The Age of Instant Gratification

It does not matter if you are a baby boomer, Gen X or Gen Y. We have all joined the new religion called instant gratification. Quietly and without warning, and without us saying ‘I do’ – we have come to practice this new mantra. We want everything and we want it now.

Thanks to instant messengers such as MSN and Skype, and Tweeter and Facebook, and of course, 24/7 news, the whole society has drifted towards an expectation of instant gratification. Some call it progress. Some applaud the ‘do it now, get it now’ attitude. Some say it’s the sign the world is coming to an end.

Get this straight – instant gratification is big business
Just look at how restaurants have spruced up everywhere. Who wants to cook when you have to shop for groceries, cook, dish the food out, wash dish, empty the garbage, etc.; when all you need is just walk into your favourite restaurant and voila – you have your meal!

Talking about food – manufacturers are now making big money selling supersize. The trick is – don’t sell 6-packs. Put them all in one tub – and if it’s any good – the consumer will finish everything in one go. It’s the age of instant gratification!

An entire industry has emerged churning out academic certificates in exchange for money. After all, who needs to wait 3 years for a degree and another 3 to add the ‘Dr.’ title in front of their name, right? On the same topic, fresh graduates now expect jobs to land on their laps. After all, with a degree in hand, shouldn’t employers come knocking? Guess who prospered? See all those job sites popping up everyday?

And when these same people landed a job – they expect to be made manager in 3 months. And double my salary, thank you sir! Or else they are off looking for another job. Yes, buy shares in job sites right now.

When we feel we are ready to do business – we expect to have investors lining up to snap up our ideas. And, yes, we are all ready for IPO next year. So here’s another business idea – setup an IPO consulting firm. There are enough instant suckers out there to keep you in business for a long, long time to come.

Retailers, as usual, are the first to catch on. Look at all those ‘buy now, pay later’ ads. Banks are laughing to the … well, banks, thanks to people using and not paying their credit cards. Because in the age of instant gratification, everyone spends now and pay later. Whoever said the recent financial crisis was caused by subprime mortgage must be kidding themselves – have they not heard of instant gratification and how it has brought the world to its knees?

If everyone has a choice, no one will want his or her money in some retirement fund. Why take care of the future when you have your needs now? And you know what – that makes sense too!

Yes, it’s everywhere
If you think it’s a generational problem – think twice. How often have you honked when the car in front moved a tad too slow? And how often you switched lanes at immigration just so there are fewer people in front of you? And have you never prayed for things to happen faster, and with less effort?

In politics, entertainment, sports and even religion – instant gratification is now the new mantra. And no, there’s nothing you can do to reverse. Just try a little patience, or join the crowd.

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This article appeared in the January 2010 issue of SME Magazine. Visit www.smemagazine.asia or get a copy from your nearest book store!

The Irrefutable Law of Decision Making

When we go to business school, we were trained to think rationally, using the full set of analytical skills and subject knowledge that we have been taught. Whilst it is not possible for us to be taught solutions to every possible business problem, the broad-based curriculum of most business schools prepares graduates to make informed decisions based on available data and possibilities. As a result of such education, many of us function methodically, and to a certain extent – logically.

Yet, when you start looking at some of the greatest inventions in the world, and some of the smartest business decisions in history, very often you will find that these flout the established ‘logic’ and ‘truth’ of the day. In fact, some of the greatest businesses of all times were built against what was then common sense, and defied conventional wisdom.

THE BEST BUSINESS WISDOM IS NOT EVEN WISE

When Steve Jobs re-joined Apple as its CEO after a stint outside the company, one of his first initiative was an odd looking all-in-one PC called the iMac – bucking the trend for ‘clones’ and customisation at that time. The result? The iMac became one of the best selling PCs of all time, and Apple today continues to lead the PC industry.

Similarly, when Genting founder Lim Goh Tong proposed to build a resort in a mountain far from the city, his closest friends thought he has gone crazy, and bankers stayed away from what they thought was an illogical, completely emotional decision. We know better now.

Employees and suppliers thought Ingvar Kamprad was not thinking straight, when one day he declared that IKEA furniture will be flat-packed and customers will have to assemble it themselves! Defied conventional logic, they sure did!

Sometimes, the wisest thing to do is not even wise at all. As entrepreneurs, we need to balance our entrepreneurial instinct with what we know to be logical. Once in a while, we need to act irrationally, defy logic, and let our instinct take charge.

TOO MANY CHEFS KILL THE BROTH

Like this famous proverb, sometimes, too much education kills our entrepreneurial instinct. I’ve known many great business people, some with close to zero formal education, and many with letters piling up behind their names. With few exceptions, I find that the more education one has, the longer and more thorough the person tends to think things through.

I’ve seen MBAs that put out spreadsheets and charts just to arrive at the same decisions they would have without the spreadsheets and charts. Don’t get me wrong – I’m all for informed decision and measurability. But very often, in business, speed is the essence. And if you are going to get your CFO to crunch the numbers to arrive at a decision that you know you need to take anyway, you may have lost not just time, but precious opportunity.

Another case in point is this publication. While our team works towards ensuring we’ve the best articles, the best layout and the best strategy in place before each issue, our less thorough competitors are taking advantage by making empty promises with the hope of delivering them later. Not surprisingly, they achieve some short term success at our expense. Would I do it differently? I don’t know. But what I do know is that the better educated one tends to be, the less risk one is willing to take. Professional and academic pride kicks in, clouding one’s judgement and allowing one to hesitate a moment too long.

Just compare the street-fighting style of Richard Branson, Steve Jobs and Donald Trump, and you will understand the secrets behind their success. Despite the huge conglomerate that they head, they remain entrepreneurs through and through. Not surprisingly, their competition, headed by paid CEOs, may have better management, featured more often in ‘Best Place to Work’ lists, and are loved by investors and analysts alike. Yet, our street fighter trio continue to kick asses again and again. Unlike Trump who actually finished school, Branson and Jobs never did. And all of us know another genius of our time who never completed school – who now work full time giving away his money.

Again, don’t get me wrong. I am not against education. People like Lee Iacocca, whom I admire, was an excellent scholar. What I am advocating is a need for us, entrepreneurs, to realise that sometimes, we need to stop analysing and follow our instinct. Our intrinsic need to worry and our self-doubt rob us off precious time. If all of us are to do things the way they are meant to be, the world will truly come to a stop.

The irrefutable law of decision making, dear readers – is to just do it!

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This article appeared in the December 2009 edition of SME Magazine . Get a copy of the SME Magazine at your nearest bookstore!

Political Stability

We’ve heard time and time again that we need political stability. We’ve been told, via government controlled media, through the various government functions and other means of propaganda, that without political stability we are doomed as a country. The message is clear: keep the ruling party in power, or suffer as a nation.

Some politicians and academicians continue to argue that our prosperity today is the result of decades of shepherding by the present government. That investors continue to pour billions of dollars into our economies because we have the same government since independence. That we have the opportunity to develop real infrastructure and build a sustainable, modern economic framework as we do not need to deal with shifting preferences and policies. That our fragile inter-racial community requires a strong political authority to keep us in harmony.

As business people, we generally like the idea of stability. Because that means we can continue pulling in weighs, counting on favours, and operate in an environment we are familiar with.

While I agree that political stability in any country is important, I do not share the idea that political stability equals continuous political dominance by the same party. I am not calling for a change of government - far from it. But the present government need to ensure that dissent and popular opinion are taken into consideration in governance. More importantly, we need to build into our system a clear separation of power between the executive, the judiciary and the legislative, as a safeguard against excesses by the present and future government of the day. We need to favour strong institutional safeguards versus whims and fancies by politicians, no matter how well meaning they may be.

Compare us to the US, the world’s wealthiest and most powerful country, or to Germany, France, the UK and even Italy. You will find that governments change every few years. As are economic policies. Yet, the Americans and Europeans have become so used to these changes, they have developed an instinct so sharp, they could instinctively change their business game plan according to the way the wind is blowing. Businesses are rarely bankrupted because of shifts of policies and political affiliations. Warts and all, these countries have something we need to emulate: independent legal and legislative institutions as safeguards to drastic changes that could rock the boat. And that, is the ultimate stabilising factors for businesses in those countries.

We have become so dependent on the idea that we have the same government and policies in place that as globalisation continue to hit us, we find ourselves in shock when operating in countries that have different systems and in many way, more democratic, than ours. We find their system to be lacking, that we cannot get things done the same way we have been at home, and that there is little help to be expected from the government. A business culture shock, in short.

We have been boasting of the few companies that have succeeded in expanding our reach beyond our own shores. Yet, we have failed to see that most of these are government-back companies, where a lot of political arm-twisting and horse-trading were done to ensure these companies succeed overseas. And the few that succeeded on their own, find that operating in more developed countries to be too challenging, and are generally less profitable than at home.

Having the same party in power, with the right check and balance is fine by me. But unless we are able to better institutionalise these, in the long run, these same political stability that has brought us to where we are today, will take us back to where we were before.

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This article appeared in the November 2009 edition of SME Magazine . Get a copy of the SME Magazine at your nearest bookstore!

Shortcuts to Success

In the age of Quad Core and Mach 3 travel, no one seems to have the patience for anything nowadays. A person in front of us in a queue is one too many. The same kiasu-ness is now so ingrained among entreprneeurs and businessmen, that we are constantly looking for shortcuts and other ‘lubangs’ to success.

Some will argue that success in business is about finding the fastest way to your objectives. I would agree if in so doing, we do not neglect our integrity and ethics. However, many of us tend to forgo the very principles we are brought up with, in favour of shortcuts to success. Expediency rules.

A few examples come to mind. One is our tendency to now ‘buy’ talents rather than groom them internally. Some would say that’s smart management. After all, aren’t clubs in Premier League known to pay millions for top players? Again, I would agree, if job hopping among senior executives is not as prevalent as it is today and by so doing we are not starting a talent-pinching war among ourselves. Some of us are blind to the fact that not all sweet-talking MBAs are any good or have any loyalty to you or your business. And certainly, few of these people stay long enough to do good for your business.

The sad truth is, few businessmen would have any qualms about pinching their competitors staff, if that means they would learn their competitors secrets and steal their clients. Again, that’s good business to some.

Another phenomenon that has hit many SMEs is the eagerness to raise fund rapidly to expand their business and hopefully make it big in a short time. Words like ‘mezzanine financing’, ‘investors’ prospectus’, ‘IPO’ and ‘exit strategy’ are being brandished even by mom-and-pop operations. Some of these companies seems to have lost all interest in taking care of the basics of business: developing good quality products and services, building relationship with supplier, staff and clients, and earning money the traditional way. Perhaps the lessons of Lehmann Brothers have not sinked in for many of us. Many of us are still caught up with the dotcom tagline: if you have an idea, money will start pouring in.

I don’t discourage businesses raising fund from whatever sources for whatever reasons. But it is good business sense to realise that businesses cannot be built on air. Many of the dotcom wonders that you read about have also gone through hardwork and setbacks like you and I. And business news are so full of unchecked facts nowadays, you should not allow yourself to be swayed by news of a competitor hitting it big through some investment from some mysterious funders. The truth is, money don’t grow on trees. And businesses don’t just grow on their own. If you thought labouring for your business is futile; well, it’s at least a notch better than day dreaming.

This brings us to another shortcut many are resorting to. I call it the ‘sugardaddy phenomenon’ (or ‘sugarparent’, to be gender sensitive). The government call it SME assistance program. Again, I would say go for it as it means free money in many cases. But if you are going to be building a business on the back of government handouts and nothing else, you will be steering an empty ship to nowhere. Real businesses are built on solid ideas and real products and services. There’s really no shortcut to success.

The lowest form of ‘shortcut’ to success must be those among us who bribe our way through. Some of us would be tempted to offer inducement to get that one lucrative project. After all, some grease between palms make some people easier on the cheque, and shorter on the memory. But consider the long term costs of such business experdiency. Many of the truly successful people I know are men of true integrity. Hard to believe, but it is true. Integrity and ethics do make good business sense.

Rich Kids, Poor Kids
I have nothing against direct selling. But before you are convinced by an eager sponsor hoping to pin you somewhere among his downlines, make sure you understand what you are getting yourself into. Like any business, it’s 99% effort and 1% luck. 99.9% of everyone who joins a direct selling business fails. And that’s a higher failure rate than conventional business. So YES, direct sales can be a route to success and financial independence, but NO it is not shortcut to success either.

Some of us are born with a silver spoon. Nothing to be ashamed of. In fact, capitalize on it. But again, that is no short cut to success. Your daddy and mommy can only help so much, the rest is still up to you. One of the inmutable laws of success in business is this: value creation. If you are not creating value with what you do, if you are a consumer of idea and products rather than creator of value, then you will never meet success.

I am going to tell you the real shortcut to success. It is one fact that the world’s three richest men: Warren Buffett, William Gates and Carlos Helu Slim, agree upon. It is called hardwork.

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I wrote this for SME Magazine October issue. If you haven't got your copy of SME Magazine, get one today!

Change?

We tell our children that if they work hard, they would be successful. But at the same time, we put in money each month into their education fund. We tell our employees to come early, and we make efforts to do so ourselves. We tell our children not to play with fire, but we also make sure we have fire alarms, extinguishers and insurance, just in case.

In short, while we do all the talking, we know that talking in itself is not good enough. It surprises me therefore, to find out that the Nobel committee decided that talk is enough in awarding the Peace prize to US President Obama.

Many people think Obama came into power on a ticket of change. What really brought him to power is the US electorate’s frustration over former President Bush’s arrogance, thick-headedness and refusal, well, to change. And his savvy strategy to appeal to the impressionable young through Facebook, Twitter and blogs.

Since coming to power barely a year ago, Obama has announced a slew of ‘changes’ – many of which was in his election manifesto. He made a slew of visits to hot-spots such as Afganistan and Iraq. Repeated his oft-quoted remarks that ‘change must come to America’. Promised the Afghans and Iraqis that America is committed to justice for all, and an early withdrawal. And followed-up by bombing buildings and houses, killing sons, daughters, mothers, fathers and friends, along with ‘suspected terrorists’.

He followed up with his ‘change agenda’ by appointing Hillary Clinton, a staunch nemesis at one point and in his own words, an ‘old-school politician’ to the powerful position as Secretary of State. Consistent with his feel-good and big slogan style, he appointed more non-white Americans into his cabinet than any previous administration. But none of these are in what Americans would call the Big Four.

In one of his many contradictory statements, he wanted troops to be pulled out from Iraq and Afghanistan, but has waivered numerous times when pushed for a date. The fact that his proclaimations are made with little consultation with the professionals and with little respect for reason and research is obvious. It’s shooting off the hip for the sake of political expediency.

Whilst critizing Bush’s heavy military budget and wars in Afghnistan and Iraq, he also proclaimed that ‘to ensure prosperity here at home and peace abroad, .. we have to maintain the strongest military on the planet’. And he won the Nobel Peace prize for that.

You want to change, President Obama? Let’s change to make sure the US government do not continue encouraging oppression of the homeless in Palestine and Afghanistan, stop suppressing the voice of the majority and listen to the voice of reason.

You want to change, President Obama? Let’s change to become leaders by example, to start dismantling your nuclear arsenal before you talk Pyongyang into doing the same. Stop your industries from polluting the world, sign the Kyoto protocol before you criticise others over their environmental records.

You want to change, President Obama? Pull your Pacific Fleet away from Asia, stop your strong-arm economics policy, stop bullying small countries into submission, vote to revamp the UN to make every vote counts, and live up to your promises!

Talk is cheap, Mr. President. Slogans and taglines are for ad agencies, not state leaders. You can put lipstick on a pig. It's still a pig. We hope that the Peace prize will at least motivate you to live up to it.

Making Friends and Influencing People

In today’s volatile, fast shifting market, we may do well taking a leave from the lessons ditched out by Dale Carnegie. 73 years ago, Carnegie wrote the book that remains in the reading list of many business schools today. In a world of management books, self-help guides and bestsellers, ‘How to Win Friends and Influence People’ has undoubtedly achieved lasting reverence.

Even as we move towards greater automation as a profession, and increasingly adopting various metrics in every aspect of people management, the need for HR professionals to be emotionally connected is greater than ever.

Whilst the HR profession started off with the management of labour and unions, we have evolved into a complex profession with numerous specialisations. As complexity increases, and demand on our time and knowledge increases, sometimes our ability to connect with others decreases. Like it or otherwise, our focus has been moving away from staff welfare to HR strategies. As we align our goals and processes with those of the company, we tend to move away from those of the employees. This is not a study in right or wrong, but it certainly is important to remember that at the core of our profession are the talents that make up the company.

A renowned professor in HR used to tell me that if you get your systems right, HR as a practice is as duplicable as say, purchasing or finance. He is not alone. After all, isn’t all the current fad for HR measurements and KPIs is about dispassionately standardizing processes and breaking our job down into measurable components? In fact, the higher we move up the ladder and the more time we spend interacting with top management and shareholders, the less contact we have with front line employees and customers. The net effect is the dulling of our ability to make friends and influence people.

I’m afraid as a profession we are losing our moral rights and our raison d’être in our quest for better measurability and aligning our activities to the bottom line. So powerful is the call for measurability and so pervasive is the need for KPIs, that we are drifting towards the realm of accountants and investment analysts – where numbers rule supreme.

Many of us know deep down that people matters. But if we are to honestly measure the amount of time and effort we put as part of our day to day task to think for employees rather than the management, then we will come to a realisation: that the need to meet corporate objectives have taken over. What happened to our role as arbitrator between the employees (labour) and the management (owners)? Once upon a time, HR professionals were also union leaders! Unbelievable, right?

You have the power to effect change. To many, it’s moving backwards to non-measurability and management by gut feeling. But consider this: true HR professionals feel, not think. It’s time we let our hearts rule again.

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This is my editor's message for HR Asia Issue 4. Get a copy of Asia's most authoritative publication for HR professionals at your nearest bookstore or email chro@hrasiamedia.com.

The Economy Is Recovering, But What About People?

All signs are pointing towards a speedy recovery. Contrary to what this writer initially predicted, the economy seems to be genuinely recovering. Key companies, including many government-linked corporations, are reporting profits once again. Across Asia, key economies led by China and India are experiencing growth in Q2, Japan is experiencing output growth, and the worst is over in Europe and the US – the epicentres of the financial crisis.

Our own economy is seeing a lower contraction of 3.9% in Q2 as opposed to a 6.2% contraction in Q1. The Asian Development Bank is predicting a 0.2% contraction this year followed by a 4.4% growth in 2010.

The amazing amount of stimulus being pumped in by governments across the globe is seeing its effects. Consumers are buying again. Cars are being sold. And in Malaysia, property speculation and ‘investment’ is hot again. All the pent-up demands are slowly being unleashed into our economy.

U, V, W or L

Economists and politicians alike have been talking about various ways the economic recovery will take. Depending who you talk to, the alphabets U, V, W or L are being brandished as the shape in which the recovery will take. If you are an optimist, then a V of straight up recovery it will be, but if you are pessimist, then a W shaped recovery followed by another dip may be what we’re looking at.

The good news is, regardless of the shape, a recovery now seems a certainty. The bad news is, employment is still at an all time high. Official figures asides, graduates are finding it tough to get jobs, large employers have not started re-hiring and there’s only so many Bumiputra graduates the government can absorb. These, plus the mass retrenchment last year, and VSS offered by many GLCs, mean there are still hundreds of thousands of Malaysians out there who are without jobs. What does an ‘economic recovery’ means to these people?

We were screaming for a major overhaul of the system. For more stringent measures to be put in place to ensure transparency and accountability in both private and public sectors. For our manpower to move up the value chain and stop thinking and acting like unskilled workers. For our economy to be further liberalised and the distinction between Bumiputra and non-Bumiputra in business to be narrowed. I have not heard any objections to any of these goals. Yet, a year into the financial crisis, we are not seeing much real change happening in this country.

Speculators are still being allowed to play up the prices of property. People are still expecting hand-outs from the government. Major trade bodies are still asking for protectionism to be kept in place. And promises of major reform in the government have so far netted more strings of alphabets than real changes.

Capitalism at its finest

There was a major debate among economists and politicians, including at the World Economic Forum and at the G20 Summit that there must be a new economic model to replace the current capitalism for us to prevent another global economic meltdown.

Yet, we are seeing the very essence of capitalism – that the rich gets richer and the poor gets poorer. Even the economic stimulus packages tend to accentuate this. Massive bailouts are benefiting major shareholders and corporate movers and shakers, lower rung employees are being sacrificed as ‘excess headcount’ while top management and business owners are getting away with little more than their cars being downgraded. Politically connected construction companies that were seeing double digit growth before the crisis are seeing double digit growth once again. While small manufacturers that had to scale down are still being turned away by banks. Now, where’s the new economic model these ‘world leaders’ were talking about?

Teach them to fish!

If we continue to ignore the plight of the lower income group, and fail to develop a sustainable strategy to improve their livelihood, we are going to see an ‘Indonesia ‘97’ styled revolt soon. The current practice of handouts and skills training need to be overhauled, as the problem is not physical poverty, but mental poverty.

People will remain poor because they are not being taught how to move out from their comfort zone. We’ve been offered the proverbial crutches for so long, we can no longer stand on our own. With the recession over, barriers down and globalisation resuming, we are doomed as a nation.

Well connected companies will continue to make money, some segments of the society will continue to prosper, but for majority of Malaysians, where’s the recovery?

As Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz said, “recovery will amount to nothing if the most important element of the economy: labour, is overlooked”. The economy may be recovering, but have we done enough for the people on the ground for all these to matter?

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This is my article for the Perspective section of SME Magazine September edition. If you haven't got your copy, head towards your nearest news stand now. :-)