This is a good article in terms of understanding where you are and where you want to be?

So, Are you surviving, sacrificing, sustaining, stimulating, or succeeding?

Are You Living for the Short Term or the Long Term? - BusinessWeek

In analyzing how we spend our time, whether personally or professionally, it can be helpful to consider two dimensions: short-term satisfaction and long-term benefit. Both have value. It can be disappointing to live our lives with no meaning or pleasure in the here and now, just as it can be unfulfilling to live only for today.

We have only one life and a short one at that - that pretty much is something we have to realize - we don’t have forever, and someday we will go.

There will be no regrets when we go (regrets or not, it will happen), but it is important I think that we leave a legacy and a feeling that at least the world is a better place because of us.

I am now 43, and for the last 25 or so years, i have been very conscious of this, and have spent a big part of my time trying to better my financial condition ( in short, earn a living), as well as do what I can to contribute back to society - either engaging in community activities, participating in chamber of commerce activities and charitable endeavors, teaching, and also writing.

Because I live in a developing country, what was always impressed upon me is that poverty is the single biggest hindrance to happiness and fulfillment, and therefore its elimination must therefore be the prime importance. 

Indeed, even among those of us who are middle or upper class, who does not harbor the illusion that maybe tomorrow, we will suddenly become obscenely rich, and therefore will spend the rest of our lives indulging in what we want without having to worry again about money, and therefore live happily ever after.

Yet, the pursuit, and attainment of happiness is more than that.

The last one or so years, i have started writing and publishing business comics books, teaching in my alma maters master of management program, and also playing in a band.  This has brought upon me some fulfillment and I justify that I am planting a rose. What does it mean?

It means that attainment of fulfillment is more than just eliminating hindrances, lifting miseries or righting wrongs.  It means we need also to provide people with good mental attitude and reasons to be happy.  A poor person will become miserable if we allow him to focus that he must be become rich first to be happy, and imposes on him the thinking that until he becomes so, he does not have the right to be happy.

In short, we need to build better gardens ( and communities) — and the way to build a great garden is to do two things — you remove the weeds and you plant the flowers. Let us not be only too focused on removing the weeds.  Let us plant some flowers.  I am proud that we just recently released a CD, and we hope that our music will be one of the flowers that will give to listeners some measure of enjoyment.

They say art is something that makes a person feel less lonely, and I would like to think by dabbling into music, I am doing something worthwhile as well.  Is your role that of clearing away the weeds, or planting the flowers?

Technorati Tags: Asian troubadours wilson ng bizdrivenlife ngenius itsngenius engy

Fortune released their 500 list.

One statistics that is significant - Fortune 500 companies collectively had $645 billion in profits for 2007.  In 2008, that went down 85 percent to only $98.9 billion.

Exxon Mobil overtakes Wal-Mart to top Fortune 500 - Yahoo! News

Exxon Mobil Corp. unseated Wal-Mart Stores Inc. in the 2009 Fortune 500 list, shrugging off the oil price bubble and weathering what the magazine called the worst year ever for the country’s largest publicly traded companies.

Fortune’s closely watched list, released Sunday, ranked companies by their revenue in 2008. Irving, Texas-based Exxon took in $442.85 billion in revenue last year, up almost 19 percent from 2007. The company also raked in the biggest annual profit, earning $45.2 billion.

Bentonville, Ark.-based Wal-Mart had held the top spot for six of the last seven years but fell to No. 2 this year. Still, the retail giant’s 2008 revenue climbed 7 percent to $405.6 billion, as the battered economy sent more consumers searching for bargains. The world’s largest retailer took in $13.4 billion in annual profit, an increase of about 5 percent.

Goals that are unrealistic may do harm than good.

There might be some wisdom in forcing things a little bit, but not too much.  Whatever will be will be.

Beware the Harmful Effects of Goal-Setting - BusinessWeek

For decades goal-setting has been promoted as a panacea for improving employee motivation and performance in organizations. Across hundreds of experiments, dozens of tasks, and thousands of participants on four continents, the results are clear: Compared to vague, easy goals (e.g., “do your best”), specific, challenging goals boost performance.

In fact, goal-setting has powerful and predictable side effects. Rather than being offered as an “over-the-counter” salve for boosting performance, it should be prescribed selectively, presented with a warning label, and closely monitored.

In Japan, I cannot help but notice how many people are so polite, helpful, and most of all, they decline your tip.  That makes you feel good in the sense that you get the feeling that the smile, and the courtesy was so genuine, and not eying some short end returns , like a gratuity.

IN the United States, people are polite, until you don’t give them not only their tip, but their expected amount, and they give you a glare.

Human relationships used to mean that since we live together, and/or cross paths, then we have the obligation to be courteous and civil to each other.  That helps builds a society that has meaning, and satisfying.

Excellent service used to mean that since I am patronizing my business, I deserve to get some attention, and courtesy.  If i am happy because you went out of your way, and did more than the usual, then I may give you a small appreciation.

However, tips nowadays seems to be obligatory, and that being said, it does seem that more obligations is now put into the customer rather than the person serving.

I still think Americans are becoming too materialistic and too short term minded.

IN Japan, most everything is expensive, but then everybody pays the same high price, and gets the same personal attentive service….

We always need to hit our short term goal, but we should not forget always the long term objective… What was the purpose of the tip in the first place, and when you see that it has become a tool for service companies to underpay their people, and therefore the people have to be forced to do whatever tactics to strongarm their customers to get their extra tip which the employer has had to give in the first place, then it becomes a hideous tool.

Not long ago, CEO compensation was in the tens of millions.

Now, anybody earning a few million is either an object of envy or an article of hate.

Yahoo! News - Intel CEO gets $12.4M in 2008 pay by AP: Yahoo! Tech

The value of Intel Corp. Chief Executive Paul Otellini’s compensation package rose slightly to $12.4 million in 2008, a year in which the chip maker’s profit was whacked by a global slowdown in personal computer sales.

A billion here, 10 billion there! Gosh! The world’s richest are suffering!!!

World’s richest not so rich, Gates regains top spot

The number of billionaires in the world fell by nearly a third to 793 in the past year, with large numbers dropping off the list in Russia, India and Turkey.

Gates regained his title as the richest man in the world, with $40 billion after slipping to third last year when he was worth $58 billion. Buffett, last year’s richest man, fell to second place with $37 billion, down from $62 billion. Mexican telecommunications tycoon Carlos Slim took third place with $35 billion, down from $60 billion.

Collectively, the top three billionaires lost $68 billion in the year to February 13, when Forbes took a snapshot of wealth around the world to compile its annual list of billionaires.

Chief Executive of Forbes Magazines Steve Forbes said that, while few would shed a tear for the plight of a billionaire, it was bad for the economy when entrepreneurs were in trouble.

“Billionaires don’t have to worry about their next meal, but if their wealth is declining and you’re not creating numerous new billionaires, it means the rest of the world is not doing very well,” he told reporters. “The typical billionaire is down at least one third on their net worth.”

The net worth of the world’s billionaires fell from $4.4 trillion to $2.4 trillion, while the number of billionaires was down to 793 from 1,125.

“It’s the first time since 2003 that we have lost billionaires, but we’ve never before lost anywhere near this number,” said Luisa Kroll, senior editor of Forbes.

Managers always joked about the Peter Principle - That you promote a person until he reaches the level of his incompetency.

However, and unfortunately, people performance is not consistent, and there are many ocassions when you want to invest more or promote an employee who done well so far, and suddenly finds to your horror, that he/she is on a downward spiral.

In short, while past performance is a good indication of future performance, sometimes good past performances don’t get a follow through.

Issue: A Good Employee Turns Scratchy - BusinessWeek

An impressive employee diligently works her way up through the ranks—only to give a subpar performance once she gets to the top

Here are 2 I like:

- If you buy things you don’t need, you’ll soon sell things you need.

-Don’t save what is left after spending; Spend what is left after saving.

- Never test the depth of the river with both feet.

I just read this supposedly aphorism by China leader, Deng Xiao Ping.

It means that we should be flexbile.  that means that the shortest distance between two banks in a river is not always a straight line, but rather we should try to navigate by testing which stone is capable of holding our weight, and move us forward without falling. That means there is an incremental commitment to action.