Monday, May 16, 2011

Book Review of “The Luck Factor” by Richard Wiseman

Have you wondered why some people just seem to get all the breaks in life? You hear these stories all the time, like the one about the man and woman who accidentally meet on a plane ride, strike up a conversation with each other, and fall in love and then end up happily married till the very end or how a chance meeting between two guys at some random party turns into a successful business partnership. Some of the world’s most successful models were discovered standing in line waiting to get ice cream. It just seems like some people, when it comes to careers, relationships and just about everything, are a magnet for good fortune. There are even some people out there who are multiple lottery winners. Unfortunately, on the other end of the spectrum, there are those unfortunates for whom nothing seems to go right. Divorce, debt, poverty and failed careers reign supreme in their lives. It’s always one disaster after another. Sure intelligence and looks are obviously factors that come into play. But there are lots of smart and good-looking people in the world. Furthermore, I think it’s quite obvious that the world’s most successful people are not necessarily the most intelligent or physically attractive. Sometimes it seems to be the exact opposite. There seems to be no rhyme or reason behind why some people come into good fortune. Why oh why are some people just so damn lucky?! Well, author and psychologist Richard Wiseman set out to answer that question, scientifically. After objectively examining scores of so-called lucky and unlucky people, he claims to have identified four discrete principles that have been scientifically proven to attract good fortune. So enjoy these excerpts from his international best-seller that reveal The Luck Factor (ISBN: 9780099443247). Oh, and good luck to you!

“Luck exerts a dramatic influence over our lives. A few seconds of bad fortune can unravel years of striving, whilst a moment of good luck can lead to success and happiness. Luck has the power to transform the improbable into the possible; to make the difference between life and death, reward and ruin, happiness and despair.” Pg. 11

“Luck could not simply be the outcome of chance events. There were too many people consistently experiencing good and bad luck for it all to be chance. Instead, there must be something causing things to work out consistently well for some people and consistently badly for others. Given the importance of luck, it seemed vital to try to understand why this was the case. Were these people really destined to succeed or fated to fail? Were they part of some huge, cosmic game plan? Were they using some form of psychic ability to create good and bad luck? Or could it all be explained in terms of differences in their beliefs and behavior? Most important of all, if we understood more about what was happening, would it be possible to enhance people’s luck?” pg. 20


Principle One: Maximize Your Chance Opportunities
Lucky people create, notice and act upon the chance opportunities in their life.

Sub-Principle One: Lucky people build and maintain a strong ‘network of luck’

“Joseph, a 35-year old mature student, has also encountered life-changing chance opportunities in his life. When he was young he found it very difficult to settle down in school, and was in constant trouble with the police. By his late twenties he had drifted in and out of prison for several minor offenses, and from one job to another. Then a chance encounter changed his life. He was travelling on a train when it got stuck between two stations. Joseph became bored and struck up a conversation with the woman sitting next to him. She was a psychologist and the two of them started to talk about Joseph’s life, and he began to confess to some of his self-destructive tendencies. The woman was impressed with his insight and social skills, and suggested that he would make an excellent psychologist. As the train pulled into the station the two of them parted company, but the women’s idea stuck in Joseph’s mind. He looked into the type of training and qualifications he would need to become a psychologist. He eventually made the decision to change his entire lifestyle and go to college. He is currently studying psychology at university and will graduate next year. Joseph told me ‘I’ve learned that if you initiate conversation with people you can get a lot out of it-to me, it improves my luck immensely.’ Pg. 43

“The differences between the lucky and unlucky people were dramatic. The lucky people smiled twice as much as unlucky people and engaged in far more eye contact.” Pg.44

“Lucky people are effective at building secure, and long lasting attachments with the people that they meet. They are easy to get to know and most people like them. They tend to be trusting and form close relationships with others. As a result, they often keep in touch with a much larger number of friends and colleagues than unlucky people, and time and time again, this network of friends helps promote opportunity in their lives.” Pg. 45

Sub-principle Two: Lucky people have a relaxed attitude towards life

“Lucky people’s ability to notice opportunities is a result of their relaxed way of looking at the world. It is not that they expect to find certain opportunities, but rather that they notice them when they come across them.” Pg. 53

“But being relaxed does not just help lucky people notice money in the street, or spot helpful items in newspapers, magazines and on the radio. Exactly the same principle applies when they meet and chat with other people. They do not go to parties and meetings trying hard to find their dream partners or someone will offer them their perfect job. Instead, they are simply relaxed and therefore more attuned to the opportunities around them.” Pg. 54


Sub-Principle Three: Lucky people are open to new experiences in their lives


“When it comes to holidays, we never book up, we just fly on the spur of the moment and get a hotel when we get there.” Pg. 58

“If you told me to go to the same store every single week and pick up the same thirty items, exactly the same, that would drive me mad. I have to go to one store one week, another the next week and a third the week after that.” Pg. 58

“Many of my lucky participants went to considerable lengths to introduce variety and change into their lives.” Pg. 58

“Imagine living in the center of a large apple orchard. Each day you have to venture out into the orchard and collect a large basket of apples. The first few times it won’t matter where you decide to visit. All parts of the orchard will have apples and so you will be able to find them wherever you go. But as time goes on it will become more and more difficult to find apples in the places that you have visited before. And the more you return to the same locations, the harder it will be to find apples there. But if you decide to go always to parts of the orchard that you have never visited before, or even randomly decide where to go, your chances of finding apples will be massively increased.” Pg. 59

Principle Two: Listen to Your Lucky Hunches

Lucky people make successful decisions by using their intuition and gut feelings


“When I asked lucky and unlucky people what was behind their successful and unsuccessful decisions they had very little idea how to explain their consistent good and bad luck. Lucky people simply knew when a decision was right. In contrast, unlucky people viewed many of their poor decisions as yet more evidence of how they were always destined to fail. I undertook research to discover why lucky people’s decisions led to so much success and happiness that those of unlucky people. The results were to show the remarkable abilities of our subconscious minds.” Pg. 71


Sub-Principle 1: Lucky people listen to their gut feelings and hunches.
“Lucky people’s intuition, gut feelings and hunches can play a massively important role in their lives. In fact, sometimes they may have made the difference between life and death.” Pg. 81

“A few years ago I was asked to speak at a business conference being held by a large bank. The timing of the talk meant that I had to stay overnight in the hotel attached to the conference center. When I booked in, the clerk behind the desk asked to take an imprint of my credit card to pay for the room. I have been in this situation hundreds of times before and usually hand over my card without really thinking about it, but this time I suddenly felt uneasy about the situation. I had no idea why I felt so uncomfortable, but I was simply reluctant about handing over the card. In fact, the intensity of the feeling was such that I took the very unusual step of paying for the room using a check. The following day I gave my talk and returned home. It turns out that the employee at the conference hotel had recently been arrested for his part in a large-scale credit card fraud.” Pg. 85


Sub-Principle 2: Lucky people take steps to boost their intuition.


Lucky people use the following techniques to boost their intuition:
1) Meditation
2) Return to the problem later
3) Clearing the mind
4) Finding a quiet place

Principle Three: Expect Good Fortune
Lucky people’s expectations about the future help them fulfill dreams and ambitions

“My research revealed that lucky people do not achieve their dreams and ambitions purely by chance. Nor does fate conspire to prevent unlucky people from obtaining what they want. Instead, lucky and unlucky people achieve, or fail to achieve, their ambitions because of a fundamental difference in how they think about both themselves and their lives.” Pg. 98


Sub-Principle 1: Lucky people expect their good luck to continue in the future


“I always go into things believing they’ll work out well. I am convinced that everything will be great. I’ve certainly come unstuck, but even then, good things come out of the bad and I always come out smiling. Some people don’t realize their luck when it is there. They look out the window and say ‘Oh dear, it is raining today,’ but I see the rain and think ‘Great, my flowers will be out tomorrow.’” Pg. 106

“Lucky and unlucky people have amazingly different expectations about the future. These expectations play an absolutely vital role in explaining why one group obtains their dreams with uncanny ease, whilst the other group rarely get what they want from life.” Pg. 107

“Lucky people are convinced that unpredictable and uncontrollable events will consistently work out for them. Unlucky people are the opposite: events within and outside their control will always work against them.” Pg. 107

“Unlucky people are convinced that any good luck that does happen to them will soon fade away, and that their future will continue to be bleak and miserable. Lucky people dismiss any unlucky events in their lives as short lived and transitory. In doing so, they are able to maintain their expectations of a bright and happy future.” Pg. 108

“What impact do these unusual and extreme expectations have on people’s lives? Our expectations have a powerful effect on the way in which we think, feel and act. They can influence our health, how we behave towards others and how others behave towards others. My research revealed that the special kind of expectations held by lucky and unlucky people had a huge impact on their lives.” Pg. 108

“Imagine that you are feeling a bit down because you have just moved to a new neighborhood and are finding it difficult to meet people. Just for fun, you decide to go along to the local fortune teller to find out what the future holds for you. The fortune teller takes your money, gazes into her crystal ball, smiles and says that the future looks bright. She says that within a few months you will be surrounded by many close and loyal friends. You are reassured by the fortune teller’s comments and walk away feeling happier than when you arrived. Because you now feel happy and confident about the future, you smile more, go out more and chat to more people. In short, you start to behave in a way that greatly increases your chances of making friends. After a few weeks you find that you are indeed surrounded by a close circle of friends and frequently recommend the fortune teller to others. In fact, it is quite possible that the fortune teller did not actually see into the future but instead actually helped to create it. Her comments affected your expectations about your social life and this, in turn, caused you to behave in a way that increased the chances of these expectations becoming a reality. Your expectations became a self-fulfilling prophecy.” Pg. 109

“Self-fulfilling prophecies so not just affect children’s levels of attainment at school. They affect our health, how we behave in the workplace, how we behave with others and how others respond to us.” Pg. 110


Sub-Principle 2: Lucky people attempt to achieve their goals, even if their chances of success seem slim, and persevere in the face of failure

“I just know that in the end everything will be okay. I know that I will win the lottery. I may not win $10 million, but I know I will get something significant. But you do have to try. If you don’t buy a ticket then you are not going to win. It’s the same in other aspects of your life. If you expect to be lucky, you will be lucky. It’s a state of mind. My mother and father were a great influence on me-I grew up to believe that you can do whatever you want if you believe in yourself enough and are positive.” Pg. 117

“Marvin’s persistence has certainly paid off. Despite his failing his woodwork exams at school, he applied for a job as a carpenter in a large shipyard. Marvin went along to the interview full of energy and hope. The interviewer was won over by his enthusiasm and offered him the job. Later on in his life he decided that he wanted to work as a private detective. Despite having no formal training or experience, he wrote to all the private detective agencies in the area, but didn’t even get one reply. Instead of giving up, Marvin put on his best suit, and went to visit the offices of one of the largest agencies in the region. The head of the company just happened to be standing in the foyer when Marvin walked in, and the two of them started chatting. The man liked Marvin and offered him a job with the company. A few hours later, Marvin walked away with headed stationary, business cards and his dream job.” Pg. 117

“Lucky people expected things to work out well and so were much more likely to attempt to achieve their goals, well and so were much more likely to attempt to achieve their goals, even if the chances of success were slim, and were far more likely to persevere. These differences actually caused many of the apparently lucky and unlucky events in their lives. They could make the difference between whether they won or lost competitions, passed or failed important examinations and succeeded or failed to find loving partners.” Pg. 119


Sub-Principle 3: Lucky people expect their interactions with others to be lucky and successful


“Lucky people expect to meet people who are interesting, happy, and fun to be with.” Pg. 120

“If I want something, I dream it through. I used to do that in business when I was doing competitions in sales. I would dream that I was winning them and receiving the prizes. I’d find myself in bed at night dream wishing. It could be six months ahead to the final outcome; I would still dream it through. I plan telephone calls even before I pick up the receiver. I sit down and I even focus on the person I will be speaking to being positive towards me. Whether I know the person or not, I’m still thinking and trying to imagine him or her saying the right things to me. At a lot of training courses I mentioned dream wishing and people laughed and probably thought I was mad! But when I tried it, all of a sudden sales figures started increasing, so I just kept doing it. I’ve had many good reactions, and been so successful, that I am certain there is something to it.” Pg. 123

“It’s odd. Things have always worked out for me. It’s wonderful because I know that, anywhere I go, I can always get a job and a place to live, because it always just happens for me like that. It’s given me an amazing amount of confidence and ability to travel. Anywhere I go into I’ll be able to get a job. Every job I’ve ever had, from the first one when I was sixteen, I’ve just walked in and been hired immediately.” Pg. 124

“Lucky people have very positive expectations about the future. They expect to be lucky in all areas of their life, and in situations that are both within and outside their control. These expectations have a major impact on lucky people’s lives-they have the power to become self-fulfilling prophecies and make dreams come true.” Pg. 128

“During my research, lucky people often spoke about how they visualize themselves experiencing good fortune.” Pg. 132

Principle Four: Turn Your Bad Luck into Good
Lucky people are able to transform their bad luck into good fortune

“In Japan, there is a common good luck charm called a Daruma Doll. It is named after a Buddhist monk, who according to legend, sat so long in meditation that his arms and legs disappeared. The Daruma Doll is egg shaped with a heavy, rounded bottom. When you knock it over it always stands back up. Lucky people are similar to the Daruma Doll. It is not that they never encounter ill fortune, but rather, when bad luck happens, lucky people are able to stand straight back up. The secret of lucky people’s ability to turn bad luck into good lies in four techniques. Together, these form an almost invincible shield that guards lucky people against the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune.” Pg.134


Sub-Principle 1: Lucky people see the positive side of their bad luck.


“The different way in which lucky people and unlucky people looked at the ill fortune in their lives emerged in many of their interviews. Agnes, an artist from Scotland, has a very happy family life and has been lucky throughout her career. Agnes has come face to face with death on several occasions throughout her life. Amazingly, Agnes hasn’t let this lifetime of deadly accidents and injuries get her down. Instead, her spontaneous ability to imagine how each of the situations could have been much worse has helped keep her spirits high and see herself as a lucky person.” Pg. 140

“Lucky people tend to lessen the impact of their ill fortune by comparing themselves to people who have been unluckier than themselves.” Pg. 142


Sub-Principle 2: Lucky people are convinced that any ill-fortune in their life will, in the long run, work out for the best

“There is an ancient parable about a wise farmer who realized that many of the seemingly unlucky events in our lives often have an uncanny way of turning out to be lucky in the long run. One day, the farmer was out riding when his horse suddenly threw him to the ground. The farmer landed badly and broke his leg. A few days later his neighbor came to commiserate with him on his bad luck, but the farmer replied ‘How do you know that this is bad luck?” A week later, people in the village were due to hold a special festival, but the farmer was unable to attend the celebrations because of his broken leg. Once again, his neighbor expressed some sympathy for his misfortune and said, once again, the farmer replied ‘How do you know that this is bad luck?’ There was a terrible fire at the festival and many people died. The neighbor realized that the farmer’s run of apparent ill fortune had helped save his life, and that the farmer had been right to question whether these events had been unlucky.” Pg. 143


Sub-Principle 3: Lucky people do not dwell on their ill fortune


“Unlucky people tend to dwell on the bad luck in their lives. As one unlucky person put it: ‘It’s almost as though I have had a curse put on me. There have been times when I don’t know where to turn. I have lost a lot of sleep worrying about everything that has gone wrong, even though I can’t do anything about it. I wonder what I have done that is so bad to deserve this.” Lucky people do the opposite. They let go of the past and focus on the future.” Pg. 145

“I think meditation helps me to get a better perspective on life. You can switch off, calm down and when you wake up de-stressed, you take a different view on things. It makes you realize that if you can’t change a situation then there’s no point in getting stressed. If you can take some action and do something about it, then do it; but if there’s nothing you can do-like if you’re sitting in traffic on the motorway-then you might as well forget about it and calm down.” Pg. 145-146

“I used to go to Buddhist meditation and that was really helpful. I learnt to just let things go if something wasn’t right or was bothering me. You just have to put it behind you as an experience that hasn’t been good and then try not to worry about it. I find that very easy to do; I don’t dwell on stuff.” Pg. 146

“I very rarely worry about the past. Instead, I look for the treasure in the mountain of trash and very rarely get bogged down into the negative aspects of things. I normally focus on what’s good about this situation and how I can benefit from it.” Pg. 147

“Research has shown that when people dwell on the negative events in their lives they start to feel sad. When people concentrate on positive events from their past, they feel much happier.” Pg. 147

“When facing problems, lucky people tend to describe how they would persevere rather than give up, how they would treat these kinds of experiences as opportunities to learn from past mistakes, and how they would explore novel and more constructive ways of solving the problem, such as consulting experts and engaging in lateral thinking.” Pg. 148


Sub-Principle 4: Lucky people take constructive steps to prevent more bad luck in the future

“After imagining going on three failed dates, one lucky person explained how they would persevere: ‘I’d try, try, and try again. Don’t be deterred, go for it. You can’t just give up that easy. Life’s set these little tasks for you and you’ve just got to see them through.” Pg. 150

After imagining going on three failed job interviews, another wrote: ‘I’d just shrug my shoulders and carry on. I think probably the same day I’d write off to more places, so I felt that I was doing something positive.” Pg. 150

“So, lucky people persist, and have more constructive responses, in the face of failure.” Pg. 151


Take these five steps to solve a difficult problem:

One: First, don’t assume that there is nothing you can do about the situation. Make a decision to take control and not be a victim of bad luck.

Two: Do something now-not next week and not tomorrow, but right now.

Three: Make a list of all your various options. Be creative. Think out of the box. Try looking at the situation from different points of view. Brainstorm. Come up with as many potential solutions as possible, no matter how silly or absurd they may seem. Ask your friends what they would do under the same circumstances. Keep on adding more and more possible solutions.

Fourth: Decide how you are going to move forward. Consider each and every possible solution. How long will the solution take? Do you have the knowledge and skills to implement the solution? What are the likely outcomes if you decide to adopt a particular solution?

Fifth: Finally, and most important of all, start to solve the problem. Obviously, sometimes the solution might involve waiting rather than rushing to do something foolhardy-that’s fine, providing your inaction is part of a plan and not simple procrastination. Also, be prepared to adapt your solution as the future unfolds. Such self-restraint and flexibility are important aspects of being lucky. But the important point is that you start to concentrate on finding a solution rather than fixating on the problem.” Pg. 167


Oh, just last thing I gotta get in before I close this blog, I have a feeling I'm gonna piss off
some people. But I don't care. So here goes with my closing thought. If you become a fervent, spirit-filled Christian (or Messianic believer, whichever term you find most apt), you will automatically fulfill all of the conditions needed to attract luck. So good luck and G-d bless!

Saturday, May 14, 2011

Thought for the Day

If Lehman Brothers can go broke, then anybody can.
- Anonymous

Tuesday, May 10, 2011

iPrinciple Seven-Master the Message

1) Tell your story early and often. Make communication a cornerstone of your brand every day.

2) Make your brand story consistent across all platforms: presentations, website, advertising, marketing materials, social media.

3) Think differently about your presentation style. Study Steve Jobs, read design books, and pay attention to awe-inspiring presentations and what makes them different from the average PowerPoint show. Everyone has room to raise the bar on delivering presentations, but rising to the challenge requires a dedicated commitment to improve and an open mind.

Taken from "The Innovation Secrets of Steve Jobs", ISBN: 978-0-07-174875-9

iPrinciple Seven-Master the Message

1) Watch a Steve Jobs presentation. Visit YouTube and search for "Steve Jobs+keynote."

2) Read The Presentation Secrets of Steve Jobs for a more thorough discussion of Job's communication skills.

3) Have a story to tell before opening PowerPoint or Keynote (Apple presentation software).

Taken from "The Innovation Secrets of Steve Jobs", ISBN: 978-0-07-174875-9

iPrinciple Six (continued)-Create Insanely Great Experiences

1) Look outside of your industry for ideas on how to stand out from your competitors.

2) Hire for cultural fit, and train everyone to be an expert in that "culture."

3) Have fun. Passion is contagious. If your employees aren't having fun, your customers won't be either.

Taken from "The Innovation Secrets of Steve Jobs", ISBN: 978-0-07-174875-9

iPrinciple Six-Create Insanely Great Experiences

1) Don't move products. Enrich lives instead.

2) Carefully review each customer touch point with your brand. Take every opportunity to create a deeper, more lasting relationship with customers.

3) Visit an Apple Store whether you want to buy an Apple product or not. Take note of the store design and the customer service experience. Are their techniques you can adopt to improve the customer experience with your brand?

Taken from "The Innovation Secrets of Steve Jobs", ISBN: 978-0-07-174875-9

iPrinciple Five (continued)-Say No to 1,000 Things

1) Ask yourself, "What is the deepest reason that people buy my product?" The answer should become your product's focus. Anything that detracts from that focus should be eliminated.

2). Review everything about your product or service from the perspective of your customer. Ask yourself, "What is the one thing our customers come to us for?". Make it easy for your customers to do or find the one right thing. Look at everything-the product, the packaging, the website, the instruction manuals, the communications. Everything. Is it cluttered and confusing or simple and elegant?

3). As a New Year's resolution-or anytime during the year-create a "stop doing" list. Cut down on the time you spend on projects or tasks that do not advance your purpose and fulfill your passion.

Taken from "The Innovation Secrets of Steve Jobs", ISBN: 978-0-07-174875-9

iPrinciple Five- Say No to 1,000 Things

1) Do you spread yourself too thin? Focus on those areas where you excel. Delegate the rest.

2) Apply the rule of three to your task list. Spend the majority of your time on the top three things you can do today to move your company forward.

3) Start saying "no" more often. It can be incredibly liberating.

Taken from "The Innovation Secrets of Steve Jobs", ISBN: 978-0-07-174875-9

iPrinciple Four (continued)- Sell Dreams, Not Products

1) When it come to your customers, it's not about you; it's about them. Your customers don't care about you; they care about their dreams. They are asking themselves, "How will this product or service make my life better?" Help them fulfill their dreams and watch your sales soar.

2) Be your own focus group. No outside focus group will give you the green light to develop breakthrough innovation.

3) Listening to your customer is not as valuable as knowing your customer. Maintain a pixel-level obsession with every aspect of the customer experience.

Taken from "The Innovation Secrets of Steve Jobs", ISBN: 978-0-07-174875-9

iPrinciple Four- Sell Dreams, Not Products

1) Commit yourself to excellence in every aspect of your business.

2) Demand excellence of others.

3) Challenge yourself and everyone on your team to make customer experience a priority.

Taken from "The Innovation Secrets of Steve Jobs", ISBN: 978-0-07-174875-9

Monday, May 9, 2011

iPrinciple Three (continued)- Kick Start Your Brain

1) Spend fifteen minutes a day asking questions that challenge the status quo. Instead of asking "How," use questions that begin with "Why" and "What if."

2) Seek out new experiences. If you typically read nonfiction texts, read a fiction book. If you usually choose business publications from the magazine stand, visit another category once in a while, such as home and gardening or arts and antiques. Attend conferences outside of your industry. Volunteer for local events that have nothing to do with your job. Take every opportunity to travel. Researchers have documented that the more countries a person has lived in, the more likely the person is to leverage that experience tom create innovative ideas, processes, or methods.

3) Hire outside of conventional norms. Recall what Steve Jobs said about the people who designed and marketed the original Macintosh. The team was successful because it included musicians, artists, poets, and scientists. Organizational psychologists have discovered that the most creative teams are diverse, composed of people with vastly different, but complementary, talents, skills, and experiences." pg.102

Taken from "The Innovation Secrets of Steve Jobs", ISBN: 978-0-07-174875-9

iPrinciple Three-Kick-Start Your Brain

1) Use analogies or metaphors to think about a problem. By finding the similarities between two things that are unalike, your brain makes new and sometimes profound connections.

2) Leave your comfort zone from time to time. Doing so is critical form the creative process to thrive.

3) Don't live in fear of the new. Embrace change. Embrace diversity of opinion and experience.

Taken from "The Innovation Secrets of Steve Jobs", ISBN: 978-0-07-174875-9

iPrinciple Two (continued)- Put a Dent in the Universe

1) Give yourself permission to dream big. Create a vision for your brand that inspires you to get up every morning. Develop a noble purpose that gives your life meaning. Chances are it will inspire your team as well.

2) Put your vision to the test. Make it bold, specific, concise, and consistent. Make sure your vision fits easily in a Twitter post of 140 characters or fewer.

3) See yourself having already accomplished your vision, regardless of how far it is in the future. Passion is the fuel that gives you energy tomreach your dreams, but vision provides the map.

Taken from "The Innovation Secrets of Steve Jobs", ISBN: 978-0-07-174875-9

iPrinciple Two-Put a Dent in the Universe

1) Never underestimate the power of a bold vision to move society forward.

2) Does your company or cause have a bold, specific, concise, and consistent vision that everyone on your team can internalize? If not, it's time you got one.

3) Do you know someone who has motivated others by communicating a big vision for his or her company or initiative? Pay attention to how such people incorporate that vision.

Taken from "The Innovation Secrets of Steve Jobs", ISBN: 978-0-07-174875-9

iPrinicple One (continued)-Do What You Love

1) Do what you love. Keep looking. Don't settle.

2) If you're an employee stuck in a job you hate, take steps today, even small ones, to find a position or company more compatible with your skills and true calling. You will never be inspired enough to create exciting innovations if you are not passionate about your role.

3) If you manage a team in a large corporation, develop intra-preneurs, giving people the time, resources, and encouragement to follow their passions and develop new ideas and, above all, the confidence to risk failure.

Taken from "The Innovation Secrets of Steve Jobs", ISBN: 978-0-07-174875-9

iPrinciple One-Do What You Love

1) What people do you know who have followed a passion? Study them. Are they coming up with unique and creative ideas? Do they seem to have more energy, enthusiasm, and excitement than others? Talk to them. You may get some insights on how they made a transition from working at something that didn't engage them to doing what they love.

2) Do you have interests outside of what you do for a living? If so, explore them. You may be surprised at how you can translate those passions into financial success.

3) Try something new this year. Take a course, read a book, or attend a conference that has nothing to do with your job.

Taken from "The Innovation Secrets of Steve Jobs", ISBN: 978-0-07-174875-9

Steve Jobs Dishes It Out!!!

The Financial Times (the pink-colored paper) just reported today (May 9th, 2011) that Apple Computer has overtaken Google to become the world’s most valuable brand with an estimated brand value of more than $153bn. This can largely be attributed to the explosive success of both the iphone and ipad. I myself own both of these products and I have to say they are ingenious. Absolutely addicting. I wouldn’t go so far as to say they’ve changed my life, but without these gadgets close at hand, I feel somewhat naked. That’s the genius of Steve Jobs. I don’t know how he does it but he’s got a real knack for inventing products out of thin air that once people got a hold of wonder how they could have done without them in the first place. Let’s take a peek into the mind of man who has revolutionized the way all of us work and play. These quotes are taken from “The Innovation Secrets of Steve Jobs”, ISBN 978-0-07-174875-9.

“Innovation distinguishes between a leader and a follower.” Pg. 1


"Some people aren't used to an environment where excellence is expected." pg. 67

"We may not know how we're going to do it, but we will figure it out.". Pg. 67

On the innovation process
“We don’t think, let’s take a class! Here are the five rules of innovation; let’s put them up all over the company! It’s like somebody who’s not cool trying to be cool. It’s painful to watch…It’s like watching Michael Dell try to dance. Painful.” Pg. 1

“You can tell a lot about a person by who his or her heroes are.” Pg. 7

“Have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become.” Pg. 13


On dropping out of college
“After six months, I couldn’t see the value in it. I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life and no idea how college was going to help me figure it out. And here I was spending all of the money my parents had saved their entire life. So I decided to drop out and trust that it would all work out OK.” Pg. 15

“The minute I dropped out I could stop taking the required classes that didn’t interest me, and begin dropping in on the ones that looked interesting.” Pg. 16

“None of this (calligraphy) had even a hope of any practical application in my life. But ten years later, when we were designing the first Macintosh computer, it all came back to me. And we designed it all into the Mac. It was the first computer with beautiful typography. If I had never dropped in on that single course in college, the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts. And since Windows just copied Mac, it’s likely that no personal computer would have them. If I had never dropped out, I would have never dropped in on this calligraphy class, and personal computers might not have the wonderful typography that they do.” Pg. 17

“The only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. The only way to do great work is to love what you do.” Pg. 18

“These Heathkits would come with detailed manuals about how to put this thing together, and all the parts would be laid out in a certain way and color coded. You’d actually build this thing yourself. I would say that this gave one several things. It gave one an understanding of what was inside a finished product and how it worked because it would include a theory of operation, but even more importantly, it gave one the sense that one could build the things that one saw around oneself in the universe. These things were not mysteries anymore. I mean, you looked at a television set, you would think, “I haven’t built one of those, but I could. My childhood was very fortunate in that way.” Pg. 19

“I think you should go get a job as a busboy or something until you find something you’re really passionate about because it’s a lot of work. I’m convinced that about half of what separates successful entrepreneurs from the nonsuccessful ones is pure perseverance. It is so hard. You put so much of your life into this thing. There are such rough moments in time that I think most people give up. I don’t blame them. It’s really tough and it consumes your life. If you’ve got a family and you’re in the early days of your company, I can’t imagine how one could do it. I’m sure it’s been done, but it’s rough. It’s pretty much an eighteen hour day job, seven days a week for a while. Unless you have a lot of passion about this, you’re not going to survive. You’re going to give up. So you’ve got to have an idea, or a problem or a wrong that you want to write that you’re passionate about, otherwise you’re not going to have the perseverance to stick it through. I think that’s half the battle right there.” Pg. 20-21

“You’re work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle. As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don’t settle.” Pg. 21

“I never did it for the money. Being the richest man in the cemetery doesn’t matter to me. Going to bed at night saying we’ve done something wonderful-that’s what matters to me.” Pg. 22

“I was lucky to get into computers when it was a very young and idealistic industry. There weren’t many degrees offered in computer science, so people in computers were brilliant people from mathematics, physics, music, zoology, whatever. They loved it, and no one was really into it for the money.” Pg. 38

“The Macintosh team was what is commonly known as intrapreneurship-only a few years before the term was coined-a group of people going, in essence, back to the garage, but in a large company.” Pg. 39

“We’re gambling on our vision, and we would rather do that than make “me-too” products. For us, it’s always the next dream.” Pg. 43

“We started out to get a computer in the hands of everyday people, and we succeeded beyond our wildest dreams.” Pg. 52

“I visited Xerox Parc. It was a very important visit. I remember being shown a rudimentary graphical user interface. It was incomplete, some of it wasn’t even right, but the germ of the idea was there. Within ten minutes, it was so obvious that every computer would work this way someday. You knew it with every bone in your body. Now, you could argue about who the winners and losers in terms of companies in the industry might be, but I don’t think rational people could argue that every computer would work this way someday.” Pg. 52

“These are team sports. You’re trying to climb up a mountain bringing a lot of stuff. One person can’t do it.” Pg. 56

“Innovation has nothing to do with how many R&D dollars you have. When Apple came up with the Mac, IBM was spending at least one hundred times more on R&D. It’s not about money. It’s about the people you have, how you’re led, and how much you get it.” Pg. 58

“Let’s make a dent in the universe. We’ll make it so important that it will make a dent in the universe.” Pg. 59

“Here’s what you find at a lot of companies. You know how you see a show car, and it’s really cool, and then four years later you see the production car, and it sucks? And you go, what happened? They had it! They had it in the palm of their hands! They grabbed defeat from the jaws of victory! What happened was, the designers came up with this really great idea. Then they take it to the engineers, and the engineers go, ‘Nah, we can’t do that. That’s impossible.’ And so it gets a lot worse. Then they take it to the manufacturing people, and they go, ‘We can’t build that!’ And it gets a lot worse.” Pg. 68

“Companies, as they grow to become multibillion-dollar entities, somehow lose their vision.” Pg. 74

“Creativity is just connecting things.” Pg.79

“Part of what made the Macintosh great was that the people working on it were musicians, and poets, and artists, and zoologists, and historians who also happened to be the best computer scientists in the world.” Pg. 81

“It comes down to trying to expose yourself to the best things that humans have done and then try to bring those things in to what you’re what you’re doing. Picasso had a saying. He said, ‘Good artists copy, great artists steal.’ We’ve always been shameless about stealing great ideas.” Pg. 86

“I wish Bill Gates the best, I really do. I just think he and Microsoft are a bit narrow. He’d be a broader guy if he had dropped acid once or gone off to an ashram when he was younger.” Pg. 89

“Since 1979 Apple has invested millions of dollars and thousands of man-hours in the development of a consistent user interface that will take the crank out of the personal computer…The philosophy behind the Macintosh is very simple: in order for a personal computer to become a truly mass-market commodity, it will have to be functional, inexpensive, very friendly, and easy to use. Macintosh represents a significant step in the evolution of the mass-market personal computer. Macintosh is Apple’s crankless Volkswagen, affordable to the quality conscious.” Pg. 90

“We, too, are going to think differently and serve the people who have been buying our products since the beginning. Because a lot of times people think they’re crazy, but in that craziness we see genius.” Pg. 103

“The only consultants I’ve ever hired in my 10 years is one firm to analyze Gateway’s retail strategy so I would not make some of the same mistakes (when launching Apple’s retail stores) they made. But we never hire consultants per se. We just want to make great products.” Pg. 111

“It’s not about pop culture and it’s not about fooling people, and it’s not about convincing people that they want something they don’t. We figure out what we want. And I think we’re pretty good at having the right discipline to think through whether a lot of other people are going to want it, too. That’s what we get paid to do. So you can’t go out and ask people, you know, what’s the next big thing? There’s a great quote by Henry Ford, right? He said, ‘If I’d have asked my customers what they wanted, they would have told me ‘a faster horse,’’”

“Apple invented FireWire, and we ship FireWire on every computer we make. It’s built into iPod. It’s the fastest and only music player with FireWire. Why? Because it’s fast. You can download an entire CD onto an iPod in five to ten seconds. Let’s take a look at how it compares to USB. Five to ten seconds to load an entire CD with FireWire. On a USB, you’re talking five minutes. Let’s talk about one thousand songs. On iPod with FireWire it is under ten minutes, on a USB player it is five hours. Can you imagine? You’ve got to watch it for five hours as it loads the songs. Under ten minutes with iPod. It’s thirty times faster than any other MP3 player.” Pg. 114

“How much is ninety-nine cents? How many of you had a Starbucks latte this morning? That’s three bucks. You could have bought three songs. And think about how many lattes are being sold around the world today. Now let’s look at the downsides again. What does it mean to have unreliable downloads or encoding? Here is a typical scenario. You go to Kazaa to find one song. You never find one song; you find fifty to sixty of them. And you’ve got to pick which one of those is going to give you a reliable download. You often pick wrong. The download is as slow as molasses and craps out halfway through. You try again and get the same result. After a few times, you finally download the song, only to find the last four seconds is cut off, or it has a glitch in the middle, or it was encoded by someone who didn’t know what they were doing and it sounds bad. You try again and again, and after fifteen minutes you finally succeed in getting a clean version of the song you want. What that means is you’ll spend an hour to get four songs that you can get at under four bucks from Apple. That means you’re working for under minimum wage! In addition, you are stealing.” Pg. 116

“The most advanced phones are called ‘smartphones,’ so they say. They typically combine a phone plus e-mail plus a baby Internet. The problem is they are not so smart and they are not so easy to use…They’re really complicated…What we want is to make a leapfrog product that is way smarter than any mobile device has ever been and supereasy to use. This is what iPhone is…” pg. 118

“It was a great challenge. Let’s make a great phone that we fall in love with. And we’ve got the technology. We’ve got the miniaturization from the iPod. We’ve got the sophisticated operating system from Mac. Nobody had ever thought about putting operating systems as sophisticated as OS X inside a phone, so that was a real question. We had a big debate inside the company whether we could do that or not. And that was one where I had to adjudicate it and say, ‘We’re going to do it.’ The smartest software guys were saying they can do it, so let’s give them a shot. And they did.” pg. 119

“Most of us use laptops and a smartphone. A question has arisen, is there room for a third category of device in the middle? Something in between a laptop and a smartphone? We’ve pondered this question for years. The bar is pretty high. In order to create a new category of devices, those devices are going to have to be far better at doing some key tasks, better than the laptop and better than the smartphone. What kinds of tasks? Things like browsing the Web. That’s a pretty tall order. Doing e-mail. Enjoying and sharing photographs. Watching videos. Enjoying your music collection. Playing games. Reading e-books. If there’s going to be a third category of device, it’s going to have to be better at these kinds of tasks than either a laptop or smartphone; otherwise it has no reason for being.” Pg. 121
“Let’s go invent tomorrow instead of wondering about what happened yesterday.” Pg. 121

“I’m as proud of what we don’t do as I am of what we do.” pg. 135

“When we got to the company a year ago, there were fifteen product platforms and a zillion variants of each one. After three weeks, I said, ‘How are we going to recommend these products to others when we don’t even know what products to recommend to our friends?’ So, we went back to business school 101 and asked, ‘What do people want?’ Well, they want two kinds of products: consumer and professional. In each of those two categories we need desktop and portable models. If we had four great products, that’s all we need. As a matter of fact, if we only had four, we could put the A-team on every single one of them. And if we only had four, we could turn them all every nine months instead of every eighteen months. And if we only had four, we could be working on the next generation of each one as we’re introducing the first generation. That’s what we decided to do, to focus on four great products.” Pg. 139

“Process makes you more efficient. But innovation comes from people meeting up in the hallways or calling each other at 10:30 at night with a new idea, or because they realized something that shoots holes in how we’ve been thinking about a problem. It’s ad hoc meetings of six people called by someone who thinks he has figured out the coolest new thing ever and who wants to know what other people think of his idea. And it comes from saying no to 1,000 things to make sure we don’t get on the wrong track or try to do too much. We’re always thinking about new markets we could enter, but it’s only by saying no that you can concentrate on the things that are really important.” Pg. 139

On iPod’s simplicity,
“Plug it in, Whirrrrr. Done.” pg. 143

“When you start looking at a problem and it seems really simple with all these simple solutions, you don’t really understand the complexity of the problem. And your solutions are way too oversimplified and they don’t work. Then you get into the problem and see that it’s really complicated. And you come up with all these convoluted solutions. That’s sort of the middle and that’s where most people stop, and the solutions tend to work for a while. But the really great person will keep on going and find, sort of, the key, underlying principle of the problem. And come up with a beautiful elegant solution that works.” Pg. 144

“We’re going to start with a revolutionary user interface. Why? Here are four smartphones. What’s wrong with their user interfaces? The problem with them is in the bottom forty. They all have keyboards that are there whether or not you need them to be there. And they all have these control buttons that are fixed in plastic and are the same for every application. Well, every application wants a slightly different user interface, a slightly optimized set of buttons just for it. What we’re going to do is get rid of all these buttons and just make a giant screen.” Pg. 146

“Certainly the great consumer electronics companies of the past had thousands of products. We tend to focus much more. People think focus means saying yes to the thing you’ve got to focus on. But that’s not what it means at all. It means saying no to the hundred other good ideas that there are. You have to pick carefully. I’m actually as proud of many of the things we haven’t done as the things we have done. The clearest example was when we were pressured for years to do a PDA, and I realized one day that 90% of the people who use a PDA only take information out of it on the road. They don’t put information into it. Pretty soon cell phones are going to do that, so the PDA market is going to get reduced to a fraction of its current size, and it won’t really be sustainable. So we decided not to get into it. If we had gotten into it, we wouldn’t have had the resources to do the iPod. We probably wouldn’t have seen it coming.” Pg. 153

“You’ve baked a really lovely cake, but then you’ve used dog shit for frosting.” Pg. 197

“Every morning I look at myself in the mirror and ask myself, ‘If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?’ If the answer is ‘no’ for too many days in a row, I know it’s time to change something.” Pg. 222

Friday, May 6, 2011

How My Mother and Father Conquered Worry-By Dale Carnegie

As I have said, I was brought up on a Missouri farm. Like most farmers of that day, my parents had pretty hard scratching. My mother had been a country school teacher and my father had been a farm hand working for twelve dollars a month. Mother made not only my clothes, but also the soap with which we washed our clothes.

We rarely had any cash-except once a year when we sold our hogs. We traded our butter and eggs at the grocery store for flour, sugar, coffee. When I was twelve years old, I didn't have as much as fifty cents a year to spend on myself. I can still remember the day we went to a Fourth of July celebration and father gave me ten cents to spend as I wished. I felt the wealth of the Indies was mine.

I walked a mile to attend a one-room country school. I walked when the snow was deep and the thermometer shivered around twenty-eight degrees below zero. Until I was fourteen, I never had any rubbers or overshoes. During the long, cold winters, my feet were always wet and cold. As a child I never dreamed that anyone had dry, warm feet during the winter.

My parents slaves sixteen hours a day, yet we constantly were oppressed by debts and harassed by hard luck. One of my earliest memories is watching the flood waters of the 102 River rolling over our corn and hayfields, destroying everything. The floods destroyed our crops six years out of seven. Year after year, our hogs died of cholera and we burned them. I can close my eyes now and recall the pungent odor of burning hog flesh.

One year, the floods didn't come. We raised a bumper corn crop, bought feed cattle, and fattened them with our corn. But the floods might just as well have drowned our corn that year, for the price of fat cattle fell on the Chicago market; and after feeding and fattening the cattle, we got only thirty dollars more for them than what we had paid for them. Thirty dollars for a whole year's work!

No matter what we did we lost money. I can still remember the mule colts that my father bought. We fed them for three years, hired men to break them, then shipped them to Memphis, Tennessee-and sold them for less than what we had paid for them previously.

After ten years of hard, grueling work, we were not only penniless; we were heavily in debt. Our farm was mortgaged. Try as hard as we might, we couldn't even pay the interest on the mortgage. The bank that held the mortgage abused and insulted my father and threatened to take his farm away from him. Father was forty-seven years old. After more than thirty years of hard work, he had nothing but debts and humiliation. It was more than he could take. He worried. His health broke. He had no desire for food; in spite of the hard physical labor he was doing in the field all day, he had to take medicine to give him an appetite. He lost flesh. The doctor told my mother that he would be dead within six months. Father was so worried that he no longer wanted to live. I have often heard my mother say that when Father went to the barn to feed the horses and milk the cows, and didn't come back as soon as she expected, she would go out to the barn, fearing that she would find his body dangling from the end of a rope. One day as he returned home from Maryville, where the banker had threatened to foreclose the mortgage, he stopped his horses on a bridge crossing the 102 River, got off the wagon, and stood for a long time looking down at the water, debating with himself whether he should jump in and end it all.

Years later, Father told me that the only reason he didn't jump was because of my mother's deep, abiding, and joyous belief that if we loved God and kept His commandments everything would come out all right. Mother was right. Everything did come out all right in the end. Father lived forty-two happy years longer, and died in 1941, at the age of eighty-nine.

During all those years of struggle and heartache, my mother never worried. She took all of her troubles to God in prayer. Every night before we went to bed, Mother would read a chapter from the Bible; frequently Mother or Father would read these comforting words of Jesus: "In my father's house are many mansions...I go to prepare a place for you...that where I am, there ye may be also.". Then we all knelt down in that lonely Missouri farmhouse for God's love and protection. (Taken from How to Stop Worrying and Start Living, By Dale Carnegie, pg. 189-191)

Thursday, May 5, 2011

Thought for the Day

I've known a lot of rich people who weren't living rich lives. They may have had a lot of money, but they weren't happy; they weren't fulfilled. A good friend of mine says,"No matter how much money I make, I just never seem to be happy.". That's because he's attaching happiness to future financial goals rather than being happy and going out and making money today. The reason why my friend never feels satisfied, no matter how much money he makes, is that he has linked his happiness to something he will never achieve. Learning to manage your emotional state is what enables you to be successful in the largest sense of the world. So does detaching your emotional state from future outcomes. The secret to living a rich life is not attached to your bank statements, now or in the future. Authentic wealth is something you achieve right now, through the choices you make about your attitude toward what you already have in your life." -Christopher Howard, Instant Wealth

The Past is Paralyzing-Financial Times Article

Regret can be a terrible addiction. Those who suffer from it so often become bitter and full of self-pity. It is an emotion that serious entrepreneurs cannot afford: they must keep pressing onwards and should not look back with remorse, dwelling on errors of long ago.

As Alexander Graham Bell, inventor of the telephone, said: “When one door closes, another opens; but we often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door that we do not see the one which has opened for us.” Entrepreneurs must learn to manage the conflict between constant experimentation – which means lots of painful mistakes – and a fear of failure, which can lead to paralysis.

Likewise, past glory can be a killer. For example, Greg Dyke, who is a clever fellow, still harks back too much to his resignation as director-general of the BBC. He should move on and stop moaning about the injustice of it all.And Tim Waterstone should give up trying to buy back his bookshop chain, which he finally left more than 10 years ago (after selling it once and then getting involved again). He has tried to repurchase it at least five times, if rumour is to be believed. Possibly the root of the problem is that he exaggerates the chain’s importance, once saying: “Waterstone’s does more for the day-to-day cultural life of the nation than perhaps anything or anyone else.”

No doubt I suffered from a similar delusion in taking over Borders bookshops. But such thoughts were never true, and are even less so now, in the age of e-books and Amazon. Admittedly, I did try to buy back PizzaExpress once, but that was different – it would have been a sound financial deal ...

And who doesn’t have a tale of the one that got away? I remember David Dein, my predecessor as chairman of the charity Stage One, telling a wonderfully self-deprecating anecdote of his initial activities as a theatrical angel. Mr Dein, who has made a fortune investing in Arsenal football club, backed some early shows from a promising young producer called Cameron Mackintosh, and they unfortunately lost money. Finally, the apprentice impresario approached him about supporting an idea to put some of T.S. Eliot’s poems to music, on stage. Not unreasonably, Mr Dein turned it down. It became, of course, Cats, one of the most successful productions of all time, and helped make Mr Mackintosh a very rich man indeed.

One of my experiences in that vein was Transform, a leading cosmetic surgery company. It was a highly profitable undertaking, serving a booming market, and I believed the acquisition would be a real winner. I spent many weeks negotiating a deal, but then got slightly cold feet at the last minute, and fell out with the vendor over a relatively trivial sum. He immediately turned round and sold it to those astute fellows at Phoenix private equity. Inevitably, they proceeded to make a rapid fortune.

At least my mistake wasn’t as expensive as George Bell’s. He was the former documentary film-maker hired in 1996 to run Excite, the dotcom darling, which achieved a market capitalisation of $35bn at its peak. Three years later, the founders of Google decided that their search business was interfering with their studies and tried to sell it to a number of buyers, including Mr Bell, for just $750,000. He turned it down flat. Excite subsequently went bankrupt, while Google is now worth $170bn.

And it would be hard not to feel some sympathy for James Monaghan. In 1960, he teamed up with his brother Tom in the purchase of a single pizza restaurant in Michigan for $500. But later that year, he decided to go travelling, and so sold his 50 per cent share in the business to his brother in exchange for a used Volkswagen Beetle. A few years later, the company changed its name to Domino’s Pizza, and in 1998 was sold for about $1bn.
By all means treasure experience, and learn from your blunders. But don’t wallow in nostalgia, pining for what might have been. Rather, go ahead and seize the day no matter what. I have little time for those who say: I wish I had started my own business. My only response is: so do it now.

DISCLAIMER: This article was taken from The Financial Times, written by Luke Johnson, published April 19th, 2011

Stigma of failure holds back Japan start-ups (Financial Times Article)

When the seafood processing company that Kazuo Honda worked for in Japan’s western city of Nagasaki went bust, he did something vital for the future of the world’s third-largest economy: he founded another company. In setting up Nagasaki Takara Foods, Mr Honda joined the thinning ranks of Japanese willing to take on the challenge of building a business in a market suffering anaemic economic growth, declining demographics and chronic deflation. Such bold souls are unfortunately increasingly rare. Between 2007 and 2009, new company registrations fell from 95,363 to 79,902, according to Ministry of Justice data. Policymakers fret that a paucity of new companies is undermining growth and making it hard for Japan to innovate fast enough to stay competitive against China or South Korea. “There are too few start-ups, so we are considering all kinds of policies that might be used to encourage them,” says Banri Kaieda, minister for trade and industry.
Entrepreneurs could certainly do with extra encouragement. While launching a business anywhere is no picnic, Japanese start-ups face cultural, funding and regulatory hurdles much higher than counterparts in the US, for example. Not least, notes Mr Honda, is an unforgiving tradition of viewing business failure as a personal disgrace. Small company bankruptcies often involve the total ruin of their owners, with an accompanying grim toll in resulting suicides.

And the stigma means very few survivors ever get the chance to try their entrepreneurial luck again. “What’s different about Japan compared with the US is that here you only get one chance,” says Mr Honda, citing Walt Disney’s return from bankruptcy to found the US media empire that bears his name. By contrast, Japan adheres to a corporate culture more akin to the exacting code of Japan’s samurai warriors. “From olden times, if you were defeated in battle you committed seppuku [ritual suicide by slicing the belly, also known as hara-kiri],” Mr Honda says. “That’s in our genes, so people don’t try if they think they might fail.” John Roos, a former Silicon Valley lawyer who is now US ambassador to Tokyo, agrees that the social and financial costs of failure are a major restraint on the commercialisation of Japan’s formidable reserves of ingenuity. “You need to give entrepreneurs second chances,” says Mr Roos. “Disruptive technologies and new companies take a lot of risk, and if you take risks in business you are not going to succeed all the time.” Nor, Mr Roos notes, do successful Japanese entrepreneurs enjoy the adulation accorded their US counterparts. Some business founders do get a generally positive press, such as Hiroshi Mikitani, who has built Japan’s largest shopping website and started the country’s first new baseball team in 50 years. But mainstream media have tended to focus more on scandal-stained counterparts such as Takafumi Horie, a spiky-haired internet entrepreneur convicted of securities fraud in 2007. Fortunately, it was not a search for personal glory that prompted Mr Honda’s act of corporate creation. He felt a sense of responsibility for being unable to prevent the collapse of his previous company, in which he had a junior management role.

A visit to the local “Hello Work” job centre yielded no obvious opportunities. Starting a new business was unlikely to yield riches, he thought, but would at least give people jobs and help keep the money “moving around”. Now, though still engaged in a daily battle for corporate survival, Mr. Honda glows with pride when he tells visitors that he employs 30 former fellow Hello Work jobseekers at his processing plant and nearby shop. He also has some valuable suggestions for policymakers wondering how to smooth the path for other new companies in a country where venture capitalists and angel investors are rare and banks are often suspicious of start-ups. In Mr Honda’s case, a Y10m state-supplied credit guarantee and a Y20m labour ministry subsidy were crucial to setting up his business.

But he has a point when he suggests more generous support could be justified, given the contribution that new companies make to the local tax base and the outsize personal burdens shouldered by Japanese entrepreneurs. And if Japan tamed its tendency to prop up “zombie” companies – hopeless cases kept in motion by state subsidies and banks unwilling to recognise their loans are lost – then there would be more in the kitty to take a punt on new ventures. “I’d like the finance people to take on a little bit more of the risk,” as Mr Honda puts it. “If they don’t, then only fools will ever start companies.”


DISCLAIMER: This article was taken from the Financial Times, written by Mure Dickie, originally published February 22, 2011.

Bruce Lee Dishes it Out!!!

This cultural icon hardly needs an introduction, but here goes anyway. Born in 1940 in San Francisco while his father was on tour with the Cantonese Opera Company, Bruce quickly returned back to his father's native land, Hong Kong, where he spent his formative years cha-cha dancing and training in Wing Chun Kung Fu. The latter transformed him into a ferocious street fighter resulting in him getting into some serious trouble with local gangsters and the police. Sensing that Bruce was going nowhere really fast, Bruce’s father arranged to have Bruce relocated back to the United States. After a short-lived stint as a dishwasher, he started teaching Kung Fu to neighborhood college students and other wannabe-badass hopefuls. One thing led to another and after giving an impressive demonstration at a martial arts tournament, he was tapped to star in the short-lived Green Hornet TV series as the lead role’s sidekick (no pun intended). This experience solidified Bruce’s acting aspirations. However, given the inherent racism in Hollywood at the time, Bruce picked up and went to Hong Kong where he made a film for peanuts and rice titled “Fists of Fury.” Following the release of the film, Bruce's fame exploded. The rest as they say is history. Regardless of his untimely passing due to cerebral edema (swelling of the brain) in 1973, Bruce Lee has continued to serve as an inspiration for millions and has probably done more for the self-esteem of Asian-Americans than any other person since, alive or dead. Enjoy these quotes taken from “Bruce Lee Jeet Kune Do.” ISBN:978-0-8048-3132-1.

“I have to say I am writing whatever happens to be popping into my mind. It might be incoherent to some but, what the heck, I don’t care. I’m just simply writing whatever wants to be written at the moment of its conception. If we communicate, which I sincerely hope; it’s cool. If not, well, it can’t be helped anyway.” Pg. 17

“I don’t know what I will be writing but just simply writing whatever wants to be written. If the writing communicates and stirs something within someone, it’s beautiful. If not, well, it can’t be helped.” Pg. 17

“Martial art, like any art, is an expression of the human being. Some expressions have flavor, some are logical (perhaps under certain required situations), but most martial arts are the mere performing of a sort of mechanical repetition of a fixed pattern. This is most unhealthy because to live is to express and to express you have to create. Creation is never merely repetition. Remember well my friend that all styles are man-made and man is always more important than any style. Style concludes. Man grows. So martial art is ultimately an athletic expression of the dynamic of the human body. More important yet is the person who is there expressing his own soul. Yes, martial art is an unfolding of what one is-his anger, his fears-and yet under all these natural human tendencies (which we all experience, after all) a “quality” martial artist can-in the midst of all these commotions-still be himself. And it is not a question of winning or losing but it is a question of being what is at that moment and being wholeheartedly involved with that particular moment and doing one’s best. The consequence is left to whatever will happen. Therefore to be a martial artist also means to be an artist of life. Since life is an ever-going process, one should flow in this process and to discover, to actualize, and to expand oneself.” Pg. 18

“Anger blinds.” Pg. 22

“I never met a conceited man whom I did not find inwardly embarrassed.” Pg. 23

“The man who pulls a knife on you is at a disadvantage. He will clearly lose the fight. The reason is very simple. Psychologically, he only has one weapon. His thinking is therefore limited to the use of that single weapon. You, on the other hand, are thinking about all your weapons: your hands, elbows, knees, feet, head. You’re thinking 360 degrees around him. Maybe you’re considering some form of escape, like running. He’s only got a lousy knife. Now he might throw it at you. Let him. You still have a chance to avoid it, block it, or he may miss you. You’ve got all the advantages when you think about it.” Pg. 24

“Every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, I work on my legs. Every Thursday and Saturday I work on my punch. On Wednesdays and Sundays, I have sparring sessions.” Pg. 24

“I personally do not believe in the word style. Why? Because, unless there are human beings with three arms and four legs, unless we have another group of human beings on earth that are structurally different from us, there can be no different style of fighting. Why is that? Because we have two hands and two legs?” pg. 28

“Understand.” Pg. 29

“Many people will come to an instructor but, most of them, they say, ‘Hey man, like what is the truth?’ You know, would you hand it over to me? So, therefore, one guy would say now, ‘I’ll give you the Japanese way of doing it.’ And another guy would say ‘I’ll give you the Chinese way of doing it.’ But to me that’s all baloney because unless there are men with three hands or there are men with four legs, then there (cannot be) a different way of doing it. But since we only have two hands and two legs, nationalities don’t mean anything.” Pg. 28

“You can be a slave in the form of a holy mind to live. We do not live for, we simply live.” Pg. 31

“Don’t look for secret moves. Don’t look for secret movements. If you’re always hunting for secret techniques you’re going to miss it. It’s you. It’s your body that’s the key.” Pg. 34

“What man has to get over is consciousness. The consciousness of himself.” Pg. 34

“When a man is thinking he stands off from what he is trying to understand. Feeling exists here and now when not interrupted and dissected by ideas or concepts. The moment we stop analyzing and let go, we can start really seeing, feeling-as one whole. There is no actor or one being acted upon but the action itself. I stayed with my feeling then-and I felt it to the full without naming it that. At last the I and the feeling merged to become one. The I no longer feels the self to be separated from the you and the whole idea of taking advantage or getting something out of something becomes absurd. To me, I have no other self (not to mention thought) than the oneness of things of which I was aware at that moment.” Pg. 35

“Nowadays, I mean you don’t go around on the street, kicking people or punching people. Because if you do, they will pull out a gun out of their jacket and bang! That’s it. I mean, I don’t care how good (in martial art) you are!” pg. 36

“Boards don’t hit back. This matter of breaking bricks and boards with the edge of your hand: Now I ask you, did you ever see a brick or a board pick a fight with anybody? This is gimmick stuff. A human being doesn’t just stand there and wait to be hit.” Pg. 38

“The traditional teacher says, ‘if your opponent does this, then you do this, and then you do this, and then you do this and then you do this.’ And while you are remembering all the ‘and thens’ the other guy is killing you.” Pg. 38

“I’ve lost faith in the Chinese classical arts-though I still call mine Chinese-because basically all styles are products of dry-land swimming, even the Wing Chun school. So my line of training is more toward efficient street fighting with everything goes; wearing head gear, gloves, chest guard, shin/knee guards, etc. For the past five years now I’ve been training the hardest and for a purpose, not just dissipated hit-miss training.” Pg. 53

“I stress again, I have not created or invented any kind of martial art. Jeet Kune Do is derived from what I have learned, plus my evaluation of it. Thus, my JKD is not confined by any kind of martial arts. On the contrary, I welcome those who like JKD to study and improve it.” Pg. 55

“Jeet Kune Do uses all ways and is bound by none, and likewise uses any technique or means which serves its end. Efficiency is anything that scores.” Pg. 55

“Of my art-gung fu and Jeet Kune Do-only one of 10,000 can handle it. It is martial art. Complete offensive attacks. It is silly to think almost anyone can learn it. It isn’t really contemporary forms of the art I teach. Mainly that which I work with-martial attack. It is really a smooth rhythmic expressing of smashing the guy before he hits you, with any method available.” Pg. 59

“I’m telling you it’s difficult to have a rehearsed routine to fit in with broken rhythm.” Pg. 61

“In attacking, you must never be halfhearted. Your main concern is with the correct and most determined execution of your offensive. You should be like a steel spring ready at the slightest opening to set the explosive charge of your dynamic attack.” Pg. 65

“There is always a temptation to rely too much on a small repertoire of favorite strokes which particularly suit one’s temperament or physical advantages. This must be resisted if one is to progress beyond a few initial successes in battle and, indeed, to enjoy fighting with all its subtlety, speed, and variety to the full. You must be able to exploit a wide variety of strokes and tactics, even though some movements will always suit your game best.” Pg. 99

“To be a first-class fighter, you must be able to box or slug efficiently. You must be a two-way fighter.” Pg. 119

“In comparisons of strength, the stronger one will certainly beat the weaker one. However, if the weaker one fights with all his effort and finally loses; his courage can win admiration from the stronger. Thus, one of the most important factors in fighting is morale.” Pg. 134

“In practicing Jeet Kune Do, we must practice swiftly and actively. But in real fighting, we have to keep our brain calm. Don’t let your mind be conquered by stupid thoughts. Just regard the fighting as if it were nothing.” Pg. 134

“Practice makes perfect. After a long time of practicing, our footwork will become natural, skillful, swift, and steady.” Pg. 134

“Many people make a big mistake in fighting against an enemy by thinking too much about winning or losing. Practically speaking, they should allow none of these sentiments to invade their mind. They need only to act as circumstances demand. When they act naturally, their hands and feet will suitably function.” Pg. 135

“Forget about fancy horse stances, of ‘moving the horse,’ fancy forms, pressure, locking, etc. All these will promote your mechanical aspects rather than help you. You will be bound by these unnatural rhythmic messes, and when you are in combat it is broken rhythm and timing you have to adjust to. The opponent is not going to do things rhythmically with you as you would do in practicing a kata alone or with a partner.” Pg. 183

“The leg is the more powerful weapon but, ultimately, the man who can punch better will be the one who will win.” Pg. 206

“The force of our fists must originate from the dynamic power of our waist and back. Of course, the amount of force is determined by the strength of the practitioner’s muscles and his weight. If two men of different weight are equal in strength of muscle and both know the technique of using their energy, then certainly the heavier one is in a more advantageous position.” Pg. 206

The advantages of the lead punch
1. Faster-the shortest distance between two points is a straight line.
2. More accurate-‘chooses the straightest course,’ thus, less chance of missing and is surer than other punches.
3. Balance is less disturbed-safer.
4. Less injurious to one’s hand.
5. Greater frequency of hits-more damage can be done.

“Jogging is not only a form of exercise to me, it is also a form of relaxation. It is my own hour every morning when I can be alone with my own thoughts.” Pg. 323

“It is not a shame to be knocked down by other people. The important thing is to ask when you’re being knocked down, ‘Why am I being knocked down?’ If a person can reflect in this way, then there is hope for this person.” Pg. 328

“Constant drilling on classical blocks and thrusts desensitizes oneself, making one’s creativity duller and duller.” Pg. 330

“To free yourself, observe closely what you normally practice. Do not condemn or approve; merely observe.” Pg. 334

“Living generally means living in imitation and therefore in fear.” Pg. 334

“Truth comes when your mind and heart are purged of all sense of striving and you are no longer trying to become somebody; it is there when the mind is very quiet, listening timelessly to everything.” Pg. 336

“Being oneself leads to real relationships.” Pg. 336

“Accept the other person’s feelings.” Pg. 337

“Only the self-sufficient stand alone-most people follow the crowd and imitate.” Pg. 337
“There is intelligence when you are not afraid. There can be no initiative if one has fear. And fear compels us to cling to tradition, gurus, etc. The important thing for you is to be alert, to question, to find out, so that your own initiative may be awakened. Understanding.” Pg. 339

“Tradition=the habit-forming mechanism of the mind.” Pg. 339

“The poorer we are inwardly, the more we try to enrich ourselves outwardly.” Pg. 339

“Sensitivity is not possible if you are afraid of this, that, etc.-the inner authority game. Authority destroys intelligence.” Pg. 339

“One must not merely copy but try to convey the significance of what you see.” Pg. 339

“Books, teachers, parents, the society around us, all tell us what to think, but not how to think.” Pg. 339

“What is the point of being educated, of learning to read and write, if you are going to carry on like a machine? After all, it is merely the root to function from.” Pg. 339

“The great mistake is to anticipate the outcome of the engagement; you ought not to be thinking of whether it ends in victory or in defeat. Just let nature take its course, and your tools will strike at the right moment.” Pg. 342

“The process of maturing does not mean to become captive of conceptualization. It is to come to the realization of what lies in our innermost selves.” Pg. 342

“Instead of looking directly at the fact, cling to forms (theories) and go on entangling oneself further and further, finally putting oneself into an inextricable snare.” Pg. 342

“To meditate means to realize the imperturbability of one’s original nature. Meditation means to be free from all phenomena and calmness means to be internally unperturbed. There will be calmness when one is free from external objects and is not perturbed.” Pg. 344

“Have no mind that selects or rejects. To be without deliberate mind is to have no thoughts.” Pg. 345

“To me, ultimately, martial art means honestly expressing yourself. Now it is a very difficult thing to do. I mean it is easy for me to put on a show and be cocky and be flooded with a cocky feeling and feel, like, pretty cool and all that. Or I can make all kinds of phony things, you see what I mean? And be blinded by it. Or I can show you some really fancy movement-but, to express oneself honestly, not lying to oneself-and to express myself honestly-that, my friend, is very hard to do.” Pg. 349

“When I look around, I always learn something, and that is: to always be yourself. And to express yourself, to have faith in yourself. Do not go out and look for a successful person and duplicate him. That seems to be the prevalent thing happening in Hong Kong. They always copy mannerisms, they never start from the root of their being: that is, how can I be m?” pg. 349

“Not every man can take lessons to be a good fighter. He must be a person who is able to relate his training to the circumstances he encounters. Self-actualization is the important thing. And my personal message to people is that I hope they will go toward self-actualization rather than self-image actualization. I hope they will search within themselves for honest self-expression.” Pg. 350

“Be flexible so you can change with change.” Pg. 351

“My only sure reward is in my actions and not from them. The quality of my reward is in the depth of my response-the centralness of the part of me I act from.” Pg. 351

“I feel I have this great creative and spiritual force within me that is greater than faith, greater than ambition, greater than confidence, greater than determination, greater than vision. It is all of these combined. My brain becomes magnetized with this dominating force which I hold in my hand.” pg. 352

“Whether it is the godhead or not, I feel this great force, this untapped power, this dynamic something within me. This feeling defies description, and there is no experience with which this feeling may be compared. It is something like a strong emotion mixed with faith but stronger.” pg. 352

“All in all, the goal of my planning and doing is to find the true meaning in life-peace of mind. I know that the sum of all the possessions I mentioned does not necessarily add up to peace of mind; however, it can be if I devote to real accomplishment of self rather than neurotic combat. In order to achieve this peace of mind, the teaching of detachment of Taoism and Zen proved to be valuable.” Pg. 353

“Classical methods and tradition make the mind a slave-you are no longer an individual, but merely a product. Your mind is the result of a thousand yesterdays.” Pg. 356

“Intensity and/or enthusiasm is this god within us-one that instinctively becomes the art of the physical ‘becoming’ and within this transition we no longer care to know what life means. We are indeed furnishing the ‘what is’ by simply being.” Pg. 358

“Simplicity is the beginning of art, and the beginning of nature.” Pg. 358

“Recognizing the influence of my subconscious mind over my power of will, I shall take care to submit to it a clear and definite picture of my major purpose in life and all minor purposes leading to my major purpose, and I shall keep this picture constantly before my subconscious mind by repeating it daily.” Pg. 361

“Things live by moving and gain strength as they go.” Pg. 361

“You will never get more out of this life than you expect.” Pg. 362

“Keep your mind on the things you want and off those you don’t.” pg. 362

“Be a calm beholder of what’s happening around you.” Pg. 362

“There is a difference-a. the world; b. our vision of or reaction to it.” Pg. 362

“The aphorism ‘as a man thinketh in his heart, so is he’ contains the secret of life. James Allen further added, ‘A man is literally what he thinks.’ This might be a shocking statement, but everything is a state of mind. I ran across some very interesting passages in a magazine and I’m writing them down to let you read it.” Pg. 362

“I’ve always been buffeted by circumstances because I thought of myself as a human being of outside condition. Now I realize that I am the power that commands the feeling of my mind and from which circumstances grow.” Pg. 362

“Defeat is also a state of mind; no one is ever defeated until defeat has been accepted as reality. To me, defeat in anything is merely temporary, and its punishment is but an urge for me to greater effort to achieve my goal. Defeat simply tells me that something is wrong in my doing; it is a path leading to success and truth.” Pg. 363

“Faith, too, is a state of mind. It can be induced or created by affirmation or repeated instructions to the subconscious mind through the principle of autosuggestion. This is the only known method of voluntary development of the emotion of faith. It is a well-known fact that one comes, finally, to believe whatever one repeats to one’s self, whether the statement be true or false. If a man repeats a lie over and over, he will eventually accept the lie as truth. Moreover, he’ll believe it to be the truth. Every man is what he is because of the dominating thoughts which he permits to occupy his mind.” Pg. 364

“The mind is like a fertile garden, it will grow anything you wish to plant-beautiful flowers or weeds. And so it is with successful, healthy thoughts or with negative ones that will, like weeds, strangle and crowd the others. Do not allow negative thoughts to enter your mind for they are the weeds that strangle confidence.” Pg. 364

“I’ll give you my secret for ridding my mind of negative thoughts. When such a thought enters my mind, I visualize it as being written on a piece of paper. Then I mentally light it on fire and visualize it burning to a crisp. The negative thought is destroyed, never to enter my mind again.” Pg.364-365

“Visualize success rather than failure, by believing ‘I can do it’ rather than ‘I can’t.’ Negative thoughts are overpowering only if you encourage them and allow yourself to be overpowered by them.” Pg. 365

“We are told that talent creates its own opportunities. But sometimes it seems that intense desire creates not only its own opportunities, but its own talents.” Pg. 365

“Here I ask you, are you going to make your obstacles stepping stones to your dreams or stumbling blocks-because unknowingly you let negativity, worries, fear, etc. take over?”
Pg. 365

“Believe me that in every big thing or achievement there are always obstacles, big or small, and the reaction one shows to such obstacles is what counts, not the obstacle itself. There is no such thing as defeat until you admit so yourself-but not until then!” pg. 365

“Don’t waste a lot of your energy in worry and anticipation. Remember my friend to enjoy your planning as well as your accomplishment, for life is too short for negative energy.” Pg. 366

“So action! Action! Never wasting energy on worries and negative thoughts. I MEAN WHO HAS THE MOST INSECURE JOB AS I HAVE? WHAT DO I LIVE ON? My faith in my ability that I’ll make it. Sure my back screwed me up good for a year but with every adversity comes a blessing because a shock acts as a reminder to oneself that we must not get stale in routine. Look at a rainstorm; after its departure, everything grows!” pg. 366

“Remember that one who is possessed by worry not only lacks the poise to solve his own problems, but by his nervousness and irritability creates problems for those around him. Well, what more can I say but DAMN THAT TORPEDO, FULL SPEED AHEAD!” pg. 366

The four idea principles:
1) Find a human need, an unsolved problem.
2) Master all of the essentials of the problem.
3) Give a new twist to an old principle.
4) Believe in your idea-and act!

Five-step idea-getting process
1) Gather materials
2) Masticate the facts.
3) Relax and drop the subject.
4) Be ready to recognize and welcome the idea when it comes.
5) Shape and develop your idea into usefulness.

“There are two ways of making a good living. One is the result of hard work, and the other, the result of imagination (requires work, too, of course). It is a fact that labor and thrift produce competence, but fortune, in the sense of wealth, is the reward of the man who can think of something that hasn’t been thought of before. In every industry, in every profession, ideas are what America is looking for. Ideas have made America what she is, and one good idea will make a man what he wants to be.” Pg. 367

“Probably, people will say I’m too conscious of success. Well, I am not. You see, my will to do springs from the knowledge that I can do. I’m only being natural, for there is no fear or doubt inside my mind.” Pg. 368

“If you don’t aim at an object, how the heck on earth do you think you can get it?” Pg. 368

“All riches begin as a state of mind. And you have complete control of your mind.” Pg. 368

“What you are is because of your habits of thought.” Pg. 368

“Repetition of thought-emotionalized with burning desire.” Pg. 368

“When you drop a pebble into a pool of water, the pebble starts a series of ripples that expand until they encompass the whole pool. This is exactly what will happen when I give my ideas a definite plan of action.” Pg. 368

“A positive mental attitude attracts wealth.” Pg. 369

“Thoughts backed by faith will overcome all problems.” Pg. 369

“The spiritual power of man’s will removes all obstacles.” Pg. 370

“Daily habitual practice-backed by faith.” Pg. 369

“Ideas are the beginning of all achievement.” Pg. 369

“Every circumstance of every man’s life is the result of a definite cause-mode and control yours.” Pg. 369

“Defeat is not defeat unless accepted as a reality-in your own mind.” Pg. 370

“The power can be created and maintained through daily practice-continuous effort.” Pg. 370

“Reading-the mental food (specialized reading).” Pg. 371

“Faith is a state of mind that can be conditioned through self-discipline. Faith will accomplish.” Pg. 371

“Faith makes it possible to achieve that which man’s mind can conceive and believe.” Pg. 371

“The possession of anything begins in the mind.” Pg. 371

“Your state of mind is everything.” Pg. 372

“Make at least one definite move daily toward your goal.” Pg. 372

“Persistence, persistence, and persistence.” Pg. 372

“Every man today is the result of his thoughts yesterday.” Pg. 372

“Faith backed by action-applied faith.” Pg. 372

“Your mental attitude is what counts.” Pg. 372

“What you are is because of established habits of thoughts and deeds.” Pg. 372

“He is because he thinks he is-positive or negative.” Pg. 372

“The spirit of the individual is determined by his dominating thought habits.” Pg. 372

“When you look after your thoughts, your thoughts will look after you-magnetize them with positivity.” Pg. 372

“Habits are due to repetition.” Pg. 372

“The ego is fixed entirely by the application of self-suggestion.” Pg. 373

“The subconscious mind favors thoughts inspired by emotional feelings. It also gives preference to dominating thoughts.” Pg. 372

The six-step creative method
1) Develop the creative attitude.
2) Analyze, to focus on the unwanted solution.
3) Seek out and fill your mind with the facts.
4) Write down ideas, sensible and seemingly wild.
5) Let facts and ideas simmer in your mind.
6) Evaluate, recheck, settle on the creative ideas.

“Despair is the conclusion of fools.” Pg. 374

“What is defeat? Nothing but education, nothing but the first step to something better.” Pg. 375

“Damn the ‘15th degree red-belt holders,’ the ‘honorary supermasters’ and those ‘experts’ that graduated from the advanced-super-three-easy-lessons courses!” pg. 376

“False teachers of the way use flowery words.” Pg. 377

“Remember no man is really defeated unless he is discouraged.” Pg. 377

“It is not what happens that is success or failure, but what it does to the heart of man.” Pg. 377

“Genius is the capacity to see and to express what is simple, simply.” Pg. 377

“Remember my friend, everything goes to those who aim to get. Low aim is the biggest crime a man has.” Pg. 378
“One will never get any more than he thinks he can get. You have what it takes. Look back and see your progress-damn the torpedo, full speed ahead.” Pg. 378

“The string is broken and time passes on. Meet again we may, but will it be in the same way? With the same sentiments? With the same feelings? Rarely.” Pg. 378

“Don’t regret the past, but make the most of the hours that last and don’t worry over the day that is well on its way.” Pg. 379

“Self-will seems to be the only virtue that takes no account of manmade laws.” Pg. 380

“Among people, a great majority don’t feel comfortable at all with the unknown-that is, anything foreign that threatens their daily protected mold. So, for the sake of security, they construct chosen patterns to justify.” Pg. 388


Wednesday, May 4, 2011

Thought for the Day

"How do you become more productive?" Richard Branson leaned back and thought for a second. The tropical sounds of his private oasis, Necker Island, murmured in the background. Twenty people sat around him at rapt attention, wondering what a billionaire's answer would be to one of the big questions-perhaps the biggest question -of business. The group had been assembled by marketing impresario Joe Polish to brainstorm options for Richard's philanthropic Virgin Unite. It was one of his many new ambitious projects. Virgin Group already had more than 300 companies, more than 50,000 employees, and $25 billion per year in revenue. In other words, Branson had personally built an empire larger than the GDP of some developing countries. Then he broke the silence: "Work out." He was serious and elaborated: working out gave him at least four additional hours of productive time every day.
-Taken from the "The 4 Hour Body-By Timothy Ferriss"

Nassim Nicholas Taleb Dishes It Out!!!

Mr. Taleb has written one of the most intellectually stimulating books I’ve had the privilege to read this year titled the Black Swan. The black swan is a metaphor for those totally out-of-the-blue extraordinary events that when they occur literally change everything. The Lehman Shock is one example. 9/11 was another. The recent devastating earthquake that struck Japan on March 11th followed by the nuclear disaster at Fukushima is another prime example. Since I did some translation work for Tokyo Electric Power Company at the time, I know for a fact that the safeguards erected to protect the nuclear reactors’ cooling system were built to withstand a tsunami up to six meters in height. Now why six meters? Well, according to the records, the average height of all the tsunamis that ever struck that region was approximately one meter. Hence, at the time, the experts at Tokyo Electric figured that if they installed safety barriers that were at least six times the average, it would be more than sufficient to handle any onslaught of flooding waters. Turns out no such thing; the killer waves that bore down on the nuclear power plant that fateful day knocked out the cooling system resulting in one of the worst nuclear disasters in history. The earthquake and the tsunami that followed was a black swan, as totally unpredictable as the tremendous impact that ensued in its aftermath. However, what is so funny is how we humans try to rationalize what happened after the fact. Of course hindsight is always 20:20. It reminds of the saying: “If you want to make God laugh, simply make plans.” I look at my own life and am still in a daze as I become aware that things have turned out so contrary to what I had originally wanted or planned. The simple truth is WE CANNOT CONTROL OR PREDICT THE FUTURE and I submit that any control or predictive power we may seem to possess is illusory. Nassim’s book is a compelling tome on how we are regularly duped by the unexpected. His plea is simple. Learn to use uncertainty to your advantage!

“What we call a Black Swan is an event with the following three attributes. First, it is an outlier, as it lies outside the realm of regular expectations, because nothing in the past can convincingly point to its possibility. Second, it carries an extreme impact. Third, in spite of its outlier status, human nature makes us concoct explanations for its occurrence after the fact, making it explainable and predictable.” –from prologue 1

“What did people learn from the 9/11 episode? Did they learn that some events, owing to their dynamics, stand largely outside the realm of the predictable? No. Did they learn the built-in defect of conventional wisdom? No. What did they figure out? They learned precise rules for avoiding Islamic prototerrorists and tall buildings.” –from prologue 4

“The human mind suffers from three ailments as it comes into contact with history, what I call the triplet of opacity. They are:
a) The illusion of understanding, or how everyone thinks he knows what is going on in a world that is more complicated (or random) than they realize;
b) The retrospective distortion, or how we can assess matters only after the fact, as if there were a rearview mirror (history seems clearer and more organized in history books than in empirical reality); and
c) The overvaluation of factual information and the handicap of authoritative and learned people, particularly when they create categories-when they ‘platonify’.” Pg. 8

“Consider the nature of information: of the millions, maybe even trillions, of small facts that prevail before an event occurs, only a few will turn out to be relevant later to your understanding of what happened.” Pg. 12

“I noticed that very intelligent and informed persons were at no advantage over cab drivers in their predictions, but there was a crucial difference. Cab drivers did not believe that they understood as much as learned people-really, they were not the experts and they knew it.” Pg. 14

“The overlap between newspapers was so large that you would get less and less information the more you read.” Pg. 15

“During the one or two years after my arrival at Wharton, I had developed a precise but strange specialty: betting on rare and unexpected events, those that were on the Platonic fold, and considered ‘inconceivable’ by the Platonic ‘experts’. Recall that the Platonic fold is where our representation of reality ceases to apply-but we do not know it.” Pg. 19

“Do you face the possibility of an adverse event? Don’t worry. Who knows, it may turn out good for you. Doubting the consequences of an outcome will allow you to remain imperturbable.” Pg. 46

“Consider a turkey that is fed every day. Every single feeding will firm up the bird’s belief that it is the general rule of life to be fed every day by friendly members of the human race ‘looking out for its best interests,’ as a politician would say. On the afternoon of the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, something unexpected will happen to the turkey. It will incur a revision of belief.” Pg. 40

“Many people labor in life under the impression that they are doing something right, yet they may not show solid results for a long time. They need a capacity for continuously adjourned gratification to survive a steady diet of peer cruelty without becoming demoralized. They look like idiots to their cousins, they look like idiots to their peers, they need courage to continue. No confirmation comes to them, no validation, no fawning students, no Nobel, no Shnobel. ‘How was your year?’ brings them a small but containable spasm of pain deep inside, since almost all of their years will seem wasted to someone looking at their life from the outside. Then bang, the lumpy event comes that brings the grand vindication. Or it may never come. Believe me, it is tough to deal with the social consequences of the appearance of continuous failure. We are social animals, hell is other people.” Pg. 87

“You play tennis every day with no improvement, then suddenly you start beating the pro. Your child does not seem to have a learning impediment, but he does not seem to want to speak. The schoolmaster pressures you to start considering ‘other options,’ namely therapy. You argue with her to no avail (she is supposed to be the ‘expert’). Then, suddenly, the child starts composing elaborate sentences, perhaps a bit too elaborate for his age group. I will repeat that linear progression, a Platonic idea is not the norm.” pg. 89

“We favor the sensational and the extremely visible. This affects the way we judge heroes. There is little room in our consciousness for heroes who do not deliver visible results-or those heroes who focus on process rather than results. However, those who claim that they value process over result are not telling the whole truth, assuming of course that they are members of the human species. We often hear the semi-lie that writers do not write for glory, that artists create for the sake of art, because the activity ‘is its own reward.’ True, these activities can generate a steady flow of autosatisfaction. But this does not mean that artists do no crave some form of attention, or that they would not be better off if they got some publicity; it does not mean that writers do not wake up early Saturday morning to check if The New York Times Book Review has featured their work, even if it is a very long shot, or that they do not keep checking their mailbox for that long-awaited reply from The New Yorker.” Pg. 89-90

“Most people engaged in pursuits that I call ‘concentrated’ spend most of their time waiting for the big day that (usually) never comes. True, this takes your mind away from the pettiness of life-the cappuccino that is too warm or too cold, the waiter too slow or intrusive, the food too spicy or not enough, the overpriced hotel room that does not quite resemble the advertised picture-all these considerations disappear because you have your mind on much bigger and better things. But this does not mean that the person insulated from materialistic pursuits becomes impervious to other pains, those issuing from disrespect. Often these Black Swan hunters feel shame, or are made to feel shame, at not contributing. ‘You betrayed those who had high hopes for you,’ they are told, increasing their feelings of guilt. The problem of lumpy payoffs is not so much in the lack of income they entail, but the pecking order, the loss of dignity, the subtle humiliations near the water cooler. It is my hope someday to see science and decision makers rediscover what the ancients have always known, namely that our highest currency is respect.” Pg. 90

“When you look at the empirical record, you not only see that venture capitalists do better than entrepreneurs, but publishers do better than writers, dealers do better than artists, and science does better than scientists (about 50% of scientific and scholarly papers, costing months, sometimes years, of effort, are never truly read). The person involved in such gambles is paid in a currency other than material success: hope.” Pg. 90

“If you are engaged in a black swan-dependent activity, it is better to be part of a group.” Pg. 94

“Numerous studies of millionaires aimed at figuring out the skills required for hotshotness follow the following methodology. They take a population of hotshots, those with big titles and big jobs, and study their attributes. They look at what those big guns have in common: courage, risk-taking, optimism, and so on, and infer those traits, most notably risk-taking, help you to become successful. You would also probably get the same impression if you read CEOs’ ghostwritten autobiographies or attended their presentations to fawning MBA students. Now take a look at the cemetery. It is quite difficult to do so because people who fail do not seem to write memoirs, and, if they did, those business publishers I know would not even consider giving them the courtesy of a returned phone call (as to a returned e-mail. Fuhgedit). Readers would not pay $26.95 for a story of failure, even if you convinced them that it had more useful tricks than a story of success. The entire notion of biography is grounded in the arbitrary ascription of a causal relationship between specified traits and subsequent events. Now consider the cemetery. The graveyard of failed persons will be full of people who shared the following traits: courage, risk taking, optimism, et cetera. Just like the population of millionaires. There may be some differences in skills, but what separates the two is for the most part a single factor: luck. Plain luck.” Pg. 106

“Have you ever wondered why so many of those straight-A students end up going nowhere in life while someone who lagged behind is now getting the shekels, buying the diamonds, and getting his phone calls returned? Or even getting the Nobel Prize in a real discipline (say, medicine)? Some of this may have something to do with luck in outcomes, but there is this sterile and obscurantist quality that is often associated with classroom knowledge that may get in the way of understanding what’s going on in real life.” Pg. 125

“The policies we need to make decisions on should depend far more on the range of possible outcomes than on the expected final number. I have seen, while working for a bank, how people project cash flows for companies without wrapping them in the thinnest layer of uncertainty.” Pg. 161

“It is often said that ‘is wise he who can see things coming.’ Perhaps the wise one is the one who knows that he cannot see things far away.” Pg. 163

“Being an executive does not require very developed frontal lobes, but rather a combination of charisma, a capacity to sustain boredom, and the ability to shallowly perform on harrying schedules. Add to these tasks the ‘duty’ of attending opera performances.” Pg. 166

“Popper’s central argument is that in order to predict historical events you need to predict technological innovation, itself fundamentally unpredictable.” Pg. 171

“To understand the future to the point of being able to predict it, you need to predict elements from this future itself.” Pg. 172

“If you survive until tomorrow, it could mean either a) you are more likely to be immortal b) that you are closer to death. Both conclusions rely on the exact same data.”pg. 188

“What you should avoid is unnecessary dependence on large-scale harmful predictions-those and only those. Avoid the big subjects that may hurt your future: be fooled in small matters, not in the large. Do not listen to economic forecasters (they are mere entertainers), but do make your own forecast for the picnic; but avoid government social security forecasts for the year 2040.” Pg 203

“Indeed, we have psychological and intellectual difficulties with trial and error, and with accepting that series of small failures are necessary in life. My colleague Mark Spitznagel understood that we humans have a mental hang-up about failures: ‘You need to love to lose’ was his motto. In fact, the reason I felt immediately at home in America is precisely because American culture encourages the process of failure, unlike the cultures of Europe and Asia where failure is met with stigma and embarrassment. Americas specialty is to take these small risks for the rest of the world, which explains the country’s disproportionate share in innovations. Once established, an idea or product is later ‘perfected’ over there.” Pg. 204

“People are often ashamed of losses, so they engage in strategies that produce very little volatility but contain the risk of a large loss-like collecting nickels in front of steamrollers. In Japanese culture, which is ill-adapted to randomness and badly equipped to understand that bad performance can come from bad luck, losses can severely tarnish someone’s reputation. People hate volatility, thus engage in strategies exposed to blowups, leading to occasional suicides after a big loss. Furthermore, this trade-off between volatility and risk can show up in careers that give the appearance of being stable, like jobs at IBM until the 1990s. When laid off, the employee faces a total void: he is no longer fit for anything else. The same holds for those in protected industries.” Pg. 205

PRACTICAL APPLICATION

“The legendary screenwriter William Goldman was said to have shouted ‘Nobody knows anything!’ in relation to the prediction of movie sales. Now, the reader may wonder how someone as successful as Goldman can figure out what to do without making predictions. The answer stands perceived logic on its head. He knew that he could not predict individual events, but was well aware that the unpredictably, namely a movie turning into a blockbuster, would benefit him immensely. So the second lesson is more aggressive: you can actually take advantage of the problem of prediction and epistemic arrogance! As a matter of fact, I suspect that the most successful businesses are precisely those that know how to work around the inherent unpredictability and even exploit it. Here are the (modest) tricks. But note that the more modest they are, the more effective they will be.

POINT ONE:
First, make a distinction between positive contingencies and negative ones. Learn to distinguish between those human undertakings in which the lack of predictability can be (or has been) extremely beneficial and those where the failure to understand the future caused harm. There are both positive and negative Black Swans. William Goldman was involved in the movies, a positive-Black Swan business. Uncertainty did occasionally pay off there. A negative-Black-Swan business is one where the unexpected can hit hard and hurt severely. If you are in the military, in catastrophe insurance, or in homeland security, you face only downside. If you are in banking and lending, surprise outcomes are likely to be negative for you. You lend and in the best of circumstances you get your loan back-but you may lose all of your money if the borrower defaults. In the event that the borrower enjoys great financial success, he is not likely to offer you an additional dividend. Aside from the movies, examples of positive-Black Swan businesses are: some segments of publishing, scientific research, and venture capital. In these businesses, you lose small to make big. You have to lose a little per book and, for completely unexpected reasons, any given book might take off. The downside is small and easily controlled. The problem with publishers, of course, is that they regularly pay up for books, thus making their upside rather limited and their downside monstrous. (If you pay $10 million for a book, your Black Swan is it not being a bestseller.) Likewise, while technology can carry a great payoff, paying for the hyped-up story, as people did with the dot-com bubble, can make any upside limited and any downside huge. It is the venture capitalist who invested in a speculative company and his stake to unimaginative investors who is the beneficiary of the Black Swan, not the ‘me, too’ investors. In these businesses you are lucky if you don’t know anything-particularly if others don’t know anything either, but aren’t aware of it. And you fare best if you know where your ignorance lies, if you are the only one looking at the unread books, so to speak. This dovetails into the ‘barbell’ strategy of taking maximum exposure to the positive Black Swans while remaining paranoid about the negative ones. For your exposure to the positive Black Swan, you do not need to have any precise understanding of the structure of uncertainty. I find it hard to explain that when you have a very limited loss you need to get as aggressive, as speculative, and sometimes as ‘unreasonable’ as you can be. Middlebrow thinkers sometimes make the analogy of such strategy with that of collecting ‘lottery tickets.’ It is plain wrong. First, lottery tickets do not have a scalable payoff; there is a known upper limit to what they can deliver. The ludic fallacy applies here-the scalability of real-life payoffs compared to lottery ones makes the payoff unlimited or of unknown limit. Second, the lottery tickets have known rules and laboratory-style well presented possibilities; here we do not know the rules and can benefit from this additional uncertainty.

POINT TWO:
Don’t look for the precise and the local. Simply, do not be narrow-minded. The great discoverer Pasteur, who came up with the notion that chance favors the prepared, understood that you do not look for something particular every morning but work hard to let contingency enter your working life. As Yogi Berra, another great thinker, said, ‘You got to be careful if you don’t know where you’re going, because you might not get there.’ Likewise, do not try to predict precise Black Swans-it tends to make you more vulnerable to the ones you did not predict. My friends Andy Marshall and Andrew Mays at the Department of Defense face the same problem. The impulse on the part of the military is to devote resources to predicting the next problems. These thinkers advocate the opposite: invest in preparedness, not in prediction. Remember that infinite vigilance is just not possible.

POINT THREE:
Seize any opportunity, or anything that looks like an opportunity. They are rare, much rarer than you think. Remember that positive Black Swans have a necessary first step: you need to be exposed to them. Many people do not realize that they are getting a lucky break in life when they get it. If a big publisher (or a big art dealer or a movie executive or a hotshot banker or a big thinker) suggests an appointment, cancel anything you have planned: you may never see such a window open again. I am sometimes shocked at how little people realize that these opportunities do not grow on trees. Collect as many free non-lottery tickets (those with open-ended payoffs) as you can, and, once they start paying off, do not discard them. Work hard, not in grunt work, but in chasing such opportunities and maximizing exposure to them. This makes living in big cities invaluable because you increase the odds of serendipitous encounters-you gain exposure to the envelope of serendipity. The idea of settling in a rural area on grounds that one has good communications ‘in the age of the internet’ tunnels out of such sources of positive uncertainty. Diplomats understand that very well: casual chance discussions at cocktail parties usually lead to big breakthroughs-not dry correspondence or telephone conversations. Go to parties! If you’re a scientist, you will chance upon a remark that might spark new research. And if you are autistic, send your associates to these events.

POINT FOUR:
Beware of precise plans by governments. Let governments predict (it makes officials feel better about themselves and justifies their existence) but do not set much store by what they say. Remember that the interest of these civil servants is to survive and self-perpetuate-not to get to the truth. It does not mean that governments are useless, only that you need to keep a vigilant eye on their side effects. For instance, regulators in the banking business are prone to a severe expert problem and they tend to condone reckless but hidden risk taking. Andy Marshall and Andy Mays asked me if the private sector could do better in predicting. Alas no. Once again, recall the story of banks hiding explosive risks in their portfolios. It is not a good idea to trust corporations with matters such as rare events because the performance of these executives is not observable on a short-term basis, and they will game the system by showing good performance so they can get their yearly bonus. The Achilles’ heel of capitalism is that if you make corporations compete, it is sometimes the one that is most exposed to the negative Black Swan that will appear to be most fit for survival. Also recall that markets are not good predictors of wars. No one in particular is a good predictor of anything.

POINT FIVE:
‘There are some people who, if they don’t already know, you can’t tell ‘em,’ as the great philosopher of uncertainty Yogi Berra once said. Do not waste your time trying to fight forecasters, stock analysts, economists, and social scientists, except to play pranks on them. They are considerably easy to make fun of, and many get angry quite readily. It is ineffective to moan about unpredictability: people will continue to predict foolishly, especially if they are paid for it, and you cannot put an end to institutionalized frauds. If you ever have to heed a forecast, keep in mind that its accuracy degrades rapidly as you extend it through time. If you hear a ‘prominent’ economist using the word equilibrium, or normal distribution, do not argue with him; just ignore him, or try to put a rat down his shirt.” Pg. 206-210

“Is the world that unfair? I have spent my entire life studying randomness, practicing randomness, hating randomness. The more that time passes, the worse things seem to me, the more scared I get, the more disgusted I am with Mother Nature. The more I think about my subject, the more I see evidence that the world we have in our minds is different from the one playing outside. Every morning, the world appears to me more random that it did the day before, and humans seem to be even more fooled by it than they were the previous day. It is becoming unbearable. I find writing these lines painful; I find the world revolting.” Pg. 215

“Take a cross section of the dominant corporations at any particular time; many of them will be out of business a few decades later, while firms nobody ever heard of will have popped onto the scene from some garage in California or from some college dorm. Consider the following sobering statistic. Out of the five hundred largest US companies in 1957, only seventy-four were still part of that select group, the Standard and Poor’s 500, forty years later. Only a few had disappeared in mergers; the rest either shrank or went bust.” Pg. 221

“If there is one thing on this planet that is not so uncertain, it is the behavior of a collection of subatomic particles! Why? Because, as I have said earlier, when you look at an object, composed of a collection on particles, the fluctuations of the particles tend to balance out. But political, social, and weather events do not have this handy property, and we patently cannot predict them, so when you hear ‘experts’ presenting the problems of uncertainty in terms of subatomic particles, odds are that the expert is a phony. As a matter of fact this may be the best way to spot a phony. ” Pg. 287

“Quitting a high-paying position, if it is your decision, will seem a better payoff than the utility of the money involved (this may seem crazy, but I’ve tried it and it works). This is the first step toward the stoic’s throwing a four-letter word at fate. You have far more control over your life if you decide on your criterion by yourself.” Pg. 297

“Imagine a speck of dust next to a planet a billion times the size of the earth. The speck of dust represents the odds in favor of your being born; the huge planet would be the odds against it. So stop sweating the small stuff. Don’t be like the ingrate who got a castle as a present and worried about the mildew in the bathroom.” Pg. 298