- A. “I am not good at selling or marketing.”
- B. “I am terrible in communications.”
- C. “I am in constant debt.”
- D. “I have no luck in investing.”
- E. “I have no time to take a course or develop myself.”
- F. “I fail when it comes to personal relationships.”
- G. “I am terrible at IT.”
- H. “I don’t do Internet banking or online shopping, it’s unsafe.”
In the daily business of life, you probably often hear such remarks in your conversations. How many of these statements are applicable to you? Now look at points A to H above, tick the ones that you can identify with.
The truth is that these statements indicate which department in the business of life you are weak in. Your life can be analyzed using business metaphors and concepts.
Take a look at the table below:
(each remark corresponds to a business department)
• A-B: Sales & Marketing Department (How you sell and market yourself)
• C-D: Finance Department (How you manage your personal finances)
• E-F: Human Resource Department (How you manage your own growth, health, relationships and welfare)
• G-H: IT Department (How you use technology)
Let's look at these remarks in a little more detail...
“I am no good in selling or marketing.”
If you often make this remark, this is an indication that in the business of life, your Sales & Marketing department is not doing its job. If you are not selling your abilities, then you will not be noticed at all, no matter how good you are in your work. Realize that every day, you are selling something, whether it is convincing your project management team of the viability of your recommendation, selling to your clients and customers, or even doing a presentation. You need to have a sales target with goals that you can work towards. In addition, if you do not address the needs and objectives of your boss – which is what marketing is all about – you are unlikely to make an impact in your organization, depriving you of your long awaited promotion. You should be selling him ideas and showing your value instead of doing tasks that are unimportant and irrelevant.
“I am terrible at communications.”
Communication is important in business as it is in everyday life. Your inability to communicate hinders your ability to do your job effectively and might slow down your career progression. It can be as simple as being able to present to a group of people.
Public relations, a key function in every business, is about building a good relationship with the press so that what is written is positive and this creates a positive perception of the company. In the same way, if you ignore the PR for your own business of life and neglect this department in you, you cannot shape your boss’ or management’s opinion in your favour. And you will not be able to build goodwill for yourself. PR in the business of life could mean a simple gesture of paying a compliment to your boss or colleagues (when it is due), doing more than what your job requires you to do, or even being a trusted advisor in your area of expertise.
“I am in constant debt.”
There are two kinds of debt – good and bad debt. Good debt refers to loans borrowed against assets (which can grow) that you acquire while bad debt refers to credit card debts and money you have borrowed to buy things for leisure or pleasure. When you incur lots of bad debt, there’s cause to be concerned. You would have a serious financial problem and it indicates that this department is lacking in your life. Just as a business can go bankrupt if it runs out of money, so can you if you don’t have enough money to meet your expenses or don’t know how to control your spending.
You might be surprised that many businesses are usually in debt. However, this is good debt. They borrow money from the banks to finance their purchases with the intention of growing their sales and profits. However, they know how to control their cash flow (that is, money going in and out of the company). Borrowing money so that you can have your expensive toy is bad debt!
Like it or not, in the business of life, you need to take on the role as Chief Financial Officer or Finance Director too! Otherwise, you will squander all your money away and go into heavy debt.
“I have no luck in investing.”
If you feel investing has got to do with luck, it’s a danger sign that you need to beef up the financial department in life’s business. If you are financially savvy, you will have a proper plan and strategy in terms of how to grow your money. It has less to do with luck and more to do with the choice of investments and the financial decisions you make.
You will need to address this problem by either getting professional help or start working towards being financially literate.
Finance departments in most business area are very careful about how they manage the company’s financial resources and do not subject their funds to risky investments, let alone luck! You should do the same in your life too.
“I have no time to take a course or develop myself.”
You need to constantly develop yourself, yourself. What if human resource managers say to their employees that they are too busy to run training and skills development programmes for their staff? It is their job to get this done, no matter how busy they are handling personnel related matters.
Similarly, the HR department in your life should also make time for self-improvement and developmental activities. You cannot afford to stagnate in your area of expertise as skills and expertise can also get obsolete through time. Your competitors are upgrading themselves and so you must keep up!
“I fail when it comes to relationships.”
If you are going to succeed in life, your personal life should also be in order. Your failure indicates a problem in your HR department. Problems with your personal relationships or worse, a divorce, can financially ruin you and distract you from your career goals.
Your personal welfare is important. A stable HR department in you means that you have close relationships with your friends and loved ones so that you have the necessary support and motivation to succeed. You can also count on their support to tackle the ups and downs in life as well as deal with the constant changes that will destabilize you.
“I am terrible at IT.”
If you are computer illiterate and do not browse the Internet, sad to say, you are one of the rare few in today’s connected world. Even retired people have become net-savvy.
The new generation of youths out there will not likely have this problem. However, if you think that knowing how to use key productivity applications such as Word, PowerPoint, and Excel are enough, you are mistaken. Many youths have gone beyond this and started leveraging applications such as FaceBook, MySpace, LinkedIn, Twitter, Wikipedia, etc. Your competitors are gaining an edge over you especially in the area of social networking, meeting new friends and potential business contacts.Gone are the days where the IT department is expected just to support users and basic applications. The same applies to the business of life.
“I don't do Internet Banking or Online Shopping, it's Unsafe.”
You are far behind if you don’t do Internet banking or online shopping. Saying it is unsafe is just another excuse. You are depriving yourself of increased productivity and convenience. It also suggests that you probably don’t know how to Google properly, have not bought a book from Amazon, or traded at eBay. Or how about Social Networking?
At a time where users are demanding more from their IT department, your life’s own IT department needs to step up or you will lose a competitive edge.
Get Your Life's Business Back on Track
In the business world, if one or more of the key departments of a company start to fail, it is an impending sign of trouble ahead. The same logic applies to you...in your business of life.
By recognising which business departments you are weak in and making positive changes in them, you are taking one big step in making your business of life successful!
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