Courage and Brave

Got this from Indika, a friend from my Bangkok cookie and cracker course. So good that everyone is still keeping in touch.

Scenario	(Me) I am…	(Boss) He is…
Taking a long time to finish	slow	thorough
Not doing it	lazy	busy
Doing something without being told	trying be smart	taking the initiative
Pleasing the boss	apple polishing	cooperating
Making a mistake	an idiot	only a human
Out of the office	wandering around	on business
On a day off sick	always sick	very ill
Applying for leave	going for an interview	being overworked

I should have laughed at this. Ever wonder why we always talk bad or think bad about our boss, no matter how good the boss is? I never did until I myself handle my staff. I realised that a boss needs to consider many aspects. They never want to be a mean boss, but circumstances force them to.

You need to be responsible and answerable to your staff's action. You need to consider budgetary constraint, human staffing issue, and technical issue while still maintaining your routine obligation at work. You need to ensure proper discipline at work and curb any problem from going out of control.

All this and you still need to focus on your own self-development. You need to consider your staff's self-development as well. When you yourself are demotivated, you still need to put up a tough front to motivate your staff. You dare not appear foolish since you do need to maintain your professionalism to garner some respect.

All these and lots more... how on earth do you expect a boss not to be mean at times? I myself is still finding my way in the dark, wanting to do some good to myself and to my staff, but honestly, we are all just humans. We fail at times. We lose respect at times.

I sometimes envy my staff because I yearned to be reprimanded and criticised for my shortfall. There wasn't much such thing around here. Sometimes when I met some resistance from my boss, I do feel like strangling him on the spot. Can't help, young blood boils up very fast.

But then, when I give myself some time to review the whole situation, I asked myself, if I put myself into my boss' shoe, how will I react? And that's when I realised that no one is at fault. We each value things differently so we interpret the situation differently. Factor in experience and technical knowledge, the gap is even bigger.

No right or wrong but there is a truth to the old adage... Great title comes with great responsibility. When you are the leader, you need to consider many factors in order to maintain the balance between productivity and expenditure. You need to plan for the overall improvement and fight the war with unforeseen circumstances.

Hence, I always believe that if your subordinates are better than  you in certain area, by all means, go ahead and develop them. Subordinates and boss should always complement each others strength and weakness. So the next time before you criticise your boss out of anger, do sit back and rethink, whether it's really his fault or it's purely due to different outlook on work.

Finally, we always heard people say this about our boss:
When I do good, he never remembers. When I do wrong, he never forgets.

I have to admit that I myself am like that. I always tell my staff, if you don't receive compliment when you do good, that is because you are hired to do good. But once you made a mistake, people will remember forever because of the trouble you had caused and because you are not hired to do wrong. So never made too rash decision as mistakes will cost you your credibility score.

This is definitely old school way of thinking but there is truth. I am not going to pretend that I am a modern in thinking. I do admit that I still work the old school way...

Never, Ever Be Late

A priest was being honoured at his retirement dinner after 25 years in the parish. A leading local politician and member of the congregation was chosen to make the presentation and to give a little speech at the dinner.

However, he was delayed, so the Priest decided to say his own few words while they waited:

"I got my first impression of the parish from the first confession I heard here. I thought I had been assigned to a terrible place. The very first person who entered my confessional told me he had stolen a television set and, when questioned by the police, was able to lie his way out of it. He had stolen money from his parents, embezzled from his employer, had an affair with his boss' wife, taken illegal drugs, and gave VD to his sister. I was appalled. But as the days went on, I learned that my people were not all like that and I had, indeed, come to a fine parish full of good and loving people..."

Just as the Priest finished his talk, the politician arrived full of apologies at being late. He immediately began to make the presentation and gave his talk:

"I'll never forget the first day our parish Priest arrived.," said the politician. "In fact, I had the honour of being the first person to go to him for confession."

Oppsss... moral of the story: never, ever be late!

Positive Family

Saw this in FB,

Nice light-hearted humor yet cute enough to lighten up my day,

Nice illustration to bring out the message as well,

I like this family a lot, but hey, no joke, I don't think you want to name your kids this way...

My PBIM Ranking

18.11.12 was the last Penang Bridge International Marathon (PBIM) to be held on the 1st Penang Bridge this year. Next year onwards, it will be held on the 2nd Penang Bridge instead. So how can I miss it this round? I had to miss it last year due to SP's wedding. So there is no way I am going to miss it this year. In fact, I had to skip a university-mate's wedding luncheon for it.

I don't have much confidence to complete the allocated 90 min for 10km open category but thankfully I still managed to finish within the time limit nonetheless. I registered only for 10km because I know running is not my forte and just in case I have no time to train I know I can still complete 10km without killing or dragging myself through it.

Why not join fun run then? It's still the same 10km distance. Ah-ha! The difference lies in the medal and the running vest. I want the dry-fit running vest instead of the cotton t-shirt and it feels meaningful when you have a goal to aim for. If I join fun run, most likely I won't bother too much to finish within the stipulated time.

I walked more than run this year. And when I saw that there wasn't much time left, I made the finishing dash towards the ending point. Then I realised that actually I do have the stamina. What I don't have is the mental strength and determination. So I believe that those who run marathon have very strong mental strength and determination. If you ever find one when you conduct an interview, by all means, grab the candidate, can't go too wrong with that!

Thank you to BH for forwarding me the link to check my timing and ranking for the PBIM run. I thought I would have to wait until they deliver the certificate to my house. Thanks to the advancement in technology. In fact, if you register on the PBIM page in FB, you can track your own progress, live! How cool was that? And here goes my result...

Name	:	TAN KWENG PHEO
Status	:	Active
Collect Method	:	Queensbay Mall (10th to 11th Nov 2012 10am to 9pm )
Category	:	10K Open Women
Bib No	:	K21318
Event Results
5KM Split	:	00:40:03.16
ChipTime	:	01:26:16.63
GunTime	:	01:28:48.94
Ranking	:	1027/5209

Not bad huh? Calculating by percentage, I am at the front 20% pack, though I have seen that those who won the 10km open category women actually did it within 40min. I wouldn't want to compete with that though, definitely not my forte. But it does feel good to sweat everything out.

And oh, take note of my bib number: K21318. If you read it in Cantonese, it's very auspicious. Pronounce it as "yi yat sang yat fat" which translates into 'forever getting rich easily'. And I take the 'K' as signifying 'OK'. Haha, I just like this bib number, enough to know that I am keeping this bib...

I like this round of PBIM: I got a good bib number, I got a finisher medal, and I got a very good sweating session out of it. Maybe next year I will still join it, but definitely it will still be a 10km category. Nothing more, nothing less.

What's better to end this post than my reaped fruit of labour?

What Is The Fastest Thing You Know?

An Office Manager at Wal-Mart was given the task of hiring an individual to fill a job opening. After sorting through a stack of resumes he found four people who were equally qualified - an American, a Russian, an Australian and  Gujarati from India.

He decided to call the four in and ask them only one question. Their answer would determine which of them would get the job. The day came and as the four sat around the conference room table the interviewer asked, "What is the fastest thing you know?"

Dave, the American, replied, "A THOUGHT. It just pops into your head. There's no warning that it's on the way; it's just there. A thought is the fastest thing I know of."

"That's very good!" replied the interviewer. "And now you sir?" he asked Vladimir, the Russian.

"Hmm... let me see. A BLINK. It comes and goes and you don't know that it ever happened. A BLINK is the fastest thing I know."

"Excellent!" said the interviewer. "The blink of an eye, that's a very popular cliche for speed." He then turned to George, the Australian who was contemplating his reply.

"Well, out at my dad's ranch, you step out of the house and on the wall there's a light switch. When you flip that switch, way out across the pasture the light in the barn comes on. Yep, Turning on a LIGHT is the fastest thing I can think of."

The interviewer was very impressed with the third answer and thought he had found his man. "It's hard to beat the speed of light," he said. Turning to Patel, the chap from India, the fourth and final man, the interviewer posed the same question.

Patel replied, (in his Gujju accent): "Apter herring da 3 prebius ansers sir, et's obius to me dat the fastest thing is DIARRHOEA."

"WHAT!?" said the interviewer, stunned by the response. The others were already giggling in their seats...

"Oh, I can expleyn sir," said Patel. "You see, sir, da ader day my tummy was pheeling bad and so I ran so fast to the baatrum, but before I could THINK, BLINK, or turn on the LIGHT, I alredi done it!"

Enough said, Patel is now the new "Office Manager" at Wal-Mart in Washington.

The World In The Cow Sense

This is an interesting light reading. It is highlighting the real situation out there for each country despite its light-hearted description. You do need some knowledge of what's happening out there in other countries and also perhaps slight appreciation for the Hokkien dialect in order to understand all this. And oh, history too...

The world explained in simple COW SENSE...

SOCIALISM

 - You have 2 cows. You give one to your neighbor.

COMMUNISM

 - You have 2 cows. The State takes both and gives you some milk.

FASCISM

 - The state takes both and sells you some milk.

BUREAUCRATISM

 - You have 2 cows. The State takes both, shoots one, milks the other and then throws the milk away.

TRADITIONAL CAPITALISM

 - You have 2 cows. You sell one and buy a bull. Your herd multiplies, and the economy grows. You sell them and retire on the income.

VENTURE CAPITALISM

 - You have 2 cows. You sell 3 of them to your publicly listed company, using letters of credit opened by your brother-in-law at the bank, then execute a debt / equity swap with an associated general offer so that you get all 4 cows back, with a tax exemption for 5 cows. The milk rights of the 6 cows are transferred via an intermediary to a Cayman Island Company secretly owned by the majority shareholder who sells the rights to all 7 cows back to your listed company. The annual report says the company owns 8 cows, with an option on 1 more.

AN AMERICAN CORPORATION

 - You have 2 cows. You sell one, and force the other to produce the milk of 4 cows. Later, you hire a consultant to analyse why the cow has died.

A FRENCH CORPORATION

- You have 2 cows. You go on strike, organize a riot, and block the roads, because you want three cows.

AN ITALIAN CORPORATION

- You have 2 cows but you don't know where they are. You decide to have lunch.

A SWISS CORPORATION

- You have 5,000 cows. None of them belong to you. You charge the owners for storing them.

A CHINESE CORPORATION

- You have 2 cows. You have 300 people milking them. You claim employment and high bovine productivity. You arrest the newsman who reported the real situation.

AN INDIAN CORPORATION

- You have 2 cows. You worship them.

A BRITISH CORPORATION

- You have 2 cows. Both are mad.

AN IRAQI CORPORATION

- Everyone thinks you have lots of cows. You tell them that you have none. Nobody believes you, so they bomb the crap out of you and invade your country. You still have no cows but at least you now have Democracy.

AN AUSTRALIAN CORPORATION

- You have 2 cows. Business seems pretty good. You close the office and for a few beers to celebrate.

A NEW ZEALAND CORPORATION

- You have 2 cows. The one on the left looks very attractive.

A GREEK CORPORATION

- You have 2 cows borrowed from French and German banks. You eat both. The banks call to collect their milk, but you cannot deliver so you call the IMF. The IMF loans you two cows. You eat both of them too. The banks and the IMF call to collect their cows / milk. You are out getting a haircut.

MALAYSIAN CORPORATION

- You have 2 cows. They both live in condos in Bangsar.

SINGAPORE

- Cow- peh cow-bu.

The Story Of A Bear And A Rabbit

A Bear and a Rabbit didn't like each other very much but were casual friends. One day, they met a talking frog in a divine pond. The kind frog offered them each three wishes for being his guests.

The Bear immediately wished that all the other bears in the forest were females. The frog granted his wish.

The Rabbit, after thinking for a while, wished for a crash helmet. One appeared immediately, and he placed it on his head.

The Bear was amazed at Rabbit's wish, but carried on with his second wish. He wished that all the bears in the neighbouring forests were females as well, and the frog granted his wish.

The Rabbit then wished for a motorcycle. It appeared before him, and he climbed on board and started revving the engine.

The Bear could not believe it and complained that Rabbit had wasted two wishes that he could have had for himself. Shaking his head, Bear made his final wish, that all the other bears in the world were females as well, leaving him as the only make bear in the world.

The frog replied that it had been done, and they both turned to Rabbit for his last wish. The Rabbit revved the engine, thought for a second, then said, "I wish that this Bear was gay!" and rode off as fast as he could!

Moral of the story: It is always more advantageous to have friends than foes...I simply couldn't stop but smiling at the mischief brought out by this story...

Before You Do Anything...

Before you talk,

LISTEN.

Before you react,

THINK.

Before you criticize,

WAIT.

Before you pray,

FORGIVE.

Before you quit,

TRY.