Business and Money Tips

Unknown to many people, the PIC (Productivity and Innovation Credit) Scheme was tightened on 21 February 2014.  Effective from 2015 to 2017, all claiming businesses must have 3 CPF employees (excluding the directors and shareholders) every month , instead of only the qualifying month (i.e. March, June, September and December) as in the past. As for the popular PIC Bonus Scheme, it shall  expire for financial years ending in 2014 .  So if your company's financial year-end is on 31 March 2014, the last month for you to receive the PIC bonus is March 2014.  This is because although the PIC Scheme was extended till 2017, the PIC Bonus is not extended , thus it will end as planned in 2014. For those that are not familiar, the PIC Bonus is automatically given out to companies as long as their PIC claims exceed $5,000 in a year.  The PIC Bonus is given out in cash (not tax deduction) up to $15,000.  This PIC Bonus, unlike the PIC Cash Payouts, is taxable . ...

By far the biggest difference between successful people and struggling people is that successful people know that it is the participation that matters.  Struggling people often ask what do they get from a situation, they did not know that it is what they give to the situation that matters.  In short, the only failure is the failure to participate , and it is your level of participation that creates success.  If you too want to participate for success, you must do the following 7 things at work: Work 2 extra hours a week without staying back an extra minute Before bringing up a problem, please think of possible solutions .  If there are no solutions, at least let people know what is your level of commitment, are you a passive spectator or a serious spectator? Always to go the root of the problem and not just solve the surface of the problem. For example, the root of lack of sales is not the market but salespeople not doing what they should be doing.  By t...

With the PIC Grant , companies can claim up to $10,000 a year on internal training, i.e. their own people conducting training for their own people.  A good example would be HR Department doing Induction for new staff.  Other than that, it has become something as common as buying stationery when companies send their staff for external training .  This is because under the PIC Bonus scheme, companies get 160% of what they spend on training.  Before you sign up for your next public course , or get the trainer to come to your premise to conduct an in-house training , make sure that your next training program has the following 5 key attributes: Mix New School with Old School .  If what the trainer is doing is to replay old school principles, there won't be much value in today's context as the world is changing rapidly.  A phrase we often use in our training in describing what needs to be today in 2014 is a "time tested tactics blended with time relevant con...

Whether you are an employee , manager , salesperson or professional, we can all adopt the winning ways of the world's biggest computing platform: Android.  A company started by Andy Rubin in 2003 and launched to the world in 2008, Android is now the world's largest operating system for computers, especially smartphones. As at December 2013, Android has captured 82% of all smartphones and tablets , overtaking Apple since 2012.  Today there are more than one million applications (or apps) written using the Android's open-source operating system, with over 1.2 billion mobile devices (smartphones and tablets) installed.  The 5 Winning Ways of Android are: Focus on Product, not Marketing .  Android focused on creating apps that are useful, e.g. Play Books, Color Note and Panoroma Camera.  In fact, many of the Android's apps are more innovative than Apple's iOS, and this is also the reason that makes Android's platform more popular than Apple. Leverage on Parte...

Yes, the lack of sales is not caused by the market, your competitors or even your boss.  Salespeople are the problems, and the big problem is that they don't even realize this.  By far the biggest problem is salespeople not realizing that they are the problem and justify their situation as 'everyone is also like that, right' thinking.  There are 7 ways that salespeople make themselves the biggest problem. Know them, eradicate them, and you'll be on the path to greatness in sales... Lack of Selling Skills , especially in doing sales follow-up and overcoming of tough objections ; Never Leverage on the Team , especially the customer's team and your company's support team; No Follow-Through and Follow-up on Leads , leading to no leads and thus no sales; Lack of Lead Generating Activities , resulting in no prospects to follow-up on and thus no prospects in sales; Never Listen to the Real Needs of customers , thus missing on the big picture and cannot clos...

With people using their smartphones (and tablets) on average over 3 hours a day, that's even more than the amount of time people spend on their home computers and TVs.  But only 9% of the time (16 minutes) is on talking, the bulk of the time (72% or 2 hours) is on instant communications, especially group and private messaging on Whatsapp, Twitter, Facebook , Line and WeChat).  Many people wonder if we have become slaves or addicted to our smartphones as many people carry them even inside the water closets.  However to us, the smartphone is just a tool, it is neither good or bad.  We can make ourselves smarter with our smartphones in the following 7 ways: Learn something new every day by reading blogs , seminar write-ups , news analysis, commentaries and TED videos;  Become a Guru instantly by broadcasting to others our unique thoughts on current events .  For example, I posted on my facebook the biggest disappointment of the year: the Samsung Galaxy S5...

Sun Tzu Art of War uses tactics to achieve maximum results with minimum resources.  One of the most used stratagem is "Kill with a Borrowed Knife" or 借刀杀人。Unknown to many people and unreported by the media, our Finance Minister Mr Tharman used this tactic in pushing the PIC (Productivity and Innovation Credit). You see, Mr Tharman had a tall and challenging task.  How can Singapore 250,000 companies, of which over 95% are small and medium enterprises, reduce the reliance on cheap foreign labour and use higher skilled local staff and automation to increase productivity?  So he came up with the PIC scheme in 2010. In 2012, Mr Tharman enhanced this scheme and increased the cash subsidy from 30% to 60%, payable quarterly instead of yearly.  But he has another problem: how can this scheme be pushed out quickly to the most number of SMEs without the government hiring a big public relations team?  The answer lies in making use of vendors. You see, vendors doin...

Note: click here for PIC training As we know, the PIC ( Productivity and Innovation Credit ) scheme has been in place since 2010, and has just been extended till 2017.  Under this general and generous scheme , the government gives 60% cash or 3 times additional tax deductions to businesses that invest to innovate and up their productivity. The 8 types of expenditure eligible for PIC Claims are: Training , IT Solutions, IT Hardware, Software, Automation Equipment, R & D, Intellectual Property Rights and Singapore Design Council design projects. Many employees that we talk to feel that such a scheme only benefits their employer and they cannot see any benefits accruing to them. In fact some employees told us that making PIC Claims only adds up to their already heavy work load.  It's just a government's gimmick, right? Make no mistake: the Government is serious about making Singapore's employees more productive . When employers receive money from the gover...

Over the past few days, I poured over 20+ pages at IRAS website and managed to sniff out the 7 changes to this PIC (Productivity and Innovation Credit) Scheme .  Know them and you'll be able to take advantage of them.   If you are ignorant, you will lose out at least $375,000 .  The 7 Key Changes are: PIC is now extended to 2017 (originally to end in 2014).  This means that companies have more time to plan and take full advantage of this very general and generous scheme; Cap for Tax Deduction claims are now increased from $400,000 to $600,000 a year, effective for years 2013 to 2017.  This new scheme is called PIC + .  For cash payout, the cap remains at $100,000 per year; Website design and creation, including the registration of domain names, now qualify for IT claims, also effective for years 2013 to 2017.  Note that Search Engine Optimization (SEOs) will also qualify for this if SEOs are done as part and parcel of website creation . This m...

Note: The next How to Be a Great Boss is confirmed on 9 Dec 2014 Tuesday 2 to 5.30 pm.  Limited seats, register via text to 8201-4347 now. If you don’t like the title of this article, read on. By ‘ boss ’ here, I am referring to a person that an employee reports to. That reporting boss can be a customer, the shareholders, superior and in some cases, the government. Today I shall focus on your superior, that is, someone that you report to in your work. Most of the time this person is a manager or supervisor. Whenever an employee has a performance issue, most managers will assume it is the lack of training. As a trainer with 18 years of experience training 81,131 people in 14 countries since 1996, I know that many a times it is not the lack of training . It may not even be the lack of skills or attitude. The biggest obstacle to an employee not performing well is not about not knowing what to do. The biggest obstacle is Interferences from Bosses. The following are th...

Yesterday I talked to someone who told me he wish to learn how to close sales, but he is only free next week.  When I told him that we have a course How to Close Every Sale on next Friday, he was shocked.  I told him that he can attend for half price too as he is my friend.  I would expect him to say yes immediately.  Imagine my shock when he told me that he wanted to 'think about it'! Some people dare not commit anything and never live life in willing ways.  The way to test them is to give them whatever they wish, and 99% of the time they will not bite .  That's what I called living life in wishful ways.  When you live life in wishful ways, there are 7 negative consequences: You never realize your dreams Life is always incomplete and you'll have more and more wish-list as time goes You will miss opportunities and will miss the boat Life will seem happy but deep down you will feel a sense of emptiness or incompletion There are always suffer...

*Good news: No new foreign workers caps PIC Extension till 2017* As announced by the Finance Minister Tharman on 21 Feb 2014, this is a 'People' Budget.  As such, there are not many things for businesses.  In fact, if you are an old person (called 'Pioneers'), you will get lots of benefits.  Not so for smokers and drinkers, there will be a 10% tax and 25% increase respectively. Here are the highlights: (more details will be revealed by the Government over the next week). All Singaporeans will receive GST vouchers of $250 cash , an increase over last year.  This may not mean much to most you, but will make your staff feel slightly happier TODAY Excise duty on tobacco and liquor to rise by 10% and 25% respectively, effective from 21 Feb 2014. Drinkers will face rising cost, and this will affect pubs that rely on liquor sale negatively Betting duty rates on lotteries to rise to 30% from 25%. This has zero impact on the punter (impact on Singapore Pools only)...

In management training we know that people don't remember what a manager does for them.  But what he said will be remembered for life.  Thus instead of just saying things in a plain, old and uninspiring way, why not say it a powerful, motivating and inspiring way?  The following 5 are most powerful: I would like to hear your opinion. Wow, people love to be treated as important and want to be heard.  But you must really hear them before giving any opinion. Never give any judgement, otherwise this will be another of those 'for show' things that will not engage people and enrage them instead! I know you can do better than do .  This is often used when you want people to do difficult assignments or when their work is below your expectations.   If you were me, what would you do?  This really put them on par with you, for they now have the rare opportunity to think like you.  Great ideas will flow, and because the ideas are from them, they will...

Sun Tzu in the Art of War (which leaders can adopt) advocate the use of non-force to create lasting win-win battles.  However, many people still like to use force. Mention the word 'force' and many would think of violence, aggressive behaviour and verbal abuse.  In fact the problem managers face today is staff are no longer obeying their instructions.  In other words, many supervisors, managers and directors have become too soft and are not using sufficient force in their work to get things done. Over at Asia Trainers, we believe that the sufficient and appropriate use of force in your management and leadership will reap you dividends.  As revealed in our latest course " How to Be a Great Boss " on 1 March 2014 Saturday 9 am to 12.30 pm, you can use force and still get people to like you.  The 5 ways are: Pre-empt People that You'll Not Be NICE .  Because NICE means N othing I nside Me C ares E nough , and since you care for them, that's why y...

You have experienced this before: in front of many high level people, you have to face the music and make a daring proposal. This could be a management restructuring meeting or some meetings where you have some tough proposals to push through. You know that the audience will question you hard, challenge you fiercely and even reprimand you for what you are presenting. Yet you have no choice and have to continue the job. We call this Walk on Fire at the Workplace. Indeed many people think that walking on fire will get your feet burnt. Yet anyone that has done some fire walking (on hot embers or stones) will tell you that if you do the right things, your feet will not get burnt. This is because fire-walking has been practised by many people and cultures in all parts of the world, with the earliest known reference dating back to Iron Age India around 1,200 BCE. It is often used as a rite of passage, as a test of an individual's strength and courage, or in religion as a test o...

Following my previous blog on the need for bosses to force their employees to attend training or they will never be trained, people asked me if there are painless ways to force training. The following are the 5 ways that have worked very well with our clients (from Lego to SingTel, DBS and AIA):  Provide sumptuous lunch . The best must be an international hotel buffet that includes sashimi , local delicacies and western ice cream. As we know, such training meals are also 60% paid by the government under PIC (Productivity and Innovation Credit).  Use movies clips to entertain and educate at the same time. Like this year 2014 we use movies never used before like Jobs, Freedom Writers, The Lion Men, Man of Steel and Cast Away. Have games that have the surprise element , like the trainees able to cut a piece of wood with just a piece of tissue paper; End the session early . Make it as a reward for the the trainees to complete certain tasks. By the far this is t...

At the beginning of every training session I normally ask my students why they are here.  Inevitably I get answers like, "I was told by my boss to attend", "I have to come for training or my boss will not be happy" and "Do I have a choice?  Coming for training is part of work, right?" I would often counter what they said by saying, "That means you are forced by your boss to attend this training, right?"  The whole class would erupt into laughter.  I then thank them for their honesty and show instant appreciation to their boss (who could be inside the class). Indeed the best reason for coming to training is no reason, that is, come because of being forced by bosses.   As we know, training is not playing or social activity, very few people, maybe less than 0.01% of the population, would attend training on their own.  Most people need their bosses to force them to attend training.  The reason is that many employees feel that they know a lo...

In case you do not already know, we are all warriors in life, and the biggest war we fight is the war within ourselves.  Psychologists said that we have over 16 million thoughts everyday, and at every moment a few conflicting thoughts are going through in our mind and our thoughts have to fight to see which thought can come out stronger than the rest. In the workplace we are too fighting: fighting for promotion, for business, for attention, and for appreciation.  Learn these 5 lessons today and you'll be a more successful workplace warrior: Low Maintenance First .  Before we can talk about being a high performing employee, we must first be low maintenance.  This means that we do not require much input and help from our bosses and we are independent and reliable .  Like we are being trained, disciplined, healthy (not fall sick often), and most importantly, be easily trainable.  Also do not break down often (i.e. let go your negative emotions in public...

Yes, everyone is a salesperson, because selling is moving people. Most people are in non-sales selling, that is, they are not doing sales as their main job, like an insurance agent. But most people are in jobs that involves communication, influence and persuasion, and these are nothing but sales.  We at Asia Trainers call these sales job as Moving People. Myths and Truths of Moving People: Moving people is not about getting your way with others but about helping others get their way . You too will get your way when you help others get their way.  As what Zig Ziglar said, "You can get anything you want in your life as long as you help enough other people get what they want".  Moving people is not about how much conviction you have, but how much people feel about your conviction.  As what Andy Ferrari Norman said, it is not about convincing people but about conveying your ideas in ways that make people be convinced by themselves. Moving people depends more on th...

In our training and coaching sessions, a question people often ask is: what is the first step to take if you want to improve your performance at work?  My answer is: Realize that Your Boss is Not Crazy. Many people often feel that they are not in control of their destiny at work and believe that it is their bosses that determine everything at work. Even if this is true (of course we don't for a moment believe in this), you can still control your fate at work.  Just start to realize that you are in control and you can do something about it. For example, you can improve your performance by becoming more efficient and more effective.   Efficiency is doing things right while effectiveness is doing the right things . You can put in more hours or even come back on Saturday/Sundays to clear the backlog .  Or you can take up some training to improve your skills, knowledge and attitude .  You can also seek help from your seniors. In fact there are countless of...