IT staff work at MoonLab, a company specialising in blockchain technology application projects. — Photo courtesy of MoonLab

A scarcity of human resources to develop blockchain is not unique to Việt Nam and even in tech hubs such as Silicon Valley in the United States, India or China, the shortage of blockchain personnel is a common problem, experts said.

“It is the first time that Việt Nam is in the same starting position with the whole world with a new technology, which easily leads to a general feeling of being understaffed and not having enough resources to implement,” said Huy Nguyễn, Co-founder of KardiaChain, Blockchain.

“The scarcity of human resources in this field is completely inevitable in both Việt Nam and internationally,” said Phạm Văn Huy, CEO of MoonLab, a company specialising in Blockchain technology application projects and Metaverse development. “It is extremely difficult to recruit human resources specialising in this field as Blockchain is still quite new and there are no training programs at universities, colleges, or even information technology centres in the country.”

Both said that, in terms of human resources, Việt Nam is the birthplace of many talents in the field of new technology. Vietnamese engineers and programmers have the advantage of being very flexible and learning new things very quickly.

They said when new technology trends appear, they can flexibly switch to learning, self-exploring, directly participating in the market, learning via the Internet, etc., and achieve a certain level of mastery even though they are not fully trained.

They considered Vietnamese people able to create smart contracts from Blockchain, or build platforms only through short courses, which partly meet the needs of the market during this time.

“We need to pay more attention to the deep development rather than just the surface one,” KardiaChain's Nguyen said. “If it can solve the problems from the root, Việt Nam can easily meet the needs of the market in the next five to 10 years and help Blockchain become a technology widely used here.”

Huy suggested that to be a good hub for blockchain human resources in both quantity and quality, it is necessary to focus on personnel training from the bottom level up.

He said research centres, universities, and businesses should have a plan to train personnel from the root level, and there should be a dialogue about blockchain among state leaders, business owners and middle managers, as well as employees and students.

"There should also be good quality short-term blockchain courses for those who intend to change industries, grasp it in a short time, making the peer-to-peer transition more flexible,” Huy said.

Huy said it was also important to attract technology experts who are trained or are working abroad to return to contribute to the country, adding that so far, Việt Nam had always been in a state of "brain drain", but job opportunities and attractive incomes from blockchain development in Việt Nam could now make a "salmon wave" of overseas experts returning to the country with valuable knowledge and experience to guide the development of Blockchain technology.

“It is necessary to have more international cooperation programmes, innovation centres should have practice rooms and short-term training programmes, and update new technologies for students, while tech entrepreneurs from successful businesses in the blockchain field need to return to human resource training and add to new businesses," Phạm Văn Huy, CEO of MoonLab.

There should be practical training courses for students, such as at MoonLab, where IT students who are about to graduate can enhance skills and knowledge about the blockchain industry during an internship and then be offered an attractive salary to stay and join the team.

“Việt Nam should soon establish training centres and courses in universities and colleges for this technology industry,” said Phan Đức Trung, Vice Chairman of Blockchain Association.

Trung said that currently the Vietnam Blockchain Association was pursuing training and developing digital human resources. It seeks to create quality human resources to contribute to the process of research, testing, application, deployment, and experience in the blockchain technology business in accordance with Vietnamese law.

As an organization which specializes in blockchain training for women, SHE Blockchain has conducted the first training course completely free of charge by providing scholarships for women interested in blockchain.

According to Co-Founder & Chairman of SHE Blockchain, Huỳnh Vũ Thuỷ Tiên, learners are able to practise at the organization's partners before graduation and are given help securing jobs in the industry after graduation.