Of books, food, money and sex.....

I finished reading First, Break all the Rules.

It's a pretty good book. I am fortunate to have got my hands on Good to Great and this one. They really open the mind to new ideas, new thoughts and new ways to manage and drive your team.

I won't really bother about how other manager's think, but I want to bother about how i think and treat my employees.

Here is one takeway...

I think if another manager does not treat his employees well, then I should try to find an opening, create a role to match his talent and take that person in. Why waste a good resource because of convention?

Moving on, I will help myself to Blue Ocean Strategy. It is by W. Chan Kim and Renee Mauborgne. It says on the front "How to create uncontested Market Space and Make the Competition Irrelevant". Interesting.....Making the competition IRRELEVANT. This would be something for the higher ups, but I thought I'd give it a try.

I just read an article on CNN. It says here, 9 Forbidden Foods. Certain states have started regulating the type of food served to the public....

http://money.cnn.com/galleries/2008/fsb/0804/gallery.forbidden_foods.fsb/index.html

They are:

1. Trans fat i.e. margarine, hydrogenated vegetable oil.

I don't know about them. I try to avoid this as much as possible. I'm not a real fan of margarine and hydrogenated oil, but in Penang, it's lard, ghee and all the other most unhealthy oils. No choice....I do not intend to tell the mamak boss, "Boss, roti telur satu, keluarkan telur kuning, guna hanya telur putih, tak boleh guna ghee, mesti guna 'olive oil', jangan masak sampai hitam, mesti putih lagi....." I think i will find myself face down at the roadside of some Pelita, Kassim Mustafa or Subaidah....

2. Raw Milk - Enough said. I am not a fan of unpasteurized milk.

3. Absinthe - Not popular in Malaysia. I have never tasted it. But i remembered that Kirsten Dunst poisoned 2 boys in "Interview with the Vampire" only to feed them (the two boys) to Tom Cruise's Lestat...The blood was laced with absinthe....And after that she proceeded to slit Lestat's throat with a pair of scissors.

4. Foie Gras - Goose liver. Its a delicacy that i have always wanted to try. But not the cruel way of making it. I'm giving that a pass from now on. I mean, what kinda people would stuff down food into a goose only later to harvest it for the fatty liver? Forget about it....

5. Chilean Sea Bass or Patagonian Toothfish - Hmm...I have never tasted the meat before, but they say its good. Anyhow, the most expensive fish i have ever eaten is one that went for RM36/100gm and this fish came up to 1.5kg. It cost the table RM536, but the Japanese who were with us at the table was praising that fish. No funny names....It's just called "Lo Syee Pan" or Mouse Grouper.

6. Horse meat - Now, this I wanna try. But no one's selling eat. I am game for bats, foxes, snakes, horse, tiger, etc...all the exotic stuff. I have never had the chance to try. I want it legal, but errr....I think it won't come by in Penang.

I do think that Tommy Chin can tell me how it (horse meat) tastes like....He was hoodwinked by some Iwasaki guy to a meal of "Horse Meat Shabu Shabu". Poor fella....He was supposed to sabotage Iwasaki, during his visit to Penang, with Sup Lembu Torpedo. He did not have the guts....The coward.

7. Caviar - Roe of the sturgeon. This one really needs some regulation. Though I like it, I am willing to give it a miss. We need more sturgeons for more eggs. But I did not know sturgeons were so big....Big...just like tuna!

8. Shark's fin - A delicacy for the Chinese folks anywhere in the world. I try to avoid it too. Unless it gets served at a wedding banquet. I have no say to not having it, so if it is served, I will eat it. Jerry has says that he'd probably do way with the Shark's fin at his wedding (whenever in the future that is) and replace the dish with something else. Good for him. I hope QF agrees too. This will be good for the sharks.

9. High Fructose Corn Syrup - It doesn't ring a bell in Malaysia....Hahaha....

Malaysia's first Parliament session was two days ago. And it was a big ruckus. Members of Parliament acting like school kids arguing away. So the Information Minister is considering removing the live telecast until the MPs get a grip on their attitudes and language. Our dear PM also want to do that....Says he is ashamed. But what the heck? They give a real run for fun. They should leave it there....

http://www.thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2008/5/2/nation/21132266&sec=nation

If he removes the live telecast, it only gives MPs more reason just to continue with their current arrogance and attitude. The 'rakyat' is not seeing their character, so they do not need to keep themselves in check. I wonder what more un-helpful ideas can come from Ahmad Sabeery Cheek.

Keep the live telecast there. Show the rakyat what the MPs are up to.

The Feds cut the interest rates in the US again. They were down from 5.25% in Sept 2007 to 2% today. Interest rates in Malaysia have been sort of constant at 6.75% no change. My loan payment for my house will still be the same. I have to fork out RM996/month for the next 30 years or so....and RM1051/month for another 4 years to pay for my car. Another RM50000 for my car. I will have no money in the end. :(

Today's Star had the latest in the Durex Global WellBeing Survey.

http://www.thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2008/5/2/nation/21129421&sec=nation

Just refer here and they have the results!....

http://www.durex.com/cm/sexual_wellbeing_results.asp?browser=ok&flash=ok

Seems that Malaysians have a lot of sex, but only 44% can reach orgasm...Hmmm....And Singaporeans reach it only 36%. 62% Malaysian males reach climax, while only 25% of females ALMOST always (what is ALMOST always) achieve orgasm. I think Durex should feature one article on how to make a woman reach orgasm. This will really be a helpful article for guys....Hahaha....But i think the best would be to help guys reach multiple orgasms....Now that would be something else....

..//..

Expectation of a Manager by an Employee...by a Manager

I am inclined to think.

I have been reading a bit, reading through Good to Great (Jim Collins) and then now, First, Break All the Rules (Marcus Buckingham). Actually in between there was True North by Bill George, Shift: Inside Nissan’s Historic Revival by Carlos Ghosn, Blue Ocean Strategy by W.Chan Kim. Anyway I digress.

--> Look here: http://www.thinkers50.com/?page=biographies

The world today is globalized. Wherever we look there are plenty of opportunities to move between companies. This makes it easier for good talent and skills to move from one company to another.

As a manager, should I fear this or remember that there are others who can take their place?The managerial mindset differs from manager to manager. I have seen how my team will act and react based on the type of manager I am.

One of a manager’s skills is to be able to tune himself effectively to manage his individual employee. Each employee has a different string to play to. Pluck the right string and he will perform. Failing to pluck that string will result in his inability to perform.

A manager should not dictate his managerial style on to the employees. I have seen this happen and it ends up the employee feeling dissatisfied, grumpy, unhappy and dissenting. Playing to their strings by the manager will help to enhance the relationship, understanding, motivate them and push them.

How should a manager treat and react to an employee if he/she (the employee) is asked to give leadership effectiveness feedback on the management as a whole? Each manager will have a role to play to ensure that the feedback is successful. The manager needs to realize he is asking the employee to rate him/her. He has to cater to the individual employee’s needs.

It does not mean that the engineer does not cater to the manager’s expectations. This is always set out in the objectives and targets discussion with the managers but then the employees do not discuss expectations and deliverables FROM their managers with the managers. Employees are looking at the manager not only for directions, but also leadership and coaching. Employees should be encouraged to open up, but at the same time managers need to take these feedbacks openly.

A manager has to be caring yet stern, patient yet aggressive, understanding yet forceful. What I am trying to say is that to move forward in this new globalized economy, managers need to be good coaches AND leaders while at the same time reaching out to their employees and addressing the needs of those employees as best they can.

..//..

Blogging on Sunday afternoon.....

It is hot like hell out there....So I decided to stay in and blog a bit...









Well, first thing off....I need to get myself a camera. Seriously, I think i cannot go on like that blogging without getting a thin and easily portable camera. I think its time to return to the technical pages on the Internet and see what is both GOOD, QUALITY and ECONOMICAL...sorry, its not both but all. I want to carry a camera around and snap lots of pics, and dun get into trouble with some jealous guy....Hahaha....Power Shots are big, so i may look at IXUS.









Hmm...My company will announce if I am getting ANY bonus somewhere in mid-May, but I won't see the whites of the cash until end of June.

US economy ain't that good, but still there were still a hosts of companies that reported better than expected earnings. I hope mine is one of them. Darn it....I NEED THE MONEY!! SHOW ME THE MONEY!!.....












Talking about that (money that is), I cannot imagine how some of the managers in my company managed to get houses in high end residential areas like Minden Heights. I mean, I can hardly make ends meet, and my belt is like tighten until my top looks like my bottoms and yet I am still short of money. How did they manage it?













I think I need to have better investment know how. My current technique will allow my portfolio to grow, but at a very meagre 10-20% a year. And I don't spend that money. So now the question is "How to spend money and yet at the same time make money to replace the money you have spent and still have enough to save?" Anyone got any ideas?? I need to study better, or become a Mutual Fund Adviser. Advise myself and save on the commissions. Hmm....











So I went out over to Borders to look at some books, I got myself Fortune & Time Combo with Warren Buffet's take on the current economic situation. Also I got a Thomas L. Friedman book called The World is Flat. I will read that after finishing First, Break All the Rules. Hopefully some of this will help me understand current problems. I also got a copy of Personal Money advising on how to stay alive with the current rising prices. How lah? Food price up? Petrol price up? Stuff price up? Everything price up except my salary...... :(











I did open the Gold Investment Account on Friday. Hope it will do well. It must have been pretty good, cause when it reached our turn (a friend and mine), they had ran out of passbooks. So apparently this must have been one of the most popular investment feature in Public Bank. Apparently, they keep their passbooks in a timelock safe. I wonder why? I mean you don't have to right? After all, nobody can print anything if they are not part of Public Bank right? Or am I wrong? Anyway, they told me to go back there at 3pm. That's what I did, and I got myself my GIA Passbook. Gold was down to USD888/oz.

CF asked if I liked to use vulgar words. :_I said that I did not use them in front of her because I respected her and I would NEVER use them in anger towards her. Then she said something like "I like a man who uses those words" and I was thinking, "Well, you'll never hear me use them in front of you. I got more respect for you than juz spewing out 4 letter Eff words." Only if she read this blog...Sorry girl, no EFF word in front of you. :)

You can see the difference between the blogs.....When i am not frustrated not a single FcUk will be seen.....(That one just 4 words back was for example). But when my nerves are touched, I get frustrated and if it is all ridiculous reasons, its NO HOLDS BARRED....Just like Raja Petra's site.

http://www.malaysia-today.net/2008/











Tomorrow, Parliament opens. It will be best to stay home for the morning half just in case there are too many cross overs resulting in the Pakatan Rakyat forming the Federal Government. I do not think that will happen, but I will keep two ears and two eyes out for any news. I will go to work as usual, but hope that the Parliament opening will proceed as usual.

http://www.parlimen.gov.my/

People in the news: Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, Wan Azizah Wan Ismail, Lim Kit Siang, Hadi Awang Salleh. Lets see what turns up tomorrow.....

..//..

STUPID MAYBANK!

I wanted to blog something on the Datuk Lee Kah Choon thing and the Barisan reaction. But something saved them......

So i have been going on about how I am waiting for the Gold price to drop so I can purchase the metal. Tonight I was looking at the price and it went all the way down to USD898. That's a real drop.

Just to be sure I had my money all ready, I went to the ATM. I changed my limit to RM3000 per day. Then as I walked off, I thought, hmmmm....maybe I should withdraw some RM500 first. So punched in the PIN and then put the amount to withdraw. Only to see this message:

THIS ACCOUNT IS CURRENTLY INACTIVE

I was like ok....perhaps there is an error. So I cancelled took out the card, re-insert it and punched in the necessary numbers of keys to reach there. And guess what?

THIS ACCOUNT IS CURRENTLY INACTIVE

I was like, holy shit.....What the hell is happening here???? I mean two weeks ago, I just put in RMxx00.00 into this account through internet banking from CIMB to MAYBANK and then again deposited some RMy00.00 in cash into this account. Now why is it telling me that i cannot take my money out?

I mean, what is inactive? If it is inactive, I should not be able to deposit any cash inside.....

So, i get to a phone an start to dial the customer support center.

It started off well enough, but when I found out that the stupid people at that bank had inactivate my account, I was like "WTF"!!!!

I mean, ok, I did not use my account for one year. It doesn't mean I don't want to use it in the future. It doesn't mean I am dead. It's just that I decided not to have any transaction. I mean I have had friends put money into the account. I put money into the account, and lots of it too....

Now I cannot take out the money when I need it ?????? I was like what the $%^& is this?? And the customer center is not given any authority to do anything to help you. All they can say is

1. We are very sorry about this, sir.
2. We will take note of this feedback, sir.
3. This is our policy, sir.
4. We are only able to help activate internet banking, phone banking, sir.
5. The operating hours for the banks are from 9.15am to 4.30pm.
6. I understand the situation you are in, sir...but....
7. For inactive account, sir, you can still deposit, but actually cannot withdraw.

I mean it was like talking to a bloody rehearsed line from the fcuking phone. This people really required serious training. The customer center did not really have REAL customer empathy.....They had lots of patience, I must admit, though this could come from just years of hearing (hearing...not listening) to people over the phone. I could do that to!

What if you had only your Maybank card with you, and you had to withdraw the money? If you needed it for a life saver? You will be DEAD! Dead because Maybank did not tell you they inactivate your account because they thought you were dead. So you actually died because they thought you had died. I mean what stupid policy is this???

WHO IS THAT STUPID ARSE WHO THOUGHT THIS POLICY OUT?

Why are they afraid that someone will misuse a dead person's account? I mean this is left to the dead person's family to go figure it out. It's their responsibility to go and tell the bank..."Hey...this guy's dead." You can freeze his account till end of the world for all I care.

But no....Maybank has to care more about the dead than about the living.....What an ass of a policy....Now my money is stuck in the bank. I need to take my bank book during office hours to go sort this mess. Waste my working hours. What the f&^%??

This bank is like a real money sucker. I mean.....the reason I put my money there was that when the price of gold went down I would go buy....But i find out i can't do that because my money is stuck in an inactive account.

Furthermore, they charge a difference of RM7/gm for Gold Passbook purchase whereas, Public Bank Berhad charges RM3.5/gm difference for Gold Passbook.

Compare them for yourself:
http://www.maybank2u.com.my/rates/gold_rates.shtml

http://www.pbebank.com/en/en_content/personal/rates/goldinvest.html

Who was the real MAYBANK shit head who thought all this up? INACTIVE A LIVING PERSON'S ACCOUNT while OVERCHARGING BY TWICE the amount of commission against other banks.....

Now that I have vented my frustration I am going to spread this news about them and create awareness at the same time screw them...I'm banking with Public Bank.

Just because their stock value is high....Eff them.

..//..

Other blogs within the same area

Hmm...I juz had a talk with some colleagues looking into other blogs. Actually there are some bloggers within my own department that I did not know off.

Here are two:

http://tmnet.blogspot.com
This is Ti Wei Lian's blog. He was an engineer in the same company as I was, but he has since left. Very nice fella. Always needed a thick Long Black before the day started. Met him every morning when I went for my Cafe Latte with Jerry when the Deli was still around. I think he was one of the funniest guys around.

http://samyeap.com
This is Sam Yeap's blog. The name speaks for him. He is also a new blogger like myself, but anyway, his site has some insightful articles.

I wonder if there are any other people in my division who blogs and what they actually say. In my position I have to keep it 'clean' but sometimes its just better to be plain frank. This is a nice place where i can vent my frustration and put my opinions. I'll just keep it that way.

..//..

In the last week....

I met my mutual fund adviser (http://www.publicmutual.com.my/)









on Tuesday evening and gave her the cheques for mutual fund purchase, two good funds with good returns. Around 10-15% last year.

Only to call her back the next day to tell her NOT to deposit the cheques.

I had submitted my Income Tax (https://e.hasil.org.my/) returns that morning and calculated that I had still owed them RM2k or so. Heck, owing that amount of money basically meant I could not buy anything else if i had to pay them....POK KAI ady....












I mean when i saw the amount, my face went like...














Yes, like that...I mean....WTF!!! It was RM2136.26 to be exact. See below....















Of course, you can't see the figures, but I did submit my Income Tax returns.

Not that I am rich or what, but I would really like to know in what situation would the deduction be enough such that at the end of the year, I would either be free of paying them or they would owe me....

So now, whe the market is expected to rise (according to the Saturday business news), my mutual fund money is stuck until i get my salary some 1 week from now. I just hope it doesn't rise too far in the next week or so.


Gold prices went down yesterday to its lowest in 2 weeks, around USD915. As long as the USD continues to strengthen and the gold prices lower, I can put the Gold Plan into action. For now, I just need to be patient and wait.







I have made a move to reduce my contribution to purchase my company stock plan to 5%. The price is quite low now, and I think its a good buy.

My favourite engineer is down with food poisoning....

So I am telling her to rest well, dun come in tomoro if she doesn't feel recovered. I am not going to blah blah blah to her about MCs and be more careful about her food....She works very well, very hard, and avoids making me feel unhappy. I can't get upset with her screwing up.

Some, they screw up and I will screw them upside down until they dun even know what hit them.....









Careful, this boss can sometimes be VERY unreasonable to UNLOYAL employees.

I had a pretty eventful, errrr rough, week with CF. I was accused of being insensitive, argumentative, proud, egoistic, etc.


Actually, she ended the first conversation by telling me to go reflect about myself.













Of course, I normally would not do that with other girls who tell me this. I'll just tell them ok, hang up, say something like "Mother Sea, please proceed to feed yourself to your own self" and forget about them after that.

But for CF and after all the emotions that I put into this, I had to look into myself. I could not throw it away just like that. So ok, i lie there on my bed...thinking.....Was she been unreasonable? Did she say this all in anger?........NO!....In fact she was quite RIGHT!!......

I won't admit I am wrong, will try to wiggle and squeeze my way out, and argue this and that, one hundred bezillion reasons....ALL THE TIME. I have become so used to it that i do it sub-conciously. *sigh* Someone told me this day would come. There will be a girl who would treat you the way you have treated other girls.....Now i just hope she just doesn't say, NO! I think i will fall apart.....

So, we had a talk on the 2nd nite, and she will train me. Anytime she feels I am turning back to the old egoistical, proud, argumentative and being insensitive, she would whack me. Though, I'd rather like that too, since that's the only other reason for her to have contact with me....Physically lah...Bwahahahaha.....Our relationship is still quite new, but I have promised her "no physical contact from me" until she is CONFIRMED to be my gf.

We went out last night for a drive and it ended with me getting pounded very hard on my shoulders and chest eventhough there wasn't the slightest hint of ego, pride, argument or insensitivity. She just said..."You said I can do one mah....You didn't say when, and you said on your part, no physical contact. You cannot hit back, you cannot do anything...Blehhhhhh...."

Fcuk.....I am dumber than I look....Fell for a girl and fell on myself.

..//..

Sunday weekend....

So it is Sunday....There's nothing much happening today, so I thought that I'd spend sometime blogging about anything.

I slept around 2.30am last night. Spend my last few waking minutes/hours playing Civilization 3. Yes, I am THAT ancient. I never got an upgrade for my laptop and home PC so I am giving Civ 4 a miss for now or probably the last two years.

The last few minutes of my waking time was spent with First, Break...which is getting more interesting. Remarkably, what is written makes much sense, but not many people, (managers) practice it.

And before that, I worked out the Work Breakdown for my team. Seems like I should be having 12 engineers, but I doubt I will be getting them soon. I made a comment, which I will bring up to my manager, that when I started as the manager I had 3 products in manufacturing, 0 in NPI and 1 in support. At that time I had 10 engineers and 1 tech. Now with 4 products in manufacturing, 2 in NPI and 1 in support I have 9 engineers and 1 tech. Looks odd to me...I wonder if my manager and his manager expects me to run my team LEAN....Perhaps they want my team to go from

OBESE (scared?)

to LEAN (hey, not bad looking)

to MALNOURISHED (have mercy... :( )

I'm wondering about diversification too. I need to diversify my investments. I've got fixed deposits, shares, mutual funds, investment linked funds and some gold. Hmm...should I buy more company shares and some more gold??

Nope...not this one.....Not enough cash.....Perhaps something like this....

The USD is dropping through the roof (1 USD = 3.15 MYR) and the company shares are down...Perhaps I should cut my percentages next quarter and not invest in this quarter...I must review my options.

As for gold, it went down to USD870/oz. 2 weeks ago. Now its back to USD925. I'm just waiting for it to go low....I think there's a good chance for some investment in gold if it goes back down. Investors say there's a correction coming, but I am not sure if it has passed. Wait and see...Early next week I will be meeting my Mutual Fund adviser to invest another sum of money in there. Markets are down, the funds are cheaper. So for dollar cost averaging, this should be the time to buy more.... :)

Last night at church, we had Pastor William Lau and his wife Pastor Lucille. They came for the Elijah Challenge. Surprisingly, he is in Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Lau

That's Ps. William Lau on the right. I don't have a pic from last nite's rally because I was ushering. Obviously, I wasn't official photographer. So i took this off another website.

http://planet-ting.blogspot.com/2007_06_01_archive.html

If you are Christian and would like to know more about the Elijah Challenge Healing Ministry, here is the website: http://www.theelijahchallenge.org/

It emphasizes on the ability of ordinary Christians to be able to heal the sick. It also needs the believers to show great faith. And during his sermon, he spoke on two scriptures that I particularly like.

The first is when Jesus heals a paralytic man. The story goes that there is a man, who has been paralysed for a long time, who gets FOUR of his friends to build him a stretcher to carry him to see Jesus. But they way to the house where Jesus was was full of people. With no choice, they carried him to the rooftop of the house in old Capernaum, make a hole in the roof and lowered the man down. The two things that struck me here was...1. The man's faith, 2. The man's friends. I wonder if I have 4 friends who will do that for me...Hmmm....

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Mark%202:1-12;&version=31

The second is the bleeding lady. Bleeding for a long time (12 years) and no healing, she told herself that even if she should just touch the clothes of Jesus, she will be healed. Remarkable faith! Here's the story: http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Mark%205:25-34;&version=31;

Finally, I can't wait to meet CF for dinner tonight. I have not seen her since last Saturday, except for a quick glance at her last night. So tonight we will be having dinner, but her throat isn't feeling too well. So maybe Japanese again. But this time, I think she should have some ramen....Maybe Ichyo Ramen will be a good choice...I have got her pic in my mobile, but not sure how to post it. Maybe another time.

..//..

Only boss will know.....

My boss's boss, my senior manager that is, has just started reading a book called Profitable Growth is Everyone's Business. It's by Ram Charan who is a Management guru and also on the Faculty at Harvard Business School.










This is Professor Ram Charan...This is not my senior manager.

It got me thinking to pick up my reading on some other management books that were suggested to me by my ex-manager. He recommended First, Break All the Rules.

So on Wednesday, with me missing Mandarin class because I could not find a parking space, I went to MPH at Gurney Plaza to get the two books.

This is MPH. This one looks exactly like the MPH in Gurney Plaza because it is the exact same store...

I got the pic off this blog.....
crapperzmind.blogspot.com/2007/07/mph.html

I have not read from there before, but i think due credit should be given to him for my plagiarism.

They weren't easy to find (the books lah, not MPH), since the books were all placed in Management Business and Human Resource. But found them I did, bought them, brought them home and now reading First, Break all the Rules....After all its titled First anyway. So mah read that one first.......













Since Profitable Growth involves higher level decision making, I will leave that for later.

First, Break...is quite an interesting book. It dwells into how to retain your right people. Remember a few months back in one of my posts (you'd probably would not since you don't come to my blog), it was on the book Good to Great.













And the RIGHT people are your most important asset. This book dwells into how to make them happy and retain them. I'm into Page 30 now....there's still another 230 to go, and hopefully by then i will be a better manager....

Which got me thinking...Do other managers read these books or they just go through their entire management working life following whatever convention they want to follow? Is this why the employees nowadays are not easily retained? Is this also the reason why managers, although liked by other employees, are difficult with their own?

My engineers SEEM to have a hard time with me. Though I do not give them hell, but they just don't like me for some reason. They'd stab me in the back I know that for sure. Surely this probably contributed to my dismal performance review last year...Hmmm....






Only if they know how tough it is sitting at my place. But they won't tell me the reasons. They'd go running off to my manager complaining that i need some improvement. Wait lah....if they ever meet a boss worse than me, or are in a situation worse than they are in now....

-> Boss is too emotional. Oh come on! If i did not show any emotion, they'd think boss was made of wood and would not understand them.
-> Boss get angry. So when i try to reason with them, don't want to listen. Get angry only listen. The boss needs to put the foot down!
-> Boss is too weak. When hear other opinion will change mind already. Errrmm...Its called getting others to think and have brainstorming for ideas. Take the best and most advantageous decision lah....Tak kan, if you gonna shoot yourself in the foot after hearing others, you still shoot yourself in the foot??
-> Boss is too stubborn. Now, that contradicts the above.

So eventually, when my boss talked with me, he realized that I knew what I was doing. There is a secret to this and a lesson to learn. I won't post it here, but it is very good to know it. They thought I did not fight for them, but my boss did. They thought I got angry because I would not listen to them. I did it for their own good and my boss did know. I don't blow my own trumpet for them, but my boss did know what i was doing. My style. I'd rather do things quietly, even if they do not seem conventional. If my engineers had thought a bit more, they would realise that i will definitely take care of them because they are my rice bowl, my treasure, my income.

Also, Good to Great taught me one thing....There are people whom you MUST let go. I did that last year. And this year, I have a nice slate of team, albeit maybe 1, but I will move to ensure they stay on. Surprisingly, the lot who complained the most are still in the team. Will they leave? And so, First, Break All the Rules!

..//..

NOKIA...Connecting People

After writing the blog yesterday, i just wondered why i have never changed my mobile model. It has always been Nokia.

So I thought back to my handphones and here is a brief history of my mobile phone series......

1997.....

My first handphone was when i went over to England to study. I still have it kept somewhere in one of the boxes underneath my bed, but for convenience sake of i'll lift it off some site in the Internet :P

Here it is.....Nokia 8110. This is the one they call the Matrix Phone.....Popular back in the late 90s.

Especially after Keanu Reeves was caught handling this phone in the Matrix. Of course, they thought the Matrix was just one show, but then it became Revolutions and sumthing.....

So i used this phone in England for like 2 years, and came back to work in Malaysia. By then i had to have something more up to date.....Then what did i look for??

2000.....

Something cheap lah....Just started working mah....Where can go get one very very expensive one...And i thought about my safety too. Jadi....Mah go get one that was cheap and big and you could assault any assailant with it.....You could whack the heck out of anybody with it!

This one yah....It is Nokia 5110.....Very big, very heavy and you and a holster to hang it at your side. Just like a gun. Maybe that's why i liked it so much. I had it from 2000 - somewhere in 2002. Well, during that time, there wasn't the antenna-less mobiles yet, so this was what i had. It served me pretty well.

Then somewhere in 2001, i changed jobs and in 2002 had the chance to go to the US. And with it came some extra cash.....

2002.....

Always, people like to make the equation.....United States = Land of Opportunity = Money...

So, i went hunting for a nice phone. And got myself this one.....This one then, was the

trendy phone of the day.....Antenna-less, Blue screen, butterfly keypad...It was a really good phone, but by the time i came back from the US, it cost only RM700. I was a lucky sod to have bought the trendy phone for a cheapo price.....But then again, the market forces had made it really cheap.

Now this phone, i really liked it. So much so, that when i received an invitation by Maxis (coz i was like using so much of their services) to go buy a new phone at a discounted rate some two years later, i gave it to my mum. Guess what? After 5 years, this phone is still in good condition. My mum still uses it...Talk about Finnish technology. This one did say.......

Made in Finland.

2004.....

After coming home from an Europe trip (no, i am not a rich bus3rd, but went to US one more time), I went about looking for a new phone. The hunting wasn't difficult coz by now, i knew that I AM a Nokia addict. I am still using it on top of the Nokia 2600. And it was the model that could take pics. Presenting......

This is the Nokia 6610i. Still in good condition. I found many pics of it on the Net, but the casing on this one is the exact one that i have. The silver casing.

So in a total span of 10years, i have bought, used and obsoleted 5 different mobile phones but all the while it has been NOKIA....

Yes, they truly CONNECT PEOPLE. Myself included.....

Paljon Kiitoksia

..//..

New Mobile....

Well, so finally some nights ago, she was plain direct and told me she quite like me. There! Now i just have to wait for the right time to ask her. But at the same time, romance musn't die down...No sir, it must be kept alive. :)

I finally put that other guy thing behind me. So what if there is another guy? At least she will have the opportunity to choose....But i will need to make sure she is happy, loved, have the rightbeauty care and have the right wear.

$$$ - we don't bring it up anymore now, but some time in the future she will need to audit me. After all, her job is to audit people and processes but not in the accounting manner lah, of course.

Mobile - Yup I got myself a new Digi number....And eventually decided to get a new mobile too. :) I'm more excited about the new mobile than the number though....


This is the new mobile. Its a Nokia 2600 Classic....Really classic and I got it for a nice RM299.00 though I didn't bring cash so had to charge it to a card that cost RM7 more. But no matter.....Eventually its the use of this Nokia phone that is important.

Call her....Call her.....


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