Why did MONA build SkillHub for itself?

There was a period at The MONA when I assumed that hiring good people plus a bit of verbal training would be enough. Life isn't that easy. New hires were slow, veterans were exhausted, and every place ran its own process. At one point, training mistakes even cost us loyal customers, simply because staff weren't properly guided from the start. Only after we built our own training system did things gradually change.

So what is the biggest mistake in internal training ? And how do you fix it once and for all?

First, the software came from MONA's own real internal needs 

Veterans teaching newcomers: the telephone game that doesn't work

MONA once made the mistake in staff training of having: VETERAN STAFF TRAIN NEW STAFF 

• Veteran employees don't always hold 100% of the correct knowledge. 
• Sometimes they learned from several different sources, figured things out on their own and drew their own conclusions. 
• When they pass it on to a newcomer, the knowledge is already a little distorted. 
• The newcomer then takes that as their foundation and teaches the next person. 
• So one error follows another, until even we no longer knew what the original process was supposed to be.

=> And so the staff training problem was NEVER solved AT ITS ROOT. 

As a result, MONA lost many promising employees because we didn't have the right human resource training method from the start. We also upset loyal customers because of training mistakes in the past

So I told the other CORE members: “Training by word of mouth, sending files around and messaging on Zalo will never count as training. We need a system. We need a place to store, standardize and test, and most importantly: everyone can learn, and relearn, any time.”

So the dev team started building our own system, something like “Khánh Hùng Academy” but for internal use, where everyone studies along a learning path, with tests, certificates and workflows made for in-house corporate training. In MONA Skillhub, I designed: 

• A clear learning path. 
• Everyone has tests, certificates and their own development goals. 
• And everything is standardized by leadership, with no more word of mouth or veterans passing things down to newcomers.

This lets us solve the telephone game problem for good. Knowledge is now standardized into short videos, and everyone learns from the same source to the same standard, from operations and sales staff to programmers. Everyone is guided through the same process, with no more situations where each person understands it differently or employees dread trainingand won't work on their own initiative.

Second, MONA is a software company at its roots and knows what it needs, so delivery was fast and results were clear

MONA Group JSC built its own MONA Skillhub software to train staff in the company

What's good about MONA is that we started out as a software company. That means when we hit a training problem, instead of complaining or buying some software off the market, the team could take the initiative to build one just for our own needs. 

It sounds simple, but it was actually a big shift in thinking, because it moved MONA from teaching by hand to standardizing into a system. And once we started building it, everyone realized that if you want others to learn, the content has to be clear and coherent, with tests to know whether it works. You can't do it the “watch the video, remember it if you like, forget it if you don't” way.

Only 45 days for the MONA Retail team to have the first trial version

Thanks to having software developers in house, from concept and mockups to feature writing, coding and testing, it took only 45 days to get a trial version (version 1). Nothing fancy, nothing pretty, but enough for new staff to have somewhere to learn.

And surprisingly, the results showed right away. New staff learned the job faster. Leaders no longer had to repeat the same instruction 10 times for 10 people. And the boss had a report to see at a glance who has learned how much, who hasn't started, and where people are still weak.

When customers saw it and… asked to buy it

At first we saw this as just an “internal tool” and never thought further. But then something interesting happened: customers visiting the office happened to see the system, asked about it, and everyone praised it. Some even said: “We need this too, sell it to us.”

That was the moment the boss realized: wow, what we built for ourselves is exactly what other businesses need too. 

From then on, The MONA decided to “do it properly.” We rewrote the code to make it smoother, added permissions, quizzes and detailed reports. The interface is optimized for mobile so staff can learn anywhere. And most importantly, we made sure any business using it would find it lean and easy, not complicated in a way that “only IT people can understand.”

By 2025, the system had reached version 3. No longer a “demo for fun,” but a real product: MONA SkillHub is an in-house training platform professional enough to deploy across many industries and business models.

MONA Group JSC updates the MONA Skillhub in-house training software to a more professional version 3

=> Looking back, if we hadn't tried building it ourselves back then, MONA would probably still be struggling with new hires who don't know what to learn, tired leaders, and customers who keep running into inexperienced staff. That small experiment changed how MONA views training and became a real product, one that now solves not only our own problems but helps other businesses too.

So sometimes a solution to your own need can open up a whole new direction. And for MONA, that is the story of the MONA SkillHub in-house training software.

A modern training model that suits employees

MONA Skillhub: a modern model that suits employees

Unlike traditional training sessions that take a lot of time, repeat themselves and are easy to forget afterwards, MONA SkillHub lets staff learn through short, compact videos they can rewatch any time:

• While waiting for customers
• On a lunch break
• Or right when they need to handle a real situation
• Helping raise training effectiveness by up to 90%. 

On top of that, for any situation that comes up internally, you can use a phone to record it and update it quickly so all staff get the news fast. Later, when other employees hit a similar case, you simply send the video for them to watch. 

Or if the company has a new product, the manager just sits down, records a 30-minute video and uploads it to the system, and everyone is informed without constantly holding seminars about this service or that. 

Fixes the TELEPHONE GAME problem

Fixing the age-old problem of veterans teaching newcomers ineffectively

In the past, everyone trained in their own way. Veterans passed things to newcomers, and newcomers passed them on to the next person. Eventually the same process had a different version in everyone's head.

• With SkillHub, all internal knowledge is:
• Standardized into short, easy-to-understand videos
• Attached with documents and concrete examples
• Paired with tests to make sure staff understand correctly

Now anyone who joins the company, whether OPERATIONS STAFF, SALES STAFF or PROGRAMMERS, follows one learning path from a single agreed source of knowledge that leadership itself has reviewed. 

Saves leaders' time

Learning through MONA Skillhub saves leaders' time

Before, every time there was a new hire, the leader spent time coaching bit by bit. Over time, leaders got pulled into small tasks and had no time left to observe and develop the team or focus on the product.

SkillHub changes all that. New hires get a learning path right away and learn on their own through videos, quizzes and clear deadlines. At the end of the month, a leader just opens the dashboard to see who has learned how much and who is struggling where.

That frees leaders from repetitive training work. They get more time to set strategy, stay on top of growth goals and improve the whole team's performance.

At MONA, Hùng calls this: OPTIMIZING LEADERSHIP CAPACITY at the core by CUTTING THE BURDEN OF MANUAL TRAINING.

Builds a culture of continuous learning

MONA Skillhub builds a learning culture inside the company

The MONA is made up of 3 companies: MONA.Media, MONA.Host and MONA.Software. 

With 26+ different B2B products, the services and the knowledge behind them are EXTREMELY COMPLEX (both the software and the know-how). 

MONA's products and services in particular are updated constantly to fit the market and meet customer needs. So whenever a product changes, the CORE team just records a video and uploads it to the system so everyone in the company understands the product clearly. 

-> Don't miss: Steps to build company culture professional and systematic

Scales the business effectively

Scale your business easily when you have an effective training system

Because the system runs smoothly, MONA is fully confident adding teams and launching new services without worrying that NEW HIRES WON'T KNOW ANYTHING. Opening a new team takes just 1 week of training before people can start working on their own.

-> Read now: Scaling your business – what does a business need to do?

Fits many types of business 

MONA Skillhub fits many types of business

SkillHub is built in modules, so it is easy to customize for any business model:

• F&B: Training for service staff and kitchen procedures
• Logistics: Order handling and shipping procedures
• Service companies: Employee onboarding and customer care
• Or, like MONA itself, training staff on the company's products and services
• All you need is your internal knowledge. SkillHub takes care of the rest.

Conclusion

Overall, the biggest mistake in internal training, one MONA has made and many other companies are still making, is patchy training with no standard system. MONA SkillHub helped The MONA fix that, and more importantly, gave the company a platform for sustainable growth.

If you are in a similar situation, ask yourself: isn't it time your company had a truly serious internal training system?

If you want to bring E-learning into your corporate training then give Hùng a call or ring the hotline: 1900 636 638! My team will support you every step of the way.

-> Read more related articles:

• Reason E-learning is the future of internal training
• How to train new employees quickly, correctly and effectively
• The process training and developing human resources for businesses today