It Does Not Matter Where You Are From...

I have been a big advocate about not giving up. Whether is starting a business or going through life's setback. It is important to dig deep in your heart and know what you want. Never get anchored down by your past experience.

What I have Learned from a Star Trek TNG episode called Tapestry.

I saw this episode nearly 15 years ago in Australia. This episode was a character driven episode about the show's main character -- Captain Jean Luc Picard. That time, I never really appreciate the lesson behind the show. I just find it intriguing to learn about Picard's past. 

Watching this episode again, I have learned something new. Who says, we cannot learn new things from watching television?



This is the speech from the show.

Au contraire. He's the person you wanted to be: one who was less arrogant and undisciplined in his youth, one who was less like me... The Jean-Luc Picard *you* wanted to be, the one who did *not* fight the Nausicaan, had quite a different career from the one you remember. That Picard never had a brush with death, never came face to face with his own mortality, never realized how fragile life is or how important each moment must be. So his life never came into focus. He drifted through much of his career, with no plan or agenda, going from one assignment to the next, never seizing the opportunities that presented themselves. He never led the away team on Milika III to save the Ambassador; or take charge of the Stargazer's bridge when its captain was killed. And no one ever offered him a command. He learned to play it safe - and he never, ever, got noticed by anyone.

In life, we have to learn to stay focus and seize each moment in life. There will be times where we have to take some risk and stand out in the crowd -- to get noticed. Getting notice it means doing a job well done. You may say, you are already doing a good job but you are not getting noticed. Yes! You could be right. Ask yourself, what have you done lately to get yourself noticed? There is no need to brag about yourself, but you will still need to reach out to the relevant people. This could be your teacher, your manager, owner of the company etc. Let them know about your passion, let them know who you are.

True, sometimes you may messed up and many people would see. In the future, would anyone really remember that you messed up? Ask yourself again, when did you remember your friends or other people messed up? Even if you did, what does it mean to them? Nothing! This does not stop them from pursuing what they want in life. So, you should not let it stop yourself as well.

Start right now, go out there and reach out. Take some risk. Be good at what you do. Be noticed.

You Need Passion Rather Than Money

Many people told me that they do not have the money to start something. This is partly true. The same time, I am also seeing this as lack of passion and interest to make the idea into reality.

No doubt certain business requires high capital expenditure. You can always start small. When I created the Better Dining site, I just have a three years old Ubuntu Linux machine. All the application that I used are part of the Linux bundle. Except for the hardware, the software that I used are free! The most expensive part of the setup is actually signing up with sitesell for web hosting and Search Engine Optimization. That cost 299 USD. The only running cost that I have is the internet connection.

Yes! I have not been making a lot of money through the site. Yet, I had a great time working on the site. I have learned a lot about web publishing writing up on topics that I like. Creating and researching content for the site is not work for me. Rather it is just something that I do outside of my regular work hours. Working on the site has become such a habit that I will uncomfortable if I miss a day.

Starting today, ask yourself. What is your passion? With passion comes creativity. That passion may someday help you to put food on the table.

Never Say No Onbehalf of the Other Person

Have you ever experienced this? Whenever you wanted to approach someone asking for something, you would always say "No" on the person's behalf? I bet many of you did that. I do that too. Whenever I wanted to ask for help, I would think of a million things that would have that person to say "No" to me.

Now, what I want to tell you is to stop doing that. You have already defeated yourself before you even start. The rights of saying "No" belongs to the other person. It has nothing to do with you. If you already know that the person would reject your approach, you have think further on the true reason behind the rejection. This helps you to plan and make your approach.

This is especially relevant to many things in life from closing the sales to getting a date. There was a time that I worked in a project that requires a whole new set of equipment for a short term training. However, the company was under going a series of cost cutting initiative. Asking for new expenditure is like asking for the moon. Worst, a career suicide move. I have no choice, and I was worried that the financial controller would tear me into pieces. I prepared my case carefully and consider all possible options. I spend 10 minutes explaining it to him. When I finish, all I heard was a grunt. The controller broke into a smile and tell me that he will approve the expenditure. The reason is that many of the existing machines are reaching the end of its life cycle. No matter what it has to be changed. With the training around the corner, there are more reasons to buy the equipment. Once the training is over, the machines will be transferred for other use.

Honestly, I never thought that the request would be approved so easily. Why? I was too busy thinking about how I will get rejected. If I have done my homework more carefully, I would have found out about the soon to-be expire machines.

Your take away? Never say no other behalf of the other person.

Do You Know Your Cost of Making Money?

Everything has a cost. We read a lot about the need of making sacrifice to start a business and making money. Before you nod your head saying that you already know that. Ask yourself this question, how much are you willing to spent on making money? When will it reach a level where you think it just cost too much to make money?

The cost itself may not only be time, health but also  your social well being. Being busy making a business work, your family life, health condition may take certain amount of beating. So you must know where is your limit. If you go beyond your limit, the money that you made may not necessary be worth your while.

For example, you have an important contract to negotiate but it is also your kid's school performance. Do you try to re-schedule the negotiation and risk the deal or you miss the performance and take the deal? Both comes at a price. Whatever decision that you made, there should be no regrets on your part.

Know your limits. It actually cost you something to make money. Be sure to know how much you are willing to "spent" on making money.

The 110% Percent

I am a racing F1 fan. I do not have a specific team that I support but many times I would watch out for certain drivers, especially from the mid field teams and the bottom teams. In those teams, I see passion in some of these drivers. They may be driving a car which is not as good as the front runners but they tend to get certain recognition. Why? They are able to push the car beyond its design capabilities and able to finish the race! Many times these kind of drivers, would go and do great things such as the two times world champion -- Fernando Alonso.

The same principles should applies to life, especially in business. All of us wish that our tools is the latest and greatest in helping to get the task at hand done. In reality, not many of us has the privilege to have the best tools. This does not mean we cannot get the work done! With some creativity and passion, I am certain we can get many things done.

This PC that I am using now is four years old. It may not be the latest model nor has the latest graphic engine. Nonetheless, it has help me to create my websites, host my pictures and even to write this blog. Instead of keep upgrading the hardware to chase after the latest technology trend, I try to stay with proven technology. The very least, I have saved on technology cost over the last four years.

No doubt, faster machines and more user friendly OS has been released in the last few years. But I must think about the money spend and the benefit that I can extract from it. In this case, whatever that I am doing now is more than suffice than to upgrade my machines.

I am not asking you to get stingy and not upgrade. Rather, by pushing your existing equipment for that 10% more, it means you get more bang for your investment and run your operations as efficient as possible. Just being efficient, you would be ahead of your competitor in terms of price and quality.

Before you spent money on upgrades. Think about efficiency and cost savings. If you can push your existing equipments further, maybe you should hold back your investment a little longer. After all, the cost of technology will only come down. Good luck with that 10%.

Monetise: A UK Story

The Financial Times ran an inspiring story of UK company called Monetise. A nine years old company with a market capitalization of 250 million pounds which has yet to break even.

All its profit were invested back into the business for further expansions. This is a characteristic that is not commonly found in many business. Many business owners would be more worried about the bottom line than the company's future growth. Another company that was mentioned who sacrifice short term profit for long term expansion is Amazon. Amazon has shown great success being one of the biggest online retailer while Monetise has a strong foothold in both the UK and US market.

To be successful in business, the owner must have faith in the business. Busy making money and busy cashing out from the business is an entirely different thing. Ask yourself, how much are you willing to re-invest your business's profit?