Self-Control and Religion

An article in the New York Times has said that religious people have more self-control than others. Even when compared to spiritual persons, religious ones still do better. (Spiritual people are those that do not necessarily believe in God but more on the connection or force they feel between them and other people) Studies also found that those who pretend to be religious, like attending Sunday church for appearance's sake, fail to be the same as the truly religious when it comes to self-control.

How so? And does that mean that those who aren't the religious type should start to become one?

"Religious people...are self-controlled not simply because they fear God’s wrath, but because they’ve absorbed the ideals of their religion into their own system of values, and have thereby given their personal goals an aura of sacredness. He suggested that nonbelievers try a secular version of that strategy"

You can start by having private meditation and joining organizations that share your values and ideals.

“People can have sacred values that aren’t religious values..Self-reliance might be a sacred value to you that’s relevant to saving money. Concern for others might be a sacred value that’s relevant to taking time to do volunteer work. .."

The Value of a Bonus

Bonuses, especially the monetary kind, are supposedly given to motivate and reward people in accomplishing set goals and tasks. Intuitively, the larger the bonus is, the better it is in motivating people in accomplishing or surpassing a given goal.

However, Dan Ariely, proves this theory only to a certain extent. Larger bonuses work well if the task or job at hand requires only physical effort or mostly mechanical skill. When tasks take on a more mental or cognitive nature, large bonuses fail in having people do better.

We found that as long as the task involved only mechanical skill, bonuses worked as would be expected: the higher the pay, the better the performance. But when we included a task that required even rudimentary cognitive skill, the outcome was the same ..: the offer of a higher bonus led to poorer performance.

Gift and Resolution Tips

Below are a couple of links offering advice on how to give the 'best' gifts and some practical new year resolutions:

1. Gifts: It's all about perception. The key is to give a gift which your recipient perceives as more valuable to them than to you. So, this works best with gifts of kind rather than cash (though cash works just as nice).

2. Resolutions: Be practical about your goals and make resolutions that reward you. i.e. Have a vacation on a certain month, etc. The following tips should help you stick to them: Write them down, Make it specific, Set a deadline. Just like making plans at work, they should be SMART: specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and time-bound.

Reaching Out

This year has taught me the value of having good people around me. I think without them, I wouldn’t have persevered as much in work or in everything else. I have stayed on course instead of just quitting because of them.

We might take for granted our social network but if we try to be alone for some time, we will soon realize its importance. We are hardwired to connect and reach out to other people. In the movie Cast Away, Tom Hanks wouldn't have survived alone in a deserted island were it not for an imagined relationship he had with a volleyball, which he named Wilson. Another evidence is found in economics wherein we are all better off trading (our goods, our skills) with other people, instead of making or doing everything ourselves. Just imagine how far society has advanced in the past 100 years because of trade.

Like learning, we need to continuously grow our network according to our passion and interests. One must constantly reach out to others, not because others need him, but because it is in his self-interest.

Added Players and Added Value

If what you do can easily be copied by other players (or competitors), then you bring no added value. Put another way, if you enter the industry and just copy what the other players are doing then you bring no added value. You'll decrease the size of the pie for everyone when you enter. (The pie here refers to the total money that can be made in the industry)

I think most businesses, especially franchises, fall into this category. As long as new players enter, supply will increase and demand will soon fall. Unless demand is ever increasing or there is still unmet demand, entering the game and copying other players will be a good enough strategy.

One good example is the water-servicing business. In the Philippines, setting up a water servicing business has been once a profitable venture. As new players came and saturated geographic locations, profits predictably has fallen. The additional players who are competing for the same customers has decreased the size of the pie.

One good strategy for this situation is by adding value. Your added value is the change in the size of the pie when you enter the game. If you add value, then you increase the size of the pie.

Customers usually have a tendency to return to you once they buy your product/service but this is not always the case. Customers can be indiscriminate when products and/or services between sellers are alike. One way to add value then is to create loyalty among your customers.

A very good concrete example of creating loyalty can be found in the airline industry. Mileage or frequent-flyer programs create loyalty by rewarding customers for their patronage thru giving away free flights when a certain mileage has been flown in their airline. Such programs bring incentive to the customer to fly again with the same airline. Airlines then can look forward to keep their customers while at the same time attract new ones.

From Co-opetition by Adam M. Brandenburger and Barry J. Nalebuff

Individual Economic Welfare

According to the book, The Millionaire Next Door, those who receive (continued) economic welfare from their parents have the least chance to become millionaires. This has been a worrisome point because being well-off while growing up might actually be a handicap in reality. While I'm sure it is not everyone's dream to become a millionaire, being in a situation where one receives welfare almost automatically puts him/her out of the potential millionaire's list.

Logic being (if I'm correct), economic welfare received by the individual dampens the urgency and the necessity of the individual to improve or better himself. The reality that one has to compete in the real world and to be one's own man, has become distorted due to the economic cushion he is presently receiving. (More) dangerous is when the individual receiving the welfare becomes dependent on this aid and perceives it as his 'right'. At the extreme, what's the incentive for an individual to work or better himself, when his economic needs are already taken care of?

I see a parallel or similarity of this individual welfare with businesses receiving protection from the government. Businesses receive protection when governments impose tariffs on competing imports, and subsidize the industry in which the business is in. In the worst case, these businesses receiving protection has become uncompetitive, producing products that are costly and whose features are inferior compared to the competition. Ultimately, this higher cost is passed on the customer in terms of the higher price and the missed opportunity of receiving a better product.

While government protection of native businesses have legitimate reasons like helping businesses transition to a true competitive market environment, I have yet to read a business that is number one in its industry, and which was once a product of protectionist policy.

Going back to individual, in order for him to be truly independent, the question now is when should economic welfare be halted? When the child turns 18? When he/she finishes college? Or when he/she enters employment?

I guess it is dependent on the goals of the person, his education and his ambition. If one has ambition and is aware of the above knowledge, what do you think is he/she likely to do?

Gratitude Journal

Carla Kay White, a designer and blogger claimed her life changed when she started a gratitude journal. To write the journal, one has just to write a few things that made the day positive.

To enumerate some of the things that changed in her life after keeping a gratitude journal: Sleeping better, losing 20 lbs, and doing great in the job.

She also designed an Ipone app called happytapper and it's an app to keep an Iphone gratitude journal.

Sounds good. Will try this.

Thanks to The Happiness Project for the tip.

I, Pencil

Simple? Yet, not a single person on the face of this earth knows how to make me

I, Pencil is a story about one of the more taken-for-granted things in our life, the pencil. I, Pencil narrates the amazing tale of how the pencil is made and how just the right quantity of pencils is always available in the market, with no one person planning the whole thing.The story demonstrates economic principles at work like principle of incentives and the law of supply-and-demand.

The story is simple and was written by Leonard E. Read. December marks I,Pencil's 50th year of publication. It is also found in Russ Robert's novel: The Price of Everything.

Tip from Cafe Hayek.

Easy-to-Understand Economics

One of the best ways to grip and understand an idea is when you encounter it through a story. Just as the Gospel spreads the teaching of Christ thru parables, the layman can easily understand economic principles thru stories as given by Russell Roberts.

Here is a link of some economic principles as explained by Roberts. The Comparative Advantage principle is told using a story.

Also, Russell Roberts also has written 'economic' novels. A couple of them are: The Invisible Heart and The Price of Everything.

Trust, Ownership and Incentives

I think most, if not every one in a supervisory or managerial position has this experience: One implements a (new) rule which involves the cooperation or adherence of a group of people. Depending on how the rule was created and how big the impact is on the people who will be following it, the sucess of its implementation varies from religious obedience down to utter neglect.

As more organizations become flatter and hybrid, the command and control style of leadership is becoming outmoded or sometimes just plain ineffective. Imposition of rules paired by penalties gets us superficial commitment from people: People obey half-heartedly and will have the tendency to not stick to your rule when you're not around.

From command and control leaders, leaders must become team builders or catalysts. Before rolling out a project in particular or working with anybody in general, leaders must be able to build trust, ownership and incentives: the same elements which make a free-market society function.

Trust creates risk-taking and honesty. Ownership promotes accountability, self-interest. Incentives promote actions that will benefit the whole.

As in a free-market society, subordinates and members must be able to take risks and must be able to trust their peers and especially their leaders, before being able to fully participate with management. Members take risks when they voice out their concerns or volunteer their ideas.
To build trust, there must be open avenues for giving and receiving feedback.

Management must take advantage of their members' propensity to act in their own interest. When a member owns or is responsible for something, they act to to promote or protect this interest. Whenever there is a project, those that get involved are also those that tend to promote the project because they act like its owners. The more a leader involves others, the more they will get behind a project or a rule.

Finally there must be a pay-off for all the effort and actions of our members. If there is a monetary incentive for a successful project or for a bright idea, then the better. However, if there is none, then the leader must be creative. Recognition among peers and giving credit to those due are the least and simplest incentives one can and must give. Pointing out the monetary or cost benefit of a project to members, so that they realize their impact to the company, is also essential.

The backbone for all of these are a set of rules that the leader must lay out. Rules or guidelines must be present to set the norms and expectations from each member. The leader must enforce these rules so that a member will feel safe in voicing his concerns, that his ideas and contributions will be rightly credited to him, and that he will be guaranteed of incentives (if there are any) when he delivers what is expected from him.

The Best Time To Do Something

When you don't feel like doing what you know you must, that's the best time to go ahead and do it anyway. That's when you can break through your old habit patterns to a new level of focus, performance and achievement. -Ralph Marston

Procastinating is not our natural state, at least not for me. At the back of one's mind, there will always be this undone or unfinished business that will needle or dog you. Depending on how serious or important the matter is, our subconscious will tell us to get this thing over and done with sooner or later.

It will just take a simple nudge to get you started. A positive thought, A vision of how things will be after you've settled your business. Or just the thought that you're tired of procastinating and delaying things already and that THIS is not you.

Change the Game

The greatest profits come from not playing the game a little differently, but from changing the game. Changing the game doesn't just mean changing the Rules, it also means changing the game's other different elements: Players, Added Values, Tactics and Scope..

Change one of these and you change the whole game.




From Co-opetition by Adam M. Brandenburger and Barry J. Nalebuff

Advice for Aspiring Economists

Click here for advice from Greg Mankiw's Blog.

Steve Levitt tells why..

Getting out of/into a Habit

Below are some techniques and the economic principles behind them when we want to get out of a habit. Same principles work when we want to have a new habit.

1. Distance – Creating distance minimizes temptation or in a way puts a barrier between you and what you crave (e.g. cigarettes, alcohol). This limits supply and deters demand. As an example, there was a website that recommended only storing healthy food in one’s refrigerator so that when a craving occurs, one can only reach and eat food that will not make one fat.

2. Substitute – If one is to stop doing something, then one must fill that activity with a substitute. To be successful, that substitute must be cheaper, or more convenient to do. This will be the incentive to do the substitute activity instead of the current habit. For example, if you want to stop eating every now and then, replace it with some easy-to-do substitute like walking. Walking is something very easy to do. If you substitute going to the gym in place of eating, then the latter easily wins because of the former usually creates a mental image of something that’s very strenuous or something that requires a lot of effort.

3. Putting things in automatic – Programming your time into specific activities or tasks is committing yourself and limiting your choices. Your mind and body will adapt once it knows that for the given time ahead, you are only going to be pre-occupied with doing something else. Did you know that once a person is given a set menu for a day, he/she tends to eat lesser calories as compared when he/she has more choices to eat?

4. Goal setting – The self-esteem, pride and sense of accomplishment one gets when one reaches a goal are very powerful incentives in changing a habit. So when one decides to do away with a habit, one has to set some realistic goals. Of course, praise from peers also helps when they notice you progressing towards a goal.

You, Inc.

With the ever-changing business environment and economies being closely linked nowadays, employers and employees alike have to constantly evolve and find ways to compete and survive in today's market.

Given that insight, one therefore has to think like a company. Employees are only good as long as the company finds value in hiring their services. So it only makes sense that employees treat their employers the same way. You don't want to be caught off-guard when one day your company tells you that you suddenly have no value to them, or that they are suddenly closing shop and you'll be out of work.

As individuals, you have to know what you're good at and what skills will be most marketable to most companies. Like companies, we constantly have to scan the environment for opportunities. We always have to make investments in ourselves by constantly learning new skills so we can always be ready to whatever the business environment brings us.

There is this sort of thinking, at least for me, that it's either you have a full-time job or you have your own business. I think that view is incorrect. We can/must do whatever it is needed to make us self-sufficient just like what companies do.

Anything goes for us as long as this makes us happy. We can have a day job and have other 'sidelines' that supplement our income, or we can have several jobs, or we can start-up a business.

You can be an entrepreneur anytime. Entrepreneurship is all about taking advantage of opportunities and making money in the process. It doesn't strictly restrict itself to having a brick-and-mortar business, especially now in the information age.

In a capitalist or free-market society, we are always trading something. We trade our skills for pay from our companies. We trade goods when we own a business. It's all about trading something. So, just like econ 101, us individuals must know what our compartive advantage is (or what our strenthgs are) and build a living out of it.

The Dream Machine

What if there is a sort of dream machine where you hook yourself up and then be able to live out your dream or fantasy life in real time?

You'd never have to eat or go to the bathroom while hooked to this machine. This machine will run endlessly and you'd never have to worry of it malfunctioning or suddenly stopping.

While hooked up, if you dreamed it, you will never be poor, you'll be a celebrity, a person of power, the most handsome or most beautiful person, etc. You will be the center of the universe, so to speak. You'll be guaranteed of living out your dreams..

The only caveat is you'd never be able to unhook yourself out. You will live out your remaining years hooked to this machine.

Would you agree to have a life like this? Your comments would be appreciated.

From The Invisible Heart: An Economic Romance by Russell Roberts

Getting things done from people

The central lesson I learned from exotic animal trainers is that I should reward behavior I like and ignore behavior I don't. After all, you don't get a sea lion to balance a ball on the end of its nose by nagging.

If you don't have any incentive/penalty in place or authority in rewarding/disciplining someone or a group of people, rewarding behavior you like by recognizing and praising it while ignoring those that are not will be good enough. This method has worked for training animals and though it sounds manipulative, it may be proven to work with people too.. See more here.

When to Buy Equities

. .in 2000, .. the global price-earnings ratio was 35; shares look relatively much more attractive now, since the ratio is down to ten. A recent analysis shows that, when American price-earnings ratios are low, returns on equities over the next decade average 8%; when they are high, returns average 3%.

See complete article here.

Career advice - Do what you do

When someone asks me for career advice (and I’ve been known to volunteer this advice, even unasked!), I say, “Do what you DO. What do you do already, in your free time? Try to do that as your job.” In my case, although as a Supreme Court clerk I surely had one of the most fascinating jobs for a lawyer, on the weekends, I was writing a book. This was a helpful clue as to a profession I might enjoy. I have a friend who always felt guilty in law school, because he was wasting so much time playing video games; after graduation, he gave up a prestigious clerkship to work for a – you guessed it – video game company.

..It can be hard to identify your “passion,” but you can identify what you did last Sunday afternoon. “Do what you do” is useful because it directs you to look at your behavior, rather than to your ideas – which can be a clearer guide to preferences. It’s not possible for everyone, but to have work that is play, and play that is work, is a very, very happy state.

See complete article here.

from Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

Management Talent and the Hiring Scorecard

More than 400 CEOs, business billionaires and other leaders and investors attributed management talent to contributing more than 50% to business success. This is followed by execution, then strategy with 20% and 17% respectively.

The Scorecard when hiring somebody
Mission: The Essence of the Job
The mission is an executive summary of the job's core purpose. It has to be written in plain english so that everybody understands it.
Don't hire the generalist. Hire the Specialist.

Outcomes: Defining What Must Get Done
Outcomes describe what a person needs to accomplish in a role. Jobs must have 3-8 outcomes. They must be clear and must involve numbers.

Competencies: Ensuring Behavioral Fit
Competencies define how a new hire to operate in the fulfillment of the job and the achievement of the outcomes.

Cultural Competencies: Ensuring Organizational Fit



From Who by Geoff Smart and Randy Street

The Worst Case Scenario

What would you do when one day you're suddenly broke?

Some educated suggestions here.

Who

Your success as a manager is simply the result of how good you are at hiring the people around you.

Joe Mansueto from the book Who by Geoff Smart and Randy Street

Telling Stories

Stories naturally embody most of the SUCCESs framework. Stories are almost always Concrete. Most of them have Emotional and Unexpectedness elements. The hardest part of using stories effectively is making sure they are Simple - that they reflect your core message. It's not enough to tell a great story; the story has to reflect your agenda..


From Made to Stick by Chip Heath & Dan Heath

Eye on the Goal

When your eye is on the goal, the distractions won't be nearly so distracting. Your efforts will gain the immense power of focus when you're always clearly aware of where you're headed.
If you wish to get something done, stop telling yourself why you can't. Begin telling yourself why you must.

Ralph Marston

Petraeus Quote

The best way to protect the people is to live with the people

General David Petraeus

CEO vs Catalyst

CEO .........................................Catalyst
The Boss.................................. A Peer
Command-and-Control...........Trust
Rational................................... Emotionally Intelligent
Powerful...................................Inspirational
Directive.................................. Collaborative
In the Spotlight....................... Behind the Scenes
Order........................................ Ambiguity
Organizing................................ Connecting

CEOs and Catalysts work well in different organizational structures. CEOs work well in top-down organizations, while Catalysts work well in flat organizations.

Both organizational structures have its merits. Traditional heirarichal top-down organizations are functions of size and maximize economies of scale and concentration of resources. Flat organizations are the opposite and they are mainly a function of distance -their members are spread out and may not necessarily know each other.

From The Starfish and The Spider by Brafman andn Beckstrom

Measure of a Man

The difference between how a person treats the powerless versus the powerful is as good a measure of human character..

From The No Asshole Rule by Robert Sutton

Why We Are Prone To Make Mistakes

Why can't practice and coaching prevent us from making mistakes?

1. Because we are influenced by how we last felt when we did something.

When we refer to our memories for guidance, there is a good chance that we will be misguided because we don't actually remember the entire experience of something, we remember only how it felt in the end.

2.Advice we get is actually bad advice that has been transmitted through time.

So what do we do about it?

Instead of remembering our past experience, we use other people as surrogates for our future selves (because there is a great chance other people have experienced the state we are trying to be in).. Just don't let ego get in the way..

From Stumbling on Happiness by Daniel Gilbert

The Happiest Country on Earth

The most crucial factor that makes this country the happiest is: Low Expectations..


Click here to read the full article.

On Habituation

Among life's cruelest truths is this one: Wonderful things are especially wonderful the first time they happen, but their wonderfulness wanes with repetition... Psychologists call this habituation, economists call it declining marginal utility.

Two ways to beat habituation: increase the variety of one's experiences and to increase the amount of time that separates repetitions of the same experience..


From Stumbling on Happiness by Daniel Gilbert

Not The Secret?

In order to succeed, should you retrace steps that led to your current situation or should you visualize a positive outcome coming out of your present situation or dilemma?

Most probably, you have chosen the latter, you visualize success, as most modern self-help or psychology literature recommend that yo do. On the contrary..if you choose the former you will be better off. At least, that's according to a study involving a group of UCLA students.

"Event-simulators", or those who mentally simulate how a problem has unfolded are more likely to take more specific actions to solve their problems compared to "outcome-simulators" - people who mentally simulate a positive outcome out of their problem.

From Made to Stick by Chip Heath & Dan Heath

What is your 'fair' salary?

Companies will always pay at the lowest rate to maximize the talent of its hires. (Only) Competition drives this rate upwards. In the end, it's a demand vs supply principle.

Demand (Employers) and supply (Applicants OR you) will arrive at a 'fair' price and that price will be your salary. If your skills and experience are rare and there is huge demand for your kind of talent, then you'd expect to be paid at a premium.

Advanced education may help in validating your skill but it doesn't really follow that you'd be paid well for it.

From this article in the Undercover Economist

12 Key Elements of Practical Personal Finance

1. Discover your comparative advantage.
2. Be entrepreneurial. In a market economy, people get ahead by helping others and discovering better ways of doing things.
3. Spend less than you can. Begin a regular savings program now.
4. Don't finance anything for longer than its useful life.
5. Two ways to get more out of your money: Avoid credit-card debt and consider purchasing used items.
6. Begin paying into 'real-world' savings account every month.
7. Put the power of compound interest to work for you.
8. Diversify- don't put all of your eggs in one basket.
9. Indexed equity funds can help you beat the experts without taking excessive risk.
10. Invest in stocks for long-run objectives; as the need for money approaches, increase the proportion of bonds.
11. Beware of investment schemes promising high returns with little or no risk.
12. Teach your children how to earn money and spend it wisely.

From Common Sense Economics by Gwartney, Stroup and Lee

Making Ideas Stick

If you have a message or an idea that you want your audience to not forget, then what you convey should have the below principles:

Simplicity
Cut the fat of what you want to say and get to the core of your message.

Simple = Core + Compact

Unexpectedness
Create interest and don't go for the conventional

Concreteness

Put your audience into your story. Make your ideas be something that your audience can feel, sense, imagine
Credibility

This is very important. As important as the first principle, Simplicity.

External credibility - Get someone with authority to deliver your message
Internal credibility - Have vivid details, Use statistics, Use the Sinatra Test: If it can make it here, then it can make it anywhere

Emotional

Make people care by giving attention to a single person not the whole population.

Appeal to self-interest. What's in it for them?
Stories

Simulate a message or an idea thru a story.

From: Made to Stick by Chip Heath & Dan Heath

Ten Tips to Being Happy

From Gretchen Rubin

1. Don't start with the profundities
Go to basics like get enough sleep, Don't let yourself go hungy.

2. Do not let the sun go down in anger
3. Fake it till you feel it
4. Realize that anything worth doing is worth doing badly
5. Don't treat the blues with a 'treat'.
Don't binge(?) if you feel down. You will feel good, but only for a while

6. Buy some happiness
7. Don't insist on the best.
This is interesting. There are two types of people: Satisficers and Maximizers. Satisficers make a decision once their criteria is met. Maximers want to make the best possible decision. They exhaust every option to make sure they have the best decision. Satisficers are happier than Maximizers. Logic being they spend less energy and after all, their criteria is still met after making their decision. Sometimes good enough is good enough.

8. Excerise to boost energy
I find this tip really hepful. It beats out stress too.

9. Stop nagging
10. Take action

Full article here.

Blog Tips

1. If you are not, start blogging today
2. Write about something you love
18. Choose your niche wisely, not too big and not too small
22. Content is king
44. Return links
53. Be yourself
57. Focus on timeless content

See the complete list here and if you're into blogging, check out this site.

Finding Flow

"Flow" - Metaphor for "being in the zone", "ecstasy" .
When you have flow, you are fully engaged in your task and you don't notice time passing by.

Flow occurs when the following are present:
1. A clear set of goals
2.There is immediate feedback
3.Skills are fully utilized

When these are present, one will be completely focused on what he is presently doing or involved in. Most of the time, the 3 elements can be found in work. So if I'm choosing a new job or work, then these 3 must be present.

Of course, another big factor in enjoying your work is having a good working relationship with your boss, but that's another subject matter.

It is the full involvement of flow, rather than happiness, that makes for excellence in life. When we are in flow, we are not happy, because to experience happiness we must focus on our inner states..

From: Finding Flow by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

The Most Addictive Thing on Earth

So, what's the most addictive thing on Earth?
An obvious clue: "Man is not an island."

According to Gary Becker it is (think before hitting the link) this.

The Happiness Formula

From psychologists:

Pleasure + Engagement + Meaning = Happiness

Not really an exhaustive formula as the BBC site claims, but it does let you know which ingredients must be present at least.

Other ingredients: Friendship, Successful Marriage.

See the full article here.

Strengths

You cannot be anything you want to be - but you can be a lot of who you already are.

Those who have the opportunity to focus on their strengths every day are six times as likely to be engaged in their jobs and more than three times as likely to report having an excellent quality of life in general.

From Strengthsfinder 2.0, Tom Rath

My Top5 Themes
1. Discipline - Order, Structure
2. Focus - Prioritize then act
3. Futuristic -Inspired by visions of the future
4. Intellection -Introspective
5. Learner - Continously improve

Best Financial Advice

From Suze Orman

Q: In 25 words or less, what’s the best financial advice either 1) you have received or 2) you give out now to others? Bonus points if you answer in haiku format.
A:
Can you afford it?
Unpaid credit card balance?
One word, friend: denied!

Read the full article.

The Untouchables

Untouchables - people whose jobs cannot be outsourced

1. Special
People like Michael Jordan, Bill Gates

2. Specialized
Knowledge workers. Their skills are always in high demand and are not 'fungible'. Fungible - Work that can easily be digitized or easily substituted.

3. Anchored
Jobs that must be done in a specific location, involving face-to-face contact with a customer, client, patient or audience. E.g. barbers, lawyers,entertainers, electricians, etc.

4. Really adaptable
Constantly acquiring new skills, knowledge and expertise that enable you constantly to create value.

From: The World Is Flat by Thomas L. Friedman

Bear Grylls

'Life should NOT be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in an attractive and well preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways, covered in scars, body thoroughly used up, totally worn out and screaming 'yahoo!', what a ride.' - Bear Grylls.