Business and Money Tips

The past one week of mourning for Singapore's founding father and first prime minster Lee Kuan Yew teach us one thing: never order people to do anything. Get them to volunteer instead.  To manage the big crowds of people queueing to pay their last respect to Mr Lee when his body was lying in state at the Parliament House from Wednesday to Saturday (25 to 27 March 2015), the government did not: Issue orders to the SAF soldiers to work overtime  Ask the private sector to donate food, drinks and umbrellas to the people in queue Get any ministers to speak to ask people to come out and help Ask people to queue up orderly for 10 hours Issue any rule on how to behave while in queue (like what clothes to wear, not to take pictures or videos etc) Instead what we saw were: Non-stop queues of people forming 24 hours since Wednesday 25 March 2015 until Saturday 28 March 2015 Many thousands in queue for more than 10 hours just to pay less than 10 seconds of respect No one...

In 1965 when Singapore went independent, it's per capital income was US$1,500.  In 2014, it has grown to US$59,000.  Many people would consider Lee Kuan Yew as the father of modern Singapore for he is the one that turned Singapore from third world to first world in 4 decades.  But is this what Lee himself consider as his greatest achievement? Lee revealed to us that his greatest achievement was actually able to combine what Easterners and Westerners do: marry the woman you love and love the woman you marry. It appeared that Lee's wife was more than a wife. During the early years of his career in the 1950s when Lee was still in the opposition, Lee's wife was supporting the entire family with her income as an owner of a law firm Lee and Lee.  Lee's wife also took good care of the family and brought up three children very well.  Their eldest son Lee Hsien Loong has been Singapore's Prime Minister since 2004.   Being dyslexic, Lee relied on his wife t...

Mr Lee Kuan Yew, aged 91, founder of modern Singapore and the (late) father of current Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, passed away peacefully on 23 March 2015. (Get your course listing at here ) In 2009, I was asked by New Horizon Computer Learning Centre to conduct a one-week Management and Leadership training for a group of directors and senior managers from the Ministry of Finance and Economics of the Republic of Tanzania (a eastern African nation).  During the course, I was asked to summarise how Singapore transformed itself from a third world nation in 1963 with per capital income of US$1,500 to a first world nation having the highest per capita income of US$59,000 in 3 decades.  My answer to them is just 3 words: "Lee Kuan Yew". Born on 16 September 1923 to a upper income family, Lee Kuan Yew's grandfathers' wealth declined considerably during the Great Depression, and his father, Lee Chin Koon, became a poor shopkeeper. Lee Kuan Yew speaks English as his n...