Business and Money Tips

As we know, Sun Tzu does not advocate a martinet-style of leadership. Instead, he states that a leader must be strong enough to executive the strategy in the organization. On the other hand, the leader must also be confident and trusting enough to allow his team to carry out the strategy successfully.  It is thus both HARD and SOFT: Hard on the Problem Soft on the People .  There are 5-Ways to Sun Tzu Leadership: Build Your Character, not just Your Image .  To Sun Tzu, a leader must be courageous, sincere and yet humane. But a leader must always  appear to be in control  of the situation, exuding confidence and assurance at all times. This confidence is not a facade, but based on true inside confidence. In short,  if the leader has even one doubt, his followers will have several . Lead with Actions, Not Just Words .  The best way to show your character is not to talk about it, but set the example. Talk is cheap.  You should ne...

One: Make Sure You Add Value To know whether you add value in doing anything, ask yourself this question: is there a difference had I not done this ?  Not only must there be a difference, you must also do things differently. Like Apple's iPhone in 2007: not only do they make handphones, they also started a trend of no-keyboard. Two: Communicate Down and Up, Inside and Out Of course the most important communication is with yourself: what you say to yourself when you are all by yourself.  They call this self-talk, which is  thinking hard within yourself.    Of course you don't really need to verbalize and let people hear what you are saying to yourself! Three: Know How to Deliver Results This means you must have competency and commitment, for you need both to deliver, not just talk Four: Conduct Yourself and Your Business with Integrity To me integrity is defined as n ot taking anything that you are not given , including time, information, emotion...

1.     Define the task, output clearly. Use this SMART criteria ( specific, measurable, achievable, results wanted and timing) 2.    Delegate to a person with demonstrated competence  (this is not training, you are delegating an important task, don't leave to chance) 3. Explain the task clearly, preferably in writing (this will reduce misunderstanding & mistakes) 4. Invite questions and feedback ( Ask: "Can you show me how you're going to do it?") 5. Give a schedule, deadline  (Always leave some buffer in case of mistakes by giving a tighter deadline) 6. Inspect what you expect (surprise audit is the best) Remember, Delegation is not abdication, this means responsibility still lies with you and YOU are still answerable.  FOR A LARGE JOB, SET UP A DELEGATION AGREEMENT WHICH STATES:- · Intended outcome · Required resources · Completion deadline · Benchmarks (how can you measure progress) · Accountability · C...

Yesterday my blog about how to solve problems the SAD Way (See-Address-Do) Way has made some people sad. Today I'm going to make you HAPPY: the proven way to Build Great Teams: H - Harmonize the team, conflicts should be put aside first A - Align the different goals of the team to that of the organization. P - Purpose : find a common purpose for all P - Path : create the path to achieve the common purpose Y - Get people to say ' Yes ' to commit and do the path created above A typical team-building session using HAPPY would run like this: Harmonize : Get everyone to write down their differences and agree to harmonize, i.e. work through the differences; Goal Alignment Session t o align the different goals to the organization's goals.  Eg Sales Department goal of 20% growth must be aligned to company's profit goals Purpose : Find a common purpose that will get people charging. Like to beat the competitor; Path : here will be the detailed Road Maps and...

Customers are demanding lower prices. Factories are moving overseas. How can salespeople survive?  These are tough times for salespeople. Customers are demanding more services and lower prices.  Many are purchasing directly through the internet and from manufacturers. Salespeople find themselves caught in the middle - doing more for customers, making less money and wondering about their paycheck. The solution is simple.  Salespeople Must Add Value. How?  Salespeople add value in many ways - before, during and after the sale.    These services include product availability, problem solving and technical support, just to name a few. But customers often do not realize how these services translate into dollars-and-cents value. Why? Because salespeople are generally not trained in how to calculate this value for customers. Beyond product training   Customers are interested in more than product features and benefits. They want to know how these ...

Often in my training courses, my participants would like to share with me their problems at work and ask me for advise. The advise I gave them is to solve problems in a 3-Step SAD way:  Step 1:  See the problem as what it is, not what you wish .  Reason is that if you  don’t exactly see what the problem is, you're going to perpetuate it.  Y ou are already in reality, all you need to do is to see it. All problems at work, be it sales, cash flow or people management, can be summed up in two words: Human Problems. Settle the human problems and you'll settle all problems.  Human problems can be in the area of motivation, morale, competencies, distraction, complacency, leadership, communication, inter-personal skills, teamwork and compliance.  Step 2:  You don’t lack ideas, strategies or solutions to your problems. S o stop blocking yourself and attend to what’s going on .   When you really attend to the problems, the soluti...