What matters to you and why?

I still have a vivid memory of the moment when I first stepped into one of the most prestigious colleges in Ho Chi Minh City – Foreign Trade University. Back to then, what really concerned me at that time was how to achieve good grades, what extracurricular I should engage in or just how to simply make a good impression on my professors. After three years, now I reflect on what has been done so far and realize that everything is different from what I think it really is.

I used to be a person who always considers learning and training skills a must and you have to be perfect at those two things during your student’s life. Honestly, I believed that accumulating sufficient knowledge and obtaining good skills can offer you a large window of employment opportunities with expected salaries and other benefits in the future. That is a reason why I always dug in studies, books, researches and tests in order to fulfill what I supposed to need doing.

Regarding a recent short-term internship, I was exposed to many novelties and experienced inevitable failures due to my rigid performance based on hypothetical groundings. However, lessons may come after certain failures. Thus, right now, I hold a strong belief that what actually matters me is attitude to things and people. Undeniably, life does not just revolve around studying and practicing – this is what I learned from the 3 – month internship. It is apparent that knowledge and skills can support you at some stages of your work, but not all phases. Therefore, instead of relying too much on theoretical understandings, I have pay more attention to pragmatic guide. But the question is how to obtain practical instruction. Knowledge and skills can be acquired at university; meanwhile, on your walking into a real job, your learning attitude or respect towards surroundings such as your colleagues, your assignments or even your boss plays a pivotal role in obtaining job promotion or having others support you in specific cases.

In this day and age, most enterprises seem to appreciate staff’s attitude rather than their understandings or skills. They consider that the two latter things can be taught when they are a student; whereas, the former one is dependant on their instinct and behaviours which can be neither educated nor instructed. To conclude, learners should concentrate more on attitude to enhance their performance at work.