Category Archives: Ideas

random ideas that pop in my head…

Aggressive Financial Plans For The New Year

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This New Year, my plans are different than in previous years.  I’m going with aggressive financial plans for the New Year!  This is really a part of a five year plan.

Hong Kong Chinese New Year Fireworks

Aggressive Financial Plans

  1. In 5 years, double my net worth.  This plan might not sound that aggressive, but I’ve done a fair job of accumulating net worth already.  So when you are starting out, it’s a much easier goal to accomplish than when you already have 10+ years of growing your net worth under your belt already.  So how am I going to do this task?  By increasing my Savings Delta!  It’s worked thus far, so why not push it a bit harder!
  2. Possible going into debt?!?  Sounds counterintuitive huh, or does it.  It’s pretty obvious that borrowing rates are incredible low right now, and house prices are still pretty reasonable.  So why not?  The worst that could happen is that I would own another house, but with one house totally paid off, it’s not much of a stretch buying another one.
  3. Expand and create new financial experiments.  I’m planning on continuing my lunch experiment, but actually it hasn’t ever stopped.  I’m just going to write about it more often.  I also have plenty of new financial experiments that I’ll be writing about too.  I think these ideas are what will expedite my wealth accumulation process.
  4. Control financial creep.  I’ll admit, in small ways, financial creep has gotten out of hand for me.  While I’m not buying a Lexus (yet), but I go out to eat way too much!
  5. New technology strong sites?  I know I have the technological abilities to create some interesting and beneficial sites and can do things that haven’t been thought of.  I’m hoping this year I just do it.  Barring health issues, I don’t see why I can’t…  time is ticking…
  6. Innovative Ideas?  I know that I’ve been sloppy.  I think of ideas but don’t follow them through because of time constraints (and health).  This year I would like to explore how far I can go.

 Aggressive Financial Plans Counterpoint

While I’m planning on being pretty aggressive financially next year, I’m not going to sacrifice my lifestyle in a too restricted way.  Life is short and if I go too restrictive with my finances and life, I lose the entire purpose of having money.  I have to remember that money is not the end goal, living well each year is…

 

Here’s to a Great New Year!

Don

Getting Your Ideas Implemented

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Taking in account my personal history, I’ve been doing it wrong when it comes to getting my ideas implemented or my problems resolved.  You see, in the past, I would stop perusing an idea or problem once I encountered rejection (credit card companies bank on this… literally).  For instance, I’d have an incredible idea at work and I’d share it with a peer or boss, but because of lack of understand or because of the poor way that I communicated it to them, my idea would encounter a negative response and I would get discouraged and give.  Today I know better, today I politely take a different path in getting my ideas implemented

Oh sure, I’ve heard the old saying: “Try and Try again”, but for some reason I associated it with actually doing work after the idea(s) have been agreed upon.  Now, I realize that sometimes even the ideas need to be “Tried and tried again”, here’s why:

Over the past five years, one particular co-worker at work continues to make personal calls during work time (not lunch) to accomplish things.  While I don’t totally agree with the use of company time as much as he used it to accomplish his personal agenda, I have learned a few things be quietly listening to his actions and results that has benefited me greatly.  In addition, I’ve seen him use similar approaches with his work related ideas to get them implemented too!

Steps to Take to Get Your Ideas Implemented or Issues Resolved

  1. Be direct, but polite and confident in expressing your idea or issues.
  2. If you encounter an “A-hole” as the customer service rep., politely exit and call again.  Many times you will get someone who might be more agreeable to your concerns the second, third or sometimes even fourth time.
  3. If the person taking your call doesn’t have the authority to make a change, ask for someone who does, a supervisor, or customer retention specialist.
  4. If you have times (as is the case with an idea), if you encounter resistance, try writing or rewriting the idea and presenting the idea to another person next week.  Sometimes the problem is the way you are communicating the idea and writing it up in a document that is sent in an email helps present the idea in a more consumable format.
  5. Write the idea in a “lowest common denominator” like format (aka write your idea as simple as possible).  In other words, keep out the fancy words that doesn’t add value to the idea.  If you write your idea so that it’s a chore to read, it won’t get read.
  6. Keep you idea short and to the point, cut out the fluff.  You can always expand upon the idea later.
  7. Don’t be afraid of communicating your idea to more than one individual.  Just because cause one manager or person doesn’t understand, doesn’t mean that his/her boss won’t understand your vision.
  8. If you are sure the idea has legs (in other words it’s a great and doable idea), call a meeting with as many individuals that could support the idea.  Make sure it’s a solid idea though!
  9. Don’t take the rejection of your idea personal.
  10. Don’t feel like your idea is set in stone.  One of my favorite processes is evolving an idea that I might have to make it even better.  A side benefit is that the others helping to evolve the idea feels like they are part of the idea too.  Since they have time invested evolving your idea, they might champion it more.
  11. You idea may be improved upon, or you may have to compromise a bit on your vision just to get the idea agreed to be implemented.  Once the idea is accepted, you can always gently sway the vision back to your original thoughts if it makes more sense or makes more sense.  If it doesn’t though, then let your evolved idea continue instead.

No matter what happens to your idea, be polite and friendly about it.  Don’t let defensive or and negative forms of passion show or come out, even if you feel strongly about your idea/issue.

I hope someone finds value in this “Getting Your Ideas Implemented” knowledge, it took me too long to figure it out!

Bests,

Don

Summer Time Financial Process Reflection

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Summer is a tough time for bloggers, at least if you live in a seasonal state that has a snowy winter period.

It a time to be busy with family, friends and life in general.

During the business oriented and financial slowdown for the summer, often it’s also a relaxed time to examine your current financial strategy and see if it can’t be improved upon.  I think that since a lot of us let our financial planning go on autopilot during the summer, the occasional thought about how we go about things is relatively bias-free!

Gulf of Mexico Sunset

Captiva Sunset

By bias-free thoughts about your business/financial processes, you are able to make optimizations on the processes by looking at your current processes from different perspectives.  I think it’s easier during such times to make some great discoveries and improvements on such processes.  You might be wondering why this is a great time to make improvements since you are most likely in vacation mode…  I’ll explain:

When you are your day-to-day processing of the system currently in place, you are more concerned with managing the transactions (like income and expenses) that use your system and you try to optimize the inflows and outflows of that system.  At that point in time, most likely, you are too busy working with and managing the system to take time to think about redesigning the system for the better.  And therein exists the paradox, while we are resting and enjoying your summer,we’re passively thinking about our existing system and how to make it better!

Funny how life works out that way…

Enjoy your summer my friends!

MR

Working Alternative Work Shifts For More Money

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Yesterday, I took a personal day off from work and used that time to spend the day with my two kids (one is 11 years old, and the other is 8 years old).  Surprisingly we all had a great time and it got me thinking that perhaps it would be nice to spend more time with them as they grow over the next few years.  The problem is that work gets in the way, but what if I (or we) were to work alternative shifts instead, and at the same time make more money?

For instance where I work at my employer has both a second and third shift.  So let’s say I asked to be put on the third shift instead of the first shift.  Let’s examine the results if I were to be assigned to such a shift:

  1. I’d instantly make 20% more money because of the shift differential.  Cha-Ching, instant bonus!
  2. I would be sleeping when my kids are either sleeping or in school.  During the time they are in school, I’d be home before they get off of school, and this would work out perfectly.  During the summer, I could get a little sleep during the morning or afternoon, depending on what is going on.
  3. Since hardly anyone works 3rd shift and there isn’t much work to do for part of the shift, I might be able to work two jobs at once!
  4. I could even take my laptop in to work and do some side income work related tasks, obviously knowing that I need to do my shift related work first.
  5. There is even the possibility of juggling two jobs and working side income opportunities for a maximum of time usage.  Although this might be difficult, and the “Side Income” tasks would have to be fairly simple in nature.
  6. I would have more time to look for better paying jobs, which in turn might mean a dramatic jump in base pay.
  7. I would be able to work my side businesses during the day, when more people are available for meetings and talking.
  8. Another benefit would be that I could meet with professionals and city workers about issues concerning my side businesses.

Second shift would have some similar benefits, but because your working prime hours (when the kids are home), to me, it wouldn’t be as beneficial to work this shift… unless you could do it while telecommuting in to do it.

I think if you aren’t particularly crazy about your job, and you really value the time with your kids (and obviously get along), this might be a great opportunity.  I think the key to making it worthwhile is if you are willing to fully utilize the advantages of such a shift.  If you aren’t willing to take advantages of the perks, then even with the shift differential (usually 20%) it might not be worth it.  Personally, if I were working third shift, I would try to at least double my income!

Bests,

MR