Happiness is not that hard to achieve

In Pope John XXIII’s “daily decalogue”:

Only for today, I will be happy in the certainty that I was created to be happy, not only in the other world but also in this one.

But most people think differently, especially in China. There is a measurement of happiness called happiness index. Chinese scores very low in the index, which implies that Chinese are the most unhappy people in the planet. It is quite easy to understand that though. The pressure for living in China is quite high. Education, medication, employeement, housing and living in general all seem to be quite hard in this most populous country. People eke out to make their ends meet.

I admit that life is hard, but is life that hard ? We are quite short-sighted when we are looking at ourself in the real life. Human being is greedy. We desire things we don’t have. Consequently what we always think about is what we don’t have not that has already been in our possession. We want more money, bigger house, luxary car, higher position in the company, pretty wife or rich husband. Whereas we blindside ourselves over what is within our arm’s reach. A small but cozy apartment, a plain looking but devoted wife, a husband lives on salary but gets bread back to home etc. I could give a much longer list, and you can too if you just sit back and think what you have instead of what you don’t.

Of course events will sometimes derail us. Of course we won’t get everything we desire. Of course there will be real tragedies and tragic-seeming setbacks. But we can be happy — joyful-down-underneath — even in the face of these things.

Life is often hard. But it’s not supposed to be that hard. There’s supposed to be room there for happiness and enjoyment, not in the notional future, but in the here-and-now.

Define the strategy in a palpable way (2)

I received some comments over my blog from a friend. I quote it as follows:

I read one article of your blog named as define your strategy ...., I noticed that your wrote such sentences:
A good strategy should be articulated in a manner that every employee understands it, aligns with it and acts on it. In essence, a strategy should have three critical components, objective, scope and advantage.

I have some different views towards this: in my view, strategy is a result that got from very carefully analyzing a company's objectives ( or can be said as mission) combined with a company's self-resource and industry environment such as competitor, supplier, buyer and so. The result can be thought as code of business action.
The same thing seems as happened to scope and advantages. Unquote

And my counter comments would be

Probably we hold different definition of strategy thereof arrives at different conclusion.

The industrial environment analysis and internal resource evaluation are necessary, and they are useful when you try to figure out the advantage of your company (the advanage I defined in my article is that something you do different and where you strength lies on).

My point is that strategy should be on the top of company's operations. it is palpable and it put everyone marching in lockstep toward the same direction. whereas nowadays, many many strategy formulation becomes too dynamic and unstable, a company's strtegy could be re-defined every year. The arguement is that strategy should follow the path of market and the market is always dynamic. I don't agree so. I think this ever-changing strategy symptom either comes from the illusion of self-assessment or from the wrong judgement of the industry.

At tactical level, company has many options to adapt and fine-tune its operation. But at strategical level, company should hold one core strategy that could be existing for long. As I mentioned in my article, a strategy is a direction to guide, a magnet to unite. If it could not keep stable, the momentum toward the vision/mission will be scattered, then the company's performance will be tattered.

Define your strategy in a palpable way

Tell you a secret, when you ask the CEOs to describle their company’s strategy in less than 35 words, most probably they will get stumbled. If you raise the question to their employees, most of them will have no clue to answer it. Although strategy might be the most frequently used word in the buisness sphere, it also might be the most obscure concept to be communicated.

To put one organization in a nutshell, we see the hierchies like the following:

Mission: Why we exist.
Vision: What we want to be.
Value: What we believe in and how things are done here.
Then Strategy.

Mission and vision of the company can be very broad concepts and not specific. However, most of the companies fall into the trap to define their strategy in the same manner, like we want to privide xxxx in a cost-efficient way to add value for our customer. This kind of out-of-touch strategy could stand for anybody, so what is good for?

A good strategy should be articulated in a manner that every employee understands it, aligns with it and acts on it. In essence, a strategy should have three critical components, objective, sope and advantage.

Objective

Objective gives a direction and a goal to realize. It must be specific, measurable and in a time frame. Like We would be the market leader of ABC before year 2015 with market share over 40%.
An unclearly defined objective will lose people’s attention and focus, not mention the sense of urgency.

Scope

In what region and in what area, vertically and horizontally speaking, the business should compete and grow. No company can excel in every business and with a clearly stated scope, every employees knows what business should take and what shouldn’t. So the company’s resource can be concentrated on the core business and set on the right path toward to the objective.

Advantage

Advange is the company’s distinct (distinct here means something you do differently. I truly disbelieve the copy of buisness model because any built-in model in a business has thousands of factors at the back to buttress it) strenth to propel and grow its business. This is the power of the company can wield to thrive in the market and fend off competitors. It is something no one can do better than you and something you can always count on to hit your objective.
If employees are likened to a handful of pins, when you throw them on one paper, the pins will point to different direction. But if you place a magnet near them, magically all the pin will point toward the same direction. That is also a clearly defined strategy would do. CEOs should wear a elevator strategy statement in their sleeves and communite it rentlessly to the employees. When this is done, the success is just around the corner.

Greenspan defends his legacy.

Once it appeared that Greenspan wrapped up his legendary career when his autobiography “the age of turbulence” published. Whereas now the ripple effect of the subprime crisis now second-guessed his previous shing 18 years as the chairman of federal reserve bank.
(Quoted from WSJ)
The prevailing view among critics faults Mr. Greenspan on two main counts

First, they say, his Fed lowered rates too much from 2001 to 2003 to cushion the economy from the bursting dotcom bubble. Then it took too long to raise them again. Low rates fueled mortgage borrowing, driving home prices to unsustainable heights.

Second, they say, the Fed was lax in its regulatory role. The central bank failed to press for stiffer rules for underwriting mortgages to people who ultimately couldn't afford them, they say. Also, they say, the Fed failed to anticipate banks' exposure to risky home buyers, leaving them with too little capital to absorb the eventual losses on those mortgages.

(Unquote)

I don’t want to judge who is wrong and who is right here. However, what rankles me is that whenever there is a trobule, some people (especially people always speak more than do) will play the blame game and ride on the critics. Hindsight is easy to pick but what these guys were doing when the decision was made back then. What makes me even furious is that many Greenspan’s peers now are also pouring their anti-Greenspan rhetorics. The question is why they didn’t not use their wisdom to challenge Greenspan back then ?.

Greenspan says “I was praised for things I didn't do, I am now being blamed for things that I didn't do." Even the agruement is right, Greenspan did lax to make those decision who probably led to this credit crisis. But who can gurantee that if Grennspan proposed something else, the economic condition will be better rather than worse?

Greenspan endorses laissez-faire regulatory oversight. I agree with him. I don’t believe heavy-handed government relation can eradiate financial or economic risks, if not make them higher. Market has its own self-correction mechanism, which is beyond human-being’s meddling. The history proves it in the past, and it will do now and in the future. What government should do is to ensure the play in the market is compliant with the rule.