JasonGan.com - Get Yourself Identified

Talk to me!

2009-11-02T00:42:00.000+08:00

I see more and more workshops and seminars coming out telling you that they can teach you how to earn money from Facebook and Twitter, good thing.

After observing a lot of Facebook fan pages, Twitter accounts, social media contests and campaigns, I realize that a lot of people are still wearing their conventional marketing hat while doing this. No doubt more and more organizations and brands are jumping in, but from my conversations to many decision makers, they are still puzzled about social media marketing, and the possible outcome it will bring.

Mostly, they are in denial mode to pursuit new marketing, while trying to pursuit it. This is bad.

Welcome to Me-Marketing

Look, you can craft your marketing messages go ahead, I just don't care. Old marketing is all about top-down communication, you create messages and feed the market, hoping people will pick up somewhere. But now we're consuming a number of information you can't imagine 10 years back, so the problem is not you, it is me. I got swarmed already, so please, excite me with something that I'm interested in, not your profit. Why would I care?

Get loose dude, have fun!

Yes you got me right. I was raised in old marketing, where you work hard to come out with smart ads, confusing strategies to manipulate the market, stop that. Social media marketing is more PR than ever now, we are here to make friends, so be one or please walk away from my life. Don't be stressed up and fake, be yourself and communicate with everyone honestly, genuinely, and fun. You are about to build an army of marketers and salespersons, they're motivated by themselves, with a little push of excitements from you.

It's a long term battle

I'm not asking you to dump in big money for long run, which you totally don't need to, but be prepared to spend longer time here because its worth doing so. Replying messages takes time, answering complaints takes time, finding good information to be aggregated takes time, building conversation takes time.

To wrap up this short post, I think the final message is simple: Talk to ME. Marketers may want to throw away all their tactics and tricks to sell because the social media demands you to become a trusted friend, an aggregator, a human that cares about ME.

Or you shall be ignored, I guarantee.

Originally posted at Tribe-Up.com on October 31 2009.

How about an e-Book?

2009-08-02T16:06:00.009+08:00

I have not been blogging for awhile, many reasons.

I joined Fullhouse.com.my starting April 2009, one of the big players in the property portal industry in Malaysia as their Marketing Manager. My job is to assist the visionary founder to monetize their services and market to different groups, at the same time I'm also helping to build the social media marketing strategy to reach out to their users.

Basically that was my topic of study for the past few months, I've tested social media marketing with different strategies, approaches, methods, platforms, tones, etc etc. and it was really, really cool.

So I've decided to write an e-book. Still not sure about the title yet, but it would be something about how a local business/local brand can leverage on the power of social media effectively to expand its network, its profit, its recognitions - the social media way.

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Here's the coverage of the e-book (as of 2 August 2009):
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Introduction to Social Media - The nature of social media, the platforms and how social media are being used.

Social Media for Local Businesses - Success stories, failures, the choices and the approaches (base on my research on several local brands and businesses).

Why Social Media - Why you should or should not adopt social media marketing.

Do's and Don'ts - What you should do, what you should not do, in your social media marketing campaign.

Social Media VS Conventional Media - The comparison, and how to implement conventional marketing strategies into your social media marketing campaign.

The Strategy - How to build a strategy around your social media marketing campaign (which is the hardest part of all).
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I think it would be around 20-30 pages, and I have no intention to sell it. I don't know about you, but I am really excited about this new challenge.

Face your incompetency

2009-06-10T11:41:00.002+08:00

Yes, I mean you.

I'm bored seeing somebody trying to tell everybody how good they are, how experienced they are in certain things - including myself.

Yes you're good, but can you really be perfect? Do you know everything and mastering them? If not, face it.

Humble is not about "not bragging about what you have" - you can shout of course - but when if you don't know something, just don't act as if you know.

Admitting "I don't know" is not a shame.

How, and Why

2009-04-24T13:57:00.002+08:00

I used to focus on WHY instead of others, because I thought it is more important to know the reason behind, and for whatever you do, you need to have a valid reason to support your journey.

I think I wasn't wrong, but I realized sometimes the WHY may not come easy when you seek for it. My opinion is: some questions you just can't answer it now, but later. You get what I mean.

We're answering the questions posted by ourselves in the past; and the future us will answer our questions, too.

So I thought it might be more practical to focus on HOW.

How can I achieve this, that and that?
How can I make this better, better and better?
How can I maximize the potential of this, that and that?

How can we paint the color of our life, maybe?

If you think it is something viable

2009-03-14T11:37:00.003+08:00

Then go ahead and do it.

The only thing worse than starting something and failing... is not starting something - Seth Godin

To be frank, I can really feel him. A lot of things happened for the past few months. I had my time to rest my body and soul during this revival period, thinking about many things, restructuring my thoughts and reorganizing what I've learned for the past one year and doing something that I'm totally not familiar with.

I achieved some, failed some. Met good people, and being disappointed by some others. I started to believe that there's actually a gap between people, thinking gap, all sort of gaps. No one will ever feel, or think exactly your way.

But the point is, you have to keep moving. Keep starting when you believe and stop thinking too much about failing. You can't fight for your visions while you're starting with a loser's mindset, no?

I'm at the midst of starting a few things. While believing that I can do it, I would love to share this quote with all of you.

And this was the header of JASONGAN.COM for January & February 2009.

Learn to sell yourself

2009-02-25T16:04:00.006+08:00

As the first step into marketing.

Was talking to a confused friend about her career, I didn't tell her that I've been thru the similar route not so long ago.

When you have experienced certain things, you tend to get confused about your ability, your situations, even you're not sure if the path you've taken is correct or otherwise. You started to question. Likewise, when you're in the business long enough, you will probably lose your initial focus.

This could be quite dangerous. For a business, few area you should take care of their directions: R&D, management, customer service, marketing.

You've probably learned enough to sell a couple of years ago, eventually your company move on to the next level, maybe your marketing strategy is standing still.

Marketing strategies should grow faster than your R&D or others, it should be at the front line of any business. In order to do so, you need to find a marketer who is able to identify your USPs, no matter how it changes, she or he must be able to find out immediately.

For a person, an employee especially, you are the marketer who is selling. You need to identify a few things: your skills, your attitude, your connections.

Trust me, the best thing you can reward yourself is to invest in these 3 areas and it will become your sharpest marketing spear in your next round of job hunting.

The future of a new brand

2009-01-06T11:23:00.006+08:00

Lays on your hand. Because it is not the brand that you're selling, the products and services your brand represents are.

Bear in mind, doing business is about creating customers, says Peter Drucker. So the point here is about the value your organization, or your product, your services, and your brand carry and appeal to your customers.

So let's put one thought in our mind starting from now: We're not good. (See my previous post, if you hadn't already)

Yes, forget about good. Dell thought they're good until HP quietly took over a big sum of their market shares. Does MAS not good? But they were comfortably letting AirAsia change the game rules.

CHANGES are CHANCES to CREATE

2009-01-01T21:12:00.003+08:00

This was my new year greeting SMS to all my friends for Jan 1, 2008. I'm glad that many people liked it.

And it is true, as change is the only constant thing on earth, I believe there's a lot we can learn from it.

I started following this manifesto since 2008, and 2009 Bruce Mau did some changes on his Incomplete Manifesto For Growth (or Change).

It is good to read some inspirational articles when you face uncertainty in life. I especially enjoy reading these intelligent stuff. Like this Imcomplete manifesto, some strike me and triggered some ideas, some that I'm strong disagree with.

But that's the thing, intelligence is always about disagreement, agree? Enjoy.

1. Allow events to change you.
You have to be willing to grow. Growth is different from something that happens to you. You produce it. You live it. The prerequisites for growth: the openness to experience events and the willingness to be changed by them.

2. Forget about good.
Good is a known quantity. Good is what we all agree on. Growth is not necessarily good. Growth is an exploration of unlit recesses that may or may not yield to our research. As long as you stick to good you’ll never have real growth.

3. Process is more important than outcome.
When the outcome drives the process we will only ever go to where we’ve already been. If process drives outcome we may not know where we’re going, but we will know we want to be there.

4. Love your experiments (as you would an ugly child).
Joy is the engine of growth. Exploit the liberty in casting your work as beautiful experiments, iterations, attempts, trials, and errors. Take the long view and allow yourself the fun of failure every day.

5. Go deep.
The deeper you go the more likely you will discover something of value.

6. Capture accidents.
The wrong answer is the right answer in search of a different question. Collect wrong answers as part of the process. Ask different questions.

7. Study. A studio is a place of study.
Use the necessity of production as an excuse to study. Everyone will benefit.

8. Drift.
Allow yourself to wander aimlessly. Explore adjacencies. Lack judgment. Postpone criticism.

9. Begin anywhere.
John Cage tells us that not knowing where to begin is a common form of paralysis. His advice: begin anywhere.

10. Everyone is a leader.
Growth happens. Whenever it does, allow it to emerge. Learn to follow when it makes sense. Let anyone lead.

11. Harvest ideas.
Edit applications. Ideas need a dynamic, fluid, generous environment to sustain life. Applications, on the other hand, benefit from critical rigor. Produce a high ratio of ideas to applications.

12. Keep moving.
The market and its operations have a tendency to reinforce success. Resist it. Allow failure and migration to be part of your practice.

13. Slow down.
Desynchronize from standard time frames and surprising opportunities may present themselves.

14. Don’t be cool.
Cool is conservative fear dressed in black. Free yourself from limits of this sort.

15. Ask stupid questions.
Growth is fueled by desire and innocence. Assess the answer, not the question. Imagine learning throughout your life at the rate of an infant.

16. Collaborate.
The space between people working together is filled with conflict, friction, strife, exhilaration, delight, and vast creative potential.

17. ——————————.
Intentionally left blank. Allow space for the ideas you haven’t had yet, and for the ideas of others.

18. Stay up late.
Strange things happen when you’ve gone too far, been up too long, worked too hard, and you’re separated from the rest of the world.

19. Work the metaphor.
Every object has the capacity to stand for something other than what is apparent. Work on what it stands for.

20. Be careful to take risks.
Time is genetic. Today is the child of yesterday and the parent of tomorrow. The work you produce today will create your future.

21. Repeat yourself.
If you like it, do it again. If you don’t like it, do it again.

22. Make your own tools.
Hybridize your tools in order to build unique things. Even simple tools that are your own can yield entirely new avenues of exploration. Remember, tools amplify our capacities, so even a small tool can make a big difference.

23. Stand on someone’s shoulders.
You can travel farther carried on the accomplishments of those who came before you. And the view is so much better.

24. Avoid software.
The problem with software is that everyone has it.

25. Don’t clean your desk.
You might find something in the morning that you can’t see tonight.

26. Don’t enter awards competitions.
Just don’t. It’s not good for you.

27. Read only left-hand pages.
Marshall McLuhan did this. By decreasing the amount of information, we leave room for what he called our “noodle.”

28. Make new words.
Expand the lexicon. The new conditions demand a new way of thinking. The thinking demands new forms of expression. The expression generates new conditions.

29. Think with your mind.
Forget technology. Creativity is not device-dependent.

30. Organization = Liberty.
Real innovation in design, or any other field, happens in context. That context is usually some form of cooperatively managed enterprise. Frank Gehry, for instance, is only able to realize Bilbao because his studio can deliver it on budget. The myth of a split between “creatives” and “suits” is what Leonard Cohen calls a 'charming artifact of the past.'

31. Don’t borrow money.
Once again, Frank Gehry’s advice. By maintaining financial control, we maintain creative control. It’s not exactly rocket science, but it’s surprising how hard it is to maintain this discipline, and how many have failed.

32. Listen carefully.
Every collaborator who enters our orbit brings with him or her a world more strange and complex than any we could ever hope to imagine. By listening to the details and the subtlety of their needs, desires, or ambitions, we fold their world onto our own. Neither party will ever be the same.

33. Take field trips.
The bandwidth of the world is greater than that of your TV set, or the Internet, or even a totally immersive, interactive, dynamically rendered, object-oriented, real-time, computer graphic–simulated environment.

34. Make mistakes faster.
This isn’t my idea — I borrowed it. I think it belongs to Andy Grove.

35. Imitate.
Don’t be shy about it. Try to get as close as you can. You’ll never get all the way, and the separation might be truly remarkable. We have only to look to Richard Hamilton and his version of Marcel Duchamp’s large glass to see how rich, discredited, and underused imitation is as a technique.

36. Scat.
When you forget the words, do what Ella did: make up something else … but not words.

37. Break it, stretch it, bend it, crush it, crack it, fold it.

38. Explore the other edge.
Great liberty exists when we avoid trying to run with the technological pack. We can’t find the leading edge because it’s trampled underfoot. Try using old-tech equipment made obsolete by an economic cycle but still rich with potential.

39. Coffee breaks, cab rides, green rooms.
Real growth often happens outside of where we intend it to, in the interstitial spaces — what Dr. Seuss calls “the waiting place.” Hans Ulrich Obrist once organized a science and art conference with all of the infrastructure of a conference — the parties, chats, lunches, airport arrivals — but with no actual conference. Apparently it was hugely successful and spawned many ongoing collaborations.

40. Avoid fields.
Jump fences. Disciplinary boundaries and regulatory regimes are attempts to control the wilding of creative life. They are often understandable efforts to order what are manifold, complex, evolutionary processes. Our job is to jump the fences and cross the fields.

41. Laugh.
People visiting the studio often comment on how much we laugh. Since I’ve become aware of this, I use it as a barometer of how comfortably we are expressing ourselves.

42. Remember.
Growth is only possible as a product of history. Without memory, innovation is merely novelty. History gives growth a direction. But a memory is never perfect. Every memory is a degraded or composite image of a previous moment or event. That’s what makes us aware of its quality as a past and not a present. It means that every memory is new, a partial construct different from its source, and, as such, a potential for growth itself.

43. Power to the people.
Play can only happen when people feel they have control over their lives. We can’t be free agents if we’re not free.

What makes a brand

2009-01-01T17:55:00.002+08:00

is not what you say it is, but what the consumers say it is.

This was the header of JASONGAN.COM for December 2008.

2.0.0.9.

2009-01-01T09:30:00.004+08:00

We had fun in 2008, and seriously it was a great year in my life.

March 2008, I attended my convocation, am officially graduated.
August 2008, I completed my first commercial project, am really proud of it.
September 2008, I quit my job. Thanks for the learning opportunities.
December 2008, I got my 1st consulting contract for marketing and branding.

2008 was like a roller coaster, and I seriously love the excitement it brought me. 2009 will be a blast, am sure it is.

Happy 2009, let's make it the best year of our life!

WHY that matters

2008-12-26T16:12:00.001+08:00

I always like to ask why.

A friend approached me to ask for my opinion about his new business idea. After his 30minutes of explanation, I asked why.

A friend said he wanted to get married, I asked why.

A friend asked me which blogging platform is the best one, I asked why she wanted to start a blog now, not earlier?

It is simple to ask why, but how to ask it at the right time and at the right point, it takes a little bit of experience.

For example, many people started blogging because their friends told them to, because people made money from it. But why you wanted to start a blog?

It maybe a new business idea, it maybe a thought to try a new marketing strategy, or maybe a rebranding plan, or to venture into new media marketing.

You see people did it so you want to follow, I dare to say that you will eventually stop somewhere halfway.

A strong WHY is needed, like a vision. It has to be clear and strong enough so that obstacles won't block your sight.

Walking away with pride

2008-12-14T15:30:00.002+08:00

No matter how bad the situation could be, you know that you’ve done what is necessary.

Being bold and unpredictable is not mere about being crazy enough to break some rules but the ability to see through any situation with your own set of values and judgment.

Others may think you’re crazy because you’re doing something they don’t agree upon, or simply something they do not dare to do. When Tony Fernandes started AirAsia, buying a bunch of old machines that was “destined” to be a total failure was crazy; bringing up the idea of creating the only aviation line that serves domestic flights with low price, too. Something that not being seen by others, but you know you have what it takes to make this happen, and leave the world with tonnes of surprises.

For young people like us, being bold and unpredictable maybe a little simpler. You do not really follow the flow of going into employment and try to climb the corporate ladder like others. You may have known your dream better, your life direction or whatsover.

Do what it takes to achieve what you truly want, and guess what, Gen Y is much better than Gen X and Boomers because we simply know ourselves better, and strongly believe in it.

Just beware of all those distractions, you can too, walk with pride.

(Guest post for a Youthsays.com Group Blogging Project, read more here.)

In a branded country

2008-11-22T10:39:00.002+08:00

What do you expect to see most?

I see opportunities.

More than a week ago I spent about 5 days in the City of Lion. It was bot bad. I saw brands, and a well designed country.

Design is the word here. This is a branded country, so if you want to thrive here, you need to be more appealing than usual to attract those Singapore Dollars.

Visual is a key here for any new business venture. You can see when you walk down the shopping malls, weird names, funny symbols, thou most of them are just tweaking a little bit of the conventional, or simply just package it nicer.

I think so. When you're in a country that is so obsess about rules, people are too comfortable, and they need good designs to evoke their buying emotion.

Or simply put: you focus on WANTs.

All marketers are copy cats

2008-11-03T17:10:00.005+08:00

Because there's simply too few geniuses in this world.

AirAsia was using the success model of SouthWest; same goes to OldTown (and the those spoof OldTowns).

I strongly believe that we should copy shamelessly, as long as you're not fringing any copyrights.

It's a business world, some say war zone. Do you think so much when you fire a bullet? (or its like: oh I should invent my own way of shooting?) Bullshit.

Good copycats are creative in their own ways. Applying a strategy that was successfully implemented by other organization, other field, other industry or even other country is simply one of the best practice because they are proven as a model.

What you need to do is tweak it according to your need and your industry, let it run and watching it grow, tweak again if anything goes wrong until it starts to make money for you.

That's what I call innovation. If you want to be named the "innovative creator", then stop banging your head, start open your eyes and look around - look and learn.

Do you agree that profit is the most important indicator for the success of your business?

Now what's wrong with copying good strategies?

You have to set the system right

2008-10-31T11:02:00.004+08:00

I mean, at least organize it right.

I was talking to a friend about his new network marketing business, pretty good plan with a fair deal of pros and cons (as usual) and he has some prospects to work on and a list of plans for the future on how to make money.

I was in network marketing before, and that lesson of failure taught me a lot, especially how to leverage the time and effort you can chip in as a person in order to maximize your chances towards success.

I mean chances, and chances only. Let me list down some points from the conversation.

You can't talk to everyone. If you can, you will die bored because talking about the same thing for 10times in a day doesn't make you a prophet. Start from finding the right points, leverage on something else that will help you to explain the basic. You just make sure you stay conscious in every conversation to analyze and observe. It's a conversation fergodsake.

Get help, yes you heard it right. But before that you need to know what you're lacking, list them down and start looking around. You may need a strategist (then you can use my service) or you may need a good copyrighter. There's so many ways to do one thing, and some success stories might not suit you, remember that always.

Lock your target market right - this needs a fair deal of research, Google about them. Don't try to hit the mass market, you ain't superman. Know your budget and plan it right. You don't need to spend big money to do marketing.

And lastly, know why you do it. The reason you do it will determine your drive in long run, get the objective right and stick to it, print it in your head if you can.

Leadership

2008-10-31T10:23:00.002+08:00

Will determine the success of your marketing efforts.

If there's no Tony, AirAsia wouldn't have gone so far.

If there's no Morten Lundal, DiGi would be the same old DiGi, yellow won't be so impactful as it is to our life right now.

You need a face to represent the character of the organization. Think about the ancient war stories, if the general was not able to unite the soldiers, no victories will happen.

Your customers follow you, your investors got excited because of you. You not only lead your team, but the trend, the emotion of the consumers, the market itself will be looking at you.

So as the leader of the organization, you are the no.1 servant for the organization.

You're a brand manager

2008-10-12T21:18:00.002+08:00

Because you yourself is already a brand.

Was sharing with a uni junior about creating and managing a brand identity, sorry for making the email a bit lengthy. I was too excited to witness a rise of a very exciting symbol.

In fact managing a brand is something we do everyday - it is just a matter of we've done it right or screwed badly.

Get off your stereotype thinking about how complicated managing a brand can be, let's get things to the basic one a little bit. Ask yourself few questions:

Who are you? (Alt: What are you?)
What are your strength and weaknesses?
What is your Unique selling proposition? (Alt: What is your skill set?)
Who is your target audience?
Why they should know you?
How you want them to perceive you? (Alt: How they perceive you?)
How to make them know you and recognize you?
What is the outcome you want to achieve? (Alt: Your dream?)

Take a little moment of yourself to think about that, I should get back to my proposal now.

I'm not a designer

2008-10-09T21:49:00.002+08:00

But I do design, especially brand design.

Playing around with the designing tools to create a new identity that represent millions of possibilities behind it is simply an amazing experience.

I never learned design in a formal way, but I think I somehow have the sense to know what is needed to create a new symbol that able to create the desirable impact (and I'm learning from various channel to understand more all the time).

To me it doesn't matter if you're a pro while creating is simply a nature of we human being. When we were kiddo, we play around with LEGO and other toys and there was no rules - as long as you willing to try to make something out of it, you do it.

I'm not saying that designing is something as simple as playing with LEGO, but the imagination and willingness to make things happen is probably the most important element behind every impactful brand symbol.

Designers go extra miles to understand the vision behind the brand, talking to people and looking for the best way to convey everything... and make it sell - a lot of branding are not totally about your skills to design, but your ability to capture the essense.

The essense of a brand designer, to me, is the ability to feel the brand and paint the feeling out.

I hereby thank Jenna for her trust and willingness to let me explore and create my first two brands in my life and managed it; and Andrew for letting me design his important new show.

I shall share with you more about this later.

Is it the time to retreat or attack?

2008-10-08T01:12:00.004+08:00

Maybe I'm being a little too optimistic, but I seriously think that something can be done at this point of time - recession.

Something effective can be done - while all your competitors are cutting their budget for whatever reason and getting a step back in their business strategies, we attack.

How to attack? How about taking this time to restructure your marketing strategy? Rebranding for a better positioning in the market? Maybe we do some retraining among the team and make them a more effecient and united one?

Since everyone is chicken-ing away - go a little extra miles could just make the difference - and so much can be done at this point of time, maybe starting a new business? Seth says he will do so if he hasn't started one.

Less competition means more opportunity - simple theory, no?

Remind yourself

2008-10-05T17:09:00.002+08:00

Who you are, originaly and genuinely.

You have to keep growing, in short. I learned this from a conversation with a friend - or you will just lost your way in life.

And the most important thing of all, you must keep everything under some kind of measurement, and certain level of exposure.

I was commenting on her situation anyway, because to me, no matter how hard you work, your boss must know. If you say you're learning, you must know the progress and how far you've gone. Keep everything measurable, never ever fail as if you're measuring your marketing strategies.

It is as simple as if you're given a task, no one will care how hard you work - you sleep at 4am is none of my business. As long as the task is not completed, you fix it no matter how.

Sad case about building a brand

2008-10-02T23:57:00.002+08:00

Is when you do not have any control over it, I means the management of it.

Many business owners wanted to have a brand, but they do not seem to understand what is a brand all about.

They usually think that by creating a logo for it and incorporating it into their business card, letterhead, envelope and stuff, things are done. What is brand management to them is simple - you give me the logo and I just incorporate it into everything I need to, your job is done.

Then the question is, what is the role for brand managers then?

Same goes to a personal brand, you need to manage it, communicate it well, strategize it well and then, only you can making the most out of it - making it your asset - the most valuable one for an organization.

A brand is not build on surface, it is created in minds.

It is sad when you see a brand that you built failing and falling apart because no one is managing it, delivering its promise, it is heart breaking especially you see a company is driving away from the vision of it - which come from the leader behind the organization.

To business owners: a brand is not what you say it is, it is what the customers say it is.

New platform for new experience

2008-09-30T21:06:00.003+08:00

In case you don't know, I've left MyPath - the company I served for the last 15months.

Everything is fine and I appreciate the experience and the opportunities given, I'm thankful.

Now, it is time to move on and well, I'm still enjoying my long holiday till my next plan kicks in. Nothing has change, unless this one. I changed from FTP to Blogger.com, and I believe this is good as I never remember my log in.

From now on, JasonGan.com has a new tagline - Get Yourself Identified. Besides, this is still truly yours.

Tell you more next time.

Something to share

2008-09-28T15:01:00.002+08:00

After long, here’s the new post. I’m not going to start with what I’ve discovered for the past few months, but something I’ve discovered last night.

It reads..

Entrepreneurship is a life concept, not just a business concept. There are two approaches to life. One is to buy the “paint-by-number kit” and stay within the line. The other is to start a blank canvas and try to paint a masterpiece. You can be an entrepreneur without starting a company, by creating a path uniquely designed for you. — Jim Collins.

What do you think? And which part of the above statement makes you think?

Here’s what made me think.

Entrepreneurship is a life concept - Business should be an innovation that aimed to make the world a better place. If a business started because of money, it will rise - because the business plan is great; but it will fall, because there’s no passion in it. A business should have its attitude, and it comes from the entrepreneurs behind it.

Start a blank canvas and try to paint a masterpiece - Being involved in few start ups (businesses or projects), to me the best and the most thrilling experience of all in the process - may it be a success or a failure - is the feeling of you’re creating something new, that will create an impact to the world. Again to me this is an attitude, with courage, with foresight, with confidence and the guts to take all risks, you do it because you believe in it.

Be an entrepreneur without starting a company - An innovation is an idea that works. Not to say I don’t encourage start ups, I do. But the thing is, when you come out with an idea, what is better than seeing it grow with your own eyes with yourself executing it? As I stated at no. 1, Entrepreneurship is a life concept, if it creates value.

Creating a path uniquely designed for you - Yes you, only you yourself can determine this. And for the business owners, this is something you need to take into considerations for your employees, especially those who contributed in critical stages - they are entrepreneurs - either you design a unique path for them, or they will do it themselves.

To me, appreciation is not building a wall with red tapes, but sharing the burden as they have shared yours along the way.

But the challenge is, do you see who contributed the most?

(Originally from JasonGan.com - Sep 2, 2008)

The price of procastination

2008-09-28T15:00:00.002+08:00

Is enormous.

I believe no matter what profession you’re in, you need to take care of this problem, especially young people like us.

This is our nature, in a way, because we always have too much on our plate, always we’re 3/4 of everything so we tend to be able to take up a lot of responsibilities.

And we don’t know how to stay focus, thanks to the internet and the easy accessOrig to so much information.

So what you gotta do is simple, be a detailed person, or at least try to be one. And most importantly, know how to differentiate what is important and what is urgent.

Another suggestion would be do not spend too much time on one task. Remember? We’re always 3/4 good at almost everything and we tend to have too much on our plate, so make sure you set a timeline, finish one thing at a time.

So what happen when you are burning out? Yell for help of course.

(Originally from JasonGan.com - May 24, 2008)

The answer is within you

2008-09-28T14:58:00.001+08:00

A fascinating conversation after a long drive, freshed up my mind.

It was a sweet lady who sparked the conversation, the story went this way. She went for a music carnival, and I’m not sure what happened in between, she was invited to the VIP box where food and beverage was provided, free flow, and served.

Now what happen was, although the VIPs there were friendly, and she was having fun with the atmosphere and music and of course, the company of so many successful people, but she still felt that something is not right.

She felt that she was not belongs to this group.

Story ends here, I know, I’m not a good story teller.

Is the story sounds familiar to you? You see, the problem here is, you may start questioning, why these people can be so successful but not me? And what should I do in order to achieve where they are now? How can I join the group and be part of it?
The answer is within you.

Still remember how was the first day you went to school? I mean primary school. You did not know everyone, you asked your parents, why these people look so strange to me, and I do not know how to make friends with them! Bingo, you made best friends with this “stranger” group until today, and this could be the friendship that you treasure the most.

Or maybe another example, you 1st went to university, from outside, the seniors from “that” group looked so superior and smart, even they came to talk to you and they were friendly, but you still find something wrong, as you don’t feel like you’re one of them.

We all know about the theory of seeding since we were kids, and we have been doing it well. We have the answers for all the things that we’re seeking for, but just sometimes, we do not believe in ourselves.

Trust me, you know what you need to do, but maybe you need someone more experienced to guide you through part of the journey, so go and seek for them. Many people will start doubting, and that’s it. They just believe that they are not belong to “that” group, and walked away silently. To me it is very simple, this is our life, we decide what is going to happen to us.

All of these starts from you, start to believe in yourself, and start finding the answer within you.

(another rambling post after few weeks of busy-ness)

(Originally from JasonGan.com - May 7, 2008)