Thang Nguyen 555

Cultures on Collision Course

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With some short-term relief work in Asia/Africa and long stint in Telecom, Thang also earned a B.A. at Pennsylvania State University. M.A. in Communication at Wheaton Graduate School, M.A. in Cross-Cultural Communication at Gordon-Conwell Seminary, Boston. In addition, he earned a CELTA – classes taken in Hanoi for cultural re-immersion.

Tag: Costco

  • On being an influencer

    Like it or not, we all are either on the receiving or giving end of Influence. But few understand what constitute sphere of influence. A study on the subject, by Cialdini , lists below elements: – Like (ability). This is self-explanatory. When you like someone or are liked by someone, nothing can go wrong. This explains the “a…

  • Moon Cake

    You can’t possibly finish one all by yourself. In fact, when I was a kid, I remembered it got cut up not into four but eight pieces, like we would with a Costco pizza. Slices of sweet moon cake, in all varieties. Big confectionary  revenue every year in China and Vietnam. Although it’s a Children…

  • The flow

    We woke to all sorts of noise, among them the flow of traffic. Resting by the lake after my few-mile run in the heat, I noticed all sorts of creatures: squirrels, rabbits and ducks. As peaceful as could be, yet we don’t often say “I’ve got peace like a lake”. We say, “I ‘ve got…

  • Empathize and Energize

    You wish your co-workers are all into that. They know how you feel, and because of who they are, they take it up a notch. The virtuous cycle. Feeding into it is like fueling the fire. Passion, dedication and yes, winning. Don’t you miss working in teams with those qualities? Pettiness has no place there.…

  • Fragmented and segmented

    Marketers have had a field day over the last few decades: market fragmented and segmented. The former is a reality in our pluralistic society. The later, careful study and strategy to go after niche markets. Microtrend covers this very topic: knitting, teen markets etc…as long as the niche constitutes 1% of the total mass market. It’s a…

  • Ads during downturn

    You might think that business are spending less on advertising during the down turn. Think again. Financial, insurance and banking, all pumped more ad dollars into the system. Meanwhile, more VC‘s are of “angel” nature (this explains why Facebook can afford taking its time before next year’s IPO), the 21st century version of Independent Film…

  • Marketing genius

    Charlie Chaplin would keep filming until he got it perfect (100:1 filming ratio to get the ladder to swing just right etc…). In “the Kid“, the little girl would throw rocks at windows, while our handyman walks right behind to fix them. Gillette would give away razors just to sell the blades (HP has done…

  • The road most traveled

    Fireplace (fake or real), Christmas tree (fake or real) and toy boxes (stuffed or life-sized), all put together to create a Hollywood home version of  White Christmas, the illusion that we are OK and what-and-how-much we charged at the registers won’t haunt us in late January. In America, the road most traveled has been to…

  • Listening across the cultures

    Listening is hard to begin with (just ask a psychiatrist). Listening across the cultures is doubly hard. It requires an extensive grasp of the others’ frame of reference. As technology enables the world to shrink, more groups join the globalized market. (The PM of Malaysia was on GPS telling Fareed that in the 60’s, Malaysia…