Sypnosis of 24 years of my life ;)

This project has not been plagiarized or copyrighted in any manner. All sources were used as references and information submitted is purely from student’s viewpoint.

1: In life, what have you been doing? What experiences you had?

Well-to-do kids in my primary school was normality, however I was one an exception. My dad worked hard to make to support a family of 5 while my mum was a full time housewife.

In primary school, during recess time my classmates ordered food to their hearts content food overflowing on their plates with whatever they desired; soft drinks, deserts and tidbits. As for me, money was scarce and sparingly spent as I queued to order my food.

To make things worst, life became tougher since my dad passed on when I was 14, found a job as a cashier at my neighborhood mini-mart. It was illegal however I took the risk to reduce the financial burden on my mum. I thought of ways to make money by buying certain toys and tidbits from my mini-mart and sold it to my friends with a bit of profit.

Life in secondary school was mediocre. I had to work and school, and when fatigue sets, I fell asleep during lessons. I did not have much time to study then, however with the minimal time I had, I managed to pull through graduating with 2A’s and 2B’s during O’levels.

I was anticipating life into polytechnic and the full independence of working life thereafter.

I was considered an active sports person then, I looked forward to PE (Physcial Education) classes and was asked by my PE teacher to join the athletics team. I was chosen to represent my school in the team relays of track and field and we won a couple of medals.

The training was held twice a week but I had to skip training due to work commitments. Despite the pain of training intensely till there were stitches, I pushed on. To me giving up halfway was a failure. I did not want to re-create the steps of poverty in my family.

My life in polytechnic was the best period of my life. I had many friends, had a fulfilling life as I joined a Christian group called campus crusade. From there on, my life seemed to dramatically change. The companionship of like-minded people striving towards a common goal really encouraged me and gave me a sense of direction in my life. I loved communicating with people, sharing principles towards life’s issues. The church had all sorts of people and it was interesting mixing with such a vast variety of people. I was actively involved in planning events, group activities and eventually became a leader of a small group.

Question 2 : What have you learnt about yourself through these experiences?

In secondary school, despite the fatigue due to working and schooling, I enjoyed the whole process. It gave me a wider experience as compared to my peers as I learnt to be more independent. I was young then but being poor gave me a stronger sense of survival instinct.

Throughout these times, I have vowed to provide for my mum comfortably when she grows older. Success and money was something I wanted and lacked in my younger days.

This gave me an entrepreneurial spirit since young.

I had also learnt the process of time management, prioritizing my needs and wants. I felt proud of myself when I had received my results during the O’levels. Anticipation kept me going every day, not knowing what was lying in store of my life. But knowing that hard work, perseverance will lead me to greater success one day.

In poly days, I took time to understand people’s perspectives, their personalities and throughout it all, I saw goodness in mankind. My communication skills with people increased dramatically. My planning of activities stirred about creativity.

I felt a limitation towards how much I could impact people thus I started taking up leadership roles as it grew me to have a more servant hood spirit towards people.

One specific incident, I was feeling emotionally negative due to the overwhelming stress I had during my polytechnic days and the tight deadlines, I was out strolling and felt like I needed someone’s comfort very badly. My close friend and leader, Jeraine had just ended her work as a nurse and it was around 10pm. She was exhausted but upon receiving my call, she rushed down immediately towards city hall to comfort me. Her sacrificial leadership taught me how to love others by being a role model. From there onwards, I captured her spirit and decided to show the people around me; to serve and love.

At church and orientation group leadership events, we had undergone personality tests to understand ourselves better to outreach to people of different personalities.

I realized one thing - trust is very sacred amidst people. One important lesson learnt, in order to befriend people, be a friend to them, lead a very open life and proactive initiation towards conversations.

People usually tend to be more open-up after listening to me sharing about my life.

However, there were blind spots of myself that I was not aware of. The close friends of mine had given me some feedback commenting that I am too brief or non analytical, too playful at times and get carried away when I am too involved. I felt in order to learn, I must be humble enough to accept feedback to improve oneself.

Q3 : How have you developed your skills during the Practise of Management Skills module?

Throughout the years, I evaluated my strengths and weaknesses and paved my career path and decided to specialize in sales as communications and persuasiveness is my forte. I realized this would be a rewarding career as the remunerations are in alignment with the hard effort put in.

When I kick started my first career in vacation ownership sales with a large American MNC, I was enthusiastic in meeting new clients and had read up a lot of self improvement books.

The spirit to serve focuses on making employees happy which in return, happy employees will have happy customers. It became a permanent feature of my company’s culture that was put into action. I had really enjoyed my work on my first sales job. There were monthly company functions, awards given every quarterly, spiffs that were handed out daily in recognition of the top 5 achieving sales executive.

I had learnt the spirit to serve and it was one of my fortes towards my church group that I was overseeing, to serve and be a role model for them. Thus, in return I could see the youngsters capturing my role model and sharing it to their family members and friends. This was a huge sense of self achievement knowing that the lessons are passed forward.

Marriott, J.W., Brown, K.A. (1997) The Spirit To Serve: Marriott’s Way. New York. HarperCollins Publishers.

I had met some hiccups along the way whereby clients were very nasty and provoking in their speech. There was this skeptical lady who walked into our gallery and started finding faults with everything I spoke off, I felt like giving up and sent her off from our office. However, something within me told me to preserve on and treat her with love and tact.

At the end of it all, she purchased our product and I savored the fruits of my labor.

I tried to live by this principle many atimes and it helped me in my darkest moments.

Holy Bible (1984) defined love as: Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.

Years ago, I read this author’s biography. There were so many ways I could identify with him, from a life filled with poverty, determination, strong survival instinct that allowed him to be a successful individual after much failures.

One lesson learnt was such: “work to learn, not work for money.”

Kiyoksaki, R.T., Letcher, S.L. (1997) Rich Dad Poor Dad. New York. Warner Books Edition.

Sales have taught me so much in my past 3 years, from Buyer to consumer (B2C) whereby I learnt a lot about body language from my sales managers and directors. Many times, I had read up on sales books whereby we had role-plays with our colleagues to determine: lying, how to use body language, facial expressions, handshakes, seating positions, dressing with intent. All these lessons learnt taught me to understand a person’s body language in the corporate and non corporate world. All these lessons learnt was put in to practice and I was the top 5 sales executive amidst 40 other colleagues within the first 2 months of work. It gave me a stronger sense of assurance that I was in the right career then.

Thompson, P. (1996) The Secrets of Communication. Australia. Simon & Schuter Ltd.

Creating a great first impression within the first few moments of meeting a person was something that I look forward to achieving successfully. It is the enthusiasm, mimicking the body language and the mindset of onself that will impact the other party’s impression towards you. Our framework imagination distorts or creates our reality. It became very evident that the tools worked when I applied what I had read.

Boothman, N. (2000). How to make people like you in 90 seconds or less. New York. Workman Publishing Company.

Two years ago, I downloaded the DISC Technical Supplement with the profiling test and had a better understanding of myself; my personality was an “I” which meant Influential. I really enjoyed being around people and gained energy from socializing with people, this also meant that I made decisions based on feelings which crippled me to have a more analytical view towards problems. Being aware of my shortcomings was my first step towards growing. This helped me to work better with in a team, whereby I learnt to understand my colleagues’ personalities.

At this point of life during my work, my job as a sales consultant required me to sell (Skills Program For Upgrading & Resilience) funded programs focusing on the Employability Skills Series, soft skills aspect. I have also met up with clients who wanted Problem Solving Decision Making Program incorporated with the DISC profiling aspect. When I had went down to the client’s place for a sales visit, I explained the DISC profiling kit with great conviction to them as I had personally experience the effectiveness of the tool. This tool was helped me in many areas, in my career, in my personal life and every social gathering I went to.

Kulkin. S. (1998). The DISC Personality System - Enhance Communication and Relationship. UK. The Institute for Motivational Living

Juggling a full time job and pursuing my degree is still a tough process. Thus time management was very important, this book taught me the time management matrix whereby I learnt to list down all my-to-do list items and place them in the 4 different quadrants based on the importance and urgency. I had to reject certain social gatherings with friends and colleagues when I had to attend night classes, exam preparations and project meet-ups. I had to prioritize the important things and get them done.

Covey, S., Roger, A., Merril, R.R. (1994). First Things First. New York. Simon & Schuter Ltd.

Q4 : Taking the answer to question 2b, how will you develop your skill?

For my communications skills, I personally felt that throughout these 6 years, I have mastered the art of speaking to people from all levels, from elderly people, to teenagers, to peers, to senior management and C- level directors. I feel that I have no qualms or fears towards this.

However last year during my Key Performance Index (KPI), my manager has feedback that I could improve my communication skills by being more polite and less blunt. I have learnt to held back and reflect thoroughly before I speak.

This year my Key Performance Index (KPI) has indicated that I have improved in this area and personally I had reminded myself to practice before I went to meet clients for presentations.

I felt that this has aided my career and allowed me to build closer relationships with my clients.

Now that I am rather efficient in soft skills, I would like to enhance my hard skills by seeking a change of a new career in a total different industry.

Using the SMARTER goal setting format, I have reflected on my personal goals and how about I will go towards achieving it.

S- Specific- New Career in arts or advertising industry

M-Measurable – yes, by ensuring that I send out at least 3 resumes per week to companies with job openings

A-attainable- yes, by seeking websites, job openings, career fairs

R- Realistic- possible as there is a arts fair this coming May whereby they are looking out to source for rookies and provide on the job training

T-time bound- by end august

E-evaluate- to attend some short courses relevant to this industry and have a feel of whether I would have passion for this industry

R-redo – I have to keep sourcing for more career openings and to start networking with people in this industry

Despite all these planning, I can foresee that the road ahead will be tough.

Firstly, as I have no experience in this industry, I will have to start from scratch and probably earn a meagre salary while I am a rookie.

I have to put in a lot of conscientious effort before I will be recognized as compared to other veterans in this industry. Undoubtedly sacrifices have to be made to pursue my goals and dreams. I understand from my colleagues in the marketing and advertising industry that the work environment will be very political, many urgent deadlines and much stress would be a part of the job culture.

Personally, based on feedback from people and my personal evaluation, there were many characteristics of myself that I feel proud of. Namely, they are display of confidence, people oriented, passionate, trust worthy and proactive.

The weaknesses that I have would be: not meticulous, bad listener, untidy, too blunt and straight forward, overly independent which would result in stubbornness when people try to offer their feedback.

The first step to change is to have awareness of my weaknesses. Next, I will work towards making changes to these characteristics. At my workplace, I deal with a lot of soft skills trainers and often have the chance to hear about their insights towards issues in life.

One specific example is of communication and relationship management: there was an event whereby my sales team had new additions and we had quite alot of rubbing shoulder in the initial start.

After understanding that for a team to come together, there are 4 stages : forming, storming, norming and performing is a natural process, I have learnt to appreciate the diversity of my colleagues’ characteristics and accept them for who they are.

In conclusion, I have been through quite a tough patch while I was in my teens but I gained a lot of experience and learnt how to be street smart.

My present situation is mediocre and sales is something that I have already achieved huge success in, in my previous and present company I had been the top sales executive for a continuous period of time and have felt the gratification and satisfaction.

In order to grow, I would have to make tough decisions outside of my comfort zone. I am excited and anticipative of my future with a new career change and am aware that barriers will be presented, but await to see the future.