Tag: BRIC

Softer side of Soft Power

In the end of A Christmas Holiday, our Somerset Maugham‘s character went back to his middle-class comfort zone but quite aware of his “plastic” existence. This was right after he had spent a week in Paris, meeting Lydia, a Russian gypsy whose suffering life was nothing Charlie had ever imagined.

I couldn’t help think of a parallel to what America was going through: having involved with a suffering Europe and came home with a G.I Bill, went through a life-altering experience and education. Then we got a Kerry who once testified before Congress as an anti-war camouflage-wearing activist (John Lennon-like) , just to find himself decades later on the other side of the mike.

Softer side of Soft Power.

War-weary country, post-industrial America no longer wants to play global cop, regardless of the nature of mass weapon violation.

We truly are entering the Post-American era whose first phase leaves a huge void to be filled by a host of BRIC countries.

(NATO now stands for No Action, Talk Only).

In short, when the world calls 911, there is no answer.

Only a recording that says “we are short of resources and too compassion-fatigued to be involved, please call back at another time. Sorry for the inconvenience this may have caused”.

And that recording might be generated from a pre-recorded upload from India.

Syria or India, to an average American in this post-Recession era, is the same.

Kids need shoes, need to be dropped off and picked up. Groceries in the freezer and fast food at the second drive-through window.

That’s about it.

Please don’t bother us Please do not show us any photo of mass massacre, or influx of refugees to Lebanon and Turkey.

We might enjoy a vacation or a movie set in Istanbul (Taken 2), but we prefer marginal exposure, not deep engagement.

Yet, there has been a significant rise in NGO’s treasure chest during this Recession.

Where is our sense of priority?

Back from our Christmas Holiday, to same old La-Z-Boy chair , feeling life returns to normalcy.

We might have met a few real-life characters whose suffering we could only imagine. But then, it’s better to let sleeping dog lie.

Even Soft Power has its limits (we no longer talk about Hard Power). State is leading Pentagon, but then Russia is now in center stage. Where are Britain, Germany and France?

The so-called Lords of Finance?

In a Post-American World, the power vacuum is up for grabs But no one is big enough and “naive” enough to step up to the plate.

Perhaps there will be a new “NATO”, one that acts only, and no talk at all.

Our Somerset Maugham’s character did give Lydia some money. He felt good about giving. He had a wonderful Christmas Holiday in Paris, the Louvre and the London’s status-quo existence. Will life ever be the same after each human encounter?

The answer lies in whether there is a softer side of Soft Power. I believe American at heart are people with a softer side.

It is finding its footing and balance after a period of growing pain. Mr Kerry wasn’t shunned by first turning into an anti-war, then a pro-war and finally the Geneva deal. Maybe someone will pick up the 911 call after all. It’s called a change of heart. That call can be routed anywhere in the world, It’s called follow-the- sun technology and follow-your-heart ecology.

Retreat, retrench and return

40 years on since the last US combat boots pulled out of Vietnam.

Today, Starbucks lady returns, luring passer-by amidst the town square. Senator Kerry is getting his confirmation while a 40-year-old Vietnamese couldn’t tell an American from a Russian.

Vietnam is just a name, like Iraq will be 4 decades from now.

Vietnam today has Vespas (Italy), Mercedes (Germany), Honda (Japan), Kia (Korea), Haier (China) and La Vache qui Rit (France).

I enjoy reading translated literature from all over the world (sometimes direct translation without going through English).

40 years on.

The cyclos used to be common. Now they are relics of the past, confined to tourist districts only.  Machine is replacing muscles.

Then we buy gym memberships to exercise those sedentary muscles.

Talking about machine. News have been trickled in from BRIC nations: clubs from Russia and Brazil were burning (smoke machines for real, not just for special effects). The flip side of prosperity. Just like crime rates have been down  in NYC (people went online instead of walking the streets. 60% search inquiries were porn).

Home alone with hormones.

It’s easy to look at a poverty-stricken nation and make moral judgment (while a convict in developed nations would wear suits-and-tie sitting on the defense side of the bench, trying to deceive the jury just as he had done with thousands before).

40 years of regress and progress (Watergate to Bill Gates).

Good-hearted folks can’t help but see poor ROI the US have spent on arms.

Russia at least refused to play Russian roulette, so instead of pushing ICBM‘s, its leader went private, pushing Pizza (Hut).

We are evolving into a post-hardware era: software and soft power.

Those with thought leadership and social influence rule. And not for long.

Think not of the pyramid model. Instead, it is a kaleidoscope which keeps changing (the good side of this is if we can reinvent ourselves, we can reappear multiple times, like associates in Cirque du Soleil).

I am glad to see Starbucks here. I heard it is also opened in Forbidden City.

If Friedman is right (two nations are least likely to be at war when both have a McDonald) then perhaps Vietnam and China can avert another conflict, over coffee. American quintessential Starbucks coffee.

Fool’s errand?

On NYT‘s Op-Ed‘s Pages, I found a piece “Asians are too smart for their own good”.

The author brought up a historical parallel between Jews’s admission at Ivy League schools back then, and Asian‘s now.

She neglected another important parallel: Japanese-American got put in internment camps not too long ago. With BRIC‘s second generation, growing up in America, demographic make up will once again be more diverse.

By 2050, Asia will have stepped up to claim its top spot. By then, demand will outweigh supply of needed talent.

White Ivy League students are more than welcome to prepare themselves for the day, same way I was sent to French school, then to EFL schools, then to State School, then to Private schools etc…. Gotta to pay the price of admission.

Not just the tuition.

Besides, with global communication and global commerce, Ivy League Institutions themselves are facing crisis. High-valued professors from these places are moon-lighting and contracted out to the highest bidders in Singapore, Taiwan, Hong Kong, China and India anyway.

I am not sure who has done more learning: professors or students in these regions.

America is still a magnet and market for the likes of Google’s founders, for now.

But the jury is still out for the next big thing. Cisco , Google and GE are agressive in talent acquisition.

A degree from an Ivy League school might get you into the door, but does not ensure your staying there, much less rising.

I am not naive about the climb from within, with glass ceiling and all.

But give society and corporations some time.  First women, then minority. (at this edit, Lean In has just come out – giving modern women something to discuss).

There are no rush to judgment. I understand the timeliness of this issue (admission to college. It’s called Senior panic). But one needs to take a long view back (to WW II at the very least) and forward (2050).

It’s a wonderful and widely connected world. There is no need to play the victim card. Just the value card. After all, the genes and genius cannot be hidden for long. We got Youtube, Twitter and Linkedin. If those platforms are not enough, invent your own “religion”. There is no need to be a follower. Asian families are better at making followers than leaders out of their children.

The weakness lies in its strength: Tiger Mom reproduces Tiger mindset. On that note, Jewish mothers can agree with Asian mothers: “They” are after us. So unfair! Personally, I don’t think it will ever be a fool’s errand for anyone (Asian are a subset) to be overly educated and enlightened. It’s our mission in life.

Expired Empires

The Distributed Model has enabled the Rise of the Rest.

Capital, talent and market flow where the chips may fall. Apple courting China, China Africa, Japan Rest of Asia etc…

Everyone is out on the dancing floor.

Dance anyone?

The combinations are endless. Permutation and exponential.

Hard and soft powers, hard and soft currencies.

Exert that influence. Assert that strength. Differentiate.

Nations, like people, will have their 15-minutes of fame.

Advertisement section (like ones in the Economist) paints beautiful, picturesque locations, from Japan to Jamaica.

In reality, no one wants to remember Fukushima and Sandy.

Amnesia and amnesty.

Shelters from the storm.

America got its own set of problems e.g. FOR LEASE and FORECLOSURE.

There was a sign in Los Angeles that says it all. It was NOW HIRING, but the W has been whited out to be read: NO_  HIRING.

I got all sorts of CV’s (binders full of men). I feel the weak pulse of a declining empire.

We have squandered the opportunities this side of the Cold War (the US fared much better on this side of World Wars). Peace time problems e.g. Petro State (Dutch disease) to Penn State (low morale).

Meanwhile, the C in BRIC keeps growing stronger by the day. Scrapped metal scavenging, refined and remade into finished products, which got shipped back. In the process, this turns America into a Third-World nation by industrial standard.

China on the hunt for raw material, for petro, for talent, for know-how, for creativity. It has Soviet, US and Japan lessons to learn from. And it has Hong Kong and Taiwan as matchmakers. When a Taiwanese University came to Alhambra, CA to recruit students, we know the Rest is Rising.

And this foreshadows an expired Empire. Wake up Ivy League. Start at Little League. Math, Science, and English. 10,000 hours.

Leaders as human

We miss those towering figures from WWII (remember the canes, the hats? and the saying  e.g.”Never never give up”).

It’s a different landscape now  (Apple, Facebook etc… with CEOs without a tie).

So it goes. New world order.  New icons. New  profiles and preferences.

Still, they are human. Supposedly connected with their people.

Leaders of common people.

Know how you feel.

It’s been tough.

We shall overcome.

Let’s tap into that which is best in each of us.

Arouse the spirits of sacrifice. Go beyond the call of duty.

Be the better version of you.

The spirit needs some workout just  like the body. Zumba for the soul.

Go and prevail. Stand tall and stand your ground.

Yes. It’s a new world order, with more participation and information.

BRIC and PIGS. Men and women, in bedroom and boardroom, on the playground and in the background.

Different world. More colorful world. More participation and equality. The future is calling.

Uncharted waters

When Henry Ford first put together 2 and 2 (wheels) to make 4 (wheels), he was probably laughed at.  Then his policy to increase worker’s wages, so they could afford buying the very same cars they had helped assembled was probably viewed as radical.

Today, the same thing with Nissan Leaf‘s buyer’s incentive, and Diamond-Lane privilege (even just one driver) that comes with driving an EV are looked at with envy and intrigue.

Early adopters only.

Going to uncharted territories.

No what if!

Without entrepreneurial spirits, we wouldn’t get Netflix, Amazon, Zappos, Yahoo and Google.

Names that did not exist a few decades ago. Uncharted waters.

Broadband-enabled companies. Google Fiber?

To the tune of Billions and employing big pipes, but not fat payroll.

They were probably laughed at too in early stage. What do you mean customers can send back the shoes free of charge? (Zappos)

Convenient online check-out? Customers recommended purchase? Perhaps you would like to check this out (Cross-selling and up-selling).

With fat pipe, we can expect more apps and new business models i.e. 24/7, easy shipping and hassle-free return,  self-improving algorithm that knows its customers better than they would themselves.

In short, business will get smarter as machine processes transactions faster.

Machine will help both sides of the equation: Business and Consumers, selling and buying.

Entrepreneurs can strike out without too much sunk costs.

Software can be tested off-shored, and while being overseas, companies might as well let the public sneak peak at  their proofs of concept (Japan has a Sample Store).

The irony of this whole process is: while off-shoring centers were viewed as cost centers, they ended up as profit-centers, for BRIC countries are now the ones with relatively strong purchasing power (after years of doing someone else’s dirty work). When traversing uncharted waters, one will never know what perils and possibilities are waiting at each turn. The pre-req is an open mind and a brave heart to deal with those unexpected turns of event.

The Routine

Instinctively, we follow the path of least resistance (park in the shade, grab the nearest item on the shelves…).

Marketers make it their mission to study this, the same way scientists experiment with reflexive rats in the lab.. Nike even filmed the Standford team, trained barefooted, to see the landing and movement of their feet.

Creatures of habits. Social animal.

Maximum connections: 120, to stay meaningful.

Yet, we are now networked at hockey-stick growth chart.  Majority of the world, including what used to be called the Third World, got phones. Can you hear me now!

Mobile payment, mobile banking, mobile TV.

Nomad lifestyle all over again. I blogged about Point A to B.

Louis L’Amour said it best ” the problem with mankind is that we can’t stay put in one place”.

Train and now plane hobos. Air travel used to carry with it social badges: prestige and class (think Pan Am).

The same with the automobile when it first came out. Then the assembly line (yesterdays’ Foxconn) and high-paid manufacturing jobs at Ford, changed all that.

Everything is new, yet nothing is new.

The rich have to (and have always) reinvent the game, find new playground and fence it off to stay exclusive (can you imagine online education for the mass, live streaming from the Ivory Tower of Ivy League schools). It is all happening.

MIT, then Standford. My fair lady, for the world. The rain in Spain doesn’t fall mainly on the plain.

It is common grace (rain on the field of the good and the evil).

Brazil is hosting the next Olympic. Perhaps it is fitting and symbolic that after England, we shift focus to BRIC, with B for Brazil.

Something about growing ethanol down there. About reinventing a country, about female leadership in a vibrant and colourful nation.

Let’s hope that spirit and energy rub off on us, stodgy and austere nations.

I believe our best days have yet been behind us.

We just need to look inward, take an honest inventory and reinvent ourselves. Focus on the essentials and task ourselves with the right things. Ignore the critics. They are always there, taking shots at doers. And above all, believe. We have pulled this off before. Can and will do it again. It’s our good routine. It’s us, intrinsically and uncompromisingly, at our best. As Chris Gardner puts it, “only us can give ourselves legitimacy”.  Routine, but earned routine, not forced.

1+1=3

Organizations go through many life cycles before winding down, or absorbed in a M&A.

Here in Vietnam, fluidity is the word that describes the dynamics of organization.

Like organism that evolves with its environment, organization here often bends and changes beyond recognition.

We know the solution is embedded in the problem.

Yet we need to affect change slowly.

Harmony is key.

Disruptive behavior is not encouraged.

Yet to grow, organization has to build disruption into its timeline.

As long as 1+1=3

Synergy.

Organizational change is a microcosm of a larger trend, similar to the rise of  BRICS.

The South-South axis will influence emerging nations much more than North-South Imperialistic past (as of this edit, there is a book out entitled “The End of Power”, in which the author argues that power is more fleeting and transient than ever before).

For instance, students from Vietnam are offered choices to study in Australia, Singapore and US.

Yet for financial reasons, they cannot pick US, their premier destination.

With option A, they come back only know Australia as the outside world.

Yet Australia takes its cue from the UK and North America.

Hence, two-step flow of cultural change.

This trickle-down effect is accelerated by the internet and network effect.

Voila! We got a borderless world, whether we like it or not.

Open U and Open Door.

All we need now is open mind, to welcome change.

Young mind will take in anything.

Just build, and they will come.

Be courageous, and be flexible.

1+1 might equal 4 here in Vietnam.

In the mirror

Among Dylan’s many memorable lines is “you don’t need the weatherman to tell you which way the wind is blow-in”.

Even without the weatherman, we can feel that things are at a boiling point.

Like in the movie “the Network”, people start to open their windows and bell out “I am mad like Hell, and I won’t take it anymore”.

Except this time, instead of opening their windows, they opened Windows and Adbuster, which called for Occupy Wall Street (and McToilet on Wall Street).

A leaderless protest against figure-less forces that have worked against them e.g. commoditization, globalization, or automation.

Their 60’s counterparts wanted to rage against the status quo.

Conversely, “occupiers of Wall Street” just want to have an occupation that pays a little more than “nickel-and-dime”.

The wind is blowin but not in their favor (Andy Rooney has just retired leaving one vacancy for roughly 2 Billion people who recently joined the rank of the Middle Class).

Instead of “Hell No, We won’t go”, they are now yelling “Hell No, PLace To Go”.

India? China? Brazil?

To land a job in  BRIC‘s countries, one needs a crash course in language and culture.

(I resent the author of a recent Economist’s article, ridiculing “poor English” in Vietnam. Cheap shot at best, and colonialistic at worst.

http://www.economist.com/blogs/johnson/2011/09/english-vietnam?fsrc=scn/tw/te/bl/iamenglishteach

Go ahead and try to learn Mandarin).

Employers look for those with soft-skills that couldn’t be outsourced such as critical thinking, communicative and collaborative skill set across the cultures, but also to pay them at blue collar wages (high skill/low cost) since employers themselves are caught in a competitive race to the bottom due to outsourcing, offshoring and now re-shoring. Damn if you do, damn if you don’t.

Currently a jobs bill which runs at $200,000 per job is on the table.

Foreign students said “No thanks” (even when their HB1 visas were extended) and went home after graduation (BlueSeed is trying to dock a ship out in Seattle Waters to go around this rule).

At first, I thought it was because of the wives (who couldn’t find spices in groceries stores) who pressured their expat husbands to return (let’s stay to India and Singapore) – Japanese executives wouldn’t choose to work here in the US for fear of derailing their career tracks – But, I found it’s more of a pull than push force that they chose not to stay around (follow the money i.e. emerging domestic markets).

In “It used to be us”, the author of “The World is Flat” himself is baffled by his own themes (globalization and IT revolution).

Now, even call centers got automated (outsourcing next level, to automation), so high-value representatives can proactively chat with callers.

We are all caught off- guard: a job loss here, a dead-end career there.

Before we know it, we blame it on Wall Street (partly true, but not the whole picture – the same way India’s service industries and China’s manufacturing industries got the blame for our Lost Decade, or the Japanese lean -semiconductor- manufacturing in the 80’s or the Vietnam War for taking the Johnson’s administration’s eyes of the-Great Society).

But the story is more complicated than that. The solution seems to be multi-pronged because the problem is multi-faced.

Jack Ellul already touched on the idolization of “technique” back in the 60’s. Now, techno-fundamentalism is pervasive in every faced of life (what could be digitized, must be digitized – Larry Page was quoted to say : “let’s have a million engineers” to outrank or outPagerank Microsoft’s 25,000 strong army), forcing “human” to reflect and re-think about what it is that makes them marketable (the human touch, emotional intelligence etc….) in the 21st century.

No wonder we feel short-changed (too many of us chasing too few opportunities at the bottom – even high-paying construction jobs are no longer there on this side of the housing bubble). At the top, one will take a CEO job, like at HP, but for only $1.00.

It reminds me of Newsweek which was acquired also for $1.00).

This Halloween we will be in default costumes, that of homeless men and jobless women (carrying huge luggage, or brief case).

It’s time to revisit Native Americans on the occasion of Columbus Day (to press restart).

It’s time to reinvent  the American Dream. We don’t have to look too far, since the cause and the cure for today’s malaise and misery are right there, in the mirror.

I hope they keep the mirror squeaky-clean there at the McDonald on Wall Street for our protestors’ comfort and convenience.

My 555 plan

Get back to your roots.

Eliminate waste and accessories.

Differentiate and make it relevant.

Actually, 555 is just a self-branding attempt, after a cigarette a friend of mine used to smoke.

I had to attach a numeric code to differentiate (sticky and trans-cultural)  my Yahoo log-on ID.

Now we hear of 999 plan etc…

It’s hard to stand out among Earth’s 7 Billion.

During a town hall meeting on LinkedIn, its CEO was ambitious to convey its vision i.e. to connect people to people, and people to opportunities.

Now we have the way (technology that connects millions at 2nd and 3rd degree separation), but we lack the will.

I heard of a new book entitled “Lean Start-ups”. The author mentioned “rentorship” of the means of production (Google Adwords, Amazon rack space etc…).

Even when the barriers to entry (means of production) are lowered, new entrants still get cold feet (catch 22: low consumer confidence leads to low spending, hence reduces the size of the pie, in turn, weakens the pull factor).

Even our Greek demi-gods need bail-out.

In education, we heard of “Waiting for Superman“.

Now, it’s waiting for Superman everywhere from EU zone to the O zone.

No, I don’t have a 555 plan to come to the rescue. It’s all in the unwinding.

And this takes time and belt-tightening (the 60’s protest was a rage against the machine i.e. inhumane,

now Occupy WS couldn’t articulate its distress i.e. wanting things back to the way it used to be in).

One thing is clear: we are in this together (dark side of globalization).

Vacationers from Europe couldn’t afford to travel to Hawaii. A resort in Hawaii got shut down (Michael Dell lost a lot of money there along with his Santa Monica hotels).

A Chinaman decided to shop in France (instead of Florida).  A Filipino street vendor just got flooded and went under. A Korean caterer LA tweets about his lunch site. And a Vietnamese man tweaks his latest app to share photos (Color) while Japan nuclear power plants striked a deal for two more reactors along the Vietnam coasts (this time, with Fukushima lessons learned).

There will be a lot of sorting out inside our hot and crowded sandbox.

The age of oligarchy has just dawned, not only in broadband, but in all sectors.

We can’t remember and choose among too many offerings (as BRIC countries export themselves e.g Tata in England, Huawei in TX).

Consumers always say they want more choices, while in reality, they pick the default option (organ donors in Europe were too lazy to opt out ).

So we are back to our roots (As of this writing re-shoring is on the rise with Albany getting $4 B pledge for chip facilities, and Pitts a huge endowment).  After all, America got talent, right!

I read somewhere that Youtoo is doing just that: to offer everyone a chance to submit their own video and to broadcast their 15-seconds of fame.

There will be enough bandwidth for everyone. Everyone is a star, because each has lived a wonderful life. Irreplaceable and invincible.

When your heart still beats, the cursor still blinks, don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. There are zillion of stars in the Universe whose 7 Billion are here on Spaceship Earth, wading water to school, landing a plane at near miss, or coding all night to finish version n.0.

There is no better time to live, to invent and to round people out of their slumber. Victim no longer. Victor all the way. Brain bubble is the kind that never bursts. What’s your 555 plan?