Business and Money Tips

Last week, the CEO of the world's largest software company launched a new product called 'Doors 10'.  This CEO said that his goal is not for people to not just use this new product, but to love it. It is like me setting a goal to get my girlfriend to love me. That cannot happen in life. A goal is something that you set as a target so that you can work towards it .  The goal is based on things that you can work on and things that you can control .  What happen when you achieve your goal is called an outcome.  Note that the outcome is the result of your goal plus other things that you cannot control , like the response and reaction from other people.  In short, a goal is something that you can control but an outcome is not.  So base on this understanding you cannot set a goal for your girlfriend to love you.  You can set a goal for you to woo your girlfriend, but you have no absolute control over the outcome of whether your girlfriend will love you or not.  You can as

Employees are often considered a cost to their employer.  Most employers think that only the salespeople and top management make money for the company, with the rest just spending money.  "All employees are simply cost" as exclaimed by one senior management of a big organization. Is this true?  We show employers in our training "High Value Employees" (details at here ) that there are at least 36 ways for every employee to make more money for their employer.  (Note: Our "12-month Weekly Execution Training Program helps companies implement all the 36 strategies with ease). Whether you are in sales, customer service, engineering, finance, administration, human resource, operations, production, warehousing, research, quality control or technical support, you too can make more money in 36 ways in the following 5 areas: 1.  Increase Sales without Spending a Single Cent  Serve customers better, leading to more repeat business, thus higher sales Always ask

Gone are the days where people will buy what you sell if you sell well.  Also, a long established brand may not bring in sales.  Look at the dismal sales of Windows Phone and you'll realize that what customers want is nothing but increase in profits.  (see here for winning sales strategies) Profits to an individual could mean more convenience, faster productivity and reduction in cost.  If you are selling to a business, there are 36 ways a salesperson can increase his customer's profits: Increase in sales.  Like our sales training can help our clients achieve a 10% increase in sales in just 2 months Reduction in wastage Lower direct and indirect labour cost Lesser overtime and thus lower labour cost Higher and more predictable quality products and services, leading to more sales Cut down in repair and maintenance cost Faster turnaround, resulting in higher sales and lower overheads Lower overheads Higher productivity, leading to lower labour cost and higher profi

Sales built on relationships does NOT work. If relationship selling works, why do so many people who have over 35 years of relationship with Microsoft Windows operating system do not use Windows phone or Window tablet at all? The undeniable fact is people don't care how long you have been in business or how long you have been serving them. What they care is do you add value to them NOW? I called this value adding type of selling Profit Selling. You don't want to be just a good salesperson.  You want to be an exceptional salesperson .  An exceptional salesperson is not measured by how well he serves his customers but how much profits he adds to his customers.   Profits to the customer may mean increase in sales, reduction in costs, increase in productivity, improvements in cash flow, reduction in risk and most importantly, improvements in the name of the customer.  To other organizations, profit means improvements in teamwork, reduction of stress, simplification of wor

Everyone wants to earn more, but there are some people that cut their own income. I'm not referring to those employees that are lazy or incompetent, but salespeople that instead of doing limitless selling, do limited selling.  We all know that it is not the market, nor is it the competition, or the marketing budget that is limiting your sales.  It is also not your boss, your manager, your supplier, your support departments and even the finance department that is putting a lid on your sales.  Of course it is never the market or the government that is putting any strains on your sales. The only thing that limits your sales is your own thinking .  Many salespeople I come across are doing limited sales instead of limitless sales.  The 7 most common situations are: 1.   Sales Targets.   Going after sales targets that were themselves limited to growth from previous year's performance. In other words, your sales targets are determined by what you achieved last year.  If last ye

Many people always tell me (as their coach) that they will start doing the right things when they are more ready tomorrow. Some people say that because currently their career is doing fine, they don't need any coaching or upgrading.  Others claimed that their bosses did not intend to promote them (as there are no such promotion opportunities) and as such they have not started to think about learning on their own.  "I'll learn when I get there", is what they say.  I'm sure you can recognize this: many people live day by day.  They will upgrade their skills when they're feeling confident and good.  Since currently there is too much workload to handle, they will wait until tomorrow when things are more stable to pick up learning. Meet Joe - the person that lives as though there is no tomorrow. Joe makes use of each day to the fullest: he will grab opportunities as they come along.  He does not improve himself or embark on self-learning according to his wh

Many managers avoid the handling of poor performers.  They are afraid to do anything for fear of losing that staff.  Some have no guts and zero assertiveness, that's why they do nothing.  Others went the other extreme and become a terrible boss and undermine the entire team.  We know that a manager is responsible for what his team does, so if his people are not performing, that means the manager is not performing . Therefore it is imperative that a good manager must handle under-performers without undermining them.  There are 4 steps to do this: Identify and Agree on the Performance Shortfall .  You need to analyse the areas of shortfall (like not hitting sales targets consistently), obtain agreement from the staff and most importantly, let the staff know how that shortfall is affecting business in the whole organization.   Reason for Shortfall : The manager should not be crudely attach blame but jointly identify the facts that have caused the shortfall.  So no use saying t

In his military classic "Art of War" written 2,500 years ago, Sun Tzu taught us that to defeat the competition and achieve your goals, you must have foreknowledge or 先知.  Foreknowledge is not about the following: Prediction based on the past Unsubstantiated Hearsay Analogy with past events Derived from calculations Foreknowledge is about 4 things: Detailed research and analysis from people who know the competition situation in detail Knowledge of the personality and behaviour profile of people Psychology of things, why people do things in certain way Knowledge about the environment, including business climate Foreknowledge does not stop at knowing your competitors.   The most important knowledge is to know yourself.   You must know where you are strong and where you are weak so that  your weakness will not be exposed and instead positioned as strengths.    Having foreknowledge will also help us to exercise  Deception,  which is simply  not letting th

The 9 Dos' and Don'ts of Hiring from 'How Google Works' book by Eric Schmidt, Chairman of Google Inc: Hire people who are smarter and more knowledgeable than you are.  Don't hire people that you cannot learn from or be challenged by Hire people who will add value to your organization's business and your culture.  Don't hire people that cannot contribute anything to these 2 important elements Hire people who will get things done, not those who will just think about problems Hire people who are enthusiastic, self-motivated and passionate.  Never hire people who just want a job Hire people who inspire and work well with others.  Don't hire people who prefer to work alone. The worst is to hire people who will de-motivate and de-moralize people Hire people who will grow with your team and with your organization.  Don't hire people with narrow skill sets or interests and are only concerned with surviving, not growth Hire people who are w

Understand that things don't get better, we must get better. Volitional or intentional actions generate their effects, even though you may not see them immediately.  If you don't have an action today, there won't be an effect. But natural forces like winds and tides do create effects that have nothing to do with what you do.  They are not your intentions, so do things that you do unconsciously or without intention.   It's not what happened but what you do to what happened that makes the difference.  We can always choose to react or respond to what happened.  Know that our actions will have an effect. Like I responded to the strong winds by wearing more clothes, it definitely have effect on my health.   The above is what we called Law of Cause and Effect, commonly known as Karma.   Karma invites us to take responsibility for our own behaviour .  Our behaviour s tarts with our thoughts . So pay close attention to your thoughts, speech and action - above all,

Yahoo News reported on 24 January 2015 that Singapore workers work the longest hours in the world. Based on their lower productivity levels this means they’re either doing the same amount or even less in a longer amount of time than their counterparts in other countries. How can this nation that is among the most advanced in the world be actually less productive than many less advanced nations?  If we want to be rich and happy, how can we work not lesser hours, but actually less hours?  There are 5 ways that we can all work less hours and yet achieve more: Work with More Heart .  Many people work hard, but what they do are without any feel and they are just going through the motion.  As a result, there is little meaning in what they do.  Look at many of the silly meetings where people are just finger pointing and you'll know what I'm talking about.  To know how to work heart, not work hard, read this article . Be More Productive . There are more than 36 ways to boost p

The little known secret from Sun Tzu's Art of War is simply Go High if you want to win big . There are 5 ways that you can go high: Reach customers at the highest level possible. Sometimes the highest level is the secretary. Pitch your product at a level that no other competitor can fight, like having a unique feature (eg Samsung flexible Yoom phone) Go beyond the benefits of your products and focus on your company's passion and strong belief, even if the market is not ready for it; Get the highest level in your company (eg MD) to approach the prospect, and look at the awe in their face! Instead of mentioning your strengths, mention all your weaknesses . Your prospect will be shocked that you're so upfront and he will think that the weaknesses will not pose much problems if you are sincere. Then show your confidence of resolving the weaknesses. By Andy Ng, whose programs Sun Tzu Art of War for Sales was delivered also in Philppines,

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 8 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 canno