Why the city matters to the search
Ho Chi Minh City holds the deepest concentration of commercial, finance and general management talent in Vietnam. It is where most multinational country offices sit, where the large domestic groups run their commercial functions, and where almost every senior candidate with regional exposure has worked at some point.
That depth is real but it is uneven. For a commercial director in consumer goods, the pool is genuinely competitive and a well-run search produces choice. For a plant director with specific process experience, or a CFO with both IFRS depth and Vietnamese statutory fluency, the realistic pool is often a few dozen people nationally - and a handful who would move.
Knowing which situation you are in before you start is most of the value. It changes the brief, the salary range and the timeline, and it is the first thing we establish.
Where senior people actually sit
The last point is worth labouring. A plant two hours from District 1 is a materially harder sell than one at forty minutes, and the difference usually shows up as salary rather than as a refusal. If your site is remote, we will tell you before the search starts rather than after the third decline.
What a search looks like in practice here
We work the mandate the same way everywhere - calibration, mapping, direct approach, assessed shortlist within ten business days - but two things are specific to this market.
The first is the counter-offer. In Ho Chi Minh City, a strong director-level candidate resigning from a well-run company should be expected to receive one. We prepare for it during the process rather than reacting to it at resignation, which means having the money conversation early and understanding what would genuinely make the person stay.
The second is notice. Director-level notice periods are commonly 30 to 45 days and senior people rarely negotiate them down, because they care about leaving cleanly. Build it into your plan. A client who needs someone in the seat by a fixed date should start the search roughly three months before that date, not six weeks.
A note on language. Most senior roles in this market require working English, but not all of them require it to the same standard. Over-specifying language is one of the most common ways a Vietnamese shortlist gets thinner than it needed to be. We will push back on it if we think it is costing you candidates.
Sectors we see most from this office
Manufacturing and industrial leadership, logistics and supply chain, consumer goods and retail, financial technology, and education. Sector pages for manufacturing and logistics set out what we have actually worked on in each.
Working with us from here
We are at 63A Nam Ky Khoi Nghia in Ben Thanh Ward, District 1. Clients in the city usually start with a calibration meeting in person; clients overseas start on a call. Either way there is no fee until someone starts work - see fees and engagement model for how that works.
If you are opening a Vietnam entity for the first time and the first hire is the country lead, read building your first leadership team in Vietnam before you write the job description.