Kevinlee

Three Challenges in the Workplace#

Every challenge is difficult, but we can overcome them.

Challenge One: What Has Taken Away Our Wealth?#

Annual income does not equal annual salary. In traditional industries like retail, manufacturing, and dining, very few people can reach an annual salary of a million; perhaps only the general manager can achieve that.

However, if there is a small business owner, like a shopkeeper running a parts store or a hardware store, they can also reach the goal of an annual income of a million.

In this case, where does the general manager fall short compared to the small shop owner? Education, expertise, eloquence, IQ, EQ—these all seem to overshadow him.

The root cause lies in the different distribution methods.

Distribution Model#

No matter how small the shop is, for the shop owner, all the money earned in the store belongs to him.

The general manager, no matter how big the company, is like a cormorant in the hands of a fisherman; they must earn millions for the company to receive a commission of over a million.

So, the reason we earn so little becomes clear.

We are being deprived of the portion of wealth that originally belonged to us by the boss and capital.

But is this answer necessarily correct?

The first reason is that no one is supervising.

When you are at work, you are required to clock in; if you arrive late, it’s tardiness; if you leave early, it’s early departure; if the clock-in interval is less than 8 hours, it’s absenteeism. You have human resources and administrative departments keeping an eye on you.

It’s like when you were in middle or high school, being monitored by teachers and parents, unable to date early or go astray. Someone is watching you to ensure you don’t drop out of school, and the best outcome is that you go to college.

Sometimes, when an opportunity arises, you might slack off, and then the opportunity slips away. Waiting for a rabbit to come by fails, and whether the next rabbit will hit your stump is uncertain.

Then, even if you slap your thigh, wildly beat your face, and cry out in sorrow, it won’t help; the opportunity has already slipped away.

All of this is because no one is supervising, and you inevitably become lazy.

The second reason is, there is no timely feedback.

The company filters the return cycle for workers.

From the company’s perspective, it may take a year to produce a product and two years to receive payment, but from the worker’s perspective, they can receive their salary in the first month.

For ordinary people, this is a hurdle that is hard to overcome.

Many people will foolishly wait by the stump for a few days without seeing a rabbit, wait for a few months without results, and finally give up when they can’t stand it anymore.

Many workers believe that income lower than the wealth they create through labor is taken by the boss. However, without the boss’s involvement, can you create it yourself?

The boss can be in that position because they have capital, background, channels, and claim to have production materials.

At this point, you might think, if you also have production materials, you can do it too.

Can you really do it?

If given the opportunity, can you be useful?

The answer is clear: no, which is why we need to invent something called work.

The team leader who supervises you to ensure you’re not slacking off is someone you hired yourself. That boss who advanced you a few months' salary is also someone you brought in.

What did you use to hire them?

With the rabbits you waited for by the stump.

So, it’s not that others have taken your wealth, but rather that you must pay a management fee.

You need to be managed to create wealth; this is something you discovered yourself.

One thing that Drucker’s management theory teaches us: discover the 10% among the crowd.

What is this 10% like? It is the shortcomings discovered in yourself during the process of waiting for rabbits.

Turning those two shortcomings around leads to the lifelong research results of management master Drucker—execution ability¹.

• Self-driven, able to take initiative without supervision.
• Long-term oriented, not needing immediate feedback like in online games.

$Execution Ability = Self-Drive + Long-Term Orientation$

This is the understanding shared from Li Shimin to Hongli.

What is the purpose of the imperial examination? To win over the ambitious people of the world.

This is also the management experience summarized by Silicon Valley patriarch Peter Thiel over his lifetime.

Thiel says there are two types of companies in the world: those that make monopoly money and those that try to make monopoly money.

Drucker says there is no management in the world; there are only those who discover people suitable to be bosses, promote them, and let them surround you to form a monopoly, rather than become your competitors.

If you haven’t succeeded, then you need to innovate for the people, attracting talents that meet Drucker’s standards from your competitors, then forming a monopoly to earn monopoly money.

So how can you help yourself become one of that 10%?

Beat yourself; do you need a reason to be beaten?

When you were a student, if a teacher said a certain knowledge point wouldn’t be tested, you would instinctively skip it; this is almost human nature.

At this point, you need to beat yourself, beating the laziness hidden deep within you.

Beat yourself from childhood to adulthood. Only you beating yourself is useful.

There is no such thing as being unable to do it; it’s only about whether you want to or not. Ding Fatty begs, thanking everyone he meets, God bless, his emotional value is full. Meanwhile, other homeless people are still waiting for government aid, their eyes dull.

It’s not for that rabbit; you are striving to whip yourself for the principle of becoming one of the 10%.

Challenge Two: People Can Only Earn Familiar Money, But Familiar Money Doesn’t Earn.#

Is there a possibility that in the newly generated stumps, rabbits will collide more densely?

Let’s look at a common investment-related question:

For example, you have your habitual investment varieties, perhaps one or two, or maybe three to five.

At this time, a new variety emerges in the market, creating a big trend and sparking widespread discussion globally, like Bitcoin during the recent U.S. election period.

Now, when faced with this situation, do you chase it or not?

Readers lacking experience might say, I’ll chase it.

Because the trend has already formed. The earlier I chase, the safer it is; it’s a game of foolishness. As long as I can get in and out quickly, I can make money from those who are slower and more foolish than me.

At this moment, experienced people would oppose:

Doing this once is fine, but doing it multiple times can be very dangerous.

If you often walk by the river, how can you not get your shoes wet?

Why? Because of the law of large numbers.

If you play the fool too many times, there will always be a few times when you happen to be the most foolish and slowest, and then you will lose all the gains you made from eating others’ foolishness in one go.

When you see a trend through news and media, you are definitely in the middle or later stages of that trend.

For example, the computer industry was booming in the early 2000s and for the next ten years; a senior software engineer could earn 20,000 a month. But when the whole country is talking about it, it is certainly in the middle or later stages of the industry.

So when was the early stage of computing? In the late 1990s, a few people already knew the future prospects of computers and were preparing to cultivate them.

Now, some people are still waiting by certain stumps they see, waiting for rabbits; perhaps at this time, some unknown stumps will emerge.

If you see it as an investment, then the stumps here represent investment varieties; if you see it as an industry, then the stumps here represent newly emerging industries.

Therefore, if you want to discover these new stumps early, unless what?

Unless you have already intervened.

Nail It Down

When you are willing to strictly demand yourself according to the first challenge, no matter which industry you are in, you will definitely do well; you will definitely have the capacity.

So, are you willing to expand your advantages in advance while everything is going smoothly for you?

In this demand for progress and gaining more stumps, the best way is to expand. You need to know the forefront changes in this world as much as possible.

You need to know what the forefront of the industry is playing with and what related industries are playing with.

Knowing what to do is more important than knowing how to do it.

You don’t have to make it your main business, but you cannot be unaware of it.

Invest a little in everything; it doesn’t necessarily mean that this little bit will make money, but it’s meant for you to understand.

Before the troops move, the supplies must be prepared; before the supplies move, the information must be prepared.

If you haven’t clarified the logistics and haven’t explored the map, how can you transform?

A programmer, while doing technical work, must have the resources to do sales so that you can switch seamlessly.

In a startup, when you run out of money and the funding chain breaks, can you still raise funds? The alliance under the city is a dead end.

When you don’t lack money, that’s when you should raise funds; at that time, you have room to negotiate with investors.

While you can do your job well, maintain more connections.

This matter isn’t complicated; the only key point is to intervene in advance, even if it’s just to nail something down.

Just like what was mentioned in the first challenge, normally you should nail down many things in advance, follow along, and in the end, only a few things will succeed.

You have to make many efforts in advance, beyond your main job, many of which may seem hopeless.

For example, in some industries or investments, you intervened but didn’t scale up, so you didn’t gain much.

For instance, some preparatory work was done, but you weren’t promoted, so there were no gains.

Are these important?

Not important.

You have passed the first challenge; you are a very long-term oriented person.

You are an intermediary who will show a property a thousand times without success and will show it ten thousand times; who can stop you?

No one.

Over time, the law of large numbers will take effect, and you will win.

So the key to the second challenge is simple: expand your contact base.

Note that this expansion is based on the foundation of the first challenge; it is expanding after establishing a foothold, expanding with a base.

If you expand your contact base without a base, that’s just a jack of all trades.

What does a company fear the most? Blind diversification without occupying advantageous projects; this is a guaranteed death.

Transformation is a cycle; it is not a single action.

Recognizing a benefactor should be done early; otherwise, you will have to wait in line.

For example: When I was under Ding Yuan (technical route), I had already secretly communicated with Dong Zhuo (the client, market) and had also had deep exchanges with Wang Yun (high-frequency trading) for many days.

There’s no harm in recognizing more benefactors; a benefactor may not give you returns immediately, but you need to open up channels, connect joints, and nail things down in advance.

In case the benefactor rises strongly, because you have communicated secretly for a long time, you can quickly and timely switch allegiances and hold onto the new benefactor’s thigh.

This challenge has no difficulty; after passing the first challenge, the second challenge has no practical difficulty.

What limits you is merely your thoughts; beyond that, it’s a smooth road.

Challenge Three: Diligent People Often Work, While Those Who Don’t Work Are Often Lazy.#

Having passed the first two challenges, shouldn’t you enjoy the rewards now?

No, the greatest danger is just beginning.

A person’s greatest strength is often their greatest weakness; from another perspective, what rises by this will inevitably decline by this.

Lazy people lack initiative.

How can a person without initiative cause trouble?

On the contrary, a person with initiative is the one who has the potential to cause trouble.

When Huang Laoxie taught Shagu, was her foolishness her flaw?

Yes and no.

Because she was simply foolish; she wouldn’t try to be clever.

Shagu isn’t lazy; she is a thorough executor.

Moreover, she cannot be clever or create a fourth move; she won’t tailor her approach based on the skill level of others, and she wouldn’t dare to use three moves against Li Mochou.

We no longer have the innocence of infancy; our mindset changes with our own strength.

After passing the first challenge, you have endured countless hardships, and you may even be suffering for a lifetime because you are fighting against human nature.

After enduring so much hardship, don’t you want to compensate for it?

In Liu Bei’s words, after fighting for so many years, can’t I enjoy it a bit?

After passing the second challenge, you have experienced many things; you are no longer who you used to be; your horizons have truly opened.

After seeing so many cutting-edge practices in various industries, will you still have a sense of awe?

The little nun’s scalp moves, but I can’t move?

Your inner arrogance towards this world cannot be suppressed.

Being smart is a curse, and success is too.

At first, you need to beat yourself, scolding yourself while beating, why are you running so slowly? You can’t even catch the warm food.

After passing the first two challenges, you still need to beat yourself, scolding while beating, why are you running so fast? Are you in a hurry for a funeral?

It’s quite awkward; the key is that if you’re slow, you get beaten, and if you’re fast, you also get beaten; it’s just a life of being beaten. It’s still you beating yourself, and there’s no place to reason about it.

Tokugawa Ieyasu’s Three Teachings:
The first: When young, do not be lazy. You see your friends playing and having fun, but you don’t realize that time is fleeting, and you waste it. When the real test comes, you will be unprepared.
The second: When middle-aged, do not become complacent. If you do well in something, don’t think you can live off that success for a lifetime; the problem is, a lifetime is too long, and you might not even get to enjoy it before you graduate.
The third: When old, do not become satisfied. You feel that everything has lost its novelty; too many successes have numbed you. One failure can turn all your life’s efforts into nothing.

Life is nothing more than being able to pick up and let go, able to go up the mountain and down the mountain.