Sorry, Jack! Why Welch's Rules Don't Work

Current issue of Fortune, August 7, 2006 on the new rules of business. It is available on the www.fortune.com as well.

We did a presentation session on The Welch Way, 24 lessons on Jack Welch's management philosophy 3 years ago in our team meeting. Fortune is discovering new rules in today dogs-eat-dogs world of business. Are the 24 lessons of The Welch Way obsolete? The new rules makes a lot of sense. Here we go...

Old Rule: Big dogs own the street
New Rule: Agile is best; Being big can bite you

Old Rule: Be No. 1 or No. 2 in your market
New Rule: Find a Niche, Create something new

Old Rule: Shareholders Rule
New Rule: The Customer is King

Old Rule: Be Lean and Mean
New Rule: Look Out, Not In

Old Rule: Rank your players; Go with the A's
New Rule: Hire Passionate People

Old Rule: Hire a Charismatic CEO
New Rule: Hire a Courageous CEO

Old Rule: Admire my Might
New Rule: Admire my Soul

Why Blog?

Sunday Times today cites that 50 millions bloggers today. All shouting for attention. Most nobody cares just like this blog. Reasons for blogging were varied from sharing and updating close friends to trying to get famous with cute or daring pictures of themselves.

So why do I blog? I reflects...

I first learn about blogging when I read Janice Wong's blog. She shutdown her blogs which is a pity. I enjoys reading her columns and her blog. She is now studying her masters in Communication. For the longest time, she has been lamenting about her love life and I believe she just started with a new guy before she suspends her blog. Enough about Janice.

I became interested in blogging and sign up with blogspot since it is free. My first entry invited comments from Goh Sze Li, author of My First Blog. She recently change her blog's name to SzeLi's Thoughts. Following her lead, I realise while my orginal intent was to write book reviews and management thoughts and thus calling my blog K Thinking, I have to change it to K's diary. My blog has become more of an online diary with occasional book reviews and management advice.

Do I really seek fame? Not really. My key reason for keeping this blog is to improve my writing skills and shares my personal thoughts. Will I be able to pursue a dream to become an author? Even if I am published, will my book sells?

Jurong Bird Park

I have guests from Korea. After discussions, we had lunch at Samy's Curry. They enjoyed the hot, spicy food. After that, I became a tour guide. We went up Jurong Hill right beside Bird Park and then to Bird Park. The main entrance is undergoing renovation. It is a pity. I always remember the grand entrance that greet me...pink flamingoes before paying and then the moment you enters, a riot of colours and cacuophony of squawking from the Macaws.

The indoor aviary has improved. It now has an observation deck with supension bridge and lots of Lori, very colourful bird similar to parrots and parakeets. The entrance is a cafe. So it is nice to smell coffee rather than the smell of bird droppings.

I asked my guests what do they like for dinner - Chinese, Indian, Western, Japanese, Korean, Seafood... Korean was a definite NO. Mr. Park who has been here before like seafood at the seaside. So off we go, to UMDC Seafood Centre. We had Chilli Crab, toufu, kangkong belacan, crispy squids and deep fried buns. It was a delicious meal. Mr. Kim has to release his pant!

Classics

I tried reading Pride and Prejudice today. My wife always tell me she enjoys this book a lot. I have a hard time remembering all the characters. The words used were a little dense for me. I will need to check the dictionary numerous times. I do not have strong affinity to British English. I find it easy to read To Kill a Mockingbird, another classic by Lee Harper, American author. When I was you, I had hard time finishing books by Charles Dickens, another English author.

It may the style that I am unable to cope with rather than English authors. I always enjoyed read Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, who is an English author as well. I remember reading the Professor Challenger's (The Lost World?) stories as well by Doyle. Around the World in Eighty days and Journey into the Center of the Earth by Jules Verne, a French author is interesting read as well.

Birthday Present from the Office

This morning someone rang at my door. It is the DHL man. He has a parcel for me. It is a nice present from my office. My colleagues have a bought a nice birthday gift for me. It is a Bonia Polo shirt. The package was amazing. It comes in a gold box with a fabulous gold and silver ribbon tied in a gorgeous bow. The birthday card was very meaningful to me.

Birthday

I had lots of wishes from my colleagues. My wife gave me a nice present. This is one of the rare time I was home for my birthday. I am not the sentimental kind. Birthdays for me is another day. My eldest sister and my two nieces sms to me birthday greetings as well. Sigh! It is nice that people remember yet I do not like the attention. The day is almost over and tomorrow will be another day.

Ex-boss and friend

We met my wife's ex-boss during lunch today. We have a very interesting conversation. YS is a senior finance person in an MNC. He is into investments of different asset class. He invested in real-estates, REIT, shares, etc. He like us is looking for opportunity. He says opportunities are everywhere. We need the eyes for them. I am very impressed by his perpectives.

On reflection, we are like him caught in a paradigm that do not enable us to look out for opportunities. We are good at working hard, improving ourselves, increasing our skills and capbabilities the "corporate" way. That is working for an employer. We seems to lack the creative or innovative mindset or ability to undertake risks. We do extremely well under the umbrella or protection of a big company. The systems and processes are in place. All we have to do is to improve. Starting from scratch is my single largest fear. When can I overcome this fear and be an entreprenuer?

Blue Ocean

Jeffrey sends a summary of Blue Ocean Strategy. I have been eyeing on this book for some time. It is the bestseller and with 20% discount, it is an attractive target. The summary makes a lot of sense. However, it is still analysis. That is left-brain orientation. You know the success factors when you see it. The challenge is how do we create using right brain so that we can execute the Blue Ocean Strategy. Hindsight is always 20/20. Foresight is littered with failure. Most literature quote statistics of 1 huge success in a 1,000 and may be 10 so-so success in new business venture.

Business Acumen

What is Business Acumen? Business Acumen is vague unless it is demonstrate in results. So how can you say one has business acumen. The person who has successful business or run a business successful. I had coffee with a colleague today. Kate is an American girl. She has lots of commonsense. It is easy to see in a big company it is just a job for most. Therefore it gets frustrating to see the company is beating down the path. When the basic is not there, it will be not successful. What is basic? Instead of talking, do the right thing for the Customer.

Take time to reflect

Reflection is an important activity. Thinking through our actions and working out what we could have done better is an important activity and process to improve our ability. Benjamin Franklin is a big proponent of Reflection. Benjamin Franklin is a very successful philosopher, scientist and businessman.

In the executive coaching session, this is one of the more important process that I have learned as the best teacher is experience.

Virus

Ever been infected? Your computer I mean. It is not easy to get rid of virus and it cost money. Viruses are insidious. They are were embedded and pull in more viruses from the internet. I have a hard time as my system keep flashing warning and the browser just go crazy. It keep sending me to anti-virus websites and it is impossible to do anything else in the system. Luckily my brother-in-law is in IT. I spent the whole afternoon following his instructions and even then it was not clean. He helps me out with his software as well as help me buy another anti-virus software to clean up my system.

Do you know there are two types of anti-virus software? One is for virus that damage your files, the other is anti-spyware. Spyware download information from your computer. My brother-in-law feel that the reason we need two different software is because the companies have an implicit understanding not to compete with each other.

Centipedes

This morning, B1 reported a centripede in bathroom at ground level. He accuses B2 of bringing in. However, in the afternoon there was another centripede in the kitchen and B2 was vindicated. I reminded B1 again not to accuse anyone without proof. Mum panicked and we have to go and get insecticide as well as door seal to seal our kitchen door.

Busy times

I have not been this busy for a long time. Lots of mails to attend to. It has been work, work, work! It seems like a cycle now. Q3 is my busiest time. This time I have no travel for two weeks. I am quite sure the season for travelling will begin. I recall the last two years I will be out almost every week.

Inflation

Price of everything is going up. With petrol prices up, inflation is getting from bad to worse. I recall having breakfast in KL 4 years ago when a plate of wanton noodles cost RM2.50. Today the same plate costs RM3.50. I just fill up my car. It used to cost S$75. Today it costs S$130. Our cost of living has increased, our pay has not.

Globalisation is causing disruptions to our economy. The rich gets richer and poor poorer. Whatever the future will be, will be!

Proud Daddy

I am very proud of B1. We decide to catch lobsters out of the blue as it is not too far. B1 managed to catch 4 lobsters in less than an hour. The only problem is the lobsters died in our pond. Maybe the water is too toxic for the lobster as I did put in bleach before to keep the water clean.

Hopefully, we will figure out how to keep the lobsters alive in future.

Lunch with Jeffrey again

Jeffrey has lunch with me just before he leaves for US at 4 pm. He is incredibly busy and travelling everywhere to transition his responsibilities as he will be leaving the company soon. The good thing is he has another position waiting for him. He has good network and done a lot of favours for his business associates. I am lucky to know him during an Executive Program in NUS.

Unhappy Singaporean

It seems like material success does not equate to happiness. The developed countries has a lower happiness index than developing or underdeveloped countries. Hence the underlying implication of money does not buy happiness.

Studies in US did show that when you have little money, more money does buy happiness up to a point. After that, there is diminishing return of money for happiness. Yes, I am not rich. I am happy. Comfortable is how I would put it. I am not poor either.

I like to count my blessings. I have a nice home and family. Our boys are great(just great and NOT perfect as they do give us troubles). We have a good family times. I have a good job that give me reasonable income. My teammates are solid performers and delivers great results for the team. Overall, I am happy in Singapore. Maybe the survey did not pick the right samples.

Lobster fest at Lower Pierce Reservoir

We go to Lower Pierce Reservoir to catch lobsters. We learn about catching lobsters from our neighbour's kid. We decided to go at about 6pm when the sun is low and temperature is more tolerable to be outdoor. As we approached the car park, cars were parked along the road leading to the carpark. I thought it is unusual as Lower Pierce Reservoir is not a popular place. By we were lucky to find a spot to park. As we approached the reservoir, there were hordes of people squatting at the reservoir's edge. We realised they are all doing what we intended to do. Many families were there before us. We have no idea catching lobsters is so well known.

We observes how others catch their lobsters. They have a long stick with they tied bread with one end as a lure. On the other hand is a net. When the lobster is lured out to the open, you must be quick to catch it with your net. It is not easy. However B1 managed to catch one of the biggest. I walked around to compare sizes! It was exciting! We were very pleased to catch a lobster, largest to boot! We also caught 6 small shrimps. They are transparent. The shrimps were attracted by the bread and is easier to catch.

This is a good way to end our weekend, quality family time. And it is free...something rare in Singapore.

Home Sweet Home

It is nice to sleep in my own bed. Wake up without a wake up call. Go to my mamak stall for a teh halia, breakfast, read the papers... Good to be back on familar and regular routines. Then off to the pool and to relax. This is a good way to unwind.

Time to send B2 to school for NDP rehearsal. Have to go now.

Meetings

We finally ended our two days meeting. It has been a long meeting. We had accomplished many agenda item. It has been very productive but a little tiring. I am satisfied with the outcome of our meetings.

Diet?

I am always concern about my weight and yet do not have the discipline to eat less. It is always nice to eat food that I cannot get back home. Now I am in Kuala Lumpur and it is a food heaven. I had Ampang Yong Tau Foo and Ipoh Chicken with beansprouts. Simple but delicious. I enjoyed eating so much. We sat in a meeting all day and I keep feeding myself with tea and snacks. Snacks are rich. I had blueberry tartlets, orange chiffon cakes, cream puffs all day long. Sigh! when will I be able to stop myself from overeating?

The Elements of Style

The Element of Style by William Strunk and E B White is a classic guide to good English. I was introduced to this book when I took extramural course conducted by University of Singapore probably 25 or 30 years ago. My instructor has a Master Degree in English. He was educated in Chinese during his primary and secondary school. So his spoken English was not impressive. I still remember he actually learned all the words in Oxford Advanced English Dictionary by underlining every word and remembering them by heart.

Anyway, back to Element of Style. It is a tiny book. So it is not intimidating. It has good advice. I would recommend it to anyone who wants to improve his or her English.

Grocery shopping

Today is grocery shopping day. Early start to Toa Payoh market. Car park is full by the time we reach at 7:45am. So my early start is not early enough. We bought fresh vegetables and meat. We also decide to buy grocery from Mustapha as Mustapha supermarket carry a wide range of Indian spices. Mustapha is really a one-stop shop. It has the most selections of products. It carry a lot of stuff that most other supermarket do not carry e.g. coconut oil, indian incense, castor oil, etc. There is a medicine shop, electrical goods store, electronics, cellphones, CDs and DVDs, jewellery, travel...I lost track. I suspect if you need anything more difficult to find, just go to Mustapha.

Compensation

I am thinking about compensation. It is a double edge sword. Paying very little to get very big results is what most companies do. The market rate is for the job is use as a basis for paying employees. The company provide financial resources and the complete business system. Every year, small amount of pay increase is given out. Meanwhile, for sales target the increase is substantial. Let's work out a simple theoretical example. We pay a sales employee $100K per year. He/she is responsible for $1 million in sales. For the employee to get 10% pay increase, the sales must increase by 10 to 20%. This mean the company just need to pay $10K to get a $100K to $200K return on sales. Of course this is quite simplistic as we did not look at base pay, market rate for the comparable job, years of experience, academic qualifications, etc, etc.

Why double edge sword? If the employee feel that $200K growth is too much and is willing to settle for less growth in his/her income, says 5% with a comparable drop in sales growth. The company will now have a sales growth of $50K to $100K.

With this kind of system, both employee and employer will lose. So this is a lose-lose situation.

Temperature Rising

Our weather is getting hotter and hotter. Now it is very hot and humid during the day. It is quite challenging to be in a non-aircond environment. It is nice to have a pool to cool down. I really enjoys my current home. It is very easy to pass time at home as there are lots of space and it has the right atmosphere. I am very satisfied with my home!

Learning Mandarin

China is well known now for the economic growth and opportunities. It is the largest growing market. Sales are growing tremendously. We are expanding into China. More and more documents are coming into my mail box in Chinese. Reading Chinese requires tremendous effort for me. So I decided to cheat. I look for a software that can "read" Chinese and translate Chinese to English and vice versa. I will see how much this software can help. I usually understand if the words were spoken. To read Chinese is as good as asking me to drink poison. This software can convert characters into hanyi pinyin as well as verbalise the words like reading. I hope with this, I can be more proficient in handling Chinese language.

Writer's Block

It is interesting to enforce a discipline to write. I can understand the term "writer's block". Every time, I have to update this blog, it take a while to figure what I want to pen down. Sometimes inspiration hit or a sudden thought happen just like the earlier entry on "Standing Ovation". Other times I just wonder why my day is so routine and there is nothing write. Finding something interesting can be challenging. Yet it also gets easier as time goes on. My mind starts to accept this is a to do and can come up with something to write. Most recent activity is the easiest to pen down. For example now I am watching a documentary on weather phenomenon. I was thinking of writing on some of the interesting facts. Then I change my mind and decide to write about writer's block.

Developed Country

I lived in a developed country - Canada for a total of 7 years. I can see a lot of similarity now that Singapore is a developed country. One key feature is unemployment. Developed countries have high unemployment rates i.e. between 5% to 13%. The professor of Macroeconomic in U of Toronto states 5% unemployment is acceptable and the best a developed country like Canada could achieve. Retrenchment/layoff is common in developed countries. Men staying at home to look after the family is not an unfamilar sight. Cost of living increases or Progress(rather than inflation) as Singapore govt puts it is another common feature. It also seems like the gaps between the haves and have-nots has widen. This phenomenon may be due to globalisation rather than moving into developed status. In underdeveloped countries, it is common to see huge gaps between the poor and rich.

As Charles Dickens put it "it is the best of times, it is the worst of times". Many times I worry about my kids. What are they going to do to survive in this world. Will our education equip them with the right skills and behaviours to thrive in the brave new world? Time will tell....

Interesting Synchroncity

I wrote the standing ovation this morning. After I finished and checked my email, an ex-colleague wrote to me. It is such a coincident that this ex-colleague is from the same company that I received my standing ovation. The thoughts come to me while I was showering. So I penned them down in my blog. Immediately someone from the same company wrote to me. Why? Is this a coincidence? Can there be a linkage in thoughts(telepathy)?

A Standing Ovation

I was working in Canada as a Product Manager in 1991. The factory that produce the products I was responsible for was shutdown. I was new in the job for only 3 to 4 months. It was a huge undertaking. I have to move C$18million worth of business to new supplier in less than 3 months. Two other product managers, Gail Vincent and Ron Davis was in the same boat as I. Gail has tubes i.e. plastic tubes use for suctioning and Ron has cotton guazes and underpads. It was a harrowing year for us. I was in meetings all day and have 50 messages at the end of the day. Listening to all my messages take more than an hour! I have to talk to suppliers, respond to sales reps, make there is right inventory, update all my bosses on the progress of the change, etc...

Glenn Sosney was my inventory analyst. He was instrumental in my success. He was very good with Excel and numbers. He works hard and is very responsive. There are many time where I go to him and request for information with very short deadlines. He came through for me.

At the end of the first year, I managed to save 85% of my disposable tray business. The highest percentage among the three product managers. My product line was also the most complicated.

During Annual Sales Meeting, we were all presented with an award to recognise our efforts in The Brantford Project. As I go up the stage to receive my award, the audience stood up and clapped for a long time. It was embarrassing yet exhilarating. The memory of this evening was etch in my mind forever.

Successful Team

The strength and success of a team depends on the complementary strengths of the individuals members. We had a successful run in the past four years and build a strong track record of performance. Success can be fragile. The ecosystem can be disrupted and the change needs to be adapted.

I will attribute the success of our team to strong partnership and the strengths of a key manager who can understand and execute my thinking fast and well. It seems that I am lucky to get one all the time. Right now I have a right hand man(female). 7 years ago, Wilson was my right hand man. As I reflect back my track record, I supply the coaching, training and thinking. The rest of the team executes and executes well. The measurement is important too. We usually measure three or four important parameters and always grow sales and profits year on year. Usually, one in the team will stand out for me to rely on. I am a lucky guy....

Wilson came to visit...

Wilson is my ex-colleague and came over to visit. It is more than two years since we last met. I remember we visited him in his home along Changi Road just before our current house is ready. He now has a boy three and a half years and a girl nine months old. It was good to catch up with him. He is quite successful in a partnership. He has done well.

Wilson was a cocky young man when I first met him. He was street smart, full of energy and drive. After working with him for two years, he has changed. Our business partners and Customers noticed the change and give me the feedback. One supplier told me I should be proud as he was very impressed by the positive change and professional way he carry himself when he last met him in a wedding party for his staff, Jason. Colin Fergusson told me it was my guidance and effort and I must be proud. I replied it is a nice feedback and yes, I am proud.

The Hidden Messages from Water

Jeffrey invited me to attend a seminar by Dr. Masuru Emoto, author of The Hidden Messages from Water. I read this book in Sep 2004. It was good to meet to author live. He was here last year as well but I was not aware of it. Dr. Emoto is a Japanese Professor who photograph water as they form crystalize under certain conditions. He did lot of experiments and found that water forms beautiful crystal when it received messages like Love, Gratitude, Family, etc. It cannot form crystal and look ugly when it received messages like you fool or devil. Water from natural spring forms beautiful crystal while tap water or polluted water does not.

You can find out more at: http://www.thank-water.net/english/index.htm