Of F1 Singapore

So the buzz from the F1 race weekend is still looming... Plans are already on the way to improve the event next year...

If you miss the race this year, there's always 2009.. and 2010... and 2011... and 2012... yes, 4 more years of road closure, expensive tickets, loud V8 engines and rubber on our roads..

I'll didn't and can't afford the tickets this year and i doubt i'll pay to walk around the circuit either, ain't that big a fan to want to spend on all this, television provides the best images anyways.

Just 3 to share, the rest don't make the grade:

Of Colours of Little India

Hindus will celebrate the festival of lights - Deepavali  on 27 October

Of Office

Going back to my Homebase One gets me soaked in a different culture, different people.. Maybe the full-length window directly on my right helped to make work conditions better..

I also realised that i talk alot more when i return to Homebase ONE.. could this become a more permanent homebase in future? Only time will tell..

Tomorrow, its back to the dungeon

Of Lovely S'poreans

More petrol ah?

Of Silence

Overheard on the train today: "You want to sit down or not? You want mummy call police catch you? I call now uh!" All spoken in good english, perhaps till the part where the uh came out...

It is amazing that to this day, parents are using the Police as an outsourced fear to manage their children.

In managerial terms, how do we manage performance and behaviours? Rewards, Inducement, Threats.

Why do parents resort to the ultimate falsehood of "police will catch you" to manage their children then? Is it due to the authoritative image that the men in blue hold? Or are parents today still as weak as those 20years ago that they need an external source of power to lord over the children?

Over the exchange between the mum and child on the train, a silent figure stood, towering above the restless boy at stood near his feet, it was only when the boy grabbed the man's knees that i realised that the one person that kept quiet all this while is in fact the father..

Mummy : "you want to sit or not?!"
Daddy: (silence)
Mummy : "some other words to the kid"
Daddy : (still silent)

Different styles brings about different results

Silence is golden?

Flashback:
Back when i was in NPCC, it was part of my duty to train up the next batch of NCOs to lead the unit after i'm gone(sounds so morbid). During one class session where a batch of noisy cadets were held in a classroom, of the the NCO-to-be approached me for help to manage the restless kids

Me : Well, there are 2 ways to do it, firstly, you can walk in, take the duster from the board and slam it against the board, that should shut them up.

She: ... (shocked)

Me : Of course, there's also a softer approach, go back in, switch off the lights, grab a chair and sit there silently

She: K****** Sir, can demo?

Me : Ok

And i did it

Of Cool!

It's all happening this weekend

Of Flat Status

Unit can be seen, still quite alot of works before it looks habitable, frames are in, no window panes yet, interior should be almost bear though there's no way i would be able to see..

Water tank are installed, i'm on the highest level but the water tank doesn't sit directly above my unit

Projected completion : 4th Quarter 2009

Of Individual Sim

The Individual Simulation is harder than i thought, some differences:

• The bots are smarter in CompXM than BizCap
  
• There are now 4 segments instead of 5
• TQM(Total Quality Management) and HR investments become more importanct
• Being graded on BSC(Balanced Score Card) means that financial results are not the only important achievement
• Bots are smarter now! They invest in Marketing and marketers do
• We have less time to do 4 rounds and simulation and answer 5 rounds or Board Enquiries, which is a very fanciful name for accounting and finance related questions posted to Marketing students
• Bots are smarter, they invest in automation, HR and TQM to lower labour and material cost!
• We can try again, results are fixed once you advance
• Numbers sucks
• Did i mention bots are smarter? They aim for specific segment and whack good investments in them
• One bot beat me by $31,239,594 in terms of cumulative profits!

Here we go, Round 4, the last stand:

Wondering what's my BSC score? 

That's for academic scoring, so don't bother yeah?

Of Vader vs JP Police

Of Serving

What exact is Service? Service is a provision of a good that is not physical in nature, yet, it requires a physical body to provide this "good" to the recipient.

My job now requires me to create a service culture amongst a wide variety of people, each with different levels of competency, motivation and knowledge about service. In a way, this is a social engineering project to mould the mindsets of people and change behaviour.

Pavlov's classical conditioning equates behaviour to certain cues that can be used to trigger positive behaviour. At the workplace, incentives in the form of bonuses, time-off and/or recognition from bosses are colleagues are some of the possible sources of motivation. Move higher up the ladder and big words like Self-Actualisation comes into play.

Oh yet another note, every male Singaporean and second generation PR are liable for National Service. Within such parameters, is it fair to require those who are enlisted to provide this service with a heart? To go the extra mile so as to speak? National Service - NS - National Slavery, when young men are enlisted by law to be trained as soldiers, police officers, fighter fighters and everything else for 2 years(i did 2years and 4mths), what kind of service levels would you expect from these men?

The service doesn't just stop there, on a yearly basis, majority of the ex-National Service Fulltime (NSF) are recalled after their Operationally Ready Date(ORD) for Reservist duties, some slip through the sytem due to various reasons and never put on another uniform again.
These men form a pool of resources known as National Servicemen (NSmen). From F to men, must be quite a change. We drop our job responsbilities and risk incurring the wrath of bosses and appraisial ratings to report back to respective units for duty.

Who do we serve when we report for such duties? Our unit? Our Country? Our People?

Sometimes, the level of service is afforded to those who we think deserve it, there's a correlation between what we are willing to give and who we serve, that could be a form of discrimination, but surely we can use our freedom of thought to decide what we want to do isn't it?

Of Keane VS Warner

In the lull of international games, football gets boring, unless its the actual World Cup of course...

Something is brewing finally and its an entertaining read:

Sunderland boss Roy Keane has fired a withering blast at FIFA vice-president Jack Warner by branding him ''a clown''.

Warner, a special advisor to the Trinidad and Tobago Football Federation, wrote to Keane this week to accuse him of ''insensitivity and disrespect'' after midfielder Dwight Yorke was withdrawn from the squad to face the United States in a World Cup qualifier on Wednesday.

But the furious Irishman, who was unhappy that the letter had been leaked to the media, called him to tell him exactly what he thought, and his contempt has apparently grown during the ensuing days.

Keane, who revealed Warner has never tried to contact him about striker Kenwyne Jones, who suffered knee ligament damage playing for his country in a friendly against England in June, said: ''It's just ridiculous. This clown is writing letters through the media.

''I spoke to Yorkie, who has officially retired a number of times. He is 36, and if they are depending on a 36-year-old to get them through to the World Cup in two years...

''I spoke to the man on Wednesday myself and I told him exactly what I thought about him. He has not once called or dropped a letter about Kenwyne.

''Carlos Edwards was over and has played a couple of games for them - Carlos was selected last year when he had a broken leg.

''He is probably a small man and he has got this 'Small-Man Syndrome'. The world is against him.

''If he is writing a letter representing Trinidad, why is he putting it under FIFA? If he is vice-president - and remember, he is vice-president, he is not president yet - God help us.

''People worry about the game and agents and directors of football and managers losing their jobs - we should be worried about people like him.''

Yorke, who can also expect a rocket from his club manager, captained his country in Saturday's 1-1 draw with Guatemala in Port of Spain, but was missing when they lost 3-0 to USA in Chicago four days later.

However, Keane, who insisted he has never prevented a player from linking up with his country, was adamant he has an arrangement with his former Manchester United team-mate.

He said: ''Kenwyne got injured playing in a friendly. I don't know what deal was going on with England that time, obviously a deal for (World Cup) votes or whatever.

''Kenwyne injured his knee even though he had broken his wrist in the last game for us and I was pretty sure he wasn't available.

''Then I saw Yorkie coming on for a 20-minute cameo appearance. Yorkie is 36 bloody years of age - I'm blaming him anyway.

''He's a clown as well. You retire and then go on an ego trip...

''He has not played in the Premier League since he busted his cheekbone [in pre-season], and he goes over and he played the first game, 90 minutes.

''He couldn't play Saturday, Wednesday and then try to get involved for us on Saturday, no chance, absolutely no chance. If I had known that, he probably wouldn't have got another year's contract from me. You have got to prioritise certain things at his age.

''All my other eight or nine players who were away, no problem. They have all been selected for every friendly match - I have never, ever once spoken to one of my players about missing a game, never.

''Certain managers do - certain managers look after certain national teams, I know that. The man (Warner) is a clown.''

Warner has hit back:

The war of words between Roy Keane and Jack Warner has intensified with the FIFA vice-president making a personal attack on the Sunderland manager, after the Irishman had called him "a clown" amid the row over Keane's decision to withdraw Dwight Yorke from international duty.

The Sunderland boss described Warner said: "If he is vice-president of FIFA, then God help us", and suggested he wrote letters on FIFA-headed writing paper "just to impress everybody".

Now Warner has retaliated with a new letter attacking Keane - and making a dig about his own conduct in walking out on the Republic of Ireland before the 2002 World Cup.

The letter says: "The disrespectful tone of your reported comments further demonstrates the total disrespect that you and others of your ilk have generally for players and officials from 'small' countries.

"It is obviously difficult for you to accept the fact that someone from a 'small' country could rise to become a vice-president of FIFA.

"I chose to respond on a FIFA letter-head because that is a privilege afforded me owing to my said status and the fact that your callousness showed utter disregard for FIFA's regulations re the release of players for international duty. Regrettably, but not surprisingly, you did not grasp the message.

"In closing may I remind you that a player's greatest honour is to represent his country in spite of the fact that you chose to walk away from yours during the 2002 Korea/Japan World Cup after publicly abusing your manager... indictment that you will no doubt be proud of up to today. Poor Sunderland."

How fun!

Roy Keane Rocks

Images from bbc and getty image

Of LHC

We are looking at a science experiment that potentially could signal "the end of the world" the LHC - LARGE HADRON COLLIDER

Source: LHC Official Website

I'm kind of lazy to provide a write up based on what i have read so far, so here's what wikipedia has to say about the LHC:

The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is the world's largest and highest-energy particle accelerator complex, intended to collide opposing beams of protons with very high kinetic energy. Its main purpose is to explore the validity and limitations of the Standard Model, the current theoretical picture for particle physics. 

It is theorized that the collider will confirm the existence of the Higgs boson, the observation of which could confirm the predictions and missing links in the Standard Model, and could explain how other elementary particles acquire properties such as mass.

The LHC was built by the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN), and lies underneath the Franco-Swiss border near Geneva, Switzerland. It is funded by and built in collaboration with over eight thousand physicists from over eighty-five countries as well as hundreds of universities and laboratories. The LHC is already operational and is presently in the process of being prepared for collisions. The first beams were circulated through the collider on 10 September 2008, and the first high-energy collisions are planned to take place after the LHC is officially unveiled on 21 October.

Although a few individuals questioned the safety of the planned experiments in the media and through the courts, the consensus in the scientific community is that there is no conceivable threat from the LHC particle collisions.

Date to note: 21 October

Reason: Some argue that the LHC can create a mininature black-hole that will then suck our planet and universe in and therefore put us out of existence.

Imagine if your last day is 21 October 2008.

What would you do?

More on that when i regain my civilian life and only the passion to write, being "on duty" seems to take the creativity and interest out of me

Of Curtin Results

On my last leg of studies, i shall attempt to explain Curtin's scoring system.

For my degree, the highest attainable grade is a High Distinction, the scoring is as follows:

High Distinction 80 onwards

Distinction 70-79

Credit 60-69

Pass 50-59

I have a total of 12 modules to complete after exemption, i have thus far cleared a total of 10 modules, inclusive of Marketing Professional Practice 300 which was the Curtin Study Trip.

Of the 9 modules completed previously, i have managed to hit 8 Distinctions and 1 Credit, i have was close to a High Distinction twice, scoring 78 marks for both Consumer Behaviour and Advertising Strategy.

For those who complete the degree with an aggregate of 75marks, a Degree with Distinction/Merit will be awarded, i am some 2 marks away from that 75 mark now but that means i would need to outscore 75 for my remaining 2 modules..

Self-doubt is the start of failure.. but i am just being realistic about my chances.. 

On another note, i had hoped to obtain at least 1 High Distinction through my course of study for my Bachelor of Commerce with double majors in Advertising and Marketing.

I just did that.

An 80 for my Curtin Study Trip marks my first and probably only High Distinction. 

From undergraduate to Graduate

Of Alternate News

Something our Channelnewsasia, Straits Times, The New Paper, Today, My Paper and Stomp won't show:

Flag looks familar? Yup, its the Singapore Embassy in London

More on this from the blogger

Of Business Capstone V

Train your soldiers for a thousand days to use it for one day. A chinese saying says..

The actual round of the stimulation produced somewhat different results. For the first round, our projections and investment into Product Development and Marketing gave us confidence that we would be able to sell our products well and grab market share from others.

Instead, there were inventory leftover, the loss of income from projected sales was never properly recovered which resulted in a massive emergency loan for cash flow, this emergency loan also came with a higher interest rate.. 

In short, we lost big money in Year 1 and that result in a cumulative lost in Year 1.

Year 2

More conservative projections from the team now.

We sold all that we produced and made profits for Year 2, selling out our products also mean that we did not manage to maximise our profits, loss of sales means competitions benefit from our under-projection of sales. 

The cumalative profits was still negative, got to depend on Year 3 to bring the company back in the black.

Hope all goes well for Year 2, results ready next week.

Of New Age

When the rich russian arrived to inject funds into Chelsea, i grew disillusionised of the club and dropped my support of Chelsea when the likes of Dan Pretrescu, Marcel Desaily, Frank Lebouf, Gramme Le Saux, Dennis Wise, Gustavo Poyet, Roberto Di Matteo, Gianfranco Zola, Tore Andre Flo and Gianullca Vialli

Now that Manchester City has been overtaken by the people from Abu Dabi, the club joins Chelsea, Manchester United and Liverpool in the league of foreign injection of money

Is this healthy for football? I seriously doubt so. Now Arsenal is not saint, but the way we have carry ourselves in the transfer market and how we do business sets us ahead many teams in the league. I do believe that Wenger has the money, yes, the stadium cost the club a hefty sum, but its this stadium that brings in cash from tickets and sales, cash flow is important to any business and i'm certain that the money is there

What many are upset is how Wenger has choosen not to use it, he has undying faith in youth while many supporters are half-dead and dying.. he says look in, not out for new players, and that the club has little to worry about.

What can you say to a man who change Arsenal Football Club?

You say nothing

Victoria Concordia Cresit (translate: Victory Through Harmony)

Go Gunners!