I don't know how people can update their blogs everyday. Either they're very free at work, or they don't really do much after work but stay at home, which in the latter case can be a good thing. Nowadays I work till quite late, and then after that meet my SO for dinner, then when I reach home it's too late to do anything productive, let alone write on the blog.
These few nights have been spent sending out job applications. Despite what people tell me (that the job market is bad and I should just apply to ANY job that I fit the requirements for), I still prefer to only apply for jobs that I really want to work in.
Sure, I may be able to do just any job, but I believe that it is my employer's benefit (and mine) if I have real passion for what I'm doing. Only then can I truly excel in my work.
So, the search goes on.
I realise that human life today is pretty worthless. In the past, when the World wasn't so Friedman-flat, and when communities were closely-knitted groups, people really did give a damn about what happened to their workers.
Farmer John, for example, knew each one of those who worked in his corn field. He gave a damn about what they wanted, their hopes and dreams, and their lives. They were all happy and gay.
Even up till the 60s and 70s, companies still treated their employees really well. Take IBM for example - they had a solid record in this area and IBM employees were happy and gay for they knew their bosses would take care of them for life.
Fast forward to current times, and you'll find that the situation's completely different. Many CEOs now pretty much care only for one thing - their paycheck. With this mentality, only one thing can happen when they take a look at their balance sheet and realise that it isn't really that balanced.
Expenses must be cut, which is a statement often mentioned in the same breath as the dreaded exercise known as retrenchment.
In such exercises, they trim employee numbers as though it meant nothing to them, and I'm sure this is more the norm than exception. It's like all they'll say is: 'Hey, let's just get rid of 10,000 of them. There, we're going to save $50 million dollars in this way - problem solved!'
But wait, this goes around in a vicious circle. If A loses his job, he won't be able to buy stuff from B's company, so they lose money and cut B from their payroll. So B loses his job, and he can't buy stuff from C's company, who has dealings with A's former company, and so they cut their dealing, and A's company retrenches more staff.
So after all the retrenchment, who's going to be left with salaries to buy anything? Maybe some of the aforementioned CEOs of course, and let's not forget those financial market types, some of whom destroyed their companies and made millions of people lose trillions of dollars -but still got away with extremely fat paychecks. Where'd you think all that money comes from?
Money doesn't appear magically - it's gotta come from somewhere. Well, my friends, it's people like us, or more specifically those of us who were gullible enough to have our money siphoned off by these so-called brilliant financial engineers.
And its not just money these people had sitting around but money that they've slogged our entire life to earn. Losing all that money.. it's like they've worked for nothing.
Of course, like I said before, they aren't excused from the blame either. They could have chosen NOT to invest in something they didn't understand. But then again, in the financial world, how many people really understand what's happening? How many people read contracts nowadays? How can we? Modern contracts are so long, they can be sent for publishing as a paperback novel.
So as I was saying, many management members now only think about the numbers, and not about the human aspect of their companies. As warped as such a mentality may be, that's how the World works today. People only care about the numbers, or at least, I notice many that do.
People no longer care that much about service, and even if Spencer the salesman smiles all the time and gives a good customer experience, you know you're still going to go to Max, who is nasty as hell but sells the same product for 50 cents less.
Let me add a disclaimer that not everyone is like this. I know of some people who do care about service and will pay a premium for it. Wealthy people, in particular are good examples.
But if you think about it, these wealthy people most likely earned their fortunes by playing around with numbers as well - doing cost-cutting and such, and thinking about how much money they can make off a field of crops grown for bio-fuel, not thinking about how more people are starving because their isn't a great availability of arable land for growing food.
It's a World of numbers, my friends. We are all a statistic, nothing more.
Ah well, maybe I'm thinking too much.
Anyway, this weekend I'll update with my Phuket thing - which I promised earlier but haven't really followed up on it.. oops.
These few nights have been spent sending out job applications. Despite what people tell me (that the job market is bad and I should just apply to ANY job that I fit the requirements for), I still prefer to only apply for jobs that I really want to work in.
Sure, I may be able to do just any job, but I believe that it is my employer's benefit (and mine) if I have real passion for what I'm doing. Only then can I truly excel in my work.
So, the search goes on.
I realise that human life today is pretty worthless. In the past, when the World wasn't so Friedman-flat, and when communities were closely-knitted groups, people really did give a damn about what happened to their workers.
Farmer John, for example, knew each one of those who worked in his corn field. He gave a damn about what they wanted, their hopes and dreams, and their lives. They were all happy and gay.
Even up till the 60s and 70s, companies still treated their employees really well. Take IBM for example - they had a solid record in this area and IBM employees were happy and gay for they knew their bosses would take care of them for life.
Fast forward to current times, and you'll find that the situation's completely different. Many CEOs now pretty much care only for one thing - their paycheck. With this mentality, only one thing can happen when they take a look at their balance sheet and realise that it isn't really that balanced.
Expenses must be cut, which is a statement often mentioned in the same breath as the dreaded exercise known as retrenchment.
In such exercises, they trim employee numbers as though it meant nothing to them, and I'm sure this is more the norm than exception. It's like all they'll say is: 'Hey, let's just get rid of 10,000 of them. There, we're going to save $50 million dollars in this way - problem solved!'
But wait, this goes around in a vicious circle. If A loses his job, he won't be able to buy stuff from B's company, so they lose money and cut B from their payroll. So B loses his job, and he can't buy stuff from C's company, who has dealings with A's former company, and so they cut their dealing, and A's company retrenches more staff.
So after all the retrenchment, who's going to be left with salaries to buy anything? Maybe some of the aforementioned CEOs of course, and let's not forget those financial market types, some of whom destroyed their companies and made millions of people lose trillions of dollars -but still got away with extremely fat paychecks. Where'd you think all that money comes from?
Money doesn't appear magically - it's gotta come from somewhere. Well, my friends, it's people like us, or more specifically those of us who were gullible enough to have our money siphoned off by these so-called brilliant financial engineers.
And its not just money these people had sitting around but money that they've slogged our entire life to earn. Losing all that money.. it's like they've worked for nothing.
Of course, like I said before, they aren't excused from the blame either. They could have chosen NOT to invest in something they didn't understand. But then again, in the financial world, how many people really understand what's happening? How many people read contracts nowadays? How can we? Modern contracts are so long, they can be sent for publishing as a paperback novel.
So as I was saying, many management members now only think about the numbers, and not about the human aspect of their companies. As warped as such a mentality may be, that's how the World works today. People only care about the numbers, or at least, I notice many that do.
People no longer care that much about service, and even if Spencer the salesman smiles all the time and gives a good customer experience, you know you're still going to go to Max, who is nasty as hell but sells the same product for 50 cents less.
Let me add a disclaimer that not everyone is like this. I know of some people who do care about service and will pay a premium for it. Wealthy people, in particular are good examples.
But if you think about it, these wealthy people most likely earned their fortunes by playing around with numbers as well - doing cost-cutting and such, and thinking about how much money they can make off a field of crops grown for bio-fuel, not thinking about how more people are starving because their isn't a great availability of arable land for growing food.
It's a World of numbers, my friends. We are all a statistic, nothing more.
Ah well, maybe I'm thinking too much.
Anyway, this weekend I'll update with my Phuket thing - which I promised earlier but haven't really followed up on it.. oops.