About BWP Sonasea PQ

Far Eastern Group was established in 1937 in Taiwan with a variety of investments in a plenty of industries.  

Far Eastern Apparel was founded in 2007 in Binh Duong, Thuan An Vietnam with more than 3000 production workers, supplying a number of international brands from USA, Europe, Japan, etc.

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The Group motto has been "Sincerity – Diligence – Thrift – Prudence - Innovation".

The Factory in Binh Duong pledged to proactively comply with international labor & human right standards, instead of passive compliance as requested by their buyers.

Social dialogue was their priority to uphold social responsibility as well as production efficiency. They believed effective communication can help achieve 8 goals. They are (i) improved stakeholder responses; (ii) zero labor dispute/strike; (iii) reduce turnover rate; (iv) enhanced professional image; (v) increased productivity; (vi) clearer promotional materials; (vii) stronger business relationship; and (viii) steadier work flows; 

WIth this in mind, they developed 12 communication channels & 6 areas of focus ranging from personal issues, collective issues, productivity, working conditions to compensation & benefits. Monthly Free Talk Forum has been their most original & effective channel until currently. 

Key Challenges

Far Eastern Apparel Ltd. Co proactively identified t of their key challenges was the costly resources to maintain all 12 communication channels & the reliability of the employee handling data to suggest or improve systematic production issues

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1. The costly & complicated communication system

• 12 communication channels created confusion for employees to better engage;

• They required a lot of costly resources that mostly were time & efforts of relevant staff & teams who already were occupied with other full-time jobs;

• The quantity of data received & handled became a burden of workloads;

• The poor data quality failed to correctly suggest system issues & their root causes for long-term solutions; instead it encouraged tip-of-the-iceberg solutions & quick fixes that led to failures in meeting with social responsibility requirements

2. The need for a reliable dataset to suggest changes

• Leaders realised the need for a more effective mechanism for social dialogue in order to achieve the above-mentioned 8 goals of changes;

• The mechanism must require more mindset & skillset transformation for all involved, from grievance makers to takers; from decision makers to decision takers;

• The mechanism must produce more reliable data to suggest & drive changes that work for employees' engagement & employers' expectations;

Key Successes

Far Eastern Apparel gave RespectVN an opportunity to introduce WE@WORK with EASYFORM/IRFORM in Binh Duong Factory & later Binh Phuoc Factory from 2014 to 2016 to help gain 8 expected goals via improved communication & dialogue:

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1. Employee Mindset & Behaviours Transformed

Both blue-collar & white-collar employees transform their mindsets & behaviors:

• From anonymous & low-quality to high-quality & direct grievances/complaints 

• From baseless, emotional to evidence-based & constructive complaint

• From negative conflicts to positive policy suggestions & recommendations

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OWNERSHIP: The WE@WORK model was duplicated from Binh Duong Factory to Binh Phuoc Factory from 2014 to 2016

2. Employer Mindset & Behaviours Transformed

Leaders, managers, supervisors & trade union officers transformed their mindsets & behaviours (although the level of transformation differed between 2 factories)

• From 12 communication channels to the main 2 (Suggestion boxes & face-toface)

• From hardly accepting to actual allowing of anonymous grievances 

• From quantity-focused to quality-focused in term of better grievance handling

• From deployment of semi-functional staff to full-time & trained persons-in-charge

• From quick fixes to evidence-based & constructive feedbacks/responses to employee grievances;

• Starting to develop & enforce key policies (productivity, wage, hours of work, engagement, career path development, etc.) based on data in conflict management & case analysis/recommendations from bottom up

KEY SUCCESSES: The case set a good example for workplace conflict management & workplace efficiency, especially in introducing the tech-aligned employee handling mechanism to replace manual ones. Finally the concept of integrated data management to serve internal rule/policy development & implementation was also perceived