Investigating determinants of new graduates' first-choice career in Vietnam

Abstract

Career choice is invariably one of the most significant decisions a young person must make because it is a solid foundation for them to own a smooth career path and high-quality life. To understand the decisive factors affecting the graduates' first choice career, this thesis focuses on final-year students in business schools in Vietnam, since after graduation, they will have to deal with this challenging choice. Additionally, the research aims to evaluate the graduates' perception of employment in Domestic Enterprises (DMEs) and Multi-national Corporations (MNCs) to help promote DMEs' growth because MNCs ordinarily receive more preference. The quantitative method was applied, and an online questionnaire with 298 responses was collected. The respondents came from 39 different schools in various locations within Vietnam. The study used Statistical Package Software for Social Science (SPSS) Version 22.0 to analyze the collected data. The survey conducted reliability analysis, descriptive statistics, importance-performance analysis, and Pearson correlation analysis. As a result of descriptive statistics, working environment, career development, and pay are three factors that are incredibly important to the graduates. Furthermore, after running the IPA technique and Pearson correlation analysis, it is indicated that graduates perceived MNCs with better performance, and there is a positive correlation between importance and performance dimensions. However, DMEs' performance scores were not too low, thus suggesting that DMEs employers need to communicate more with graduates for both parties' advantages