Choosing between investing in career and downsizing

In my last post, I asked the question about what you would do in a situation where you need to invest in your career while keeping your children in private school. What I would do, and as a matter of fact, what I really did when I was in that situation was to send my children to public school in order to allow me finish my PhD. I know the discussion is a difficult one because it has emotional component to it. But, think about it this for a moment. Your ability to continue keeping or even increasing your standard of living depends on progression in your career. If you break that cycle, you will find yourself in a rat race. Getting out of the rat race is not easy. Suspending your children's private school temporarily will not prejudice their education. Secondly, there are good public schools where one can get quality education. Sometimes, people create myth over public education. On the other hand, not investing in your career can put you in a situation where you may never be able to pay for private education of your children. 
     The question arises because of my observation of executives I teach business English. Whenever there is a problem with the economy, the first thing they do is always to cancel the course while continuing with other aspects of their lifestyle. It is important to let people know that when they need to invest in their careers the most is when the economy is in a downturn. However, many do the contrary. Think about this!





   

Conflict between professional and personal life

As human beings, we sometimes find ourselves in a conflict involving professional and personal life. A typical example is the problem that arises when parents find themselves on the brink of losing their jobs and struggling to maintain their standard of living. The standard of living here refers to keeping their children in private school. The decision they have to make is between spending money to acquire new skills or updating existing ones and keeping their children in private school. What would you do in this situation? Would you invest in getting new skills and send your children to public school or keep them in private school and forget the skill thing.
     I would like to receive your input on this issue.

Benchmarking your career

You should benchmark your career if you really want to make progress.

factors affecting success: strong desire

In my first post, I listed the main factors which affect success. In that post, I mentioned awareness as the first factor because without awareness, one cannot make the correct assessment of the current situation. Secondly, awareness triggers the second factor which is desire. Knowing that my current situation is bad will force one to ask how this can be changed. The level of one's need for change is reflected on his level of desire. Therefore, the more one wants to make the change, the stronger is the desire. This is the reason why I call it strong desire. You can easily notice that many people want to change something, but do not have enough energy to do it. Why do we need strong desire in order to make a change?
     I can demonstrate it using the minimum energy concept used in science and engineering. Human beings are made of biological molecules and consequently, function through biochemical reactions. However, this issue is too technical and I will explain it in a different post. Just bear in mind in this post that we need higher energy in order to overcome barriers.
     Coming back to our discussion, many people cannot make changes because they do not have strong desire. Rather, they wish for something external to do the job for them. Although they want a better life, the low desire or weak message does not entre into the subconscious mind where problems are really solved. It could not get into the subconscious mind because their desire does not have enough force. No one can significantly achieve anything if he or she does not have strong desire for something. The burning force of desire is the power that activates the subconscious mind.
     How do you use your subconscious mind?              

Transforming your college degree into success

In my last post, I mentioned the fact that it is easier today to be successful than before. The reason is that we are in a knowledge economy. This means that what you have inside your brain is more powerful than what is in the factory. The second reason is that there are various social media platforms one can use. The social media platforms provide you with free entry point, especially, for those with limited financial resource. The question now is: how can you take advantage of these facilities to leverage your success? You have to transform your knowledge into product or service. In order to do that, you need to think on how you can give it to people so it will be useful to them. In order to be useful, you must think about how someone without education can understand or use your product or service. So, you must bring sophistication down to being simple. The more people you have buying your product, the more money you make. This is how late Steve Jobs conquered the world. How can anyone use the computer or any gadget without hassle? In order to answer this question, he provided a simple interface that is interactive. This is where many educated people get stuck. They cannot use simple language to expalin things. They use the same complex language used in the classroom. 
     Another thing to note is that you need to master the knowledge or product you want to offer. In other words, you have to be sure of what you are saying. This means you must constantly be updating yourself about the topic. Remember, you are not the only one with that information. The difference is that you want to make a difference with your knowledge. 
     When you want to go for success, you do not need to listen to your friends who will be telling you that nobody will buy that everyone knows about it. Let me use an example here. Imagine a medical doctor who wants to provide his expertise online by only giving tips about eating healthy food. Many people will say many people provide the same service and therefore, the market is saturated. This is not true because most people who talk about this subject are not doctors. But, the doctor should use real world examples to transform his sophisticated knowledge into a simple one and make people understand he or she is a doctor specialized in the subject. 
     I used a medical doctor in my example, but this same principle can be used for any college major. Now, think about this. Many people who make money in your area of expertise do not have college degree or are not specialist in that area! If someone without degree in my area of specialization is making money, why shouldn´t I make more than he does? Think about this!              







 

Is college degree a guarantee of success 2?

The dream of all parents is to have their children have a college degree. College degree is also important for a country. The more graduates a country has, the more qualified its workforce is and consequently, the higher the productivity of the country. But, when it comes to success, college degree is not generally a guarantee. The reason is that success requires other skills or abilities. If college dgree is well used, it can bring success. Well-used college degree implies understanding how it can be transformed into an instrument of success. College degree can shorten the distance. With a college degree, the holder still needs to fulfill the factors that lead to success. These are awareness, strong desire, vision, and other qualities collectively called the execution phase. 
     The problem is that traditional education prepares their graduates to look for job. Parents also raise their children with the intention of finishing college and looking for job and have good salary. Because of these limitations, most of the college graduates do not have strong desire to go for more even if they may not be very comfortable with what they make. They are not keen to take risks. They are trained to play it safe. Going for success means taking risk. Success means going fo the unknown which your vision shows you, but which unfolds as you move along.          

Success means going for the unknown which your vision shows you, but which unfolds as you move along!

College degree can easily lead to success especially now that we are living in a knowledge economy. Knowledge economy is an economy based on knowledge. That means what you have in your brain is more important than factories and offices. It also means you can stay in your house and be successful. But, you should use a college degree as a stepping stone. The second requirement is to know how your knowledge can be turned into product or service or monetize it. There are many ways you can do that. No one can see with clarity how to reach success unless he or she starts. 

     What are the various ways one can use college degree to reach success? The discussion will continue in the next posts.     

Is college degree a guarantee of success?

Among the questions many people ask is whether college degree is a guarantee of future success. The question arises because of the number of years people spend on education and the amount of money invested. A lot of people compare other options such as using the money for college education to startup a business or even buy a home for rental purposes. Which argument can you use to convince these people that investing in college education is useful. Sometimes, you see many families incuring debt to educate their children. After graduation, some of their children still live with their parents because their income is too low to sustain them. Some graduates may not even get job. The second question is: why should I spend money and time and have no job after graduation. These arguments makes me look at education from a different perspective. If someone without a college degree can be successful, why should another with college degree or even with PhD just go by?
     This is the question a college student or college graduate should ask himself. Instead of this question, many college students think that having a college degree automatically means success. However, many become deceived after graduation when they realize that getting job is even difficult. It should be clear that education in general is very important and college degree is also important. The importance of college degree can be felt by different specialties, such as, medicine, dentistry, engineering, etc. 
     But, how then can knowledge lead to success? This discussion will continue in the next posts.   



    

Third solution to managing debt

This post is a continuation of solutions to managing debt. The third solution is about reducing family expenses. The first thing to change is eating out. Someone in this situation should avoid eating out if he or she wants to solve the problem. Always prepare your food and eat at home. Look for cheaper brands in the grocery or apparels, etc. You should really be on budget. It is a sacrifice worth making because it gives you the long-term financial freedom. The financial freedom comes immediately the student debt is paid for. Another part of family expenses that can help is transfering children from private to good public school. In this form, the tuition fees can be used to pay off the student debt faster. After paying the debt, the children can return to private school again. The most important part of the sacrifice for debt payment is the agreement of the whole family in doing it. In this way, everybody is on the same page. The force of family union is enormous. In order to succeed in anything, there must be sacrifice towards it. The pulling force is the end game which is free from debt and which ultimately leads to financial freedom. 
     Think about how you can apply these solutions to your problems.




       

The second solution to debts

Let me just give background information to those who are reading my blog for the first time. The topic of discussion here is how to manage debts arising from student loan, car loan, mortgage, and family expenses. In my last post, I said the first solution is to sell the car and buy a cheaper used car. You cannot spend more than 15% of your take home pay on vehicle. I used a worker on an annual salary of $50,000 with a $30,000 car loan. Someone on this income shouldn't buy a car of more than $8,000 and should pay it cash. After solving the problem of car, the second issue to tackle is the mortgage. The reason for the choice is that student loan is a constant which must be paid. There are two options as regards the mortgage problem. One option is to look for another job to increase your income so you can continue paying the mortgage. The second option is to sell it to another person or to return it to the seller so you can get out of the mortgage debt immediately. In the second case, you need to live with your parents until you can save enough money to make a bigger down payment. While saving money for the down payment, you should be paying the student loan. You must pay all the student loan before getting into the mortgage again.      The problem is not a difficult one if one is committed changing his or her lifestyle. The solutions I have been providing here are exactly what I would do in the same situation.
     I will give more tips in my next posts.

      

First solution to managing debts

In my last post, I mentioned the problems of different type of debts. Now, let me give some tips on how to reduce these debts. The first solution is to deal with the problem of car debt. One of the problems of the working class is buying expensive cars. They like using new cars. How can someone on an annual salary of $50,000 finance a car of $30,000. It is too expensive even when one is single and live with parents. So, the solution is to sell your new brand car and buy a used car of between $5,000 and $8,000. The difference you receive from the sale of a new car should be used to pay student debt or mortgage. This should be the first solution to the problem. Think about this and take action immediately. 
     In my next posts, I will provide more solutions.