Han Xin and Yuen Qi: Two Similar Civil Servants in Different Time

Posted on July 1, 2008 by Roan Yong

The story of Han xin catches my attention. This guy practiced “taking small insults for greater purpose” in his early life as a nobody. He took insult such as crawling in between legs of a bully who is bigger and stronger. But, that incident was the best thing that happened to him, because it spur him to achieve his ambition. In a way, he uses his anger as a positive energy to achieve success.

One of the most defining moment in Han Xin’s military career is when his talent is not recognized by Xiang Yu, the greatest warrior at that time. Disappointed, he then joined Liu Bang, the future founder of Han Dynasty. He served both Xiang Yu and Liu Bang, as one of the lowest rank officers. His chance came when many of Liu Bang’s follower deserted him, including Xiao He. However, Xiao He came back on his own accord two days later with Han Xin. Han xin disappointed with Liu Bang, because he was never promoted despite multiple recommendations by Xiao He. Liu Bang then asked Xiao He, “So many general left, but you chased only Han Xin. What’s so special about him?”. This event centered Liu Bang attention on Han Xin, and allowed Han Xin to become one of the greatest military commander in history.

In Summary, Han Xin talent is not recognized although he has talent and connection (with Xiao He), however a single event turned his fortune. One single event that turned his life. Some people may call this event, “big break”, or “The Black Swan” (After the book by Nassim Nicholas Taleb), or for those who are religious “Divine Intervention”. Whatever you called it, the event has several characteristics: unpredictable, extreme impact, and retrospective predictability.

Fast forward hundreds of years later, in another time (21st century) and place (Singapore), a young man with similar characteristics and situation existed. His name is Yong Yuen Qi. Like young Han Xin, he has high aspirations, highly talented, but no one recognize his talents despite his efforts. Whether Yuen Qi going to be successful man in the future is uncertain, because the “black swan” or “divine intervention” has not appeared in his life.

Some readers might thought that Yuen Qi ought to excel in small matters first, before he can be trusted in big matters (as what the Bible suggested), and therefore fulfill his ambition and talent. If only the world is this simple, i.e. Everyone who execute small (easier) task would ALL be given bigger (and more difficult) task. This is not always the case:

1. Consider Han Xin who proves himself in managing warehouse, but Liu Bang vilified him exactly because he did small matter (although important, but not valued by Liu Bang). Liu Bang said to Xiao He, “he only good in managing warehouse, but war is different issue. Since he is good in managing warehouse, let’s use his talent and ask him to manage warehouse (only).”

2. Compare this with Yuen Qi, who proves himself in organizing data such that it is more meaningful and presentable. Yuen Qi’s Boss vilified him exactly because Yuen Qi is doing small task. His boss said, “What’s so great about organizing data?…It is simple, everything is done by Microsoft Excel”. No doubt, what his boss said was correct, Excel did most of the job, but Yuen Qi is the one who has organized mind, not Excel. Excel does not run by itself. His boss failed to see this point, and entrusted Yuen Qi with small matters only.

In the above examples both Liu Bang and Yuen Qi’s Boss fall into narrative fallacy, i.e. the bosses already convinced themselves that what their subordinate did was no big deal, and thus no “ordinary event” can convince them otherwise. Note that Liu Bang ignored Xiao He’s advises to promote Han Xin for doing good job in managing warehouse. Likewise, Yuen Qi’s boss suggested Excel work is no-brainer task that deserves no credit. Tragic. This confirms that the “Black Swan” effect (or “Divine intervention”) is required to change someone’s life (for better life or worse).

Up to this point, those deviant readers will try to argue that Yuen Qi and Han Xin should find out what their bosses values. I almost believe such advice. This argument is invalid, since it contains logical flaws. Assuming both men (Yuen Qi and Han Xin) knew what their superior wanted. They still could not do it, because their superior would not allow them to do it. Can you think of small matter that is valued by your boss?…If that task is valued then it is big matter in the first place.

Those people who experienced that they can discover what their boss wanted or small task lead to bigger task, are probably due to statistical inference. You could be doing many small things, until someday your boss “find out” that one of the small tasks is actually a big task. (The division of small and big tasks are pseudo in real life). Think about the flip side, there are many individuals who keep on doing countless small tasks without being recognized. If your boss do not want to promote you for political reason, or for fear of position, can you do anything to convince him?

The moment your boss recognize your work, or the time when your boss feels that you are ready for bigger responsibility is largely determined by random event, instead of what you know or do. Alas, like Han Xin and Yuen Qi, there is nothing much you and I can do to influence the occurence of positive random event (Good “Black Swan” or Divine Interference). Just do your work diligently, and wait for opportunity to present itself.

A Skeptic View on Semiconductor Industry in Singapore

Posted on June 22, 2008 by Roan Yong

In Straits Times (ST) few days ago, our beloved PM Lee, said that Semiconductor is a vital industry. Thus, he said, “The government remains committed to working with semiconductor companies to understand their needs, reduce the obstacles they face, and help them succeed in this exciting but challenging environment”

Straits Times also reported that Siltronic and Samsung open $1.4b wafer plant in Singapore. This plant is Singapore first 300nm wafer plant and only 1 out of 20 worldwide capable of making the product of that diameter. By 2010, this plant would produce 800 jobs and 300,000 wafers a month.

As mentioned in that article, it is not easy for a country with limited land such as Singapore, to offer the best deal to semiconductor companies, despite Singapore key strengths, which is the high tech electronic manufacturing ecosystem. For this reason, the Singapore government, especially PM Lee deserves big compliment.

However, despite the government valiant effort to lift semiconductor industry and create jobs for Singaporean, I believe Singapore should move away from wafer production for several reasons.

First, the race to produce more superior wafers is not sustainable. The cost of production in Singapore is expensive despite its more productive workers. Additionally, although wafer plants in Singapore generally are technically more advanced than others in low-labors-cost countries like China and India, these countries would eventually learned the new wafer technology and produced the same technologically-advanced wafer as Singapore did, with lower production cost.

Second, dependency on foreign workforce is not sustainable. If you look at the lowest rank of manufacturing workforce, you would see that majority of them are foreigners (usually Chinese, Malaysian, Filipinos, Indian). Whether they are willing to continuously use their hard-earned experience to contribute to Singapore is questionable. They might be tempted to return to their respective countries for higher post. This tendency is especially prevalent among Chinese (China PRC) workers. These workers are young (20+), without commitments.

While semiconductor industry continues to play part in this country, Singapore should reduce its reliance on technology-laden industry, and increase its presence on service-oriented industry, which tap into Singapore’ greatest asset: Human Capital. The emergence of Casinos, IRs, F1 race is a good start, and an evidence of our government’s foresight.

Singapore Job Market Summary Q1 2008

Posted on June 17, 2008 by Roan Yong

From Straits Times:

Employees’ real wages in Manufacturing, Transport, & Administration fell, after taking effect of inflation rate (at 26-year high of 6.6%)

From Business Times:

Most job opening in Services sector, while most retrenchments in manufacturing sector.
3 in 4 workers laid off in Q1 2008 were manufacturing workers.
Over two third of the workers affected were in their 30s & 40s.
With rise in job seekers, Ministry of Manpower (MOM) said the ratio of job openings to jobless people down to 115 per 100 in March 2008.

From Today:

Overall unit labour cost (ULC) rose for eight consecutive quarter, rising by 8.8%, while labour productivity dipped further by 2.8%
Chua Hak Bin, Deutsche Private Wealth Management Asian strategist, said that job market figures tend to be a lagging indicator. The strong Q1 2008 figure probably reflected the intentions of firms late 2007, it is likely that firms turned more cautious early this year.

My advice for those people looking for new career challenge:

With inflation soaring high, coupled with high oil and food prices, companies in Singapore will reduce hiring rate. This unfavorable economic factor added with thousand of fresh graduates looking for jobs, means that we should hold on to our current jobs

The facts given above suggest that several tips. First, If you need a job urgently, you ought to apply in Service industry. Second, avoid Manufacturing jobs. The manufacturing is the hardest affected industry by global economic slow down. Further, other than manufacturing, Transport and Administrative wages cannot cope with inflation, and thus these jobs are among the lowest paid jobs.

How girls solve problem in office, and what guys should know

Posted on June 11, 2008 by Roan Yong

Based on my experience, this is what girls do to solve relationship issue in office:

· Seek help from someone (usually guys), making use of their communication skills: pleading (“please pity me”)

· Refer to boss. This is due to their need for ‘security’. The girls see their boss as someone with authority, power, and all-knowing human being that can solve all problems.

While the above methods are not wrong, these methods could complicate things if they are applied blindly.

Case Study: a girl disagreed with her colleague about certain issues. Instead of sorting the issue with each other, this girl would do several things. First, seek support from other colleagues. The girl would tell her version of what happened to every colleague that she knows. She wants to make other colleagues agree with her perspective only. Second, after winning several support, she will see the other person boss so that ‘the person with authority’ (i.e. the boss) will ‘help to punish’ the other person. Here the girl, convinced that the issue is not caused by her, often bicker and condemn without the other person knowledge. While seeking support and seeing boss, she would smiles, forgive and pretend to make-up (note: this is what I mean by preference to be known as good girl) with the other party.

Lesson Learned: If you quarrel with a female colleague, be very careful. Try to settle the issue immediately with her without intimidating her. If you are a guy, avoid confronting her directly. The best way is to first say you are sorry for …; and then try to address the issue as objectively as possible (don’t put blame on her).

The truth about working for government / statutory boards

Posted on May 11, 2008 by Roan Yong

Based on my experience working for a stat board, I will try to list down few points that would describe working for government, regardless of divisions / departments

General responsibilities of an executive level

· Lots of writing papers. These papers usually approval papers, which described certain proposals of project and directed to senior management for their approval.

· Lots of project management. An executive does not carry out the project work. Instead, he / she need to appoint contractors to do the job. This contractor work performance would be evaluated by the executive.

Colleagues and working conditions

Majority of government / statutory board employee is in their mid-30 and older. This may pose several problems for young graduates in their 20s. First, the young graduates’ opinions would not carry much weight in the eyes of their colleagues. This issue exacerbated when the 20-something is the supervisor of a group of older staffs (in age and length of service). Second, the older staffs are used to status quo and will resist change. This means that the young graduates will find it difficult to change the ‘this is way we do things here’ attitude.

Another obstacle to good working conditions is the attitude of most staffs aged 50 and above. In addition to slower response compared to young staffs, this group of staff also will try to shift work responsibilities, assign to other staffs, or simply refuse to do meaningful work. In their mindset, they already retired and collecting their retirement benefits.

The working pace is definitely slower compared to private sector. This make government / statutory board job ideal place for those who want work-life balance, young parents, or part-time students.

Promotions and Performance appraisals

Despite the government effort to reduce bureaucracy and promote performance-based remuneration, the fact of the matter is promotions are still based on seniority. Two of the criteria for promotion and appraisals are “length-of-service” and “number of years since last promotion”, which implies an average performer with long service, would be in better position to get promotion compared with a new employee.

Other than seniority, another factor for good appraisals is senior management favor / support. In this case, employee with long service years would also be in better position than new ones, since the ‘old’ employee would know ‘who are who’ in senior management, in addition to the management’s ‘office politics’ play.

Salaries and bonuses

Majority of Civil Service offered salary at 65^th percentile of market wage for the same job. In addition, there are several packages throughout the year like 13^th month bonus, performance bonus, welfare-bonus (usually cash to spend in insurance, courses, etc), bonuses relating to market conditions (e.g. recently government announced 0.5 month inflation bonus to help civil servant cope with inflation), and generous annual leave (on average: 18 days for executive level).