One of the major differences between managing a business and other challenges such as sports is that in most challenges you are honored for what you are able to do.  For instance, you write a great book, or set a world record in sports, or become the champion.

Your goal is to be as much better on it as everybody else.  What matters is what you have accomplished, and what you would like to set is hopefully a record that is rarely equalled.

However, especially if you are finding an organization or a business, your goal is not only how high you can bring it to, but hopefully also how high it will continue to be once you are not there.  Thus, you are not building only something that will serve you, but will continue to serve its function way after you are not there.

That is why one of the cardinal role of a CEO is to train his successor.  I got this after watching the movie Alexander the Great.  The man was a legend, having conquered most of the known world the Greeks know by the time he was 25.  However, the huge empire that he built crumbled as quickly after he died.

Founders of companies who become famous are notorious for not only not knowing when to leave, but also in knowing how to train their successor.  It is almost as if egoistically, you really want to make sure that the next CEO does not do as well as you do, but if youa re the founder the company, what you really want to do is to insure the success of the company even after you have exited gracefully.

One of the things I am talkingto now, is how to work on proper succession on family companies for which there are numerous worldwide, especially in Asia.  IN the 70s, 80s, 90s, and the start of the century, millions of businesses were founded, and many of them are now time to pass to the second generation.

As a patriarch or founder, think that you really want that the business you started will not only endure, it will even become bigger.  And if you are nearing retirement age, spend somet ime to insure that the business will not only be ok for the nextg few years, but try to see how it can build the foundation so that it will continue to succeed in the next 20 or 30 years.

Related Posts:

-Two Precepts I Learned in Managing

-Your Most Important Job

-How to Get Out of Business

-Who is the More Valuable Employee?

If Halle Berry feels her sense of self worth was so low, how about you?  If Glamour, wealth and beauty cannot give you self-esteem, what will?

Halle Berry talks about suicide attempt - Yahoo! News

The 40-year-old actress, who won an Oscar in 2002 for her performance in the hit "Monster’s Ball," told Sunday magazine Parade that she tried to gas herself in her car over her stormy marriage to baseball star David Justice. "I was sitting in my car, and I knew the gas was coming, when I had an image of my mother finding me," she says. "She sacrificed so much for her children, and to end my life would be an incredibly selfish thing to do. It was all about a relationship. My sense of worth was so low," Berry said.

Related Posts:
-Success Fails

Sometimes it is great to find posts that questions conventional wisdom. For instance, I did come across this quote, and thought it quite refreshing. ” There is no dignity quite so impressive, and no independence quite so important, as living within your means.” This was uttered by Calvin Coolidge almost a hundred years ago.

Currently, you won’t find many believers on it because the conventional wisdom says that you have to dress up to impress - even if you have to go into debt for it.  Another track that Asians find when they confront people from the West is that people have been thought that the way to impress people is to act it up - be aggressive and assertive ( many times to the point of rudeness) so that you will not be perceived as weak or treated like a doormat.

The Asian way is different - you are comfortable enough with yourself that you are willing to be considerate to others, and being polite means you are confident where you stand.

Here is a great post on rethinking about politeness.  Be courteous, not merely because it will help you achieve success, but more so, because it makes you feel more deserving to be successful, and you will also be happier notwithstanding with yourself and others.


Politeness: Respect for others pays : Blog Business World

You can very easily find people who view politeness and good manners as weakness and as character flaws to be overcome. They argue that rudeness succeeds and common courtesy is a mark of failure. They view rudeness to others as a sign of their superiority as people, and a badge of their status. They couldn’t be more wrong. Politeness and common courtesy are more likely to achieve success, in business and in life, than a selfish, bullying attitude.

Related Posts:
-Respect for elders
-Smiling and Common Courtesy

Yahoo promises unlimited e-mail storage - Yahoo! News

In another reminder of technology’s quantum leaps, Yahoo Inc. (Nasdaq:YHOO - news)’s free e-mail service will provide unlimited storage space to its nearly 250 million users worldwide — a concept that seemed unfathomable just a few years ago.
With the move, Yahoo will trump its two largest rivals in free e-mail,
Microsoft Corp. and Google Inc., which currently provide 2 gigabytes
and 2.8 gigabytes of free storage, respectively.

I just found a great source of IT facts in the ZDNET IT Facts blog.  It is a blog, but focused on giving research and market information.  The following posts highlights what is happening in the market the last few weeks:

-520 mln mobile users in China by year-end 2007
-$600 mln spent on external hard drives in 2006
-33% of US medium businesses are using ERP solutions
-$16.8 bln spent on Internet ads in 2006
-29.8 mln digital cameras sold in the US in 2006
-Global server market up 5.2% in Q4 2006
-Itanium-based servers up 71.5% in Q4 2006
-Hard drives up 15.5% in 2006
-Worldwide storage software market in Q4 2006
-Microsoft server revenue up 9.4% in Q4 2006
-Server blades up 18.2% in Q4 2006

I am a finalist of the 2007 Philippine Blog Awards.

This is a movement by many volunteers to recognize the best of Philippine bloggers, of which there are a good number.  Going to the site is a good way to know more of these bloggers.  You may also not want to miss the nominees for the Bloggers Choice Awards in which the blogges vote for their choices.

For those that can make it, the awarding night will be at the Podium 4, RCBC Theater in Makati this March 31 from 6 to 8 pm. 

I just came back from a one week conference last week.  I have been able to use that time to catch up on some readings, as well as enable me to take a break from the daily grind and gain some new perspectives in my business as well as my thoughts.

I am starting to think that regular trips out are essential.  It takes out the routine which can become a grind, but most important, it allows you to retreat yourself or take yourself up a few thousand feet so that you are not always facing the trees, but are able to see the forest.  A 10,000 feet view from way up to see the traffic, and the problems, and refresh yourself on what is really important.

Maybe that’s why vacations are so important. Not really to physically rest. In fact, most of the vacations which I took ( many with my family with my little kids) can be as physically gruelling, and challenging.  Logging around big luggage, having the tension of trying to catch schedules, or hitting some unfamiliar traffic somewhere can be physically challenging, and most of  us don’t really sleep that much during these trips, as well as endure hours in the plane or in the airport.

Maybe recreation works by at least forcing the things out of your brain for a few days, and replace it with different challenges, and environment, so that when you reenter the same old problems after a few days, you will be able to see it in a new light.  I also like travelling in that you meet different people and different situations, and if you take time to observe, it can sometimes teach you a lot of things.

I was inside the plane, and there was a 2 hour stopover.  But as usual, when the plane stopped in front of the gate,  everybody scrambled to stand up and try to be the first to rush out to the gate.  I did that as well, most likely out of  habit.

But then I stopped myself - hey, wait a minute.  I have a 2 hour stopover, and I hardly have anything to do anyway.  Why charge up your adrenalin and compete to be first?  Why get charged up so that you can be out of the plane two minutes earlier?  And it occured to me that we do that because of habit — we are in a habit of rushing and winning, and when it comes to these, we dare not be behind. Don’t you notice people who get upset when somebody overtakes them on the highway?  Why should they be?  That is taking competition to the wrong battles.  They are so used to competition that they compete even if there is no need to, or winning is hardly meaningful or necessary.

Sometimes, I think there is value for us to just consciously slow down.  Maybe just sit down the plane, and wait everybody to rush out instead of joining the fray. So I did that and I feel good.

Soon, it was time to get back to the plane.  I noticed ten minutes before boarding, people were standing up in line so that they can go into the plane first.  My, are we that tense or what?  The plane was not going anywhere that soon.  Hey, we have seat numbers assigned.  So if you go ahead, and get seated, what do you do?  Why not sit outside in the airport where it is more comfortable?

I did that as well, and it felt good.  I was not harrowing myself into unnecessary battles in which winning was meaningless.  And I made myself think — what are other life battles which we spend so much energy to be ahead, instead of just letting go?  Why not compete where and  when it is important?  Why not choose your battles? 

Related Posts:

-Being busy without prioritizing 

-The Not to Do and Not to Know List

-Success Fails

-What for?

-One Thousand Marbles

 Also check out:

The 5th edition of Carnival of Debt Management,  and The 6th edition of Carnival of Credit Card

I’d like to thank all of you as this blog passes two miestones:  First, it looks like in a day or so, I will pass my 200,000th page view of this blog.  Second, hopefully, in a few days, I will also pass my 200th offsite readership.  There are many readers who don’t come to the site, but uses RSS to pull my articles, and it is great that almost 200 of you are doing it now on a daily basis.  I do look forward to more of your comments and feedbacks.  You can always click on Ask me / Feedbacks  to send me a note or question that you would like me to share my views!

I noted a particularly blunt statement in an investment book which was cause for thought:  He said that even " if you are 40 and earn 100,000 USD annually, it will still be hard for you to retire on the money comfortably you save if all you do is invest in time deposit."

I know some friends who spend their lifetimes trying to get the best terms and rates for their term deposits.  They are not open to taking any risk, but over time, they are going to be taken over by people who  are willing to diversify and learn other investment strategies that is a little bit more risk but can give potentially more payout.

What it means is that fundamentally you have a flawed strategy that limits your ability to reap a better return for your efforts.  You can execute that strategy to perfection, but you would still be way off.

Which brings me to the realization that I also know many friends who have big ambitions and goals, and they back it up with a lot of hard work.  But there is something that you should not forget — hard work, just like a term deposit, can only give you so much."  If you want much better returns for your labor, the most important thing is for you to continually ’sharpen the saw.’.  Make sure that in the course of your hard labor, you are also constantly learning and imbibing new stuff that will allow you to plan better and work smarter.

Hard work is commendable, but  if you are merely working hard but still doing the same stuff you are doing 5 years ago, then you are not doing yourself a big favor.  How many of us are ‘too busy’ to plan or learn new things? 

Hard work is essential, but it alone does not suffice. 

Hard work is great, but only if backed up with good amounts of planning and learning, and with a quick realization for change and adoption to new ways. 

Related Posts:

-Making Employees Productive

-Doer vs. Manager

-Working for a boss and Getting Ahead

-Want To - Have To

-Magic Pills and Silver Bullets

-Inspire not Motivate

-80% Effort

-Do Better, Not More

Yes, it is long overdue.  For all the businesses running in China the last 27 years, nobody owned property except the Chinese government.  What businesses got were rights to use the land for 50 or 70 years.  I believe the same is true in Hong Kong.

Is there a big difference between owning the land in perpetuity or just owning it for 50 years?  Apparently, it makes a difference for some really long planning businesses ….

China to pass controversial private property bill - USATODAY.com

After 30 years of economic reform and 14 years of debate, China’s legislature today is set to recognize the legitimacy of private property in a law that provides the first modest legal protections.

Passage by the National People’s Congress (NPC) is virtually certain. That’s because legislation doesn’t come to a vote at the annual meeting of the NPC unless the Communist Party has approved it and assured its passage. Even so, the vote hasn’t been without controversy.

Since the Communist revolution in 1949, China has permitted only public ownership. The party stripped landowners and others of private property, persecuting them and declaring all property collectively owned.