Alexis Tung's Blog

When creating a business, we need to know what our core values are and to what extent we will go to stand by these core values. We could even list stories to illustrate what it means to stand by the core values. For instance, in a restaurant whose core value is to serve the healthiest food possible, they could cite examples where they refused to use a highly tasty dish due to its high fat content. In fact, companies should use a database of these stories to train their employees (but this will only work if there are proper incentives for the staff to note down these stories).

Posted in Business

Whenever delays happen in projects, the people working on these projects experience a change in work schedule. They originally planned to perform work A this week. However, since someone critical they were working with took a week off, they had to experience a one week delay. However, the next week, they had other work scheduled that week. Therefore, if nothing is done about it, they could experience a doubling of workload in the second week. When planning work or thinking about risk in a project, it is important to factor in this sort of risk and therefore plan out a contingency plan based on it.

Posted in Business

Nearly everyone in IT knows that a good software is one that 'shares'. One that is compatible with major operating systems as well as other frequently used software. A good software will be able to share information and make use of the features as well as add to the features of these other systems. However, with this, you will need to make sure that this compatibility is still there even the the operating systems or other systems experience upgrades. You will then need to send upgrade to your customers therefore adding to a hidden cost.

Posted in Business

I was at Mos Burger's today and the lady serving me my meal was polite and when she got filled my cup with cola, she waited a while for the fizzes to die down in the cup and then continued filling it. This is what I call good service. If I were ever to own a company for whom customer service is of critical importance, these are the types of people I would hire. Forget the classifieds. Sometimes, the best way to get great service staff is to go out and poach the good ones that you encounter.

Posted in Business

I am a paranoid person. But I do not thinking that I am truly living up to my potential as a paranoid. A paranoid person would make a great risk management consultant. Risk management is being able to come up with the many unexpected and expected ways something (like a project) could screw up. A true paranoid would be able to imagine the cumulative effects of one screw up and how it could lead to multiple screw ups.

Some people would just whine about these screw ups and give up the entire project. Some people would just not want to think about these screw ups until they actually happen. To truly bank on his paranoia, the paranoid person would have to carry out the additional step of having contingency plans for each of these screw ups.   

Posted in Business