Abstract: This study has two objectives: firstly to investigate time-related behaviours of Vietnamese people by comparing them with those of the French, and secondly to discuss the implications of these behaviours for the management of foreign firms in Vietnam (Human resources management, Business negotiation, and Marketing). A survey was conducted on a sample of students in both Vietnam and France. The results indicate that the Vietnamese respondents show a traditional style in their time-related behaviours, and that this time style is very different from that of the French respondents. In particular, the Vietnamese respondents are more monochronic, more sensitive to the task efficacy (or task quality) than of the speed (or time) in task execution, and finally more nostalgic (turned to the past). Following a brief literary review of time concept in management research, the survey procedure and results of the empirical study will be presented. The implications and limits of this study will be discussed in the last section of this article.
