TAKING ADVANTAGE OF OPPORTUNITIES

Hard fact! Life is a jungle, only the strong survive. Google did not invent the search engine and Facebook did not invent the Social Media, but how come they define their category?

The answer is tenacity and tunnel vision. Truth is, being original or first is nothing – you can ask Apple and Yahoo, how their smart competitors, Samsung and Google overtook them.

In the race of life, nothing is fair. Life only compensates the SMART and the BRAVE. No one owes you a reason for you…r existence, we’ve all got to chart our own path, own it and keep milking it until a cycle ends and another begins; because truth is, no one is going to win all the time but you can make one victory last a lifetime!

Its all about OPPORTUNITIES and TAKING CHANCES. There are few chances, so only the strong survive. Its all a zero-sum game, one gets it, another loses it and the cycle begins again. Ever believed that there was a time when Google was going through a hard time in it early days and its founders were prepared to sell-off to Ask.com for a paltry $750,000? And guess what? Ask.com was not smart enough to see the opportuinity! A university Professor who saw the opportunity, invested his widows-might – $100,000 and in 10 years harvested over a billion dollars! Today, Ask.com is nowhere, but Google is soaring away. What does this mean anyway? Life is about risk taking, working smart and placing a bet on the future no matter how bleak it may initially seem. We need to keep dreaming

RUNNING GOVERNMENT LIKE BUSINESS:

1. Paying Legislators Salaries instead of Allowances: I often wonder if corporate governance statutes will even allow non-executive directors earn monthly salaries? That will be totally at variance with corporate governance standards, wouldn’t it? So why do we pay our Legislators Salaries instead of Sitting Allowances? Why do we have a National Assembly Service Commission different from the Civil Service Commission?

2. Voting Money for Const…ituency Projects under the Management of Legislators: The constituency project issue is also another interesting issue. I can’t imagine a non-executive director having a dedicated budget from which he is able to implement projects meant to be done by executive directors. So who will exercise the oversight?

3. Having no Standards on Which Ministers Are Judged: Although the Federal Government claims there is a performance measurement standard for its Ministers, but I really cannot see it in practice except at press conferences where bogus achievements are unveiled by each ministry without a verification process and a peer-review mechanism as it happens in best practice business environments. In a Company, Directors are given targets that are measurable and Appraisals are conducted periodically and scores are given and based on performance appraisals, Directors are either rewarded, lose bonuses or are asked to exit based on performance, isn’t it? So why will you have a Minister who is basically playing politics, missing critical targets and getting rewarded from tax-payers money?

Though I accept that government must keep its social basis, it must yet apply basic business principles in order to deliver tangible results.