Count Our Blessings

It is easy to re-post a picture to remind us to count our blessings on facebook. From the read a post to the time to click to share a picture, this takes us only a maximum of 2 minutes. During this time, we take upon ourselves to really count our blessings. After the 2 minutes of sharing the picture or re-posting the picture, we completely forget to count our blessings and are back to comparing and complaining and forgetting that we are living a more fortunate life as compared to those depicted in the picture that we have just posted.

Be Self Aware

One must know one's limitations in order to know what one can achieve in a day. To be unrealistic of what one can accomplish in a day will lead to only frustrations for oneself.


Author - Jacqueline Goh

Why Do We Recruit?

There is something which I cannot understand despite the fact that I have been in the field of human resources for the past 15 years. We know as human resources practitioners that if a person who does not stay in a job for more than a year he/she cannot really grasp or contribute to the job at hand. This way it will be difficult for the individual to accurately define the accomplishments one might have on the job.


Yet when we recruit people, we allow ourselves to pay for a higher salary for an individual who has not stayed in a job or role long enough to to demonstrate his/her value. Are we that short on talent that we are willing to compromise what the value an individual brings to the table? Yet, when a person stays in a job/role his/her salary does not increase as much as the other person who job-hops and does not contribute just as much as the other. 


There seems to be something amiss here..

Low Cost Air Carriers - Are They Really Cheaper?

My friends have a tendency to decide last minute that they would like to explore a particular country. Usually it is me that scrambles to book the air tickets and accommodations.


Last night was another one of those nights. This time the destination - Bangkok.


For many of us in Singapore, we usually think of the budget airline carriers to go to Bangkok or maybe Thai Airways. So I did what a normal Singaporean would do - check out timings and prices of the various low cost air carriers - Tiger Airways, Jetstar Asia, Scoot. I also did a search of Singapore Airlines and  Thai Airways.


The cheapest was Scoot based on a Friday departure and a Monday return. The only huge disadvantage for us taking Scoot was the timing of the return flight from Bangkok to Singapore. Next I evaluated Jetstar Asia and Tiger Airways and based on price decided to book Jetstar Asia. As I was going through the booking, I realised the costs kept on increasing because of the 20 kgs baggage as well as the charges for a standard seat. Then I stopped the booking mid-way and decided on another approach to explore the other airline possibility.


I did a search via Wego and found there were indeed other cheaper airline tickets options which I did not explore earlier on. This included a flight via Cathay Pacific. Through Wego, it linked me to this local travel agent booking site - New Shan Travel Service. I realised they had various promotions and finally decided to book air tickets to Bangkok using the HSBC promotion. This way of booking actually saved me per person $25. Although the difference in monetary terms is not much (without a corporate job $25 saved is still something significant), but on Cathay Pacific, I would have gotten a meal served as well as some drinks. 


Maybe one is able to evaluate or see things differently when one has to carefully consider all options given that money is tighter. So on your next travel trip, do give the other airlines a consideration and maybe you will end up with a much cheaper airfare if you consider other alternatives (New Shan Travel Services) which you did not normally try like myself.

Is there Life in Singapore without a Corporate Job?

So far, I have been creating and shipping things based on what customers want. So far although it has only been 6 weeks, I feel like it has been an entirety.


Honestly, I have not been getting much traction from the people that I have written to or have I sold anything for my two businesses as yet. One may say that I am being impatient but maybe it is right for this generation that we live in, where we expect at least some form of feedback - positive or negative.


For my online pet business, I know that there are people looking at the products - there are even repeat visitors - it is just that no one is buying and I am wondering if it is because of price or design but I am not getting any feedback so that I can adjust the price or the design accordingly. 


So is there any life in Singapore without a corporate job? Presently, I can say no. Without a corporate job unless you have already established a blog for yourself where you have a certain amount of income generated or already established a side stream of income through various options available in the market eg stocks, books, presentations, talks etc life is tough in Singapore without a corporate job.


No one seems willing to help the new start-up business, there are plenty who can dispense advice on what needs to be done but no one has extended that friendly hand to say "Come, let me work together with you so that you can have a head-start on your business or here are some contacts you can call and they would be able to refer some business to you". Maybe that is why my business is called a start-up.


Maybe it is the naive me that still believes should I able to demonstrate one can survive without a corporate job in Singapore, I will definitely extend my hand to someone who needs it but till that day, anyone willing to extend a hand to me or refer some contacts to me so that I can at least make a sale on my online pet business?

I am Lazy!

Despite being successful in the corporate world, I realised more and more these days that I am lazy. Why?


In the work of running one's own business, you need to constantly SHIP (like what Seth Godin teaches) or deliver. What this means for me is I need to create value or content which my customer wants. This is really tough. When I sit to start thinking what kind of content or value that my customer wants or what in this world that really makes me frustrated, I realised that to deliver on this value or content, it takes a lot of hard work and I am too lazy to do it.


Now I truly understand what it means to really penetrate a market (for example a highly closed market like the pet industry) and really make a difference and leave a mark!


So here goes!

We Are Not Stupid

It is still interesting to see the mentality of the white vs the non-whites even till this day in Singapore. It is quite sad to see that some of the whites (or the foreign talent) adopting the mentality that Singaporeans do not have what it takes to do the work here in Singapore.


Personally, I have worked with many foreign talent (whites) and I have enjoyed myself working with them because they give you the respect and they really do work and SHIP (like what Seth Godin says).  With some of my friends, I can see how they are not given the respect or are treated like dirt, stepped all over by them and are assumed to be STUPID.


Lets look at it this way - we, Singaporeans are not STUPID despite our skin-color. We may do things differently from where you come from and do remember you are in our country and there is a Singapore way of how we do things here in Singapore.

Excitement

These days I wait in excitement of when our first sale will come. It has been slightly more than a month since I started working on the online pet business while my business partner takes a long-overdue break. The online pet products business has been running for a total of 18 months but last year, we did not do much marketing. This year, we went on a very aggressive market drive on the online pet products business. 


I still can recall very vividly how I feel - every day, I wonder when we will get our first sale, when no sales come in I wonder if it is me not doing enough. I have been reading blogs of other entrepreneurs giving me tips on what I need to do, what I should be doing and in my search, I have not really found one blog that speaks to me on all aspects of developing a start-up business. There is no one blog that told me these are the initial steps one has to take.


One particular blog that I read (now I cannot remember which blog since I read so many), compares the initial start-up of a business to that of a fresh graduate applying for a job. One would be sending in numerous job applications but only 1 out of 100 would reply - this is similar to me sending out numerous emails to get in contact with suppliers/distributors for me to carry their pet products. It is just so frustrating when they do not reply - maybe it is indeed because they have their business and there is really no incremental value towards increasing or working any harder.


On good days, I wait in excitement of what my email might bring me. On bad days, I go into depression and hide away.


I guess these are the perils of running one's own business in Singapore especially starting from ground zero up with little or no support from influential figures here in Singapore.

Customer Service in Singapore

It is amazing...you tend to observe more human behavior when you are not rushing and are really in the present.

I am now sitting waiting for my watch battery to be replaced. I walked up to the counter since I am the first customer and her reply to me was "please press for a number and I am on the phone".

So the obedient me followed what the lady advised. I pressed for a queue number and sat down. Her colleague buzzed my number and I walked up to the counter again in an empty waiting room. Passed my watch to the lady and I over-heard the other customer service conversation - she was talking to her family.

I wonder how many employees realize their own actions and how it reflects on the company or organization that they work for. In this case, I feel as a customer I was not important and had to wait until I finished my conversation with my family before I would deal with you.

It is also not fair when employees complain their bonuses are reduced or when they are not adequately compensated because their actions do affect how customers view the businesses and how they can affect if customers decide to go to their competitor. In this case, I do not have a choice to go to another competitor as they are the main company that can change the battery for my watch.