Still remember you first day of work? What happen 3 months, 6 months, 1 year and 2 years later? So, you resign and start over the process again. 2 years later, then what you should do? Resign again? How many times you can resign in your career path?
Does this cartoon look familiar to you?
One of the hardest challenges to be employee is self-motivation. 2 years is usually the case just enough to take down your motivation and enthusiasm. In other words, 2 years you must CHANGE. So the only choice left is to resign. No other choices? Nope, there are few things you can do before you resign:
(1) Proactive Approach
People resign is usually because they do not get the recognition that they suppose to get. Identify the recognition that you want (e.g. promotion) and calibrate with your boss to set the expectation. The recognition must be within 2 years.
(2) Change Job Functions
If you do not get the recognition, you must request to change job function or task. Work on something else that you’re interested in within the same department. Give yourself 2 years again and back to step (1).
(3) Try for Internal Transfer
If none of the job functions those attract you, time to look for internal job’s opportunities in different department. This is one of the mistakes that I made when I resigned few years ago. I should have looked for internal opportunity first. Don’t make the same mistake as I did.
If these 3 steps fail, you only look for external job.
Once resign, you start all over again the 3 steps above. The key is really to make the CHANGE or MOVE in every 2 years. 2 years is the optimum duration in my opinion.
I think this is the best way to keep yourself motivated if you really want to stay in the corporate ladder. Believe me, you don’t want to wait until the day you drag yourself so hard to work every morning. You want to avoid that as possible, don’t you agree?
To avoid that, you need to upgrade yourself in every 2 years.
42 Comments:
very good post. i believe the 2 yrs is just the right time for someone who is in the right industry. if u r searching for ur true passions or something u really like to do.....then 2 yrs is quite long :)
2 yrs will also ensure that u don get too comfortable with your current job. :P
You have the point but I wonder how many of us can actually find our own true passions or something that we love to do in 2 years. We usually have a lot of constraints and dependencies to do what we love to do. Because of this, we usually drag our dream a way more than 2 years. Don’t you think so?
You're right, stay out from comfort zone is also another reason too.
Alvin,Champdog,
I wonder if I agree with you guys or not.
Say you start work at 21 and if according to both of your reasons
One move in 2 years and if you intent to work till you are 55, there are 34 years of working yrs.
34/2=17 companies
Is there so many companies out there for you to move ?
If so, how would it reflect on your resume ?
My philosophy in life is this if you are a goal getter, I do not believe there is any company you think that you believe the mgt will recognize you. And that is why my dad philosophy about fund your passive income from your active income and when your passive income exceed your active income, that is when you quite your active income work and concentrate on your passive income !
He did just that when he was 51 but he still work whenever he want to, ie whenever the bank call him up and request " Mr Tan, do you want to take up this piece of contract.'
Contract that people do not have any $ to continue and take over by the bank and he would figure out if it is profitable after calculating the costs of project. If he thinks it is quite a reasonable project, he would call up a few of his investment club friend to take up the project.
So, that philosophy is one I cherish because I realized long ago that I am a goal getter and no matter where I go, I tend to find out that the mgt are inefficient and most of the times I do not have the ability to convince them to see what I have observed and seen. And I am doing exactly what he had taught me.
So, my passive income consist of
Tax lien investment
Gold and silver
Land
That is my 2 cents.
Jamy
Typo,
He did just that and able to retire from his active income when he was 51.
If you love what you do, you will never work another day in your life...Mark Twain.
However, if you are unhappy in any way with what you do, then definitely get another job...motivation and inspiration come from inside.
I think Mark Twain does not know what he is talking about :).
I am not the one who simply changed job. Recently I changed job because of disagreement between my manager and me. I stayed for 5 years in my first job. A boring job scope is ok for me as long as I click with my colleagues..
I have this strong feeling you wrote this for me.
I'm not exactly in a comfort zone cos I'm dying to leave my current job.
But yet the fear of the unknown takes a lot of my courage away.
My family commitments & constraints pull me back from big leaps.
That leaves me with not much choice.
Again..I hope the right door opens soon...at the right time
Champ, I am not in the position to comment because I never change job but still, I'd like to say that it's easier to jump about when you are young and have lots of time ahead. If you are old, you'd probably be discarded like a tissue paper. Sometimes, people have to stay long at a place to learn the ropes of the trade.One however would probably stay to learn if one loves his or her job and of course, if it pays well and there is much prospect. I hope you are happy with what you are doing now!
Keeyit,
I have to say this is not the reason to leave a job : "Recently I changed job because of disagreement between my manager and me."
You will always have disagreement with any human being no matter where you go, sometimes coworker, sometimes manager. I learned young that there will always be 1 or 2 people in a company who will be pain in the neck, but that is not the reason to leave a company.
My 2 cents about leaving a company or a department is that you only leave when a company/department you work with out-grow you or you out-grown the company/department, but other than that, you have to learn to deal with issues or with people because if you don't, you will met the same kind of people / issue in a different format or setting.
But, if you go because the other company offer you double of what you get than the bottom line is you out-grow your present company because the other company can see what you can bring on the table. My sister is an excellent corporate ladder climber. She said every move she made, she has to make sure it is at least double of what she got and she moved every 4-5 years from junior mgr to senior mgr to now Vice president within 15 years of her career and her salary has increased from RM$3 to $25k a month.
It is the same concept with divorce. A lot of people divorce because they could not get on with their spouse and they move on to the next marriage and they find the same problems and issues in the next marriage except those issues present themselves in a different format.
So, my advice to you is learn how confront it and deal with it, do not leave a company/department because of a person. There are a lot of difficult people in every company, a lot of times, the art of success is to learn how to deal with these people.
Set yourself short term medium term and long term goal and you should not let others distract the goals that you have set.
I don't care if there are people who are interested in reading my gold and silver investment blog but as long as I knew gold and silver investment are the 2 best investment for the next 10 years, I am going to blog no matter what. (talking about this , I still owe Champdog a topics about why I think gold and silver are 2 best investment the next 10 years :):).
Jamy
@Jamy
I might not make the post clear enough. :D Move on in 2 years doesn’t really need to resign and leave the company. You must upgrade yourself in 2 years to learn new things and not to say in a comfort zone. That’s why I’m proposing a few options for you to upgrade yourself before you really want to consider resigning. You’re right, company is also look at your resume but if you’re changing a new company in every 2 years (job hopping), unlikely they will hire you too.
Building up passive income is surely the way to go. But we can’t completely ignore your active income when you’re building them. You need bullet to play the passive income game and the active income is your bullet. The more bullet you have, the more flexible you can play and therefore higher chances to win the game.
Your dad must have a lot of $ with the bank. Every time when I get called by a bank, they usually encourage to spend or loan more so that they can earn more as well. :D
I think my passive incomes now are:
1. Stock
2. Unit Trust
3. Property (Not Really)
4. Maybe into Commodities (influenced by you)
@The Fearless Blog
That’s right, love what we’re doing is the key. Have you ever thought of that hobby can be cultivated? Can we cultivate the passion of our jobs? What if someone make himself to be passion in his job? Can he be considered love what he is doing?
@Jamy
Mark Twain does not know what he is talking about? Really? :D
@Keeyit
Nice to see you here. Ya, I know that you just resigned recently. If we don’t change job is okay, but we can’t stop continue growing. No matter what, we have to find our way to grow whether it is still with the company or outside of a company.
@Peky
Maybe I write it for you without my awareness. It just comes to my mind to write about it. Now think of it, I could be writing for you.
Once I read a book about fear once you step out and experience the unknown, you’re actually gaining the power of doing it. When you gain the power, it really makes you feel good! Talk about family commitments & constraints, I totally understand your situation. Not easy huh, life?
@Jamy
Maybe disagreement may not be the right word to use. How about bad relationship with your boss? Or bad perception your boss on you? Sometimes we do screw up our relationship with our boss. It comes to a point that you must make a decision whether you want to continue to mend the relationship or just change a new boss.
Fixing the relationship with someone who has a bad perception to you is 20 times (maybe more?) harder than someone does not know you at all (unless you’re really confident). Putting 80% effort may end up getting maybe even less than 20% return. If this is the case, moving to the new boss could be a solution and right choice.
Talking about Gold & Silver, do you think the U.S recession may lead to fall in demand for Gold & Silver? This is one of the risks we should consider.
@footiam
This is exactly what happens to those who have been working for quite sometime in the corporate world. I’m one of them actually, sad to say that.
The older that we get in the corporate world, the lesser opportunity we can move around. That’s why we don’t just build “value” to our company but “value” to the industry. We must prove to ourselves that old people has old people’s value and contributions. :D Another strategy is to build a second income just in case one day we have been replaced. Still no matter what, we need to find a way to grow.
Thanks for bringing out this good point.
Some really helpful tips, another words, don't procrastinate because procrastination is another term for becoming lazy...my boyfriend says he is procrastinates but I tell him its being lazy...lol Thanks for the tips ;)
Champdog,
A lot of times Bank took hold possession of undone properties due to the fact that developers do not have any bullets to go on the project, that is where these private bankers take over projects. I don't know how much the old man had before he passed on cos I was not there when they read the will but I told my brother to keep safe for me. I do believe he did achieve a fair bit in his life time, let put it that way. $ is the easiest thing to achieve in life but when we give up the last breath, what is 1 more million you have make any difference ? That is how I feel about life at times. When I saw him breath its last, a lot of thoughts flow through my brain !
My 2cents is gold/silver are the best 2 investments for the next 10 years if US economy continue to go down.
Have you heard of the saying that all roads point to Rome ? something like that every economy indicators point to gold $10,000 and silver $1000, ya, call me crazy woman, it is ok with me :), he he he.
When gold was $250, I told people that gold will be $1000 and people think I was mad and when oil was $33 per barrel, I kept telling people oil is going to hit $100 per barrel, people looked at me thought I was schizophrenia, he he he.
Well, I cannot for gold to retrace a bit so I can add on more :).
Jamy
Champdog,
"Fixing the relationship with someone who has a bad perception to you is 20 times (maybe more?) harder than someone does not know you at all (unless you’re really confident). Putting 80% effort may end up getting maybe even less than 20% return. If this is the case, moving to the new boss could be a solution and right choice."
If you do not learn to fix the issue with your boss and move on , you going to face the same issue again and if you keep moving on and not fix the issue, I think the same issue will haunt you no matter where. I think it is the same as marriage as well. But, that is my 2cents lah.
I think Mark Twain was right. Or, maybe I am just one of the lucky few. I always had fun at whatever job I ever did, enjoyed to the hilt, never paid any attention to time invested, or the calendar, and left with satisfaction. I retired two weeks before hitting my 50th birthday.
If I don't feel comfortable in my work environment I will eventually be miserable beyond measure. Things may smooth over where I am at.We should try to love our work and everything will follows be positive in everything that you do.It's pretty hard to get a passion job.Maybe we can look around while we still have a possitive attitude.
@mee moe
You’re welcome. Sometimes I do procrastinate too but I guess we can take that as rest so that we can run further. Do it too often will become “lazy” as you said.
@kayatan
I see, you meant those projects. There have some risks (quite high) there. Regarding the gold and silver, I hope you’re right. If there is an opportunity, I think I would like to invest too. I don’t want to tell you “Jamy, I should have listen to you” in 10 years later. Hahaha…
About the relationship with your boss, I totally agree with you. Usually when you put yourself into his shoes, you will understand where the problem is. But I just want to bring up another point that at one point at time you have to learn how to give up and look for a better opportunity. Learn the mistake why you make with your boss and make sure you don’t repeat the same mistake again with your new boss. You should give yourself some time. Let’s say 2 years to fix the relationship. If it fails, then you can look for other bosses. Just my 2 cents too. Maybe will benefit keeyit if she read this. :D
@jack
You’re so lucky! You’re right. When you really into the job that you’re working on, you have no idea what time it is. By the time you finish you task, it is probably in the mid night already. :D
@sweetiepie
Fall in love with job, huh? Ya, it is not easy. I love many stuff. That’s why I can easily get bored to work on the same thing for too long. Maybe I’m a playboy or unfaithful?
nice post you have here champdog. i'm going to let my friend read this post because he's been trying so hard to determine whether or not he should resign. maybe this will help him in some ways. :)
Champdog,
I think a lot of us did not have the chance to learn some psychology class when we are in school (esp. in Malaysia Science class) and that is why Chinese people has very concrete thinking (esp. those who are in Science stream, which most of us are in S.E Asia country because countries around the areas still need a lot of engineers, accountant, etc). When a country become more affluent like US, UK, Australia or most Western nations, they have the luxury to study psy, philosophy (most of our parents would frawn and say why study these kind of subjects, cannot make $ one lah) but in fact these kind of subjects help us to develop our abstract side of thinking where we learn to see things not just in black and white but grey and I do believe these kind of subjects help us to develop our EQ.
My sister and I are from different school, she convent, I Chinese school and she took fine arts, literature and accounting, laws and others. And I specialized in computer science, Pure Maths, statistics. In CS, there is only 0 and 1, every logic derived from 0 and 1. So, I cannot see grey, either right or wrong, B/W. But, she is not so, she often says there are many ways to skin a cat. And that philosophy helped her a lot in her corporate climbing. I think being one of the few Asian woman who held the VP post for one of the biggest American firms in Asia pacific region speaks a lot on her education and philosophy.
She is younger than me but I learn a lot of philosophy from her cos I have never attended any philosophy class.
"But I just want to bring up another point that at one point at time you have to learn how to give up and look for a better opportunity. Learn the mistake why you make with your boss and make sure you don’t repeat the same mistake again with your new boss. You should give yourself some time. Let’s say 2 years to fix the relationship. If it fails, then you can look for other bosses."
I see this very different from you. Might be our age different, experience and etc...
I do not think anyone (people) should be the reasons one leave a company because anywhere you go, there is that 'pain in the neck' fellow, he/she can be your boss or your coworker.
I knew it is easier say than done especially in Asia culture.
But, I do believe 2 parties should sit down and find out where the problems are and see if can met in half way (win win situation). I always believe in it takes 2 to tango. If someone said his/her boss is totally wrong, I would give that someone benefit of doubt but deep down I don't believe in him/her 100%. It takes 2 hands to clap.
I wish the school prepare students more on what to look for when you look for a job, what kind of personality one has, one values one has, what kind of corporate structure would compromise one value and how much you want to compromise your value.
Champdog, that might be a good consulting area to go.
Business is all about filling a void that you see around you :).
@Gelene
You’re welcome. Hope your friend (your boyfriend?) will find this useful.
@kayatan
When we get into management path in the corporate world, we will start realizing the area which is called “grey”. This is where we have a chance to learn philosophy in practical. That’s why I keep emphasizing (which you may disagree), in life we do not know the decision we make is the right or wrong one. Most of the time in fact there are no right or wrong answers.
Take this topic as an example, whether you’re taking the approach to resign or not to resign, there is no right and wrong answers for that. But it doesn’t mean I don’t agree with your statement. A good leader can interface with any kind of people anywhere he/she goes. If you can deal with your current difficult boss, you can deal with almost any other difficult bosses in other companies.
There is no 100% wrong or 100% right of a person. It is all about how we perceive things. It is a matter of how your boss perceives you and how you perceive your boss. I’m sure you have heard about “Win-Win or No Deal”. Sometimes as you said especially in Asia culture, Win-Win situation is not easy to achieve. There are times we need to make a call “No Deal” when Win-Win is not possible. So in this topic discussion, “No Deal” basically means you’re resigning.
In business, I believe it is still the same. Sometimes we need to make a call for “No Deal”. Recently, I have rejected numbers of paid reviews for blogging is simply because we can’t achieve the win-win situation. When I buy a product (as a consumer), it is still the same – Win-Win or No Deal.
Does this make sense? Jamy, I like having discussion with you and thanks a lot for your comments. I really appreciate that.
ah..my coworker quit his job to get motivated..and now he's less motivated to work so he's looking for another job. I think it really depends on the person.
It is a pleasure :"Jamy, I like having discussion with you and thanks a lot for your comments. I really appreciate that."
I think what I shared about this topic is all based on my personal opinion. I mean I am quite an old fart who has had 35 years of working, business experience. I started very young. I think I was 12 years old when I started my own candy business.
I think one of my earlier years of experience impacted me so much that I learn early that no one , no body should affect your decision on resign.
When I was about 25 years old, I worked under these 2 IT business consultant and I was the programmer analyst. They would go out to client site after the sale manager got the deal for the company. I could not stand working with one of the 2 women (1 of them was very nice). The company overall atmosphere was quite good. One of the owner was a Chinese lady from Ipoh (it was like mid 80's in Sydney, Australia). It was a small company where everyone kind of treat one another like family and I love my immediate boss who was a Caucasian Australian who married an Anglo Indian and adopted 2 Korean kids. Beside working, we hang out a lot together at social gatherings, like pubs, opera, etc...
This other lady whom I dislike was not my immediate boss but she was in charge of the project that I was on so she became my boss by default. I was young and very inexperience. I was really piss of with her but I did not share with anyone not even my immediate boss. I hid all the anger in me and I literally had mouth ulcers working with that lady.
One day, she pushed me to the edge, I blew my top and said that is, enough is enough. I walked out, my immediate boss and his wife asked me to go to their place for dinner to thrash thing out. But, I thanked them and said I don't think I like to continue getting myself piss off. At that time being a pick basic programmer analyst was a well sought after item. All one need to do was call up a head hunter and a job interview can be found within 24 hours.That was how hot we were then. (Yes, when I graduated from Sydney uni at late 70's, there were like 21 of us and there were like 50 big companies from BHP to AMP (Australia mutual providence), Westpac bank, ANZ , you name it, we have all these big corop. under our finger tips. They are the ones who wooed us big times and our roads are gold paved.
Though I resigned, I still kept a very good relationship with my ex immediate boss. I often joined the Amnesty group that he hosted.
And guessed what, 1 week after I resigned, the woman tendered her resignation. I was shocked. I thought to myself, if only I talked things out with my immediate boss and let him thought of of a strategy for me, might be he could transfer me to another project, etc... But, I did not, I quit cos I could not take it.
That was a big lesson for me and it lasted a whole life time.
After that time, I had never never never left a company because of someone else. Not even any a.h. boss.
If I could not come to a resolution with the person who has the most power in my career, I will analyze the situation to see if I have growth so much that the company no longer can accommodated my growth or it is because I have regress so much that the company no longer can accommodate me.
In fact, I thought I was the only one who thought that way until I met my last boss in Brunei. He is one of the youngest multi millionaire in Asia. He had 21 textile factories in 21 countries and most of his textiles are sold in major retail stores in US. His group company is not only listed in KLSE but NY stock exchange and Australia's.
In fact, he is same age as me and went to my rival school in Australia but I had not meet him until I worked for him. He is a close friend with Anwar but he resided in Singapore because he was too scared to be kidnapped. When they went back to Johor for Chinese New Year, he and his family had to go in different Mercedes with their drivers because they were too scare of being kidnapped. Yes, the guy is not only rich but he is a big admirer of Bill Gates.
He taughtt me a lot of business philosophies and I am very thankful ; and one of them was the one that I shared before.
I might be biased to say this but people who moved around and not achieving much in one place will not achieve much in the next. What make them think that next place is better than the other ? Likewise people who divorce always think they will be able to handle better in the next marriage, but statistics show people who marries the 2nd times are more likely to get divorced than others.
To me, the 1st 12 months of work and business is full of struggles and difficulties and most people could not make it to 3rd years !
The last interview I had with this guy who is the head of an ICU (you asked me what I was doing, I am doing clinical related kind of work. He said when he started that unit , people said he would not last 1 year, he said it was hard cos the boss was an egg head but he was shocked that his boss quit after his 2nd years and because no one can stand his boss so he by default became the most senior, the director promoted him to be assistant mgr. He said deep in his heart, he has a desire to build this ICU into one of the best in the hospital. Yes, after 12 years of sweat and tears, he is taking on another new department, one of its kind in the entire Florida, the most state of the art neuro unit. When I listened to his story, I can sense the radiant on his face.
No success comes easy. There will be scarify here and there, and a lot of times you have to put our prides on the chopping board.
Just my 2 cents.
I could have quit 12 months ago, 7 months ago, and 7 days ago in my present job (because of 1 a.h) but I did not. It also does not mean I wait for things to happen. I research for opportunity and environment where I can bring in my expertise to the table and likewise they will invest on me on new clinical medical trend which will make me hot items the next 2 years. And I did ! I waited 12 months.
We live in a microwave and disposable society (esp. in US), if something is not desire, just thrash it lah, buy a new one. Husband, wife , marriage also sama lah. We forget a lot of virtue in life such as perseverance and patience but they are virtues young men need to acquire in this microwave age..
Champdog,
Before I forget, that company that I said I resign because of that lady. Well, after 1 year, they started another branch, in fact, my ex immediate boss told me later that in fact, that Ipoh lady (one of the director) had in mind earlier on to make me the person who supervise that branch but since I left, they hires someone else. In fact, I regretted about this incidence for quite a number of years. 1 year before I left Aust. for Malaysia, this company had grown 5 folds.
life is one continous timeline, work or doing biz, resign or get new job are all just changes along your life line. it shouldn't have any hard cast rules about that ... but one should be clear on what he wants and try his best to make sure each change is toward the better.
once in a while, we screw up driving opposite direction ... just hit brake, turn around and get back to the track again ...
When you are young, time is on your side, when you are older, time is against you.
And I also do not think a lot of times, the cruel world allow us to make a lot of mistakes, neither give us time to change different gear or brake to turn back.
A mistake is a mistake ,no matter if it is forgiven but it always come from consequences, high price that one pay for the mistake.
It is better to think twice before one takes on the wrong turn and end up in the hot soup, like the Enron's guys did, many people lives were screwed because of some guys' mistakes.
"If you love what you do, you will never work another day in your life...Mark Twain.
However, if you are unhappy in any way with what you do, then definitely get another job...motivation and inspiration come from inside."
yea?but what if i like my job and the people around me keep telling me to quit and because the pay isn't. im 24 now and im stress already.
thanks for this post mate.
... because the pay isn't as good as they expected?. im only 24 now but i started getting worry.
so true. thanks.
I am surprised you did not suggest to work self employed! why not? that's what i am doing. i believe this is the only way to stop that fatal 2 years cycle for me at least and maybe for many others out there
Sorry guys for the late respond as I’m quite busy recently applying a new job offer. Now the interview process is done and hopefully I can get the job offer. :D
@thebaglady
Ya, I think that is the common “working syndrome”. We need to find a way to motivate ourselves and different person has a different motivation factors. The tricky part is the motivation factors change over time even for the same person.
@Kayatan(Jamy)
Your personal experience is the most valuable stuff here. They’re a lot of things that cannot be learned until we really experience it. The closest thing is to learn from someone who has experienced before like you. I always enjoy reading your personal experience in your life. Thanks again for the sharing.
“I think one of my earlier years of experience impacted me so much that I learn early that no one, no body should affect your decision on resign.”
I absolutely agree with your statement. I think I have a different experience than yours when I was first working. I have a bad impression to my next-level boss and I used more than 4 years to build a better impression but yet it still doesn’t work. I could have used the wrong strategy. The only mistake that I make is when I look back is I do not look for other alternatives. I should have look at other opportunities while I’m fixing it. At that point in time, I believed any relationship can be fixed. Yes, I still believe this until today but I don’t eliminate the escape could be one of the options too. I love your statement below:
“It also does not mean I wait for things to happen. I research for opportunity and environment where I can bring in my expertise to the table.”
You see that we have totally different opposite experiences in our first job. You learned that we shouldn’t just quit because you pissed off with someone and I learned that we can quit while we’re fixing the relationship with someone. I think this is a very good sharing and what we really look for is the “balance” in my opinion. Don’t you think so?
But of course when you’re being interviewed for a job, you usually don’t mention the quit as an option because this is not what they’re looking for.
@Michael
Very well said, there are no hard cast rules for that. I agree with that. You’re right that one must clear what he/she really wants. If you know exactly what you want, then the next thing is to figure out how to get there and how to get there is different from a person to another person.
@Kayatan(Jamy)
I think we have been discussing this before. I agree that we need to think twice before any decision is made but most importantly we want to learn how to deal with the decision that we have made. Focusing too much time on making the right decision is just making you afraid of failure. We must dare to fail if we want to succeed in life.
Enron’s case is another story which tells us that anything can happen to a company no matter how good or how big is the company. So if you’re an employee, you must anticipate this kind things can happen to your company too. If it really happens, what should you do? Do you have plan B, plan C?
@Orange
If you love what you do, you don’t live in this time dimension. You don’t know when you suppose to have your dinner or lunch and you don’t know when you suppose to sleep too. How amazing isn’t it?
You bring up a very good point. Money or the job that you love? Which one to choose? If money is not a concern to you, will you still doing what you’re doing now? Majority of us will say no. I only meet few people in life is really doing what they love. Having said that, I also meet a lot of people who are lying to themselves that they love their jobs. In fact, they don’t. They probably just want to be a good role model to their sub-ordinates.
24 is still young and it is not too late to make a change now. A lot of things need to be considered whether you want to get that new job or not. Is your current job is really what you love? Doing what you love can make you outperform than everyone else. When you’re top performer, will you get higher paid? You need to identify the career path in long run. Same thing to that job which has higher paid, you need to know the career path in long run which one has a bright future.
@anonymous
You’re welcome. Thanks for bringing up the point. I won’t say self-employed is the *Only Way* to stop the fatal 2 years cycle. There always have more than one way to a solution. What I suggested in this post is mostly for those people who choose to continue to work as an employee.
You will face a different challenge when you’re self-employed and not everyone I is suitable to be self-employed. But bottom-line is as what Orange has brought up, is doing what you love.
If we really want to be self-employed, I think we should get out of the corporate maze as soon as we can. The longer we stay there, the harder for us to move out especially to be self-employed.
Champdog,
I totally agree with your point of view on this : "You see that we have totally different opposite experiences in our first job. You learned that we shouldn’t just quit because you pissed off with someone and I learned that we can quit while we’re fixing the relationship with someone. I think this is a very good sharing and what we really look for is the “balance” in my opinion. Don’t you think so?"
I do believe our personal experience tint our perception of a place, or a person.
So, we all hold to a certain degree of biases based on our personal experience.
Let me share this with you.
After I decided to leave for Australia for good and return to Malaysia. I planned a round the world trip (12months) before I hit Malaysian ground because I knew the working condition and the number of holidays there. I knew holiday there did not come by easily. While I was planning my trip, Washington D.C was one of my destination because I wanted to take photos on some of the famous buildings there cos my brother was an architect.
Washington DC areas are renounced for its high crime rate,(certain areas). So, my church people gave me lots of warnings, advices and also prayers when I told them I wanted to go visit D.C.
While on the plane from Cleveland to Washington D.C, I met a lady who worked in white house. She was very fascinated with my round the world trip journey. She decided to take 1/2 day off to take me around. I had a wonderful time in D.C, was not robbed neither was being shot :). And because of my personal experience, I thought D.C was one of the most beautiful cities :).
A lot of times our personal experience shaped our thoughts and gave us biases. And that applied to both of our perceptions on should we resign to get motivated.
Yes, I agree with this as well :"Focusing too much time on making the right decision is just making you afraid of failure. We must dare to fail if we want to succeed in life.
Enron’s case is another story which tells us that anything can happen to a company no matter how good or how big is the company. So if you’re an employee, you must anticipate this kind things can happen to your company too. If it really happens, what should you do? Do you have plan B, plan C?"
If you look at our father generation, (at least my father), most of these China men did not have any education. But, they saw opportunities and seized them.
My dad was nearly sold to his aunt cos there were not food in the family. He was old enough to understand that either he or one of his young siblings had to be sold to bring food to the family table, so he decided to go look for fortune in a bigger city.
He did not have $ to buy ship fare to Kch, so he decided to work for this ship owner who sailed to Kuching every mth. The ship owner gave him 3 meals, 3 t-shirts and 3 kaki pants in return for his ship fare. And the deal was 3 years work.
When he landed in KCH, he slept on street, worked all kind of jobs and saved every penny he got. Then with whatever $ he got, he started a small fish monger business, selling fish on the fish market in KCH.
After he got enough $, he then bought himself a few fishing boats and hired fishermen to fish for him.
After he acquired about 10 fishing boats, he and a few business friends bought an ice factory and the rest of the fish monger bought ice from them.
Then he and a few of his business friends ventured into Japanese market. They were the biggest prawn paste exporter to Jap.
And from fish business, these China men who all had never set their feet into any schools started housing development, taking 1 project at a time. And eventually became one of the biggest developer in KCH.
And none of these old China men knew how to read any English legal documents but they hired the best CEO, managers to read for them :).
All these China man Apek children were all well educated, all being trained in the imperial British education system,(I hold a master degree in IT, my sister is a chartered accountant, my brother is a chartered architect), but none of us did as well as my dad who did not in his life had the opportunity to step in the school.
I often wondered has education reduced us (at least the men) to be "ballless" ? Does education make us into 'kuli'( employees) than 'towkey' (employers)?
Yes, you are right. My take is we need to take some risks in life, if possible 'calculated risk', if we cannot, at least learn from our mistakes.
Of course, I do not think a person should blindly take risk. Making decision that is obviously wrong, e.g getting married to a guy you know out right is an alcoholics, a drug addicts or even a workoholics and you think you can change him by marrying him. To me, that is plan idiot !
I cannot remember which blog I read, but I remembered the young guy is a Malaysian entrepreneur who went to one of the famous uni in US and his dad is a successful business man and his dad and friends say it is not enough to love what you do being an entrepreneur. I agree with my 10 fingers and 10 toes.
Yes, you need passion to be an entrepreneur but it takes more than just passions, there are a lot of boring stuffs which a business entail, a lot of bolts and nuts that are not too glamorous...
And when you venture into business, or even investment, think always on how much you can lose, not how much you can win. If you know you can prepare to lose that amt of $ without going to mental hospital, that is the first step...
Business takes more than passion, t takes a lot of patience ! A lot of people did not know and not all are made to be a business owner.
It is the same as "Amway" sell men would tell you everyone can be a 'diamond', I say it is BS... to the maximum.
Thank you for your reply. I enjoy the dialogue.
Jamy
Yes, I agree too that our personal experiences shape our perception and thought. That is exactly how “belief” is formed. Because of this belief, argument and conflict happen and sometimes even the War can happen too. :(
Education IMO, it trains you to be employee and not employers. This is how education is designed for. The biggest problem of education now is it does not reflect to the real life enough. It is simply not practical enough. Until one day if education can teach you what you’re going face in real life, it is probably one day it will become useful. Btw, have you thought of that if everyone becomes employers, who are the employees then?
Making a right decision is important too. I absolutely agree with that too. I agreed we shouldn’t making a decisions that obviously wrong. But don’t forget that, decision that obviously wrong to you, doesn’t mean it is obviously wrong to the other person. He/she may not know that decision is obviously wrong until he/she experiences it.
I used to focus on making right decisions and now I shift my focus on making my decisions right rather than make the right decisions. Perhaps, most of the difficult decisions that I made has no right and wrong answers. That’s why I need skills to make my decisions to become the right one.
A lot of people focusing on the past or live in the past and most of them end up in depression. I believe if we can switch our focus on after the decision making (or making the decision right), it somehow forces you to live in the future. This may help at least for those who always live in the past wondering why he/she made such a decision.
Ya, I agree in business, you not only need to have passion and patient as well. A lot of people just see the easier side of the business and think business is easy money especially for those businesses that has been established. Honestly I do believe if you enjoy the business game, it could be a very fun game to play.
I enjoy the dialogs too and thank you, Jamy. :)
Hi Kayatan,
Mark Twain just want to say that if you enjoy your work, then it becomes fun and you will not feel as if you are working.
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I just left the corporate world last January. It feels good to be free from being employed.
I did my homework before resigning. I make sure that I can feed my family at least for 1 year before I dare to explore my new world today.
Congratulation to you, Richard! 1 year is pretty good. So how do you do so far? It has been 4 months already right. You’re now full time real estate investor?
Thank you. :D
Yup, I'm already a full-time real estate investor. Same as yours, I'm also earning from my blogs but not that big yet.
The first quarter is quite challenging. Honestly, I did not produce a concrete output on that quarter. As a newbie, I commit some mistakes. But I did not back down from these challenges and I continue what I have started.
I am slowly producing at the start of the second quarter. My target is to raise around 50,000 USD or 2,000,000 PHP by October 1, 2008 for me to invest in cashflow-generating properties.
This is enough to give me around 1,200 USD or 50,000 PHP in passive monthly income. Almost the same amount I used to keep after the taxes in deduction when I was employed.
My simple advice to you is to never give up on your dream. Keep it burning inside you and someday, you will have it.
Richard,
That is wonderful and keep your dream going !
One of our friends stopped work 3 years ago to find his dream. He quit his job without any new job in horizontal. He knew he has always wanted to do something he likes and his work is not really what he want. So, he quit. No, he did not have 1 year saving, in fact, he did not have any saving. He lived with his elderly parents for the last 32 years, taking care of them, doing errands for them, and at the same time, he went to libraries and any free resources he can get on hand.
I called him last weekend, he told me he started a business 9 months back- luxury sail boats. We live in Florida and we are near the gulf and water spot such as sailing, fishing are some of our favorite spots here, most families own 1 or 2 sail boats.
He told me he was amazed that a lot of his clients are from Saudi and Europe.
He told me he started hiring a secretary 2 months back, who work in her home. His secretary helped her to put listing of sail boats in his company web page.
He told me he is getting about $150k a month. I was very happy for him cos we have been encouraging him the last few years and even sponsored him a bus ticket to a conference in New Mexico. Seeing him achieving his dream thrill us and make us proud !
Yes, never give up your dream.
Cheers
Jamy
typo
in the horizon.
That's a very inspiring story.
Let's support one another as we are going in the same direction. The world has become small because of technology and we must take advantage of it by providing useful information and motivation for us to move ahead.
How do we eat an elephant? One bite at a time. Keep doing the baby steps.
Cheers!
Richard, you are most welcome.
@Richard,
You’re a good spirit and right attitude. I think as long as we’re persistent on what we’re doing and never give up, one day we will see the result. That’s why I totally agree with your last statement. I’m here wishing you all the best!
Ya, Jamy always has very inspiring story. I always learn something for her experiences. Baby steps is the way to go… You’re right. :)
@Jamy
You seem like have a lot of successful person around you. This is a very good thing actually. I wonder do you consider yourself also like one of them? Just out of my curiosity. :)
Champdog,
Yes, I am very blessed, I am surrounded by a lot of successful people. Very conducive environment I am in here. I am still learning and hopefully one day I will be as successful as them :).
I'm sure you will one day. All the best!
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