The teaching staff is one of the most significant factors determining the quality of education. Therefore, improving the quality of teaching staff is always considered by governments. The criteria of teacher competence, the basis for evaluating teachers as well as the basis for teachers to improve their capacity, is one of the factors to promote the quality of teachers. In the context of socio-economic changes and the need to comprehensively innovate education, Vietnam has issued new standards for teaching staff. With a documentary research approach, the study analysed the changes in criteria and capacity for general education teachers based on policy documents and explained the necessity of that criterion system for education in Vietnam in the current context. Along with the change in criteria and teacher capacity, approaches to teacher assessment and rating were also mentioned in this study. The results show that the criteria, methods of assessment, and grading of teachers are getting better. However, policy changes take time to successfully implement in practice and need to be consistent with other policies. Therefore, some recommendations on management, teacher training, and financial support were proposed for improving the quality of teaching staff.