Hardworking Doesn't Bring Success?

Everyone understands that hardworking will bring success. But that's not really true.

I must admit that my father is a very hardworking person. He started to come out to work when he is 15. He works day and night and almost 7 days a week for the past 50 years. He is 65 this year. What he is today?

Today, he is still working as a site supervisor without any savings for retirement. He used to be a millionaire. Unfortunately, he faced a great business failure 13 years ago. Not only that he lost everything overnight, he also generated some debts. My family sold everything we can sell. Fortunately we did not need to sell our only shelter. 

When I went back to my hometown early this month, he shared with me that he is regretted of what he did. He did not learn how to invest when he was rich. He did not plan how to grow his money, but only continuously do his hard work. 

I seems like also facing the same fate recently. My hard work does not return me any reward, just because I did not achieve the target. Without achievement, others won't see your hard work but see you as a failure. The fact is cruel. As a matter of fact, I just don't do enough thinking and lack of aggressiveness.

Like what Malaysia's richest man Robert Kuok said, 90% of success is from the combination of hardworking, intelligent (thinking).  Hardworking alone is insufficient to make you success. You must compliment with intelligent. To obtain intelligent, you must be aggressive, continue to learn new things, and learn how to think. 

I hope I've learned a valuable lesson. It's time to start to learn how to think and act more aggressively from now on. If you agree with me, let's switch on this button together.

How To be Success in Business?

Few days ago, I noticed someone shared a link regarding an exclusive interview on a TV program with the Malaysia's richest man, Robert Kuok, a very low profile 89 year-old business man who is well known as king of sugar and hotel.

The TV program is in mandarin from Beijing, China and the interview session is lasted for about an hour. The program is talked about his past experience, how he overcomes the hurdles, problems, how he respected his mum and how he contributed to the society and so on.

I like to watch this kind of interview. This kind of interview and experience sharing from the one of the most successful businessman in Asia like Robert Kuok, is valuable for us, especially their advice because they have walked through it.

Overall, when the host asked him is it really rely on luck in doing business, he emphasized that 90% is rely on hardworking and keep thinking (brain). 10% perhaps rely on luck. If you tell it to a normal person, he will just merely agree with it. I shared this video with a successful businessman, a friend of mine, he immediately said yes and I can feel from his expression that he experienced what has been mentioned.

He also mentioned that business is about courage. You really need to take risk and courage to act on it.

Everyone knows how to strive. We can strive for everything. But not everyone know how to keep thinking. Most of the time, we wasted our effort because we did not do enough thinking but just based on blind hard work. That's what I really need to think about it, and it's time to start to work it out right now before it is too late.

In summary, Robert Kuok advice us that if we want to success in business, hardworking, and keep thinking. And of course, do take calculated risk and courage to go for it. 

If you know mandarin, perhaps you can watch the full 50 minutes video here.

Apology To Dear Malaysian

One lady is sorry for ignoring the homeless while another apologizes for not supporting the national football team. One man apologizes to his children for smoking while another says sorry for talking at the cinema.

The message, simply, is that forgiveness doesn't change the past but it certainly brightens the future.

That tagline of Digi's “Dear Malaysians” ad campaign, which urges Malaysians to apologize and seek forgiveness from one another during the coming Hari Raya, has become a big hit.The video has moved many, with more than 47,000 people sharing it on Facebook since it was launched on Tuesday night. 

The three-minute video shows an array of people holding up cardboards with written apologies for past mistakes.Many admitted to having shed tears after watching the video, which has singer-songwriter Min'Z providing vocals for the background song.

The poignant video has also prompted many to post apologies for various misforgivings on social networking sites. Many have apologised for their bad driving habits and parking skills while some have said sorry for not keeping in touch with their friends.

Wong, associate creative director of advertising agency Naga DDB that came up with the campaign concept, said that since Hari Raya, Merdeka and Malaysia Day were around the corner, there was no better time to spread the joy of forgiveness.

“All of us make mistakes but how often do we try to atone for them?” he asked.

“It was not meant to be a tear-jerker but to hit a raw nerve. Many people can relate to not apologising enough.” Wong himself was in the video, where he apologises to a taxi passenger for not returning a wallet he had found a long time ago.