The purpose of this paper is to uncover whether and how contextual factors (information exchange, participation, trust in management, and training), relate to resistance to change. It also explores the mediating effect of perceived impact of change on the relations between contextual factors and resistance to change. This study is conducted in several manufacturing plants in food processing industry in Vietnam, which is implementing a top-down large-scale change – Lean transformation, adopting Total Productive Maintenance (TPM) program, to be specific. The findings suggest that all four contextual factors are negatively associated with resistance to change, in which training had the strongest impact. Also, the perceived change impact partially mediates the relationships between the four contextual factors and resistance to change. The practical implications of this paper are that employees who receive adequate, timely and useful information relating to change are less likely to show opposing behaviors towards change. Fostering trust in management among employees, and employee involvement in decisionmaking, also have a significant influence when addressing employee resistance to change. Employees who are well-trained, well-equipped with tools and knowledge about the change, are less likely to resist as they view the benefits of changes more significant than the risks.

Selecting an investment location is one of the most crucial decisions of investors as it has a great influence on the operation and development of the business in the future. At the same time, the attraction of localities will bring advantages for socio-economic development for the localities invested. Investors are interested in localities that have the potential to invest. The study focused on analyzing and testing the influence of place brand equity on the choice of investment locations of domestic investors through a regression analysis using 425 survey samples of investors in Phu Tho province, one of the northern industrial zones in Vietnam. Research results showed that 56.5% of investment decisions depended on factors from place brands. In addition, in the decision-making process for choosing investment locations, brand awareness factor had the greatest impact on investor’s decisions, followed by brand image and brand personality, and finally brand confidence had the smallest impact. Therefore, in the coming time, in order to retain and attract domestic investors to choose Phu Tho as an investment and business destination, it is necessary to increase the value of place brand equity and implement solutions to promote place brands to investors.