Day 60 - Weekends

Day 60 - 940 days to go

Time travels fast and today is 60th day i.e. two full months since I started my first blog post two months ago. Look back and do not really know if I should say I achieve a lot or nothing.

I just know that at least 75% i.e. 3/4 weekend of each month I am busy for some events such as marathon and ultramarathon (so far 4 this year), various types of investment course (at least 4 again), property investment trip (another 3 - 4 times), trekking either locally or out station (4 - 5 times) and children school activities. Well, I maybe quite busy on all these activities but trekking and running to me is a form of exercise and networking too. I enjoy them as I can meet like minded, fit and healthy people.

The price to pay is cost incurred travelling to other countries (2 times Singapore and one time USA), travel to outstation, wake up very early i.e. before 5am but reach home in the afternoon or late afternoon. As much as possible, I will bring my wife and kids along so that it will become another family outing at the same time.

Feel tired? Yes I do. However, I know that I cannot and should not stop doing exercise. I think many of us experience will know that once we stop doing something, it is difficult to start again especially for exercise.

I used to read articles and book every night but I stop doing it for many months especially after I start writing this blog. Well, I still read but much less due to time factor but I will put in more time on this as I do not watch TV nowadays. I used to watch TV program for about an hour for the last two months and luckily the program ended. I am not saying it is a waste of time but I know my priority in life.

Briyani Rice Restaurant

Day 59 - 941 days to go

Today we went to have lunch at a famous briyani rice restaurant near Puduraya bus station. Surprisingly, there were only a few tables of customers only when we reach the upper floor of the restaurant. I went there a few times but this round was just quiet.

I tasted the food and it remained good. Therefore, I can only guess a few possible answers to the multi million dollar question:

1. Competition - the Puduraya bus station, which is only opposite the restaurant, was reopened in April this year. There are many similar food store operating in the bus station.
2. Pricing - RM9.0 for a plate of white rice + some vegetable + a piece of fried chicken is considered expensive.
3. Based on my last experience, when their business is good or even this round, they do not provide good customer service i.e. their response rate is very slow.
4. They took quite a while to serve drink ordered despite not many customers. I guess they do not have enough staff in the kitchen. This is very bad as customers have only one hour lunch time including the travel time.

Well, I will still go there from time to time as the food is still tasty but the above 4 points, at least, will deter some customers to go back again.

Derivatives - Options Briefing

Day 58 - 942 days to go

Today two CME staff conducted briefing on Options Contracts to our staff from many departments in the company. Apparently more than 1/3 of the staff left as a result of too technical materials of presented. The technical issue here is that they are not the intended participants after all.

Option is a very powerful and versatile instrument relative to many, if not all, derivatives instruments. Actually Option writer or seller is the second oldest profession in the world, according to a "joke" cracked by a IMD speaker. We have been buying option in our daily lives without realising it such as insurance policy, lottery and so on.

Most people think that option is a very risky instrument or rather derivatives contracts are very risky. To me and to those who understand, derivatives are tools that can be used to achieve certain goals but can also lead to damage if we do not know how to use them. The same principle is true to many other tools such as gun, knife, saw, and many other tools.

The benefits and also the riskiness of using derivatives are leverage, transparency and complexity. If we understand the three aspects of using derivatives and have proper risk management measures, derivatives especially option contracts can help us to increase our profits and reduce risk exposure. Therefore, fund managers or dealers from all industries which include financial and commodity, should learn how to implement hedging strategy to protect their exposure to price and other form of risk by using derivatives.

2011 Sundown Ultra-marathon - a very useful lesson

Day 57 - 943 days to go

God has been very nice to me. I always make friends with good people in different communities such as school, college, trekking, running, office, internet marketing, courses, seminars, conference and so on.

The Sundown marathon is over but it promotes friendship among a few friends. I registered the run because of a trekking friend which becomes a very long distance runner, Alexis. She inspired me to take part in the event. She invited me to join her training with a group of runners to prepare for the run. During at least 20 km of the run, she constantly encouraged me to continue running.

From joining the weekend running group, I got to know Henry and Sifu Terence. Terence has been sharing a lot of useful tips for long distance training and he even lead us for weekly training despite his busy schedule. I was lucky enough to met him in Changi airport on the race day and hence able to learn a few more tips from him.

I learn a few things from the personal finance angle:

1. Time is money. The earlier you book the flight, the cheaper is the fare.
2. Time is money. I was not able to change my flight on the spot. I have to pay for another bran new ticket
3. If you are happen need to buy an urgent flight ticket on the spot, you can ask the cashier to check in for you immediate as well so that you can beat the long Q.
4. Don't assume. Make sure you read the e-ticket or boarding pass carefully as it will save you time or even money. E.g. I went to the budget airlines terminal and then only I realised that AIRASIA is not at the same place. Then I realised that it was printed on the ticket.

2011 Sundown Ultra-marathon - a very painful lesson

Day 55 and 56 - 944 days to go

No blog post yesterday as I was running the 2011 Sundown Ultra-Marathon in Singapore from 6pm on Saturday till close to 2am on Sunday, 26 June. Well, the qualifying time to be awarded the finisher medal and T shirt is 18 hours but I decided to stop after running, jogging and walking for 50 km.

There are a few lessons learned in this failed attempt which was also one of my top 10 new year resolution for this year:

1. Not enough training. In technical term, I have not clocked enough mileage but following my ultra-marathon teammates for training. I think I only manage to train up to 20% of the required training lessons.
2. Do not sleep or rest enough. I have been sleeping less ever since I started writing this blog in May. The reason is that I will write blog and at the same time learn various subjects by surfing the net or reading my materials in the PC.
3. Leg injury - I have been suffering from Achilles tendon injury for many years and as such whenever I ran long hour, I will feel the pain.
4. Flat foot is another problem for me as I will feel pain after a prolonged run.
5. Body preparation - I did not do enough carbo loading, no proper intake of water, mineral and fruits.

What is the post mortem action plan for me? Well, since I will be taking part in the 2011 KK International Climbathon in October this year, I will train hard so that I am able to win the finisher medal this year. I will try to manage my training schedule so that I have enough training for me to achieve the goal.

Training may not make perfect but no or not enough training sure result in failure.

Attended A Wake

Day 54 - 946 days to go

Today is a sad dad for my wife's good friend - Amy and her family. Her mother passed away due to illness at the age of 74 years old. We attended her wake after work, from the original plan of attending GLIC open day organised by Khazanah. Well, either event provide networking opportunity.

GLIC open day will allow us to know about the companies and the people there. It is also a good avenue to look for other information provided by GLIC such as scholarship. One may even get to know some senior management staff on the spot.

Wake is more of a very personal occasion. One will only attend a wake if he knows somebody from the family personally or officially. Not only that, it is an occasion for one to keep in touch with high school or university friend which was last seen many years back. A lot of time, we may even get to know that the spouse of our close friends are actually our friends from another community group. Therefore, it is very important not to offence anybody as you will never know who the person is connected with.

I also learnt about the proper way to learn diving and get certified as a diver. Well, I plan to get certified next year as my schedule is fully filled with activity this year.

Employee Share Grant

Day 53 - 947 days to go

Today I received letter from the company on our share grant which is a replacement for our ESOS that expired last year. It is slightly different from the last ESOS. For ESOS we can exercise share allocated for the ESOS in the year we received the shares. For this share grant, we can only exercise the option for shares after one year we received the grant and over a 3 years period. For instance, I can only exercise the grant from next year onward for 3 years i.e. about 33% of the allocation in one year.

There is also a mini grant allocated that we can exercise this year. The grant is given as a compensation for us to exercise one third of the option this year as the grant is supposed to be given last year and start exercising this year.

Some staff are not happy for two reasons:

1. They compared to the first ESOS and found that allocation is far too small amount this round

2. Some newly joint staff are not eligible to receive the grant

Another group is actually staff with corporate level 6 and below as they received cash and not shares.

I think the above 3 groups are not happy for the wrong reasons.

1. They should be happy as they received free shares as long term incentive again. How many company offer ESOS or share grant out there? Is that the original reason why they join this company? I think we should be grateful of what we enjoy especially if you know the average unemployment rate in US is more than 10% in many states.

In addition, they should try to find out the formula for the share allocation which is not very different from the ESOS and also with new ruling, company has to pay for share grant expenses which come into effect after the ESOS is implemented. In other words, thing has changed but we are still living in the past.

2. It is an international standard that staff who join for less than certain period will not enjoy certain type of benefits such as ESOS etc. Therefore, they should not feel unhappy as the existing staff have been working here for some time and hence they enjoy benefits from their past contribution. In addition, I don't think they are promised with the share grant before they joined not long ago as they may actually sue the company for not delivering promise in the employment letter, for instance.

The last group receiving cash have actually given opportunity to decide whether they will receive cash or share but their focus group peers have decided (about 80% agree) to receive cash. Cash or share is about rezeki. Nobody can be assure that ESOS made money as I have seen company ESOS cause employees lose money after they borrow loan to pick up the shares but the share went under water. Money in your pocket and used is your money but not shares registered in your CDS account.

All in all, we should be grateful for what we have especially it is free. Furthermore, nobody forces anybody to accept the free shares as we can always refuse. If one feels that this is not a good company or not getting the appropriate treatment, one should leave the company and look for better opportunity. One should always help himself rather than blaming others for not good treatment. Unfair treatment is everywhere and we should either do something about it or accept it. However, the least we should do is to be unhappy about something that we get for free.

Advanced Business Management Program 3

Day 52 - 948 days to go

Finally, completed the 3 days program and actually I felt a bit sad as I have to leave this wonderful group of people. I think I am very fortunate to have a chance to spend so much time with a group of very successful people. Most of them are CEO, CFO, Director, Head of Department and so on. I really feel thankful to my CEO, Mr. Chong to recommend me to attend this course for training and networking. I believe the friendship and rapport built will benefits all of us in future.

I also learned new way of conducting briefing on derivatives especially Option. This come in very timely as I will be conducting Option to market participants very aggressively in the next 6 months and beyond. There will be many channels that I need to work on besides roadshow such as newspaper column, internet, university, private colleges, option games and so on. There are many options to develop this Option contracts and we will work our best despite not having the most ideal ecosystem yet.

So, all the best to our first baby in Product Development i.e. Option on FKLI and Option on FCPO.

Advanced Business Management Program 2

Day 51 - 949 days to go

Today is the second day of the Advanced Business Management workshop. In the morning, we discussed cases on a subsidiary of a global company which lead to management buy-out. In the afternoon, we spent about 6 hours, without tea break to do simulation for implementation change in a company. Some of the takeaways include:

1. Employees' buy-in is one of the most important factors
2. Adequate communication - not too much or little
3. Identify opinion leaders
4. Try not to use CEO or senior management to assert pressure on staff to accept changes
5. Track or record staff consulted or have meeting with

6. Engage expert or consultant to assist

7. Benchmaking and training are part of the important process

8. Last but not least, communicate, communicate, communicate

Day 50 - Advanced Business Management Program

Day 50 - 950 days to go

Today is the first of 3 days of the above course held in Cyberjaya Lodge Resort and Spa. This is one of the most advanced short term course something similar to EMBA offered by Harvard, for instance. Actually the speaker, Professor Didier Cossin was a PhD graduate from Harvard. I am glad that I have a chance to learn from the book best in Malaysia.

First day mostly discussed on crisis happened in one of the major investment bank in the world and how it happened. Normally, we always think that international bank should have better risk management control plus higher level of corporate governance. However, now only we realise they are huge in revenue and global present as their are taking more risk overtime. High risk high return may be the model they employed as their salary are very much dependent of the actual profits made.

As the rewards tight closely to the person, dealers are always try to deliver results by assuming more risk. If their view is right, they may earn much higher all in salary than normal staff by assuming more risk in overseas setup.

Well, many of the participants are company CEO, GM, CFO etc. It is fun to learn how sharp they are but some also fall trap into the general shortcoming as a overconfident person. It was confirmed with two times of confident test. However, very high level of confidence is some of the common strength exhibited by successful CEO. I think somehow high level of confidence will not only make one become a possible CEO but also can help to achieve many other challenges in life.

A Sad Happy Father's Day

Day 49 - 951 days to go

Today is Happy Father's Day to many people but not for some others. I am the latter as my dad passed away last year. This is the first year I am not able to celebrate with him (and all my family members too, by chance). I attended a US tax lien and deed investment course for the last two days and today the class ended after 6:30pm.

I continued to stay there till 8pm as I was having discussion with classmate and also registered for the mastermind course in US. Well, the reason I registered for the US course is that I will be having practical training plus class room lecture on property investment in US. Hopefully and actually is the main objective, I will be back from US with one property purchased. That is the power of the course as it is a real property tour plus purchase workshop.

Why US? Well, US was one of the worst hit economy for the last two years and prices of property lost as much as 80% or more. There is sign of improvement and we believe we have seen the worst. Therefore with some property prices edge up from the bottom seen 2008, we think this is a good time to invest in US property.

What is the best method to assess a property? Online google map or through agent? Of course personal present will be the best. Therefore, the course offer the best combination i.e. learn and apply whatever learned in the same course.

Tax Lien Investment

Day 48 - 952 days to go

Today is the first day to attend investment in tax liens in U.S. I would say I learned a great deal from zero. There are lots of things to learn in this area.

Actually one of the most exciting aspect of learning to invest in something is that you will soon realise that investment is like trading, you need to compete with everybody out there. Of course it does not mean that you are the youngest or the most inexperienced one. Rather it only indicates that everyone has a chance to make money from this field.

Tomorrow we are going to learn investment in tax deeds and I believe that it will be equally exciting if not more. As a former trader in Treasury department and an investor inmy personal capacity, I would say the world of investment is still evolving and hence there is something new to learn or invest in on a daily basis. We really have to put in enough effort to keep abreast with the latest development in the investment field in order to enjoy higher yield but lower risk.

Tax Liens and Deeds

Day 47 - 953 days to go

Today is a very interesting day. I attended T Harv Eker first day preview at PWTC. The attendance is just overwhelming and more than one hundred late comers were force to sit on the floor but seemed that they did not mind. After tea break, success resources added many chair and solved the problem.

The night before I received a reminded call to invite me to attend a tax liens preview. As a result, I went there to attend the preview at night. Learned quite a bit in the one hour plus preview and decided to attend the two days course tomorrow. Course content include tax liens, tax deeds and direct purchase as 3 options of investment in the U.S.

I would say it was one of the best Fridays for me as I learned two different aspects of personal financial development strategies. I am sure I will be able to invest in tax liens very soon. I hope I can share with my family members and good friends what I learned so that we can build our retirement funds together for a better retirement in future.

Air Asia - Make You Pay By Hook Or By Crook

Day 46 - 954 days to go

I learned a few lessons from buying plane ticket from Air Asia today.

1. You dont have a choice to say no for certain item. I tried many times to cancel the insurance but to no avail. End up I have to force to pay for the insurance or not able to complete the transaction.
2. When other low cost airline charge you for only basic fare and airport tax, they charge you at least 9 items without having a choice. Basic fare, passenger security fee, passenger service fee, airport fee, airport tax, aviation levy, fuel surcharge, AA insurance and convenience fee.
3. They also tried to charge me seat selection fee which is RM30 one way, meal, and comfort kit.
4. I would say they really have a creative director. I respect their creativity but do not agree with the fact the they do not let me choose if I want to buy insurance.
5. The best part is the convenience fee which appears from noway until I want to pay with my credit card.

I am not satisfy with Air Asia for a few issues which include their forever fail customer service phone line or email (I have been taking Air Asia for 10+ times to many countries even for sending my maid home), this round it really forced me to look for alternative. Well, thanks AA for letting me realise that beside AA, Firefly and Tiger Airway, I came to know Lion Air. I hope AA respects customer a bit more or risk losing more customers eventually. From now on, I will give other airline a chance as much as possible as I don't think we get good service in terms of the business model (their staff are quite nice in general).

They think they are still better than other budget airlines but I heard more and more people going to firefly and tiger airway. MAS is a giant and if you make the sleeping giant wake up, you may end up facing stiff competition. Customers have many choice and there is no such thing as loyal customers if you do not continue to provide good or at least fair deal.

One thing I learned is that if you go to Singapore from KL, you may want to take malaysia airline. However, if you come back from Singapore, you may want to take singapore airline as I found that they charge a lot less (if any) for airport related tax and fee. Maybe just because they are supported by Singapore government and hence passengers do not need to pay many creative fees or taxes.

Love Hate Relationship

Days 45 - 955 days to go

Is it true that if there is no love, there is no hate and vice versa? Or the feeling or emotion of hate is due to loss of love? The foundation of happiness is built on the condition of mindset i.e. whether you are happy or sad, it is only a state of mind. Is it easy to be happy? Yes. Is it very difficult to be happy? You bet.

Everybody interpret or rather derives happiness from different sources or forms. I think the only common source of happiness to human being is love. The most immediate and unlimited source of love is from family members especially from parents. I cannot imagine anybody has never been loved by the parents or at least a parent.

What is the most destructive and constructive weapon in the world? Hate and love. When there is hate, there is a war and problem. When there is love, there is peace and solution. There is only a change of mindset that determines whether you love or hate somebody or something. You love to be rich but hate to work hard or you should hate to be poor and hence love to work hard. It is all a matter of how you make sure or set your mindset that makes the difference.

Therefore, when you hate something or somebody, you are actually love something else or somebody. However, most of us normally focus or see the obvious form but overlook the actual substance. Love or hate, it is only cause and consequence. You hate war as you love peace.

In sum, love or hate, give and take, open and close are very subjective and different people define the same thing differently as they view the same thing from different angles.

Rat Race Training 2

Day 44 - 956 days to go

Today is the second day of my weekday training and the first one on the actual route on a hot afternoon at 6pm. Lots of traffic with polluted air affected my running pace. However my timing of 23 minutes 10 seconds is one of the best training time for me. How do I achieve this while my muscle is still tired after two runs yesterday?

The secret is healthy competition. I was running with the best runner in my company and thus I have a very good pacesetter in front of me. I just tried my best to keep up to his pace and of course I can follow him only up to 2km or 40% of the journey. I was happy as I have never tried following the best runner so close and for so long a distance. The reason is a change of mindset and strategy. What I have been doing all this while is to reserve energy for the first part of the journey as I am not sure if I can achieve good result if I push too hard on the first part.

This round I still have the same level of doubt but I decide to keep up to the pace and see how much I can achieve. Well I would say I am satisfy with my results as the race is more than 3 months away. I will train harder to test a new personal best which is below 21 minutes.

What I learned from this training is that, "If you think you can, you can." There is no harm to test your limit or apply a new strategy from time to time. Improvement is not by chance but by taking action.

The Edge Bursa Malaysia 2011 Rat Race Training

Day 43 - 957 days to go

Today I started my first weekday Rat Race training twice - once in the morning and once after work. I clocked 23.5 minutes for the morning training on actual route which is about 3 minutes better than last Saturday's training at 6am. My personal best was recorded last year at 21 minutes. Why did I run so slowly on last Saturday? It was due to lack of training and also lack of confidence.

I lost confidence slightly on my fitness level after I registered 6.5 hours for my sundown marathon on 28 May11 compared to 4 hours 40 minutes recorded on 16 April 11. My timing added almost 2 hours after 6 weeks. The main reason is due to lack of training and proper rest ever since I started blogging and always sleep after 1am but wake up before 6am. Therefore, I dare not push myself and ran the worst timing of 26.5 minutes for rat race training.

However, I don't give up easily just because of one defeat. Therefore, I pushed a bit harder and glad to complete the run at 23.5 minutes. Of course, my aim is to run below 21 minutes. I think high level of confidence and also do not give up easily after experience a defeat are two important traits to be a successful person. Of course, the best strategy to ensure success is still good preparation and execution.

There Is A Problem, There Are Many Solutions

Day 42 - 958 days to go

I cannot and dare not say I like problem as I do not want to attract problems like what is taught in the LOA. However, I always gained and learned some problem faced and solved eventually.

I went to change my Polar watch battery despite the fact that I changed it few months ago. I thought I was conned by bad a merchant last time. However, after I changed the battery last night, I do not see anything appear in the digital screen of the watch this morning. Look like the watch is out of order and needs to be fixed.

This is a good and bad problems. Bad one is I need to repair it while good one is, I am not going to buy Polar watch anymore as I think it is too early to have problem for a few years old watch. In other words, I have concern on the quality. This problem lead to to find out more on digital watch with GPS capability. Then only I realize there are so many makes and models for GPS wantches that can measure distance, pace, altitude, compass and so on. When we do not see any problem, we will always stick with the existing solution and hence we hardly improve. Therefore, problems and needs are the key ingredients to innovation.

Now I am considering either Suunto or Garmin for my next outdoor activities watch. The first event that I will use it will be the sundown ultramarathon in Singapore on 25 June.

Yes, like the tagline says, "Sleep can wait."

First Step to Success - Just Take Part

Day 41 (post on day 42) - 959 days to go

This blog should be uploaded yesterday but due to some personal technical hiccup, slightly delayed.

I had a fruitful day and started the day at 5am morning. Reached office by 6am and started my solo rat race training along the actual rat race road. It took me about 26 minutes which was the slowest ever rat race run for the last 9 years. Look like I am going to face the music of not having preper training for my 100km ultramarathon on 25 June. Wish me luck...

Well, to me participation is more important than well prepared and then only take part. The reason is that most people do not take part in certain types of event due to the perceived fact that they are not ready yet. To me, I just want to take part and enjoy the process/journey. Well, of course we should at least put in some minimum level of effort to prepare ourselves. My point is, just take part and you will know how to prepare for it if you do not want to fail.

Day 40 - The Most Valuable Asset for A Country

Day 40 - 960 days to go

From the last 3 days and 23 meetings, I learned quite a bit of products information, market information, dealers and investors mentality, critical success of a market or products and even luck as a critical ingredient for a successful launching of product.

Today I am not going to talk about a product or company. Instead, I will talk a bout a country - Singapore. Singapore is very successful in many aspects despite fails to address the high cost of living which made her to be the 3rd most expensive city for expats in Asia, by overtaking Hong Kong. First two are Japan and Korea. High cost of leaving maybe the price to pay for development or demand for something rare or good.

The country or the people are very competitive and lots of strategies have be implemented to ensure they excel despite having the least natural resource in Asia and one of the least in the world. They know that they cannot compete in terms of natural resources, population and size of country. However, I believe they are the largest exporter of expertise and also the largest importer of expertise too, in Asia. I went to one of the foreign bank there and about 25 to 35% of their staff are foreigners, even those who are Chinese as they are Chinese from UK, US, Australia, Malaysia and so on.

Their consultants and course trainers brought back lots of revenue for Singapore and at the same time import lots of smartest brain from the surrounding countries, Malaysia in particular. For instance, they offer ASEAN scholarship to primary 6 graduates and then for students who finished their PMR (Form 3). Of course the most attractive one is the scholarship offered for university studies. To them it is a still as respective countries spend money on the initial phase of development program and Singapore just pay for advanced stage of work-in-progress. It is definitely a steal to pay for something good without paying for the initial development cost and quality control cost.

Their success is due to the fact that they realised, human resource is the most valuable asset compared to other forms of asset or commodity. Therefore, despite all the natural constraint as a country, one success factor is good enough to lift them to the world level. Yes, human resource is the most valuable resource or asset.

There Is A Will, There Is A Meeting

Day 39 (2) - 961 days to go

God helps those who help themselves.

Well, I like the above title as well as I have completed full days of marathon back-to-back meeting. I am not sure what is the world record for meeting in a day or 3 days. My two colleagues and I just completed 23 meetings in 3 days, two of us even had one extra personal meeting that made up 24 meetings in totals.

In order for any event to be successful, there must be many things done right. Sometimes, luck also plays a very critical role. Three of us are from product development division and we made a trip to Singapore to meet up with existing and potential users and intermediaries of the products listed in my company, BMD. Before we reach Singapore, we managed to arrange 17 meetings. However, we end up having 23 meetings. Key success factors are:

1. Never give up. We try to arrange more meeting until the very last minutes via handphone and email.

2. Try our luck. We drop by counterparts' office without informing them and we were lucky enough to be able to meet them.

3. God helps us. By chance we met an ex colleague who is working in a futures company that we have interest to meet and he did help us to arrange for meetings.

4. Friend helps us - We managed to fix a few meetings after getting some information from friends or they actually help us to even fix a meeting. Helps gained from our business partners, brokers, and ex colleagues.

5. Good Luck - It was beyond my imagination that I was able to fix 17 meetings without really changing any appointment time slot at all.

6. Think out of the box - I enjoyed this the most. We simply drop by an office, go to the meeting place earlier, try to combine two meetings (from the same company) into one, change meeting time in order to arrange for more meetings.

7. Just do it - To attend meeting on an hourly basis and from one office to another one seems difficult if not improbable. However, we just make arrangement and completed with minor delay for a few meetings only.

8. There is a will, there is a way - we try to arrange meeting via different channels and networks which include cold call, get help from colleagues and friends, referral, and so on. God even help us by meeting another lead while walking.

Great event never happens by chance but by own will and God will. First thing first, God helps those who help themselves. This is the lesson I learned again in the past three days.

Credit Cards Blue Ocean Strategy

Day 39 (1) - 961 days to go

I went to Singapore on 6 June 2011 and as such did not update my blog from day 36 to 38. The reason is that the Meritus Mandarin Hotel at Orchard Road wanted to charge me SGD30 per day or SGD10 per 4 hours. I think most likely I will not go back to the same hotel as free internet access should be a standard service provided by hotel now. Too bad, because of SGD10, this hotel will be losing my business.....maybe permanently despite the fact that the location is good and the staff provide good customer services.

Recently I just applied for Citibank credit card as a result of a CC agent called me up and explained to me various benefits offered by Citibank CC. Initially I do not have any intention to apply as government just imposed a RM50 tax on each CC. However, I applied for it after know some of the benefits offered by this bank.

20 years ago, CC holders of Citibank card are proud owners of CC as it was not easy to get a Citibank CC and as such perceived to be of higher social status. However, over time, when more and more banks issued CC that offered many similar benefits, Citibank cards do not command similar social status anymore and actually start to lose market share to other foreign banks such as SCB and HSBC. When more and more local banks offered CC to card holders and the entry level is lower, Citibank lost even more market share.

However, I noticed that Citibank has been more aggressive to fight back by offering more benefits to card holders and hence attracted more better quality card holders like me who want to have special member privileges not offered by most other credit cards. For instance, Citibank cardholders are offered free use of Plaza Premium Lounge at KLIA. some other CC do offer similar privileges but limit to a few time per year, for instance. HSBC CC members will earn 5x bonus points if used in overseas. CIMB and Direct Access Cards give 15% discount for duty free purchase made in certain duty free shop in KLIA.

In sum, the trick is to offer some unique benefits to a niche market i.e. create its own Blue Ocean strategy as there is no more price war for CC since everyone is offering CC for free. There is always a niche market in all industry. The trick is whether you notice or able to create one before it is taken by your competitor.

The Power of Leverage - selling book

Day 35 - 965 days to go

One of the most lucrative but also the lowest pay jobs relative to efforts put in is writing a book. For authors, you know how much effort or hundreds of hours you put in before a book is completed. However, it is normally sold for a few hours worth of your hourly rate. Then why so many people still want to be an author?

Well, the answer is leverage in terms of buying power. Authors do not aim to sell a few or even hundreds of books. They want to write a best seller that can sell ten of thousands if not million. That is the power of leverage which is much more powerful than multi level marketing for many other types of physical products especially foods and other consumable products that have limited shelf life. Writing a book is better than creating a new tool or product as the same author can write another book and sell to the same group of buyers again and again. You see people buy hundreds of books but have you seen anybody buy some other products again and again and add up to hundreds? A classic example is Chicken Soup for the Soul series....maybe is the all time best seller by now.

Therefore, food for thought business is more lucrative than food for the stomach. I always buy "outdated" book which was author 2 - 3 years back but remain relevant to me and for current application, at 60 to 80% discount. I don't think anyone wants to buy "out-dated or expired" foods at all. Furthermore, books can be sold from or to any part of the world.

The main benefit derived from selling a book is that it will make the author very famous and become an expert in the fields he authored. This branding and publicity can bring him million of dollars when people engage him to be a speaker for his field, co-author another book, invited to be in a forum, guest speaker for university or other similar occasion, and many more.

Therefore, despite not want to buy books so frequently, I bought 14 books and cost me more than RM300 despite all are "outdated" books. Unless I become a professional author or speaker, I don't think I need to buy books when they are freshly delivered from the printing machine now. We should be a smart consumer even for buying books, right?

4 Stars Chinese Language Society

Day 34 - 966 days to go

Today I spent almost the whole day from 6:30am to almost 11pm with my girl as she is one of the organizing committee members for the performance jointly organized by 4 Chinese Language Society from 4 high schools. Fun to attend such a function as I left high school more than 2 decades already.

Well, I would say the event is quite well organized despite some minor technical hiccup. One of the best values they learned is teamwork. It is not easy to have good teamwork from one organization, let alone from four. I am so glad that my girl is involved in such a good community that show high level of teamwork and respect. Of course, I can tell that they have a lot of fun organizing the event. I believe the new committee members learned a great deal managing the event, so did the returning committee members as it involved leadership skill and people management technique now as senior committee members.

Such an event is like a mini bootcamp or practical training to prepare these group of high school students to work in the real world when they graduate some time in the future. By taking part in club activities, they will be able to develop their organization, leadership, interpersonal, communication and other types of soft skills. I am sure they will be better prepared to face real world challenges compared to those who have never taken part in similar events.

Meeting Arrangement

Day 33 - 967 days to go

I have been trying to fix at least 5 meetings a day in Singapore - 2 each for morning and afternoon sessions and one during lunch. The tricky part is that in order for all these meetings take a time slot each without overlapping or changing one to another slot, requires a bit of luck. I am lucky to have all meetings fix without changing any and the best thing is when the last meeting confirmation mail comes in, it proposes to fit the last spot that I have. I really cannot believe my eyes and share that happiness with the counterpart. She is happy for me too by saying "We hit a jackpot." Yup, we both hit a jackpot indeed.

This is a classic example as I just told my student intern to give her best and focus on what she needs to deliver, good results will be the most likely outcome. I told her this as she always worried about if she can do a good job on task assigned to her. Instead of wasting time to worry about whether can do a good job, we may as well focus on doing the work. How to do a good job? I always say :"Today's performance is yesterday's preparation." Therefore, constantly improve and prepare ourselves for the opportunity to come, is the best strategy.

When I started arranging for the 3 days meeting, I thought about the possible overlapping of meeting time slot taken by more than one party. However, I just focus on making the arrangement and put them into time slot one by one. The last one confirmed actually filled the last available spot that I have. It may be my lucky day but my proven that my philosophy is right, Just do it, like the Nike tagline.

Din Tai Fung Restaurant

32 days - 968 days to go

This afternoon, my wife and I went to have lunch at Din Tai Fung located at the 6th floor in Pavilion shopping mall. Of course, the must have "steamed dumplings" is one of our choices.

Frankly, I am a bit puzzled why DinTaiFung was selected as one of the top ten restaurants in the world by the "New York Times". Well, I would say the dumpling is not bad but it should not make DTF to be selected as one of the top 10 in the world. The speed of serving customer orders is also commendable. The few dishes we ordered are quite tasty. In terms of price, I would say is quite reasonable for a fine dinning despite restaurant.

What I like the most from this first time experience is that their waiters and waitress are very friendly and polite. In addition, I found that most of the waiters and waitresses speak Mandarin, not sure if many of their customers are also from Taiwan and China or people who stayed there before like students and businessman.

Of course the variety and uniqueness of foods should be the major selling point. Many of the dishes are not sold in other restaurant in this area i.e. maybe they can claim they are the most authentic Taiwanese restaurant. In other words, if you want to have Taiwanese foods, this is the first choice.

Well, I can only say the success of a restaurant are mainly as a results of the following factors:

1. Tasty and unique dishes
2. Friendly and polite staff
3. Good location
4. Reasonable price
5. Publicity or reputation

Publicity and reputation is very important especially with internet, it will make or break a company overnight. For example, authorities in many countries are now monitoring some food products that may contain a Di(2-ethylhexyl) phthalate (DEHP), an ingredient that may have potential harmful effects on health.

Network

Day 31 - 969 days to go

I have been working tirelessly to arrange meetings in Singapore for the last three days with potential options traders and customers. Another main purpose is to identify and get market maker for the Options contract (OKLI) that I am going to relaunch.

I have been trying different channels to arrange for the meeting which include:

1. Contacts from my peer from the commodity department (I am in charge of the non commodity derivatives, product development)
2. Contacts from my immediate supervisor who is a Singaporean
3. My own contacts in Singapore
4. My friends' contact in Singapore
5. Contacts information in the website
6. Malaysia and Singapore intermediaries' contacts
7. CME's (our company's partner) contacts

This is a classic example of Network = Net worth when you need to use your network to achieve a goal.

Therefore, if you are not building your network, so is your net worth. This is especially true for building wealth in the online world - internet marketing as one of the most critical success factors is "how big is your mailing list".