$200 million from American investment fund Warburg
Pincus to invest in four business markets - commercial facilities, tourism, hospitals and schools. The
company began to be increasingly compared to companies like Hyundai or Samsung that not only
dominated their home markets but also exported products to the wider world. By 2018, Vingroup’s
market capitalisation had reached US$3 billion, and it had become the largest non-state run company
in the country. Vingroup’s rise had mirrored that of Vietnam, a country touted as one of Asia’s
No

fastest-growing economies.

Education in Vietnam

Education had always formed an integral part of the Vietnamese culture – influenced profoundly by
the principles of Confucianism. Education was perceived as a means of achieving success, and
academic performance was highly valued. Teaching was considered a noble profession, and parents
strove hard to provide the best possible education to their children.1
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Compared to other countries in the region, the Vietnamese government invested notably more on
education, with 15% of its budget spent on education in 2000 and 20% in 2017. Expenditure on
education as a percentage of gross domestic product (GDP) had swayed from 5.1% to 5.9% between

1 “Education in Vietnam”, EU Vietnam Business Network, Report, 2018, http://www.ukabc.org.uk/wp-

content/uploads/2018/09/EVBN-Report-Education-Final-Report.pdf, accessed September 2019.

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 SMU-20-0004 Vinschool: The Vingroup’s not-for-profit school

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2009 and 2012, increasing to 6.3% in 2016. 2 Increasing expenditure on education reflected the
government’s commitment to make education more accessible, and quality-focused. The ratio of

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government expenditure on education and training in Vietnam in terms of GDP was also
comparatively higher than many neighboring countries in the region.3

Vietnamese schools were categorised under two broad types - public and non-public. Non-public
institutions were divided into three types: semi-public, people-founded and private. 4 Despite its
interest in education, Vietnam did not rank high in terms of language proficiency. The number of

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Vietnamese children who could enrol into foreign-owned institutions to attain improved language
skills was also limited by government decrees. The restrictions placed by such decrees contradicted
the increased demand for international education in the country, making investments in this field less
desirable. Obtaining licenses for schools was another challenge in Vietnam.5

Moreover, government decrees for recruitment of foreign teachers were strict and required recruited
teachers to qualify as experts and have several years of work experience, limiting the number of

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foreign applicants for teaching positions in the country.6

Vinschool

Vingroup forayed into the education sector in April 2013, by acquiring a kindergarten school in
Hanoi. The school had about 200 students at the time, along with a dozen teachers and a handful of
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teaching staff. Thuy, who had 20 years of experience in managing public and private schools,
including the American International School in HCMC, was brought on board to manage the
operations of the school.

In 2014, Vingroup officially launched its first school campus under the name Vinschool at Vinhomes
Times City, Hanoi, enrolling 2600 students in its first year of operation. Thuy was appointed as the
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CEO of the school, with a few supporting administrative staff to help her run the school. The school
had a kindergarten, primary school, middle school and high school. It was set up on three campuses
over 40 hectares, and students were enrolled from kindergarten to Grade 10. The first phase of
expansion of Vinschool from a small kindergarten to three large campuses was significant, but Thuy
and her team had been well prepared for it. They had planned for the expansion methodically for
over a year, recruiting teachers and staff in advance to cater to the increase in scale.

Vingroup, however, had grander plans for the school’s future, and soon applied for a license to
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Vietnam’s Ministry of Education and Training (MOET) to open a further 17 schools over a four-year
period. The conglomerate formed a team to strategise the growth, with Thuy heading the troupe. Do
Thu Phuong joined as Deputy Chief Executive Officer of the back office and aided Thuy in setting
up the backend support to help the school operate efficiently on a larger scale.

Vingroup had a vision for Vinschool to become the largest school group in Vietnam, and this was in
tandem with its own growth as a real estate developer. Vingroup wanted to meet the educational
needs of families choosing to reside in its residential properties – Vinhomes. Vinhomes had sold
Do

42,000 residential units between 2010 to May 2018. Its contracted sales of launched projects had

2 Ibid.
3 Ibid.
4 Ibid.
5 “Education in Vietnam”, EU Vietnam Business Network, Report, 2018, http://www.ukabc.org.uk/wp-
content/uploads/2018/09/EVBN-Report-Education-Final-Report.pdf, accessed September 2019.
6 Ibid.

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 SMU-20-0004 Vinschool: The Vingroup’s not-for-profit school

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reached US $3 billion by the end of 2017, and was expected to increase to US $4.6 billion by 2018
and US $7.6 billion by end 2019.7

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To meet the needs of Vinhomes residents, Vinschool had expanded to 31 campuses by 2019. The
student strength also grew from a few hundred to 27,000 in the same time frame. The school
campuses were established across three cities in Vietnam - Hanoi, HCMC and Hai Phong. As
Vinschool grew, it also established a second stream of curriculum, the Cambridge curriculum, giving
students the opportunity to choose between a local and an international curriculum.

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Steps to a Goal

The expansion targets were massive and Thuy had a huge task on her shoulders. To begin with, she
formed a strategy execution team and entrusted it with building effective strategies to execute the
expansion plans without compromising process, staff and school infrastructure quality. The
objectives were to implement a recruitment strategy that would allow ‘conscious recruitment’ of

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quality teachers and staff and a framework that would incorporate the school’s mission. Another key
focus was to design an effective curriculum that would meet the needs of the students and fulfil the
vision set for Vinschool (refer to Exhibit 1 for Vinschool’s Mission and Vision). Formulating a fee
structure that would work well with the business model of the school was also essential. The team
also needed to create appropriate tools and processes to manage all the schools and maintain
uniformity in terms of teaching quality, classroom conduction and facilities across all schools.
Another important step was to design policies and metrics procedures to ensure that the benchmarks
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were met. Training and development of staff was also crucial while the school was on a rapid growth
path. Thuy shared,

We set up a comprehensive training program for all new staff. We also set up continuing training
programs for all our staff, and made 60 hours of training compulsory for our teachers on an
annual basis. Additionally, we introduced monitoring methods to identify teacher training needs
and follow-up with individual training requirements.
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Another key focus area was brand management, and although Vingroup was by far the most
renowned conglomerate in Vietnam, Vinschool was a relatively new entity and the only way to live
up to the brand’s expectation was to make sure that the quality of the education imparted surpassed
expectations.

Rapid expansion
No

Rapid expansion of educational institutions, although a new phenomenon in Vietnam, was not
unknown in the West and even in Asia (refer to Exhibit 2 for some examples of Rapid Growth
Schools). However, Vinschool’s growth trajectory was quite unique as compared to these institutions.
The school had not grown by acquiring existing schools, but rather by setting up brand new schools.
This meant that the effort in establishing the new schools was higher, and acquiring land, construction
of the building and recruiting new staff were the primary projects. Acquiring the land and
construction was relatively more straightforward as it was taken care of by Vingroup (all schools
were located at the Vinhomes property sites), but recruiting new staff was more cumbersome and
Do

required careful planning on Vinschool’s part.

7 Anshuman Daga, “Vinhomes Raises $1.35 Billion in Vietnam's Biggest Share Issue”, Reuters, May 7, 2018,
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-vinhomes-ipo/vinhomes-share-sale-raises-1-35-billion-in-vietnams-biggest-issue-sources-
idUSKBN1I80F3 , accessed September 2019.

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 SMU-20-0004 Vinschool: The Vingroup’s not-for-profit school

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By its second year, Vinschool had expanded its operations to incorporate Grade 11 and Grade12, and
grown to 9,800 students. It also recorded its first operating profit. In 2017, the school expanded its

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network to HCMC, with the first Vinschool in the city being set up at Vinhomes Central Park. By
2019, Vinschool had over 4,000 employees (refer to Exhibit 3 for Vinschool Campus Snapshots).

Vinschool’s Unique Business Model

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Most private and international schools in Vietnam were for-profit organisations, barring a few like
the United Nations International School and Saigon South International School. While the United
Nations Development Programme in Vietnam funded the former, the Saigon South International was
funded by Phu My Hung Corporation in Vietnam and was a one-campus establishment, opened with
the intention of providing American education to expatriates in the country.8 Vinschool had a unique
business model as a not-for-profit setup, in which Vingroup allowed all revenue from the school to
be invested into further expansion and growth. Thuy explained,

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No other school in Vietnam has a similar business model, and that is our unique advantage.
Investing large scale in building state-of-the-art new campuses requires heavy investment, and
for-profit schools cannot do this from their revenue. On the other hand, our not-for-profit setup
allows us to invest all our revenue in expansion and growth.

Recruitment Strategy
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Of all the challenges faced in managing Vinschool’s exponential growth, acquiring talent had by far,
been the toughest. The school preferred to recruit teachers who had experience working in public and
private schools, with appropriate teacher training qualifications as laid down by the Ministry of
Education and Training (MOET). The new recruits had to believe in the school’s vision of learning
for its students, and were expected to be comfortable with using the latest technology and
infrastructure for imparting quality education to students. Moreover, as the school was in expansion
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mode, it looked out for teachers who were willing to relocate, comfortable in fulfilling multiple roles,
and capable of taking on future leadership and training and mentoring roles.

As Vinschool was a relatively well-known name given its association with Vingroup, attracting talent
was not a hugely difficult task at first. Moreover, because of its unique business model, Vinschool
was able to offer an attractive salary package to applicants. “Since our teacher salaries are not
dependent on our revenues, but instead funded for the first few years by Vingroup, we are able to
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offer our teachers the best salary in the market”, explained Thuy.

Fee Structure

Charting out a fee structure was another complicated process. Vingroup wanted to eventually run the
organisation as a not-for-profit, and hence benchmarked fees had to be lower than that of its
competitors. Fees determination was also dependent on the earnings of the residents of Vinhomes –
the target customer group. As Thuy had no benchmark to determine the fee structure, she conducted
a survey of Vinhomes residents to help her team determine the right fee structure. She explained,
Do

Most of the residents have decent jobs and a decent standard of living as per Vietnam standards,
and have aspirations of providing their children an international standard education. However,
international and private schools in Vietnam charge exorbitant fees, and hence our residents
were forced to make a compromise and send their kids to public schools. Public education in

8 Ibid.

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 SMU-20-0004 Vinschool: The Vingroup’s not-for-profit school

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Vietnam is of good standard but imparted in Vietnamese. The drawback of the system is that
English is not compulsory but an elective subject, so students passing from such schools have a

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hard time finding jobs in multinational companies within and outside Vietnam.

The study helped Thuy and her team come up with a fee structure that was affordable for Vinhomes
residents, and yet could cover the costs of operating the school. Given the financial support received
from Vingroup, the fee structure was highly subsidised. Tuition fee structures in private schools in
Vietnam were typically set by dividing the expected staff and infrastructure expenses by the expected

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number of students, and then a margin was added to cover additional operational costs and other
support costs. However, in Vinschool’s case, all support costs were taken care of by Vingroup (also
demonstrating Vinschool’s commitment to a not-for-profit model). The tuition fee range was set
between US$1,500 and US$7,000 per academic year, depending on the academic program and grade
level (refer to Exhibit 4 for Comparison Data of Top International school fees in Vietnam). This was
a fraction of the fees charged by most international schools in Vietnam, which typically ranged from
US$17,000 to US$35,000 annually.9

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Brand Awareness

Although Thuy was aware that building brand awareness for the school was an important component,
she chose to first focus her attention on maintaining the quality of the school as it expanded, rather
than focusing on running campaigns to build brand awareness. She explained,
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We initially relied on word of mouth. When parents enrolled their children in our school and
experienced first-hand our unique schooling philosophy, they talked about it with their friends.
More and more people then enrolled their kids in our schools. Some parents within the Vinhomes
campus began to pull out their kids from international schools and enrol them in our school. The
word spread, and we started receiving tons of applications from people residing outside
Vinhomes as well, and we slowly started realising that our school was creating its own unique
identity because of its focus on quality.
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Curriculum

Thuy and her team worked closely with MOET to set up a local curriculum that would meet the
requirements of MOET, and at the same time conform to Vinschool’s five pillars. She elaborated,

We designed the curricula to target five foci: Knowledge, Language, Physical Education, Arts,
and Soft Skills. Subjects like English and Music were added to the MOET curriculum to make it
No

a more comprehensive fit for the school. The curriculum was also adjusted to suit the
International Baccalaureate (IB) model, which was offered as a choice to high school students.
There was a personal education component in addition to experience-based subjects such as
Global Citizenship Education, Characters and Life Skills Education, etc., which were given the
same importance as traditional subjects.

A teacher resource centre was set up to cater to the continuing training needs of the teaching staff.
An online platform acted as the everyday reference platform. It contained a comprehensive set of
quality lessons for each subject across every grade. These lesson plans were specific to the blended
Do

learning model. The lesson plans, and its aggregation in one central resource, allowed Vinschool to
distribute quality-teaching resources to every teacher. It also simplified the process of lesson planning
and created common standards across the network. In addition, teachers were provided with training
opportunities on a regular basis to enhance their skills. Upon joining, new teachers were provided

9 “Vietnam School Fees by Grade, 2019”, Edarabia, https://www.edarabia.com/vietnam-school-fees/ , accessed September 2019.

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 SMU-20-0004 Vinschool: The Vingroup’s not-for-profit school

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with 120 hours of training to give them hands-on experience with the Vinschool teaching
methodologies.

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Centralised Management

Once the curriculum, fee structure and the overall education philosophy of Vinschool had been
successfully established, Thuy shifted her attention to building uniform management procedures and
policies across all school campuses. The team brainstormed on the management style that the school

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would adopt to enable effective scaling while maintaining the reputation of the organisation. It was
decided that a centralised management would best suit the expansion plans. The organisation
structure was accordingly structured to ensure that the leadership teams across the schools could
work as a cohesive team on a day-to-day basis.

Thuy believed that the centralised management of the school coupled with effective monitoring tools
worked in her school’s favour. Moreover, it allowed the school to replicate ‘what works’ in the model.

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Ironically, the centralised model was similar in many ways to the public school district model in
Vietnam, where a large majority of the schools strictly followed the guidelines set by MOET. Such
standardisation not only created accountability for well-aligned instructional practices but also
promoted fidelity to a particular academic/curricular program - keys to consistent academic results.
Phuong elaborated,

Our processes and monitoring tools allow us to decide if our schools are meeting or exceeding
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performance indicators. When we notice any inconsistency or poor academic results, we invest
more time and resources on the identified school to correct mediocre performance rather than
focusing on the pursuit of designated replication plans.

Thuy added,

On a separate note, speedy growth of the school has several advantages. Growth allows
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economies of scale - more schools equate to an increase in per-pupil revenue, which can help
improve the quality of the education we offer. The more financially savvy we are, the more cost
savings we create, and this is directly tied to our ability to invest strategically in the development
of operational systems that are well-equipped to support the growing network of our schools.

Centralised management was supported by a digitised quality model of clearly defined frameworks
for curriculum implementation, instruction delivery, conducting student assessments, and designing
No

ongoing professional development for staff and teachers.

Policies were designed that all schools were expected to follow. These policies encompassed all
aspects of the school operations, including admissions, teaching and learning, staff recruitment, and
student life services. Technology solutions implemented with the support of Vingroup helped
implement these policies seamlessly across all campuses. In addition, a quality-analysis check system
was implemented to upload all the checklists used by the schools under one platform, so that they
could be readily accessed across all schools. A monitoring tool to observe all schools from the central
head office campus in Hanoi was also installed across all campuses.
Do

Education Pedagogy

Building a reliable educational pedagogy was a task Thuy and her team had focused on from the very
start. As Vinschool grew from one to three and then to 31 campuses across three cities, the team
continuously fine-tuned the curriculum and learning pedagogy to ensure that the school offered what

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 SMU-20-0004 Vinschool: The Vingroup’s not-for-profit school

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it promised to its students – an innovative, international standard education. Vinschool’s education
philosophy was built on five core values of inquisitiveness, proactiveness, integrity, caring, and

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respect (refer to Exhibit 5 for Vinschool’s Education Philosophy).

Vinschool students, or “Vinsers” as they were called, were trained to be equipped with not
only academic skills, but also knowledge, thinking capability, leadership, good character and attitude,
to become global citizens with a strong Vietnamese cultural identity and pride. The school focused
on imparting a combination of traditional methods and interactive blended learning methods in

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classroom to cultivate student capabilities. The learning methodology allowed students to use
computer-based tools, digital learning and direct-hands on experiences in classroom to get a better
grasp on core academic concepts. The aim was to develop students’ learning passion to seek
knowledge, develop critical thinking skills and apply their learning to real life context. However,
such interactive learning methods were costly to implement and required special teaching talent, both
barriers to scale.

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Thuy and her team implemented a dual-mode learning program, which combined group learning and
individual learning. As part of the group learning experience, teachers facilitated group activities like
projects and exercises to enable students to discover deeper meaning in the content and improve
thinking skills. The objective of group learning was to develop the skills of working in a team in a
collaborative environment along with the development of leadership skills. While group learning
focused on collaboration, individual learning allowed students to learn at their own pace in an
independent manner. The learning method was student-led with students constructing their own
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learning journey, and teachers acting as coaches in the learning process. In addition, Thuy and her
team established an Innovation Centre to promote students’ creativity and inventiveness, and also
develop their passion for science and technology.

Vinschool also started a new initiative called the “21st Century Skills” programme in 2018, to ensure
that its students had the relevant skills to have a successful career.10 The programme provided a
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combination of learning skills, social skills, cognitive skills, and self-improvement skills, in addition
to imparting technical skills that would be relevant in the future. The objective of this initiative was
to make the students adaptable to change and also active partners in the learning process. The
initiative was to be rolled out across all grades, with an emphasis on exercises to hone the skills of
students on the above dimensions.

Corporate Social Responsibility

No

Giving back to society was a key part of the Vingroup’s ethos. Providing subsidised international
standard education to the children of the residents of the townships it had developed was one way of
doing that. Another way was for Vinschool to incorporate community service in its wider agenda. In
2018, more than 2,000 teachers and employees of the Vinschool education system spent over 7,000
hours doing community service for disadvantaged children, patients, elderly and homeless people.

Vinschool also held an annual event called Edurun to raise funds for constructing classrooms for
underprivileged children in remote and far flung areas. Edurun was first hosted in Hanoi in 2015, and
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since then, many people had enthusiastically participated in the event across the country. The funds
collected from Edurun, 2018, had helped establish a new school for underprivileged children in Dien
Bien Province.

10 Vingroup, Education News, “Vinschool to Deliver 21st Century Skills Programme”, January 11, 2018,
https://vingroup.net/en/news/detail/1945, accessed January 2019.

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 SMU-20-0004 Vinschool: The Vingroup’s not-for-profit school

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Additionally, Vinschool established a Gifted and Talented Education (GATE) Centre to provide
personalised education that appropriately challenged and nurtured gifted students’ strengths and

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interests. Each gifted student was provided an individualised Advanced Learning Plan (ALP) that
outlined the learning and developmental goals expected from the student and the steps needed to get
there. ALPs were constructed through a cooperation between experts, the school, parents, and most
importantly, the student. This helped ensure that the student’s personal aspirations and strengths were
placed at the centre of the learning program, and the student had access to a wide variety of
challenging coursework, state-of-the-art programs, and support network.

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Early Wins

By 2019, Vinschool had seen three cohorts of graduates passing from the school. All the cohorts had
achieved high scores, ranking Vinschool among the top schools in Vietnam in terms of academic
performance. As a relatively new school in the public sector, consistently high academic results for
three consecutive years had provided Thuy and her team with the much-needed boost of confidence

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in their growth journey.

Key Decision Points

However, the new strategic imperative to double the student size in the next five years was by no
means an easy target. Thuy was aware of the challenges but hoped to overcome them based on her
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learnings. The primary challenge was getting the right staff on-board in the proposed new schools. It
was also important to ensure that the schools maintained their quality and effectively addressed the
operational challenges that arose from the amplified expansion, while keeping a close watch on the
long-term sustainability of the organisation.

There were other key considerations. Replicating the organisation’s vision with preciseness every
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time was not easy. However, thinking beyond the one-school one-community ideology and
maintaining the speed of expansion was important to achieve a transformational effect of the
offerings from Vingroup to the Vietnamese community in general – a key goal of its parent
organisation.

Thuy had used a four-step process to cater to the expansions in the past, and intended to use the same
process for the new expansion goals as well. The first step was to analyse the annual business plan
No

designed by Vingroup, followed by developing a resource allocation plan for the projects that had to
be approved by the parent company for allocating the budget. The next step was to create an
implementation plan for the new campuses, and then monitor the plan to ensure smooth
implementation. Once the schools were up and running, they would be slowly merged into the
existing processes of the school.

Talent acquisition & retention

So far Thuy had relied on local and foreign talent to source her staff for her schools. However, the
Do

supply of quality teachers in Vietnam was small, and banking on the existing supply for their
expansion was a risk that Thuy did not want to take. One solution was to hire foreign talent, but there
was a concern that these staff may not have the requisite skill set to address the needs of the school’s
largely local Vietnamese students. There was also the cost factor: a foreign teacher demanded a
higher salary in addition to international insurance, paid holidays and summer payments, two-way
airfare and relocation allowance, housing allowance, discounts for their children's tuition fees and
work permit and residence card support. Moreover, such staff preferred schools that had some

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 SMU-20-0004 Vinschool: The Vingroup’s not-for-profit school

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presence in their home countries as well, so that they could eventually continue their career in the
organisation, if and when they decided to move back. In addition, a government decree stipulated

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that foreign teachers should have at least five years of experience to teach twinning programmes at
Vietnamese or foreign-invested schools, colleges and universities.11

Due to the various constraints, hiring foreign staff required careful consideration. On the other hand,
limiting her talent pool could actually delay the opening of the campuses. Thuy arranged
brainstorming sessions to gather ideas from her senior staff on how to cater to their resource

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constraints to meet their expansion plans. She organised brown-bag lunch sessions every Friday with
her senior staff. She also organised senior school surveys across some of the campuses to understand
what students valued the most in their teachers. Additionally, she established a referral scheme for
employees to attract new talent. She also set-up a team to analyse individual staff achievement results
to help identify high performers. Thuy elaborated,

The idea is to develop a shared commitment amidst all our staff to help establish a balanced and

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purposeful growth process that allows them to achieve their career growth goals as well while
we grow as an institution. We want to spread the message that our growth as an organisation
should resonate with our employees and we welcome new ideas.

At the brown-bag lunches, some of the employees had proposed considering hiring professionals
with relevant experience outside education who had not yet qualified or appeared for teacher training
certification courses. The other idea was to approach former teachers who had left the organisation,
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and look at the possibility of retraining them and upgrading their skills to allow them an opportunity
to meet the quality criteria set by Vinschool. Another idea was to reduce the weight given to seniority
in ranking applicants for teaching vacancies. There was also a proposition to employ more support
staff in the schools to enable teachers to focus more on their specialist expertise, thereby managing
the schools with slightly fewer high quality teachers supported by a higher number of support staff.

Some staff also cautioned Thuy against using external talent pools for key positions during the
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scaling process as external talent were unlikely to completely understand the mission, brand, identity,
organisational culture, and academic model of the school initially.

During the previous phase of expansion, Thuy had hired an American agency to provide focused
coaching to school leaders and teachers through large amounts of targeted coaching. She
contemplated whether she should continue using the agency’s help to train and coach senior leaders.
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Thuy also needed to develop an internal pipeline of future school leaders and teacher-leaders who
would comprise the founding teams at new campuses. She was planning to build a process to include
the selection of the highest performers and then invite them to apply to selected tracks. Components
to executing her scaling plans also entailed maintaining a target of 90 percent staff retention rate.

Other Challenges

Vietnam’s economic growth over the past two decades had seen a steady and impressive growth,
averaging 5.5% since 1990.12 The growth also saw the emergence of a burgeoning middle class who
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aspired to send their children abroad for higher education. Families who could afford such education
preferred to send their children to private schools that offered international standard education -
another reason for the rising demand for international education in the country.

11 Stefan Trines, “Education in Vietnam”, World Education News + Reviews, Nov 2017, https://wenr.wes.org/2017/11/education-in-
vietnam, accessed September 2019.
12 BMI Market Report, “Vietnam”, https://bmiglobaled.com/Market-Reports/Vietnam/economic-strength, accessed November 2019.

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In 2017, the Vietnamese government had introduced a decree that increased the cap on international

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schools in Vietnam, allowing them to have up to 50% of their enrolments made up of domestic
students, compared to the early cap of 10% for primary and 20% for secondary education.13 This
had motivated international private schools to expand their base in Vietnam, but it also meant
increased competition amongst private schools in the country, all of whom were targeting the upper
middle-class and middle-class customer segment. At the same time, the quality of the public schools
was also improving, and many of them had started to offer English as a second language in their

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curriculum.

Increased competition meant that the fees charged by international schools would gradually decrease
and become more financially feasible for middle class families.14 With more choices available for
parents and students, private schools would also need to be at the top of their game in terms of
curricula, teaching staff, facilities, ancillary services and reputation in order to be successful in the
long term.15

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In addition, although Vinschool was a non-profit school, it needed to be profitable to implement the
expansion plans. Additionally, the school was also in the midst of implementing its preschool
curriculum. While thinking about her resource constraints, Thuy’s thoughts moved to her target
market segment, and she wondered about how to match their expectations with Vinschool’s resources
(refer to Exhibit 6 for Vinschool Target Consumer).
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To effectively communicate its strategy for the school to meet these challenges, Vinschool had
embarked on a number of messaging and branding initiatives. Social media was widely accepted and
used in Vietnam, and many international schools in the country had a significant social media
presence used to promote and build brand awareness. As at March 2018, there were 57 million active
social media users in the country, with a remarkable internet penetration rate of 67%.16 Vinschool
wanted to tap on this trend and expand its presence in social media to portray itself as a digitally
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savvy institution. It tried to build an active presence on most social media outlets including Facebook,
to showcase school events, various forms of action and active learning, and as a channel to interact
with students and their parents.

There were several other high-level criteria set by Vingroup that Thuy needed to meet as well. They
included placing Vinschool among the top schools in the country and maintaining this position as
they grew. At the same time, the school needed to maintain its internationalisation and competitive
fee structure. Thuy knew that Vinschool’s growth decisions would have long-term impact for
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Vingroup as an organisation.

Thuy weighed the various elements of the puzzle that she needed to join to make the vision of a
ubiquitous Vinschool a reality. Vinschool needed to have a consistent strategy of expansion and
growth, keeping its high quality intact, and yet, it needed to do so in an increasingly competitive
market for resources and students. How could Vinschool expand holistically and simultaneously
meet the growth targets set by its parent company? How could Vinschool stay ahead of the
competition? Could the school expand its potential consumer market segment further? How could
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the school make its brand more compelling?

13 Koushan Das, “Vietnam’s Education Sector: New Regulations for Foreign Cooperation and Investments”, Vietnam Briefing, July 12,
2018, https://www.vietnam-briefing.com/news/vietnams-education-sector-new-regulations-foreign-cooperation-investments.html/,
accessed November 2019.
14 Ibid.
15 Anton Crace, Vietnam increases domestic participation in international schools, The PIE News, Sep 28, 2018,
https://thepienews.com/news/vietnam-increases-domestic-participation-in-international-schools /, accessed November 2019.
16 Ibid.

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 SMU-20-0004 Vinschool: The Vingroup’s not-for-profit school

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EXHIBIT 1: VINSCHOOL MISSION AND VISION

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VISION
Vinschool - a world class school system for Vietnamese students.

MISSION

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Vinschool - Nuturing talent into passionate, capable, and responsible individuals through a world
class education with a focus on the identity, qualities, and values of a Vietnamese citizen.

Source: Company data

EXHIBIT 2: EXAMPLES OF RAPID GROWTH SCHOOL ORGANISATIONS

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There were several examples of school organisations across the world, which had grown successfully
over a short period.

KIPP: Non-profit school foundations like KIPP’s had expanded rapidly and successfully and
showcased how educational institutions with the right mindset and goals could make a difference in
the society they operated. KIPP (Knowledge is Power Program), was originally launched in 1994 as
a house-to-house sign-up program, and consecutively opened two middle schools the following year
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on the KIPPs model. Between 2000 to 2007 KIPP opened 64 schools across 17 states making it the
largest network of non-profit charter schools in the country.17 KIPP’s business model was unique in
that it allowed entrepreneurs to apply with the intention of opening/managing a school based on the
KIPPs program. The selected entrepreneurs were allowed to operate the KIPPs school more or less
independently. KIPP’s Foundation provided the necessary support for recruitment, trailblazer
services, performance evaluation and high quality instructions. All the schools were mandated to
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operate on the operating principles defined by KIPPs. Funding for the KIPPs schools mainly came
from government sources and local public funding.18

GEMS: Global Education Management Systems (GEMS), an international education company

founded in Dubai in 2000, had expanded rapidly over a period of few years both in Dubai and
internationally. By 2003, the company had expanded internationally and acquired more than 12
schools in England. By 2012, the company had expanded to more than 70 schools in over a dozen
countries worldwide. The model of the for-profit company was based on acquiring existing schools
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and then implementing GEMS policies and procedures across those schools. Schools were
established in various price brackets, to serve all markets and income levels. The more expensive
schools had more spacious grounds and amenities such as golf and tennis facilities, and smaller class
sizes. Educational quality was maintained in the budget-range schools by using excellent teachers
and efficiency and economisation of time and space. Capitalising on the breadth of experience from
the large network of GEMS schools, resources and information was shared across all schools and
training of teachers was handled at the organisation level. When entering into new markets, GEMS
also benefitted from local partners who understood local conditions.19
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Source: Adapted from various sources

17 Erin Macey, Janet Decker and Suzanne E. Eckes, “The Knowledge Is Power Program (KIPP): An Analysis of One Model's Efforts to
Promote Achievement in Underserved Communities”, Journal of School Choice 3(3):212-241, July 2009,
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/233297416_The_Knowledge_Is_Power_Program_KIPP_An_Analysis_of_One_Model's_Effor
ts_to_Promote_Achievement_in_Underserved_Communities, accessed September 2019
18 Ibid.
19 Sara Hamdan, Building an Education Empire, Global Citizen, July/August 2012, https://issuu.com/global-citizen/docs/global-citizen-
09/20, accessed September 2019.

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 SMU-20-0004 Vinschool: The Vingroup’s not-for-profit school

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EXHIBIT 3: VINSCHOOL CAMPUS SNAPSHOTS

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No
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Source: Company Website

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 SMU-20-0004 Vinschool: The Vingroup’s not-for-profit school

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EXHIBIT 4: COMPARISON DATA OF TOP INTERNATIONAL SCHOOL FEES IN VIETNAM

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Annual Fees in
School Thousands Curriculum Campuses
American accredited
International School - American Academy VND 366,036 - 467,100 curriculum 1 campus
Cambridge and IGCSE

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Australian International school VND 365,400 - 561,800 curriculum 3 campuses
British International School (Nord Anglia) VND 226,800 - 641,800 IB Curriculum 3 campuses
Hanoi International School VND 362,610 - 575,910 IB Curriculum 1 campus

Source: List of 52 Best Schools in Vietnam, Edarabia, https://www.edarabia.com/schools/vietnam/, accessed

November 2019.

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EXHIBIT 5: VINSCHOOL CURRICULUM MODEL
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Source: Company Data

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 SMU-20-0004 Vinschool: The Vingroup’s not-for-profit school

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EXHIBIT 6: VINSCHOOL TARGET CONSUMER

Vinschool’s primary target consumer segment were children of households in the Vinhomes
campuses. So essentially, target consumers of Vinhomes’ were also target consumers of Vinschool.
Vinhomes provided residential offering to high-income customers, but it had expanded its portfolio
to include more middle-income customers. In March 2019, Vinhomes had announced the

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restructuring of its products into two brands – Vinhomes (for middle- and high-income customers)
and Happy Town (for lower-income customers). The Vinhomes brand consisted of three product
lines: Vinhomes Sapphire, Vinhomes Ruby and Vinhomes Diamond. The rebranding exercise had
allowed Vinhomes to market its mega projects to a broader set of customers: from the middle-income
to high-end segments. For the mass segment Vinhomes targeted young and savvy home buyers. For
the high-end, the company targeted young affluent families looking for modern, well-equipped and
quality living environments. For the best-in-class segment, target consumers were high net worth

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clients seeking the most privileged living standards. The target consumers were not restricted to the
country only, but included consumers from neighbouring countries like Singapore, Thailand,
Malaysia, Japan and Korea as well. The company had organised roadshows in Japan and Korea in
March 2019 and received very strong interest from domestic and international buyers. Targeting the
segment of residents of Vinhomes campuses for Vinschool also served another purpose: providing a
seamless service to the residents of accessible, international level affordable schooling.
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Source: Adapted from Company Website
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