Business and Money Tips

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...

All managers must avoid 2 deadly pitfalls: 1. Control Too little control or too much control is a problem . Too little control would mean not having rules, but most often we see rules not followed and management never do much about it. For example, many companies have rules on working hours, but ask yourself how many management actually ensure that people come to work punctually? Many people have got used to being late, and the common excuse is they work late, so they can come late for work. Many don't know that this is causing some issues in teamwork, e.g. if some people are not here by 8.30 am, how am I going to get certain things done without them? So as a manager, make sure that you set the rules of the game. A good rules of the game is Values. Values like honesty and 'Go Extra Mile' must be laid down and followed by all staff. 2. Losing Their Voice It's easy for people to lose their voice after working in the company. Initially new employees a...

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...

As we know, the job of a salesperson is not to sell but to create value for his customers. For only when he creates value for his customers that he will get real business for now and future . There are 4 Ways that a salesperson can create value for his customers: 1.  Let Customer See Problem that is Not Obvious Like they still use Windows XP, which will be phased out by Microsoft in 4 months time, after which there will be virus attacks that will not be protected by Microsoft updates. 2. Let Customer See an Opportunity that is Not Obvious Like it's not obvious that able to save 12% of their staff cost and increase 31% of their productivity if the customer can use the latest tools and techniques. Better still, the salesperson can provide training at no cost 3. Let Customer Be the First to Enjoy the Benefits  When you sell, you must sell on an exclusive basis, meaning other companies in the same industry of your customer will not get to enjoy the benefits of your...

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...

Among all natural laws (i.e. not man-made laws but laws governing all nature), the Law of Action and Reaction is the most prevalent. This is also called the law of Cause and Effect, or Karma to some people. Simply put, for every action, there will be a reaction. That's why good beget good and bad beget bad.  But the point to note that there is no direct relationship between cause and effect , i.e. you cannot pinpoint a particular action and say for sure that it will precisely lead to another action.  Also, results do not arise in the order in which their causative actions have taken place . What this means is that other causative factors also come into play and often it is their combined effect that determines the result . A single cause cannot produce a result, much less many results, nor can many causes produce just one result. How does it apply to training then?  From my over 17 year of training (including part-time 1996-2001 before becoming full time since May...

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...

If I were to now transfer US$10,000 to your bank account, would you be richer? If you are like most people, you would say, 'Yes, of course". Yet we know that money by itself has no value . If I transfer money to you and you don't do anything to it, the total wealth has not increased. It is just merely a transfer of wealth from me to you, no difference to mankind's total wealth. Money has to be circulated in order for it to create value and wealth. Same for knowledge. What if instead of me transferring US$10,000 to your account, I ask that you transfer US$10,000 to my account? For that I'll give you the tools and resources for you to go on to create many times more than US$10,000. Is this a better deal? If you were like most smart people, you would say "yes" to this. Just like training. I have been doing training (part-time since 1996) and full-time (my own business) since 2001. I have paid thousands of dollars to acquire knowledge, a...