An Entrepreneur’s Journey

Competition competition and competition. I discovered I’m a sucker for competition. Put me into any competition, and I want to win. I cannot stand losing, and I’m sick of not winning in games that I played.

Though I do want to enjoy the games that I’m involved, but it feel great to win. I want to have that feeling of winning again. My soul doesn’t feel good if I’m not on a winning streak.

There will be sacrifice if one wants to be a winner. It takes a lot to be a winner. No one can just sit around and hope to be a winner. Commitment and determination is what it takes.

Are you preparing to be a winner?

Challenges arrived at our door step one after another. While there is a U-turn from the ice cream business, (turning to be better) one of our team mates, Clive; was down. He hurt his back, and he was left with no choice but to stop this whole project.

It was a sad moment for me when I got the message from him. Dennis, Clive and myself, we form such great synergy within the ourselves but now Clive has to stop.

The three of us has so much fun in this project, it was the constant encouragement that keep us going. We had our low point, and we are able to hang on to each other, bringing us back again.

I am blessed to be working together with them who are winners. It felt extremely good to be working with winners, their intention is to be the best.

Clive, though you are unable to continue with the project, I still count you as a team. After going through so much together, you are not to be left behind.

A huge distinction on myself from doing the ice cream business. This business is no doubt face with mountain of challenges from the beginning. With everyone’s effort we had conquered them one by one. However, while we are able to conquer the external challenges caused by others, we couldn’t conquer our eternal demon.

As challenges grow bigger and uncontrollable, eg. weather; doubt started to seep in like water seeping through the underneath of the door. Most of us started to lose faith, motivation and confidence.

A meeting is required. And a meeting we had, an intensive one. It is a must to get everyone back on track, get everyone to align. From the meeting I had a huge discovery. I made a decision to be involved in this project, there is an agreement to fulfill this project, and I am willing to keep to this agreement. The problem is - it is not enough to just keep to the agreement, and to do a half a bucket kind of work.

A half bucket kind of work will give a half bucket kind of result, the past 2 weeks reflected that. Our doubt restricted us to perform at our best, bringing our result down by 70%. It was because I am giving too much excuses to myself, I am too lenient to myself.
I am giving too many reasons why we can’t sell at this location or that location, thus, didn’t sell at all.

Excuses like, it seems there isn’t any big crowd, I don’t think it worth the time to sell here. This resulted in wasted trip, time wasted, and didn’t sell at all.

When I give excuses to myself, I have to give excuses to others as well. When asked about the dropping result, I couldn’t answer, because I am only giving 30%. I am too ashamed to give any excuses.

There’s no more excuses now, no more reasons not to sell. I will go in, whack, and move on to the next location. 120% is what I am willing to put in. What if there’s still no result? At least I can hold my head up high to face the world. Now I am accountable to myself, giving my all with no regrets, no turning back. The challenge will grow for sure, but same principle applies to me; I will grow too.

Are you playing at 120% today?

Found this web hosting gem. Well, it’s not exactly an web hosting site but a site where you can find most web hosting services. In 2007, if you are going into any businesses, it’s a must to have a web site.

Firstly, a web site can help you with your marketing. It serves as an complimentary support to your main marketing campaign. Or it can be the other way round which it your web site is the main marketing campaign while all offline marketing serves as support.

If you are going to do business globally, a website is a must. Millions and millions of people are surfing the web everyday, how can you not have a website to expose your business to the world.

http://www.webhostingchoice.com is a place not to host site, but a place where it can help you find the site the suits your need.

For example you may need to find a hosting site that cost you $5/month. You can key in $5, and do a search, webhostingchoice will search all hosting sites that is in your requirement.

It saves your time to go searching around the net. Cool?

What motivate you? A question that was threw at me many times. Due to my training engagement, I’ve spoken to many people in the course of my work. Many a time, people wants to know what motivate an entrepreneur.

Is it money? I admit that it is one of the motivation initially. Gradually, most entrepreneurs will discover that it is not money, for money can motivate them for a short period of time, but there is something else that motivates entrepreneurs.

I cannot answer that question for all entrepreneurs because different individual require different motivation.

Last Friday, those who are involved in the ice cream business had a thrash-it-out meeting. Basically it’s to find out the reason of bad results and to ask for commitment. It’s a time where all parties involved have a choice to opt out of this project.

First thing, I am very surprise to see this person there. This person never turn up for work, but when it’s dinner time, this person appeared. I am surprise because I always thought that this person is no longer involved in the business.

Over at the table, when everyone re-commit their time and effort to this project, there is one common denominator. We are doing it not because of money but something else.

I do not know about the rest, but I am doing it for pride. That motivate me to work 16 hours a day. It’s the final lap, I am sprinting to the finishing line, just like the sprinter in the Olympic. They are running because of pride and pushing themselves to the limit.

Running a business is full of challenges. Get your motivation right, so that you will do whatever it takes to overcome those challenges.

A big match, a disappointing night. As a Liverpool fan, this is the biggest match of the season. Playing against Man U is like playing in a cup final.

I could not watch this match because of business, but I am still very concern about the result. Alas, Liverpool didn’t win again. They didn’t beat their biggest rival at Anfield for 6 seasons. Maybe Liverpool are starting to form a belief that they can’t beat Man U.

One pattern that I observed from Liverpool this season was that they usually dominated a match, but couldn’t win. Also they have a very high number of shots, but couldn’t put it into the net.

After spending so much on players, another pattern did not change. They tends to lose to lower clubs, (lost to Reading last week 3-1), and they couldn’t beat the big clubs.

Every week when they go into match, it will never be a sure win. Yes, I know there will be no sure win in football, but for other big clubs, their chances of winning is superbly high. For Liverpool - base of their inconsistency, it is not so.

One match they can score 4-0, and in another they can lose it. A club that has a rich history, one of the biggest club with huge fan based, dominated the English football scene in the 70s and 80s, couldn’t pick up one Premier League Title for 18 years - what is happening to the club?

After losing last night match, I doubt they can lift the title this season. Think I got to wait another season.

Relationship was the topic in that 20 minutes drive with Clive. I wonder of all the people that I will discuss this topic, it’s Clive.

But it was a very good discussion. In fact, from the start of the ice cream venture, we had been discussing this on and off, except this time we really went into it.

Our situation may be very similar, but our thinking is not. Haha…that’s make the discussion interesting. Clive is a very analytical guy who is able to analyse points that I always missed out. He is also a super nice guy whom all mothers will love to have as a son-in-law, unlike me who has an evil side.

The topic is, “when a relationship is unstable, is it always the man’s fault and responsibility?”

Based on Clive’s view from a book, he said “yes”. Me, of course “no”.

While I say “no” to Clive, I will say “yes” to many people. I discovered over the past months that whenever a relationship is unstable, the first impression is “the man is at fault”, “the man must take responsibility.” This is the perception that most people has.

I am kind of sick to explain why I say “no” to this people, so friends, don’t ask me anymore, my answer is “Yes, it’s my fault.”

London, a place where most of the things are more expensive than Singapore, from my perception. One of the facts that I know is the taxi fare is 3 - 4 times higher than ours.

I have not had a chance to visit London, I reckon it will cost me a bomb. Just the accommodation alone would take a big chuck out of my pocket.

Got to find a more affordable hotel so can spend the rest of the money somewhere else. Cheaper Than Hotels may be a good place to find affordable hotels. They showed the different ratings of hotels, making it easy for me to search. The rate actually starts from 15GBP, which I thought is very cheap.

Of course with that price, please do not expect for a 5 star service. With quality, comes great price.

Beside London, they showed Hotels in Edinburgh and Hotels in Glasgow.

Life has been rather exciting. With training business as my core, ice cream business as a learning process, I am into another great business. I secure the exclusive right to distribute a product in Singapore.

This is a new product created by an ex-teacher who is into business now. Her forte is creating, I’m into sales and marketing. This product can be classified as a stationary and an educational aid.

For those who knows the primary syllabus, you would know that children got to draw models to solve some of the maths problem sums. However, some children took a long time to draw, some didn’t draw it as nice.

What this product does is to shorten that time spend on drawing, so that the time saved can be used on other worthy things.

I am also learning from this business as this is the first time I got involved in a distributing business. This is getting me really excited.

The plan is to distribute this product through tuition centers and schools. For tuition centers wise, it’s to create a win-win deal where the tuition get to earn a supplement income without any effort, because we will do all the marketing. If you know of anyone who owns a tuition center, and don’t mind earning a supplement income, please let me know.

For schools wise, students are going to benefit tremendously with my plan. Selected students get to use the stickers for free, including a free talk throw in for the whole school. If you know of any primary school teachers who are looking for free talks, please let me know.

A thought came in while I was conversing with a friend yesterday. She’s in business herself, but she has a challenge with discipline. I must agree it takes a lot of discipline to run your own business, especially those who run business from their home.

I told her she must go for Business School For Entrepreneurs (BSE). She has the intention to be there, but she didn’t attend the last one in September 2007. Her question: does going to BSE can help her overcome discipline problem.

At that moment, a flash of light strike on me. Maybe it will not overcome the discipline problem. But maybe it will.

In BSE, I learned what I am capable of doing. I was able to stretch myself, got myself out of my comfort zone. I have the ability to do much more than what I was doing before. I now know that I have the capability to do so much more, and if I am not doing it now, I don’t feel good about it.

Whenever I fall into comfort zone again, my heart will remind me of the time during BSE. That week of fullest potential being exposed. When I was reminded of that 8 days, I’m into action again. Making that calls that I need to make, doing the work that I have been procrastinating.

I am accountable to myself. I know I can do it, and do so much and contribute so much. But if I am not doing it, I just don’t feel right. I am so glad I’ve attended BSE. I am so blessed to have know many friends from BSE whom had served as an inspiration to me.

My friend, if you are contemplating of going to BSE, or having the fear of facing whatever you need to face in the course, just know this. Everything is for your growth.