NO SALESMAN PLEASE

I've just finish reading a book on financial matter yesterday and one of the subjects that interest me is the topic about the art of selling. The book explained that in order for someone to gain abundant wealth or be successful, one must be able to sell, learn how to sell is very important. Below are some of the inspiring sentences that worth mentioning from the book (The business School by Robert T.Kiyosaki )

"The ability to sell is the number one skill in business"

“If you cannot sell, don’t bother thinking about becoming a business owner”

“All great teachers have been great salespeople. Look at Christ, Buddha, Mother Theresa, Ghandi, Obama to name a few. They were all great teachers and leaders, which mean they were great sales people.”

The word selling is very subjective and arguable, since different person may have different view of what the term “selling” is all about. Selling to me involve a lot of person to person communication. To be able to communicate well is very important since it help you to convey the message with clarity and the other person whom you speak to able to understand and responded accordingly.

I go to work every day to sell my service (professional expertise as an engineer) to my employer (the government) and if everything goes well, I will receive my salary at the end of the month. The accountant sells his professional skills for a steady paycheck. Likewise you and everybody go to work to sell their skills in exchange for money.  So next time you see a Notice outside the office saying “NO SALESMAN IS ALLOWED” is actually inviting more salesmen into their office ( because most salesman can not accept no for an answer). Both the office workers and the salesmen is no different since they are both doing sell but in different manner.

We are all born sales people, whether we like it or not or whether we know or notice or not. To me the different with the successful and the non successful person is their ability to sell well, how good are they in selling. Look at all the rich people. Why are they rich? How they become rich? The answers are many but one of the most important factors is their ability to sell. So selling affects every aspect of life whether you are rich or poor. The better you are at selling, the richer you become (but you must become the business owner not employee, no one become rich being an employee).

Look at the real world, Politicians like Obama, the current US President, who won the recent US elections is a great sales person. The president sells his ideas, visions, plans, strategy and so on to the people of America. 

However, most people are terrified of selling. The word “SELLING” is enough to deter them and make them refuse to sell. This is common situation and facts of life. Why? The answer is because most people are terrified of rejection. Rather than admit their fear, they speak badly about sales people saying such things as “No sales man please”, I’m not a sales person, I’m an educated professional and I don’t do sell I do paperwork and work in an office with the air conditioning unit switched on. I don’t like seeing customer and I don’t like talking to strangers or client. These kinds of people really look down at sales man without realizing that they themselves are a salesman.

Most people who cannot sell are people who have to live below their means, shop at sales, look for discount offer or live frugally simply because they are afraid of selling. Their fear and lack of selling skills keeps them poor. 

To be successful or acquire an abundant wealth one must learn to overcome fear and rejection. Do not let fear run your life. So what if they reject you. They are thousands of people out there you have yet to meet. Who knows may be these people you haven't met yet will give you the opportunities.

Therefore if you want so badly to achieve or get whatever you really want in life, be it wealth, plenty of money, richness or whatever it is, you have to learn to sell first.

Recommended book to read :

Is being honest crucial to business?

Does being honest affect your business well being? Is honesty important in your pursuit to building wealth? The answer is yes indeed. If you want to be a millionaire, an honest person is an utmost requirement. However there are some becomes rich by cheating or become a professional swindler a.k.a conman. This is my friend an act of dishonesty and it will not last long.

Being honest will determine whether you will become successful or otherwise in business or even in your career (as mentioned in the book “The millionaire Mind” by Thomas J.Stanley).

On the other hand, to some people, being honest (they said) has nothing to do with business. They may say “I am always honest but my business is still small, in fact it going no way”. Another will say, “I’m always honest but I’m still broke. Yes, it true. Honesty by itself will not make anyone rich (extracted from a book “How to make money as an employee” by Azizi Ali). If you fail in business, it has nothing to do with being honest; However it may be to do with your business skills. May be you are not fit for business. To get into business one needs financial intelligent and business know how.

Most commonly in business, without honesty, don’t hope of making it big because it will never be. You know why? Because nobody will ever want to do business with dishonest person even though they are pretty, clever, smart, business guru, hardworking or as smart as John Chow.

DIY Sabahan Buggy

I know what you are thinking right now?  It a buggy or it looks like a buggy isn’t it? Well folks, it is a buggy indeed.  By definition, a buggy is an automobile with wheels that project beyond the vehicle body. It actually a DIY buggy made by my friend James Tukalan.  James is a Sabahan and a vivid antique collector, self taught mechanic and inventor, experimenter, he is the Do it yourself kind of a person.

James is passionate about mechanical stuff. The above buggy single handedly made by him using parts from his old Honda 50 motorcycle as well as discarded motor bike he bought from the workshop.

He designed and made the buggy only by visualization without any sketches and he improvises along the way.  This buggy was made in the early eighties and took him roughly six month to complete and he does it part time. I admire his sheer determination and ingenuity to come up with this one of a kind buggy.

James is a wonderful person to talk to; he is friendly and always smiles and laughs.  He is a contractor by profession. He builds house as well as doing interior and exterior house renovation. He stays with his wife and children in kampong Tuavon, penampang, Sabah. Malaysia.

Recommended book to read:

THEY (STAFFS) DON’T KNOW HOW TO DO IT

The most common reason most people at work do not do what they suppose to do because they don’t know how to do it.

For example, a typical manager knows that they suppose to motivate their office staffS to do their job better but they themselves don’t know how to do it (how to motivate them). Instead, the manager resorts to scream and threaten their staff. (and to some extend showing their knuckle as if they are strong i.e. act of stupidity really.

Just because you tell your staff to do, it is not the same as teaching them to do it. When you tell them, you order them to do it whereas when you teach them you show them how to do it.

Managers make too many assumptions about what people know without checking their assumptions. They promote the best accountant to accounting supervisor without providing any training in how to supervise people. Managing people is difficult if you don’t know how to go about managing them.

There are three main reasons why employees or office staff don’t know how to do what they are supposed to do because:

a) Managers assume the employees know how to do it.b) Managers really believe they are teaching when in fact they are only telling.
c) Managers decide not to waste the time needed for teaching.
Normally managers trying to minimize training time in order to get the employees to produce output sooner without realizing that when people do not know what they are suppose to do, while receiving full monthly payment give poor service or produce non sale-able and/or low quality product or output, or they damage equipment and costumer relationships. All these contribute to higher cost to the management. 

This scenario is still happening today and most of the top management are blind, plain stupid, idiot and just plain dumb.

Therefore, to avoid these unnecessary problems and non-productive, the management or manager should used their head more often and think wisely in providing solution to prevent or minimize the on-going and never ending problem.

Below are some suggestion to help the manager or management prevents employees of not knowing how to do what they suppose to do.

a) Carefully select a suitable person to train the new employees. The trainer must be fully knowledgeable, skillful and know the subject well and know how to teach people.

b) Device a training manual for the trainer to help guide and standardized the training manual for newly recruited employees.

c) Provide details reference manuals for employees. List the kinds of problems, along with the appropriate solutions, to help them solve problem when doing their job.

d) In all jobs where failure is rampant, give employees practice in simulation of the actual work so they make their mistake where the cost of failure to the management and employee is minimal.

e) Create a test for all new employees on a job so they can fine-tune their knowledge and know whether learning has actually occurred. The test can be both written and practical. If the employees do not pass the test, make the necessary arrangement to send them for more training.

Like I have said before again and again, if all these effort end in failure, sack or fired the manager.

Ref : Why Employees Don’t Do What They’re Supposed To Do – Ferdinand F. Fournies


Recommended Reading:

Never Forget Your Past

I can't believe I am writing this because I don't like to remember the past especially if it about something personal and you don't want to recall it. Anyway, just to share with you a story about Bill Gates and his past.

The story begins like this.  Bill gates was having a wonderful lunch with his son in a cafe. After eating, he gave $10 to the waiter as a tip. The waiter looks surprise and a bit sad. Bill Gates realized and asked the waiter if there is anything wrong. The waiter answered that he is not quite please with the tip after all he is serving the richest man in the world and he would expect a bit more from him. On the other hand the waiter said that his son, seating on the same table as him, gave him $500 instead.

Bill Gates answered with his famous smiling face and said “Now look here sunny, showing his fist as if he is about to slap the waiter”, stop this nonsense and get back to work. You know something bill gated added, he gave you more because he is the son of the richest man in the world (period) but I am the son of a lowly paid government servant.

The waiter answered, if you don’t want to give just say so. You don’t need to tell your past and showing your not so tough knuckles. As if I am scared.

So, the moral of the story is: Sometime past can be nuisance and pain in the neck and some people say that past is your best teacher. To me the past is bloody ….something and it more than a pain in the neck.

What Makes a Manager

The above image is extracted from :  http://4realleaders.com/2011/05/dealing-with-micro-managers/

Well folks, what makes a manager. These are some points that we should look when we talk about manager.

a)      The road to the top is seldom a short and easy one. It takes years to get there.

b)      Firm and fair to everyone.

c)      Should admit when he/she is wrong.

d)     A genuine affection for the business where he/she works for.

e)      Must have a strong desire to succeed.

f)       Must have proper training or formal education and relevant experience usually hands on experience.

g)      Must have a positive and productive attitude among employees.

h)      Should be expert in so many areas i.e. technical, finance, legal matters, sales, marketing and most important in human nature.

i)        Must make the customer or client happy, get your people involve and get rid of departmental waste and unnecessary expenditures.

j)        Must be capable to lead people. You need to be a teacher.

k)      To enforce and implement company’s policy.

l)        Able to hire the right person and retaining good people. Hire the best people and nurture them.

m)    Try to avoid erratic temperaments.

n)      Foster good working environment.

o)      Able to motivate people to reach their utmost potential.

p)      Able to work within the allocated budgets. He need to have effective cost control in all departments.

q)      Manager should shows compassion toward his subordinates.

There are so many more you can says about what makes a manager but that I leave to you to suggest and share with the readers.