3 Leadership Lessons from the President of Ericsson Vietnam

As part of the Industry Speaker Series, Mr. Denis Brunetti – President of Ericsson Vietnam, Myanmar, Cambodia, and Laos, recently interacted in person with VinUniversity students. Along his 27 years of experience working in senior management positions at Ericsson in many countries around the world, Mr. Brunetti has accumulated and shared valuable lessons on leadership skills and human resource management.

Give your people the opportunities to shine

The first and foremost lesson in leadership is to empower others. A great manager understands his people’s unique strengths and has faith in them, providing them with enough freedom and resources to fulfill their assigned tasks. Opening up about the evaluation criteria and how to build “trust”, the President of Ericsson emphasized that an excellent leadership includes the respect and appreciation of his colleagues’ lack of experience. “A blank page will easily welcome new colors to be added, and as long as they have done their best, they did well.”

Build an reasonably flexible plan

The second especially critical skill for a leader is planning. A neat plan is a basic requirement, but in practice, excellence and revolutionary changes often emerge from unexpected moments. Prepare a great plan with reasonable flexibility and no unnecessary complications.

“Zoom-in” and “Zoom-out”

With 27 years of experience working in senior management positions at Ericsson in many countries worldwide, Mr. Brunetti revealed that success in any field requires thorough understanding and practice. His advice is to keep a view of the big picture at work while paying attention to the details because “life is an open-book test, so memorization skills are not really as important as knowing where to find the necessary information”

Besides, the interaction between the speaker and our students has made this talk truly special and memorable. Instead of leading the talk, Mr. Denis welcomed VinUniversity students’ sharp questions from the very beginning, offering the opportunities for them to actively learn and discover to the full extent. The talk not only opened up a flexible career growth path for our students, but also empowered their confidence and the will to initiate.

(*) Written by Le Trung Kien, student of the Bachelor of Science in Hospitality Management program

One of the key differences at the College of Business and Management, VinUniversity is that right from the freshman year and throughout the course of study, students are immersed in leading companies to learn about the professional workplace, industry development trends, practical demands of businesses, or directly interact and learn from business leaders.

The Student Industry Engagement Program of the College of Business Administration, VinUniversity includes a diverse range of activities such as:

✔️INDUSTRY SPEAKER SERIES: A series of activities to interact and learn from the shared experiences of business leaders of domestic and foreign companies.

✔️INDUSTRY MENTORSHIP PROGRAM: Students will be paired with an advisor to learn from his/her practical experience and the industry.

✔️COMPANY VISIT: Field-trip to learn about companies.

✔️5-IN-5 INTERNSHIP: Students will spend every Friday (no-class day) for 5 consecutive weeks joining the rotation in many different positions within the companies they filed the application to study their operational model before deciding where to apply for their intensive summer internship.

✔️SUMMER INTERNSHIP: Summer Internship Program.