Simple Explanation of Blue Ocean Strategy (Review)

Another interesting book that recommended by my very top-level boss – Blue Ocean Strategy by W. Chan Kim and Renee Mauborgne

As usual, the Wikpedia explanation sometimes is just too comprehensive and I found a very good video summary in youtube. Let’s look at this video:

This reminds me the from “The Sun Sze Art of World” and the “Thick Face Black Heart” books mention that “Sometimes You Don’t Need to Fight to Win a War”. I personally love this statement. In short, the Blue Ocean Strategy is simply saying that “You Don’t Need To Fight to Win Your Competitor”.

Remember, the "BLUE" Ocean Strategy says:

• Competition is Irrelevant.
• Value Innovation – Ignoring the competition and focusing on the buyers.

Isn’t it saying a same thing? Provide what the customer really wants and create a new market for it rather than we compete and kill each other until all our blood spread out to the whole ocean which is called the “RED” Ocean Strategy.


Real Case Examples

(1) McDonald’s restaurant
Have you ever wonder why McDonald’s restaurant is so successful in worldwide? At least this is what I experienced in US, Malaysia and Europe. It always full during peak hour. Look at the graph below, does McDonald trying to compete with the rest?

source: www.csc.com

(2) Apple's products (i.e. iTunes, iMac, iPhone)
Apple is so successful until today in my opinion is because of “Branding”. You feel cool and different status when using apple’s products. Using an Apple product is just like driving the “BMW” car on the road. This market is never exists and Apple creates for it.

(3) AirAsia Airline in Malaysia.
It eliminates over the counter booking system, free food/beverage on the plane, seating class booking system, and reduce "luxury" facilities provided by Airport Lounge, seat quality and many others. Think of it, are all these things a necessity for a customer? Although this is not something new in other countries but at least it is still new market in Malaysia. AirAsia creates this market.


Conclusion

Of course it is not as simply as I say but sometimes this makes a lot of common sense and it just that when we come into practice, it is a whole different story. Don’t you agree?

In summary this book provides a tool and mythology to create a new market space using the blue ocean strategy. You can buy the book yourself and learn the details.


I personally bought it but haven’t finished yet. The question that I have in mind is, will the book help in real business? Or it is just another educational business book? You tell me…

Related link:

• Preview of this Book

Be Careful When You Resign

I have resigned for 2 times in my entire life. So, what will you normally do when you resign? I guess most of us will just copy whatever necessary information from a company, won’t you? The thing that you may not aware is 99% of those copied information are useless. I bet most of you won’t border about those so called useful information after you start working in your new job, will you? But still, you want to copy just for sake of piece of mind.

Let’s see what happen to this guy “Biswamohan Pani”, I believe is an Indian guy, Ex-Intel Employee, is currently being sued by Intel for stealing company Trade Secrets Worth $1 Billion. He claims that the information that he copied is for his wife (also an Intel employee) but those information is irreverent to his wife after further investigation. Imagine he is just 33 years old and he could spend 20-30 years in rest of his life in jail. What the heck?

See the full news here: Ex-Intel Employee Steals Trade Secrets Worth $1 Billion

If you join any multinational companies and most of them will warn you about the serious of this kind issue during your new hire orientation program. The question is how many of us really care about it? Do You? Maybe you should now think about it…

Do you press CLEAR after filing up gas?

I received this some time ago that speculating around that you must press on the “CLEAR” button after you purchase gas by credit/debit card at the petrol pump. They said that the employee from the gas station can use your credit/debit card to purchase their own gas. How true is this?

Apparently this is a SCAM according snopes.com. You can find the long explanation of its origin. Well, I do press “CLEAR” button every time after I use the Photostat machine in my office because the second person can photocopy your content since it still remains in the memory. It looks like it doesn't apply to using credit cards at petrol station...

But anyhow, it becomes a habit that I’m still pressing “CLEAR” button every time after I use the pump with my credit cards. No harm, right?

Virtual Stock Market Game - Updown.Com Review

This is not a paid review and I think it is a pretty good website to share with you all about this Updown.com website.

If you’re not really a single stock buyer and seldom keep up with what individual stocks are doing in the market and would like to LEARN and INVEST in stock market with ZERO RISK of financial loss, this website is for you. It is the free investment platform to practice investing and to collaborate with others who share their stock investment experiences and etc.

You will have $1,000,000 virtual money to start the investment. You can start your own investing group or join the existing group to discuss any investing experiences (e.g. investment strategies, stock picks, give your opinion about why certain stocks are under or well perform and etc.). In fact, you can also write your own review to earn REAL money out of it.

I hope you will find this useful. I will use this website as my learning opportunity in stocks and keep in mind that is virtual. In someday later, we should start playing a real game as soon as possible. I don't think you want to stuck in the virtual stock market forever. Happy stock investing!