Double salary, support up to 500 million to attract talent

Editorial: Imbued with the idea that "Talent is the vital energy of the nation", our Party and State have long focused on discovering, attracting and making good use of talents.

Most recently, in the country's development orientation for the 2021-2030 period, the 13th National Congress Resolution also emphasized "attracting and promoting talents".

The story of "finding talent through the sand" and retaining talent is still a concern of many generations of leaders through the terms.

Currently, the Ministry of Home Affairs is developing a National Strategy Project to attract and utilize talents until 2030, with a vision to 2045, to submit to the Government for promulgation in 2023.

Given the importance of this project, VietNamNet organizes a series of articles titled 'Keys' to attracting and retaining talent with the hope of adding an objective and multi-dimensional voice to this strategy.

According to the Ministry of Home Affairs, in the past time, 37 central agencies and 58 localities had 387 applications meeting the standards of Decree 140. As a result, 135 excellent graduates and 123 young scientists were attracted to work in state agencies.

As the first unit in the country to organize the attraction and selection of excellent graduates and young scientists, the Ministry of Finance has organized the recruitment of 88 targets and has recruited 51 excellent graduates and young scientists to work. Of which, 49 cases work at the Ministry of Finance and 2 cases work at the State Treasury.

According to the assessment of the Ministry of Finance, excellent graduates and young scientists recruited have all completed their tasks well and excellently. Among them, some are highly appreciated for their professional qualifications, expertise, ability to apply knowledge in their assigned fields, have development prospects; have good thinking and professional capacity, have the ability to work well in groups as well as independently, have a spirit of learning, and strive to excellently complete all assigned tasks.

In addition to the Ministry of Finance, at the central level, there are also the Central Organizing Committee, the Central Inspection Committee, the Ministry of Home Affairs and many other ministries and branches that also organize civil servant recruitment according to this policy.

From a local perspective, from 2019 to present, Quang Ninh province has also recruited 17 cases (2 civil servants, 15 public employees) according to Decree No. 140.

In addition, Quang Ninh province has attracted 10 PhDs and 11 Masters from abroad, in the fields needed by the province, with teaching experience to work at Ha Long University in the period 2015 - 2020 with a total support budget of about 61 billion VND.

In the past 4 years, Ha Tinh province has organized 4 recruitment exams for civil servants and public employees according to Decree No. 140/2017. With 213 targets approved by the province, 60 candidates submitted applications and 48 candidates met the requirements and standards according to regulations.

As a result, Ha Tinh recruited 32/48 qualified candidates (including 30 civil servants and 2 public employees), including 13 excellent graduates and 19 young scientists.

The Ministry of Home Affairs said that, unlike the usual recruitment method through exams, these special candidates will be considered and enjoy many special privileges in appointment, promotion, training and salary policies.

After recruitment, interns who meet the requirements are officially appointed to the specialist level and equivalent. The salary of excellent students is ranked at level 1, with a salary coefficient of 2.34. In addition, they are also entitled to an additional allowance equal to 100% of their current salary, but not exceeding 5 years. That is, they receive double the salary compared to those who are recruited normally.

Thus, with the basic salary from July 1 being 1.8 million VND, excellent students entering the civil service will immediately receive a salary of 8.424 million VND.

In addition, they are also entitled to salary allowances according to current regulations for specific regions, industries and fields (if any).

In particular, Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, in addition to implementing the policies stipulated in Decree 140, also apply special mechanisms according to regulations.

In addition to implementing policies to attract and create resources from excellent graduates and young scientists, many provinces and cities have introduced outstanding policies to attract talents to work in the apparatus.

Deputy Head of the Propaganda Department of the Ho Chi Minh City Party Committee Pham Duc Hai said that recently, Ho Chi Minh City has issued a policy that when newly recruited experts are subsidized 100 million VND, then receive a state salary as prescribed with a salary of over 8.0. In addition, there are other policies such as living expenses of 30 - 50 million VND, if there is no official house, they will be subsidized an additional 7 million VND/month...

Along with that is the policy of encouraging experts who have projects outside of their regular work. Those projects will be rewarded depending on the value. For example, if the project is worth 100 billion, they will get 1 billion.

However, from 2018 to the end of 2022, Ho Chi Minh City only attracted 5 people, including 1 Vietnamese, 1 American, and 3 Japanese.

Recently, the People's Council of Da Nang City also passed a Resolution to develop a Policy to attract doctors to public health facilities for the period 2023-2025 with a spending level of 50 - 200 times the basic salary, that is, from 70 to nearly 300 million VND.

Specifically, those who are eligible for recruitment will receive a one-time recruitment benefit immediately upon starting their work. PhD candidates will receive a benefit equal to 200 times the base salary. Level 2 specialists will receive a benefit equal to 180 times the base salary. Resident doctors will receive 150 times the base salary...

The People's Committee of Ha Tinh province has also issued a number of policies to encourage the development of high-quality human resources. The province is currently building a list of industries and occupations that need training, attraction and post-recruitment support in the period of 2022 - 2025 to serve as a basis for recruiting, receiving, attracting and training human resources of the province.

Accordingly, excellent graduates and young scientists who are eligible for recruitment under Decree No. 140/2017, if they are in the list of occupations that the province needs to attract, recruit, participate in recruitment and are admitted, depending on the specific subject, will receive additional support policies from 40 to 500 million VND.

From the practical implementation of policies to attract and create resources from excellent graduates, young scientists as well as other outstanding policies, ministries, branches and localities also realized some inadequacies of these policies.

The Ministry of Finance believes that Decree No. 140/2017 essentially only regulates input recruitment.

In addition, the salary and allowance regime as stipulated in Decree 140/2017 is also inadequate. For example, in the case of failing the promotion exam or the 5-year period of receiving additional allowances expires, the recruited civil servant basically no longer enjoys the additional benefits as at the beginning.

Ha Tinh province also pointed out the fact that the working conditions and environment for high-quality human resources after recruitment are still difficult and do not meet the requirements. Therefore, there has been a situation of not being able to retain "talents" after recruitment.

In some cases, after being accepted and assigned a job, they are afraid of difficulties, not really attached to the job, have a psychology of probing and testing, sometimes compare salaries and are not really secure in the job, so they quit or transfer to another agency.

In addition, the private sector with its dynamic, flexible working environment and attractive salary regime is attracting more and more high-quality human resources from the public sector, including excellent students and young scientists attracted under special regimes.

Associate Professor, Dr. Dinh Dung Sy, former Director of the Department of Law - Government Office, illustrates this reality with the story of Ho Chi Minh City. In 2014, Ho Chi Minh City issued a policy to attract talent, including regulations on negotiated salaries but maximum of 150 million, along with many other incentives on housing, transportation, etc.

After 5 years, Ho Chi Minh City attracted 19 experts. By 2019, when Ho Chi Minh City switched to official regimes, 14 people left, leaving 5 people and no new people could be recruited.

Notable numbers

Statistics from 24 ministries, provinces and cities (3 ministries, 21 provinces and cities) show that 3,128 people were recruited according to the policy of attracting and using talents and high-quality human resources. Up to now, 2,903 people are still working, accounting for 92.8%; 225 people have quit their jobs, accounting for 7.2%.

Regarding professional qualifications, when attracted, there were 68 PhDs, 853 masters, and 1,899 university graduates.

Regarding political theory level: The number of people with primary political theory level accounts for the highest proportion with 1,421 people, accounting for 76.94%; intermediate level 316 people, accounting for 17.11% and 110 people with advanced level, accounting for 5.96%.

Regarding age structure when attracted: From 20 - 25 years old, there are 1,180 people, accounting for 42.5%; from 25 - 30 years old, there are 1,115 people, accounting for 40.1%; over 30 years old, there are 484 people, accounting for 17.4%.

Regarding the professions trained and fostered after attraction: The most is the medical sector with 842 people, accounting for 30.97%; the science and technology sector has 363 people, accounting for 13.35%; the economic sector has 231 people, accounting for 8.5%; the finance sector has 219 people, accounting for 8.05%. Other fields have 1,064 people, accounting for 39.13%.

Source