We hear of doom and gloom everywhere, don’t we? We read it in the newspapers early morning; we hear it from the radio while driving to work, and we face it again in the evening ne
ws when we’re home and or taking it easy in the mamak stall. So how do we remain positive in this sea of negativeness? How do we turn tragedy to opportunity? Read on…It sounds terrible, doesn’t it? Banks are in trouble everywhere and economists are not sure if the developing nations will be able to hold up to the global economy. The International Monetary Fund is predicting conditions to persist until 2010.
The first thing we need to do is: -
DON’T BELIEVE EVERYTHING YOU READ! There’s a famous saying that economists have accurately predicted 10 of the last two recessions. This means that things are never as bad as they seem. It is in the media’s nature to take a fact and dramatize it for improved readership value. Take the previous political upheaval in Bangkok, where tanks and soldiers poured into the streets. I called a friend there and he said “it’s a small thing, life goes on as usual. Don’t worry; it’s not like what we read in the newspapers”.
So our advice to you is, don’t believe everything you read.
The second thing we need to do is: -
LOOK FOR OPPORTUNITIES! It’s the story of Yin and Yang, when there is a negative, there will be a positive. For every economic downturn there is a growing group of people who are very happy. Warren Buffet and Donald Trump to state a few. It’s funny how we all storm the Midvalley Megamall or Sunway Pyramids during the great big Malaysian sales (which somehow seem to be never ending nowadays). While when stocks and properties and various other investment vehicles are at a HUGE discount, we shy away from them. Everybody says buy low, sell high but hardly anyone’s doing it. Opportunities abound everywhere, even if we are cash strapped.
The third thing we need to do is: -
EDUCATE OURSELVES! Have you ever pondered what intelligence is? Is it in our genes? Is it nurtured? Intelligence is our human ability to take our past experiences to predict future outcomes. It’s a very unique human ability which animals struggle with. It is this ability that prevents Baskin Robbins from coming up with a chili steak ice cone, we can see and taste and predict the outcome before we even try it. This is what IQ tests look for, our ability to predict. But we can predict only to the extent of what we have experienced. So how do we gain experience? One way is through education. Read plenty of good books, go to seminars of the subject of your choice, and hang around the brightest people in your industry.
When we become the best at what we do, no matter what the economic condition is, we will always be wanted.
Edmond Yap
Performance Consultant
Dale Carnegie Training.
(Source: Dale Carnegie Archives)
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