Tag: business

Why Constant Ratings and Reviews Are Hurting Your Business

“As any business owner such as myself will tell you, getting customer feedback is extremely important to see how your business or company is doing.”

As any business owner such as myself will tell you, getting customer feedback is extremely important to see how your business or company is doing. Customers won’t sugarcoat it and won’t hide their feelings, especially when they’ve spent money on something they see as either useful or valuable. Having ratings and reviews is a good way to get feedback on how your business can improve. From a customer’s perspective, it is nice to make one’s opinion known, to have an impact on the product or service you use and have their input lead to actual changes to keep them around longer as a customer.

However, where this reviewing and rating system can run into trouble, is when you are constantly reviewing every single service and product, it’s become compulsory instead of optional, and it’s spread to industries where direct responses can be a bit too on the nose when they serve the public and not private interests. From restaurants to ride-sharing applications to doctor’s offices, every transaction in society now comes with a mandatory rating request, leaving more customers fatigued and desensitized.

Being asked to constantly review every single business, public or private, doesn’t always lead to better or more in-depth feedback, and there are other ways companies can strike the right balance going forward. One of the ways to do so is to go beyond the basic ‘stars’ or out of 10 scale that is being used by most providers today. Its surface-level, lacks nuance, and rarely captures how the customer truly feels. In this case, less is more. Anonymous, optional surveys completed at the customer’s discretion generate more meaningful feedback than shallow ratings from everyone at once.

For example, if you are a small business or company, and you are getting 100 five-star ratings, but they are from bots or fake accounts with no actual written reviews, can you claim to be a reputable business? Instead, especially with more of the Internet being filled with AI, bots, and fake accounts, real verification methods with anonymized surveys, which can be filled out over time, will make for a happier and less stressed customer base.

If you are getting scores or ratings constantly but with no real feedback, how can you possibly gain real insights from these ratings? Also, how can customers trust these cursory ratings when they could be fake or not with anything real backing up their star rating? Personally, I would rather get 10 real reviews from customers who opt to voluntarily leave a review for my business that’s in-depth and insightful about the product or service rather than 100 fake ones with no substance or trustworthiness. Beyond the risk of fake reviews, there’s also the problem of overwhelming customers with constant rating requests.

Forcing customers to rate every interaction is stressful, disingenuous, and harmful. Business owners should always make any kind of rating or review optional and only prompt the customer to leave the review every now and then and not after every interaction. There should not be a penalty for not leaving reviews as well and they should remain optional yet encouraged. Companies or firms can also incentivize reviews or ratings with a referral offering, a discount, or perhaps a free trial to encourage greater participation. If they really dislike or like your product or service, they often will want you to be the first to know but they should have the autonomy to do so on their own initiative. In addition to incentivizing voluntary feedback, companies must consider the ethical implications of rating individuals directly.

Moreover, I do not think it’s wise for some companies to review their customers even with the gig economy unless they consent to it as certain ridesharing companies have done up to this point. It’s good to have responsible customers using your platform or service but having anonymous reviews of your customers without their knowledge or feedback about their own ratings is morally gray at best and potentially illegal too. I also think it should be discouraged to rank teachers, doctors, lawyers, and other professionals directly even if it is a private practice or company. Evaluating the institution rather than individual professionals is more responsible; rating certified individuals in sensitive fields is ethically questionable.

In the end, more reviews and ratings do not automatically mean better feedback for a company. Overloading your customers with constant rating requests leads to superficial or lack of candid responses, stress, and even distrust, while fake or bot-generated reviews undermine the credibility of a business. The solution is simple but often overlooked: make feedback selective, anonymized, and meaningful.

Encourage customers to share their insights thoughtfully rather than compulsively and consider thoughtful incentives to reward genuine engagement. Beyond numbers and stars, businesses should focus on creating systems that respect their customers’ time, autonomy, and privacy. By doing so, companies not only gain actionable insights but also cultivate trust, loyalty, and a happier customer base, proving that sometimes, less truly is more.

How to Evaluate Your Year

“Evaluating the year that has passed can be a valuable exercise for yourself to gain deeper insights, identify growth opportunities for the new year, and celebrate the accomplishments or successes you had.”

2024 is ending soon as I write this article and I do believe it is important to look back on the year that was to evaluate it holistically, such as whether it was good, bad, or a mixed bag. Evaluating the year that has passed can be a valuable exercise for yourself to gain deeper insights, identify growth opportunities for the new year, and celebrate the accomplishments or successes you had.

Reflecting on various aspects of your life, even areas that you can improve upon will help you to set meaningful goals for the year ahead. Here’s a guide I have created on how to evaluate your year comprehensively, focusing on the five major areas of friends, family, relationships, experiences, and work or business.

Friends

Friendships are an essential part of life and key to one’s mental health as a surefire way to stay truly connected and bond over shared activities or hobbies or even lend each other a helping hand. Think about reflecting on your relationships with friends from over the past year. Ask yourself the following questions when doing so:

  1. Giving or Getting Support: Were your friends there for you during challenging times? Were you there for them when they needed you when they were in a rut or needed help? Did they offer emotional or practical support when needed? Could you say the same?
  2. Showing Mutual Effort: Did you invest some effort into maintaining these friendships? Conversely, did your friends reciprocate to make the effort to reach out to you as well?
  3. Quality over Quantity: Did you prioritize meaningful, deep connections over superficial ones with your friends? Were your interactions enriching and positive with your friends?
  4. Encouraging Growth: Did your friendships encourage personal growth or help you broaden your perspective? Did you give each other advice on how to better yourselves?

Document the moments and memories that stood out to you, whether they were fun gatherings, heart-to-heart conversations, or instances where you and your friends supported each other through a difficult time. Evaluate if there were any friendships that became draining or unbalanced and consider whether to address these issues or set boundaries or even cut off the friendship if it isn’t working out.

Family

Family relationships can greatly influence your emotional well-being in both positive but also negative ways depending on your own situation with your family members. I encourage you to reflect on the past year’s interactions with your family members and consider these questions:

  1. Building Connection: Did you spend enough quality time with your family? Were you present and engaged during these moments or were you distracted by your phone or another device?
  2. Conflict Resolution: Were there any unresolved conflicts? How well did you communicate and handle disagreements? Why did those conflicts arise and how can they be avoided next year?
  3. Support System: Did your family serve as a source of strength or encouragement? Were you able to offer the same in return? Did you help each other out in a mutual manner?
  4. Milestones and Memories: Were there any significant events or milestones within your family? How did you contribute to these moments? Did they celebrate your wins this year and did you do the same for them when they had successes?

Think about whether you balanced your time and energy across the various family member dynamics that are constantly evolving each year along with the different personalities that you have in your family. Identify some ways to strengthen bonds with family members next year who may need more of your attention or love than you were able to give up until this point.

Relationships

If you’re in a romantic relationship currently, evaluating this aspect of your life is crucial to keeping it on the right track into next year. Even if you’re single, reflecting on your relationship with yourself or any potential romantic connections is just as important. Ask yourself these questions as you close out the year:

  1. Compatibility: Are you and your partner aligned in your values, goals, and vision for the future? Have you talked about how you felt about the relationships enough in terms of how it is going?
  2. Communication: How effectively did you communicate this year? Were you able to express your needs and listen to your partner’s? Did you handle disagreements respectfully and come to a positive resolution with each other?
  3. Growth: Did your relationship encourage mutual growth? Did you feel supported and loved? Did they support you when you needed it, and have you done the same for them?
  4. Quality Time: How much time did you spend together? Were those moments meaningful and fulfilling? Were you also able to spend time apart in a healthy manner?
  5. Self-Reflection: If you’re single, consider how you’ve nurtured your relationship with yourself. Did you take time to understand your needs, desires, and goals in a potential relationship for next year?

Identify areas where you’ve grown together as a couple or individually when you two were apart. If there were challenges this year, consider how you’ll address them moving forward in your relationship.

Experiences (Travel, Hobbies, Interests, Fun Activities)

Reflect on how you spent your free time outside of work, school, or business and how engaged with life outside of your daily obligations and weekly chores you were. Think about where you went, what you did, what you learned, and how much you enjoyed life beyond the office or the shop or the factory floor. Consider the following in your assessment of your experiences:

  1. Local and International Travel: Did you explore new places, whether locally or internationally? How did these experiences broaden your perspective? What did you learn from the places you traveled to? Would you travel in 2025 and how did you grow as a person in your travels?
  2. Hobbies and Interests: Did you pursue activities that bring you joy or help you grow? Did you try something new? Were you committed to these hobbies and spend enough time on them? What new hobby or interest would you like to try in the new year?
  3. Having Fun and Relaxation: Did you allocate time for leisure and enjoyment? Were you able to strike a balance between work and play? How often were you able to relax yourself?
  4. Making Memories: What were the highlights of your year? Did you attend events, celebrate milestones, or create special moments? Who did you share those memories with?

Take note of the activities, hobbies, interests, etc. that brought you the most happiness and fulfillment. If your year felt monotonous and a bit too routine, think about incorporating more variety or adventure into your life next year. Plan the destinations, places, or cities with regards to travel ahead of time that you hope to visit in the new year.

Work or Business

Your professional or business life is another crucial area to evaluate at the end of any year as it makes up about 80% of our time throughout the year. Reflect on your career or business journey over the past year by asking yourself these questions:

  1. Major Accomplishments: What were your major achievements? Did you meet or exceed your professional goals? What was the process you used to achieve your goals?
  2. Overcoming Challenges: What obstacles did you face, and how did you overcome them? Were there any failures, and what lessons did you learn from them? Who helped you overcome these challenges in your professional or business pursuits?
  3. Professional Growth: Did you acquire new skills, take on new responsibilities, or achieve personal growth in your role? How will these new skills help you next year and beyond?
  4. Managing Work-Life Balance: Were you able to maintain a healthy boundary between work and personal life? Did work leave you feeling fulfilled or drained? Did you take enough time off for vacation or for staying healthy? How did you spend your time outside of work or business?
  5. Establishing Future Goals: Are you satisfied with your current trajectory, or do you feel the need for a change? Did you take steps toward your long-term career aspirations? Will you find a new job next year? Do you plan to launch a new business or company? Will you ask for a raise or promotion and how will you ask this question to your supervisor?

Reflect on whether your work or business aligns with your personal values and passions. If there are gaps in that assessment, start thinking about how to address them in the coming year with regards to making your work or business more personally fulfilling Once you’ve reviewed these areas and answered as many questions in these five major areas as possible, combine your thoughts to identify patterns, strengths, and areas for improvement.

Lastly, think about the following ways generally on how you could make next year the best one yet:

  1. Showing Your Gratitude: What are you most grateful for this year? Acknowledge the people and experiences that enriched your life and made it the year that it was.
  2. Compile Lessons Learned: What did the failures, challenges, and successes of this year teach you? How will these lessons shape your approach to the new year and beyond?
  3. Having Goals for Improvement: What areas need more focus or change from you? How will you set realistic and actionable goals to address these aspects next year?

Evaluating your year holistically gives you a clearer perspective on where you stand in your life and how to move forward in a positive manner. Use this article, the questions I’ve posed and to write a yearly reflection about these five major areas as a substantive foundation for setting meaningful goals and resolutions for the year ahead.

Creating Something Out Of Nothing

“The greater the ownership over an idea, a product, a thing, or a concept that you create, the more investment you’re likely to have over it.”

Every one of us has a creative impulse that should not be ignored. It is important to tap into it throughout our lives to create something out of nothing. What better gift to share with the world than something that comes from within us alone and can bring something of utility to another person. I personally find that being able to create something that you made or built or established from your own hard work is the most fulfilling thing that one can do in life. It is beyond rewarding to see something that started from just an idea alone come to fruition through your own efforts.

While it can be exciting or interesting to help someone else build their dream into reality or help be part of that team that executes another person’s idea or vision, it simply does not compare to making your own idea into reality and having others work on that idea to help you develop it into something real. Fulfillment can come in many forms, but I find that making something of your own and having it go out in the world to be a successful product, service, or thing that will be used for months, years, or generations is one of the greatest joys that one can experience in one’s life.

The greater the ownership over an idea, a product, a thing, or a concept that you create, the more investment you’re likely to have over it. When you are the owner or the founder rather than an employee or a team member, the feeling of accomplishment that you have when it happens or becomes something that is fully realized, it is hard to go back to being in that complementary role going forward.

It is good to start small when you are creating something, and to set your expectations within reason. You don’t have to start building a massive business or a large product to feel its joyful effects. It’s best to start with a small project like an eBook, a small product you designed or built, or some kind of freelance service that you alone provide. Once you start to advertise, market, or sell that small product or service you built, it will give you that needed boost of confidence that can propel you forward with other ideas to implement.

When it comes to the act of creation, you must stick with it for a while whether it is an invention, a business, or a service because it will need some tweaking, refinement, or even a rebuild especially if people aren’t buying what you are selling. Sometimes, you’ll need to start over again with a different idea and other times, you’ll need to do a lot of revisions or tweaks to make it more palatable to your audience. Any creation has a strong possibility of failure but even if it does fail, you should rest easy knowing that the act of creating anything is something that not many people can do or even try it at all.

If you can create anything at all, that’s taking a step that most people are not comfortable with doing themselves. You may think that if you create or build something that isn’t successful that you failed entirely but that is not the case at all. If you take that pivotal step in creating something out of nothing, you went further than most people are willing to go. You should keep your spirits up by knowing that just because what you built, made, or created wasn’t exactly financially profitable or sold a lot of units, it does not mean your efforts were wasted.

When you build something from scratch, you gain valuable skills in that process that you would not get otherwise as an employee or team member. Creating something takes innovation, critical thinking, subject matter knowledge, and knowledge of the components of that product or service. Additionally, any kind of creation often involves website development, shipping / delivery, sales, marketing, advertisement, content creation, and networking with other people in that area of expertise. If what you first created did not reach your own goals or hopes, don’t stop creating.

Be bold enough to create something else and to keep trying new inventions, new products, or new services. I am a believer in a creator’s ability to keep tinkering with new ideas, trying out different ideas, and being able to revise their ideas to build something even better. Many inventors including Thomas Edison, one of the greatest creators in history, had to submit hundreds of inventions and establish hundreds of patented creations, before he was able to establish and market the early version of the incandescent light bulb, the phonograph, and the motion picture camera.

Any great creator from Thomas Edison to Steve Jobs to Elon Musk did not just stop with their one creation or one product or one invention, they used their talents and their ideas to propel themselves forward into different creative areas. You should build on a small success and use that fuel to try out other ideas in your area of expertise. If you can create something that generates a little bit of success, that motivation will carry you forward in being able to develop other ideas that may be even more successful. Do not be afraid to fail either. If you can be one of those people who can create, can invent, or can build something from nothing, you should know that you are a unique individual who is changing the world in a small yet measurable way. Even if you are not the next Thomas Edison, you are a creator in the world and that is quite the personal achievement.

What is ‘True Wealth’?

“I believe the key is being able to maximize wealth in both facets as much as possible without sacrificing one or the other too much.”

There is a standard definition of ‘wealth’ as a concept: An abundance of valuable possessions, money, or other resources to the degree that it causes prosperity. However, what is prosperity to you may not be prosperity to others. I like to think of wealth is not an abundance not just of material possessions or of money or of how much you can acquire but also how much you value what inherently belongs to you. What I mean by that is your time, your health, and your freedom. While building wealth is key to having success in life, there are other facets to wealth that we can neglect if you are not careful.

Wealth will come with sacrifices whether it is your time, your freedom, or your health as there are tradeoffs involved. You’ll find that to become more prosperous, you may have to sacrifice time, freedom, or health to build that wealth up whether in the form of money, resources, or material possessions. I believe the key is being able to maximize wealth in both facets as much as possible without sacrificing one or the other too much.

In order to gain more money, you may have to sacrifice your time in the sense that you exchange your time to earn money or you are not as free to do what you want each day because you have to work a job, grow your business, or learn new skills in order to earn the money to become wealthy. The same could be said of your health whereas you may have to sacrifice the time you could use to invest in your own health to build material or resource wealth with the time you put in to earn money or other assets. That time that could be used to be spent at the gym, on a run, going on a hike, or practicing a sport could go to your job or your business or investing into a new asset.

If you can find out what you truly value and what you want to maximize in terms of your wealth, make sure you prioritize it to have true wealth for you. For example, if fancy cars, big houses, and a lot of material possessions appeal to you, maybe you don’t mind putting a lot more time into working for that, putting your health on the backburner, and sacrificing certain freedoms to do what you must instead of what you want to. On the contrary, if you care less about possessions, material wealth, but still want to be comfortable in terms of money or investments, then maybe you can work less, focus on your health and free time more, and exercising more freedoms to do what you want with the extra time you have as a result.

You should decide what kind of wealth is best for you. What truly will make you happy, what you are passionate about in life, and what you want to get most out of life, you’ll be able to build that true wealth. I think the key for anyone is to maximize the 24 hours in a day, 7 days in a week as much as possible. If you can build your wealth passively to get some of your time back, that is a key advantage in my view to having true wealth too. When you can be financially successful by having multiple sources of income, multiple options to build wealth, and with some or a lot of autonomy in your work or business pursuits, that really can be an advantage in not only being successful but happy too.

Wealth is not just about being financially well off but also about being well off in other areas including health, time, and exercising freedom in what you do and how you do it. There is a distinct difference between someone who must rely on others for their wealth building and someone who is able to create their own opportunities or build their own means of wealth in a business, in real estate, or in investments that can create more freedoms rather than slowly eliminate them.

You can have as many possessions as possible, houses, cars, and money in the world but if you have no free time, no health, or no autonomy in what you do or how you earn that wealth, then you may need to reassess if that is the true wealth that you want out of life. I hope that you’ll rethink what wealth means to you because only you can decide what you would like to prioritize as you build it. You must consider that sacrifices will have to be made, that time, money, and health are all commodities that can be saved or lost depending on what you prioritize these days.

I only ask that you realize that having the freedom to do what you want and when you want is underrated. It is a form of wealth within itself along with keeping your health in good shape as long as possible even if you must sacrifice some time or freedom as a result. Consider that you can be very wealthy in the material sense but if you are unhealthy, working all the time, and have to answer to others in order to keep building that wealth, are you truly wealthy or is it only one kind of wealth that you have?

Think about what you are willing to sacrifice, what you are willing to earn, and how to passively build on the wealth you want to earn to save more time and freedoms that can be used for health, time spent with family and/or friends, or enjoying what the world has to offer outside of your own wealth building. Wealth takes many forms as I mentioned so remember that while we often think of money, cars, houses, and other assets, we should remember that wealth can be time spent away from an office to enjoy a vacation, wealth can be an extra hour in the day to use the gym or go for a hike, wealth can be starting businesses that matter to you with hours of work that you set for yourself and only you can hold yourself accountable for. Think about the wealth that you want to build throughout your life and how you want to make it work for you.

Trust Is The Foundation

“Trust is the bedrock that glues our society together. It is the foundation for which our relationships are built on.”

Without trust, there can be nothing. Trust is the bedrock that glues our society together. It is the foundation for which our relationships are built on. Once that bedrock is ruptured, it can never fully heal again. This is why we place such a high value on it because it can be hard to find or even replicate whether in business or in work or in our lives in general. We learn from a young age the value of keeping our word, being accountable for our actions, and being part of a team or a whole.

If we cannot make a promise, we shouldn’t keep it. We learn not to overpromise, undersell, or to bite off more than we can chew in what we can be relied upon for. Whether it is a secret between friends, a business deal that should remain private, or our duty to uphold a certain standard in our professional lives, the ideal of trust is at the center of how we are expected to act and behave. Trust can be earned over time and can take months, years, or even decades to build on it but while it is hard to gain trust initially, it can last a very long time with repeated adherence.

However, once the trust is broken between people or groups or societies, it can never truly be fully healed again as it once was. While verbal trust is a key part of our lives, we often go above and beyond to string together the bonds of trust more deeply. We shake hands to formalize a deal, sign the terms and conditions of an agreement, have legal papers, lawyers, and the ‘fine print’ drawn up, so the trust given and received is as clear as day. There are multiple ways to establish trust with each other but there are just as many ways that trust can be broken too if you are not careful.

It is not just our work lives or business success that depends on the trust established within them but also our personal relationships. If you are not seen as trustworthy but those people who are closest to you, it is likely that will extend outwards to other kinds of relationships in your life. It is vital to maintain your trustworthiness across the board regardless of how fleeting the ties to the other person or group are. While our relationships, business dealings, and professional ties will all begin and come to an end, our reputation precedes us throughout our lives, and it is important to keep your trustworthiness intact as you navigate the years and decades of who you meet and who you establish connections with.

Trust is not only about keeping your word or telling the truth to someone else or acting in an honest matter, but it is also about not promising something that you can’t deliver on or embellishing or making up falsehoods to earn the other person’s trust. You may think you are able to take an action or provide something or to promise a result but if you cannot guarantee it 100%, it’s best to pull back and let that person or group know that it is not entirely possible. How often have you heard that expression, “don’t make a promise that you know you can’t keep.”

It’s not only about breaking a promise that shatters trust but also trying at something that you said would happen and guaranteeing its success without being realistic about the odds or about if you could deliver the intended result without error, delay, or setbacks. You not only have to be honest with other people to establish trust but also honest with yourself and what you can and what you cannot do for them.

Our own ego can sometimes hurt our own trustworthiness because we are biased in believing we can do more or be more or accomplish more than what we can do when we make a promise. It can be difficult to reign back our promises to others and to pull back our own ego when it comes to what we are capable of. However, it is necessary to keep our trust alive with the other group or person with whom you are dealing with. I believe it is better to hurt our own ego when it comes to being realistic about the promises or the actions, we can accomplish rather than to lie or to embellish or to delay the unrealistic promises that were made, which hurts that trust or even breaks it completely. When the trust is broken, the other person won’t think you’re honest or reliable or even a good person so that is why trust itself is the foundation for which any kind of relationship is built upon.

Trust being the foundation of an individual’s relationships is key, but it also portends to our society and our world. Shared values, beliefs, and rules are built on trust in that if you will follow them and obey them so will everyone else living in that society. If that trust is broken in the sense that there are rules for me and you, but not for them, then that trust in one another starts to erode. Basic civility, courteousness, respect for laws and rules, and overall trust builds society up and when promises are broken, when double standards are common, and when one party or group holds unfair advantages over another group, without any kind of recourse or change made to make the society fairer, then the society will suffer as a result.

It is no accident that more productive and successful societies and countries function at a higher level, and it comes down a high level of trust between its citizens regardless of age, gender, race, socioeconomic background, etc. When trust is shared by all to play by the rules and do the right thing for each other, then that society and/or country will flourish as a result. How can a society establish strong economic ties, pass new laws that are enforced for all, and foster a strong education system that works for all? if it is not built on that fundamental trust that we are to look out for one another rather than to take advantage of one another instead.

If you can read this article knowing that your trust for your fellow man or woman is high and that they can rely on you as you would rely on them, then you’re in good shape where you are with the trust of your society. However, if your trust in your fellow man or woman is waning and you are skeptical of other people’s intentions often, well, then unfortunately, your society has a lot of work to do to rebuild and strengthen that fundamental trust. You should be part of that change by helping to build up the trust in one another again where you are at rather than to keep poking holes in the foundation or to tear it down completely. The choice is yours to make.

A Sense of Balance

“When the show talks about balance, it is not just about karate in terms of making sure you are able to work to anticipate your own movements as well as those of your own opponent but to be sure to not be balancing too much where your life suffers from imbalance.”

Recently, I have been watching the ‘Cobra Kai’ series on Netflix and while I was never really a huge fan of the Karate Kid movie series, I have really taken a liking to this TV series featuring the same characters with some new ones over 35 years later. There are a lot of great things about this particular popular series such as the 80s music and influence, the acting, the fight choreography among other positives that make you root for each character for different reasons. However, my favorite thing about the series is the life lesson that is not only applicable to the martial art of Karate but to someone’s life in general.

Without spoiling too much about the show, Mr. Miyagi’s philosophy of living life with a sense of balance is applicable not only to his protégé student, Daniel LaRusso, but also to the audience who is watching the show. When the show talks about balance, it is not just about karate in terms of making sure you are able to work to anticipate your own movements as well as those of your own opponent but to be sure to not be balancing too much where your life suffers from imbalance.

Imbalance can cause you to slip, fall, and end up in a fishpond as what happens to Daniel in the movie and to some of the characters for whom he teaches. When you balance on a plank or board, you have to balance your body but beyond karate as in regular life, you have to balance your mind in order to succeed in life. It’s important to be able to not lose sight of what is important in your life to what is trivial at best. When you don’t have balance, you can quickly lose sight of what’s important and what should not take up both your time and your mental capacity.

In the movie and the show too, Daniel, the protagonist of Karate Kid and a teacher in Cobra Kai, struggles to balance his responsibilities as an adult. He has a loving wife and two great kids but finds his life is out of balance. He loves Karate and misses Mr. Miyagi, his sensei or teacher, so when the show begins, his life is somewhat out of balance, which takes time for him to realize. He has a really successful car dealership business with multiple locations but even then, he uses Karate metaphors as a way of expressing how much he misses the martial art he had been practicing for years. In a way, while his life is successful on the surface, he has placed too much weight on his family and personal success but had forgotten the nurturing, passionate side of who he is as a person.

This sense of balance can be missing as it was for Daniel when we put too much weight on professional and personal success but forget what makes us passionate about life and to devote some time out of our busy lives to focus on that passion even if it doesn’t make us money. When it comes to balancing out responsibilities, duties, and habits, you should make time for each part of one’s life but not too much where one responsibility crowds out the rest.

With Daniel as an example, he has to balance it out, so he does not overwhelm himself with one part of his life when he is being pulled in three directions. He has to keep his marriage romantic and show love to his children while not neglecting his role as a business owner and making sure his customers are satisfied. If he spends too much time at work, he still has to be a present father and a loving husband, so he has to be extra cognizant of how much time he is spending on each responsibility.

When you add his love of Karate in the show to the mix, it makes that ‘sense of balance’ much harder to achieve. However, the love of Karate and spending time on his passion makes him as happy, if not more so, than when he is at his job or when he is with family. If you in your life find a passion that great where you want to mentor or help others develop that passion, you should try to add that to your life and do your best to maintain balance.

Karate, like life itself is about maintaining balance and anticipating what your opponent or what life will throw at you next. Part of having a sense of balance is to predict what is to come and adjusting your duties and responsibilities in terms of time spent on those commitments.

For example, if Daniel has a big meeting at work, hypothetically, when it comes to car sales, he may need someone to fill in at the Karate dojo for him such as a top student so that his business does not suffer. If he has to do so, he can move his training hours for the dojo to nights or weekends but that may conflict with his family obligations so maybe he has to ask his wife first to make sure he is spending enough time with them when he’s not managing the car dealership. He also has to be sure to not spend too many hours at the dealership so as to miss breakfast or dinner with his children who may be in school all day.

A good way Daniel can balance his love of Karate with his love of family and work is to incorporate an element of Karate in his work and with his family. He can add a line like ‘kicking the competition’ to his company logo or giving away Bonsai trees to customers who buy cars from them. He can also involve his wife in his dojo by showing her around the training center he set up for his students. Daniel can also encourage his children to join him and to show them how to use Karate in their lives when they are not busy with school.

Similar to Daniel in ‘Cobra Kai’ and ‘Karate Kid’, we must continue to maintain that sense of balance in our lives and to keep adjusting the balance when we become too top heavy in one part of our life which can crowd out our other responsibilities. Be sure to not lose your passion or your family or your livelihoods in the process but see first how much time and effort you can devote to each commitment you make to yourself.

Rather than totally give up something you love or are passionate about, try to do better with time management first, see if it really conflicts with your other daily or weekly tasks, and then determine if it brings enough joy in your life before getting rid of it to improve your internal balance. Balance is not just about time management but it’s also about being aware of other people’s feelings and emotions. You have to anticipate how they’ll react to what you choose to focus on. If you spend too much time at work, you should be aware of how your wife may feel about it. If you are working on a passion too much, your family may feel neglected. If you are focusing on family too much and your work suffers, you have to improve your concentration in order to be able to provide for them.

Balance involves analyzing how your life is going and being self-aware enough to know if change is needed in it. If you do nothing, your life balance is likely to suffer. When you can instead manage your time better, seek out input from others, and figure out what priorities come first, your life balance will be that much better, and your level of happiness will likely increase as a result.

The Utility of Making Lists

“A key productivity hack that really works wonders in our fast-paced, modern era, which involves both discipline and consistency is to make a list. It is also an excellent habit to build upon and one that only requires your laptop and a ‘notes’ application or just a simple pen and piece of paper.”

A key productivity hack that really works wonders in our fast-paced, modern era, which involves both discipline and consistency is to make a list. It is also an excellent habit to build upon and one that only requires your laptop and a ‘notes’ application or just a simple pen and piece of paper. Lists have a reputation of being tedious and time-consuming, but what is actually more time-consuming is spending minutes or even hours trying to remind yourself what tasks or items you actually have to do.

List making is a good habit to build upon for a number of reasons. You hold yourself accountable and there is no shirking away from what you have set for yourself. The biggest misconception when it comes to lists is that they are all the same and focused on a to-do list. You can make lists for other reasons ranging from your progress at the gym with different weights you’ve lifted and what you hope to accomplish next to your future goals in life and what you hope to do in your ‘bucket list.’ Lists not only involve things you have to do whether its grocery shopping, what bills you have to pay, or what errands you have to run but also what career / business goals you have, what your exercise regimen looks like or where you hope to travel to in terms of next destinations.

Making lists is part of exercising that daily discipline that you need to have in order to put yourself on a path to success. It’s easier to accomplish your goals or your tasks when you remember what they are. You may have an amazing memory and feel you don’t need to have any lists at all but having that reminder especially if you have a due date for a pending school assignment or a work task can really help you especially if your memory fails you, which is always possible.

The impact of technology in our lives has made our attention spans that much more limited or distracted so I believe that the utility of lists has increased in response. There are many more things on our plate that we have to pay attention to that we may not have time to remember them all. Lists can help us organize these tasks from most urgent to least urgent and give us some peace of mind since you would likely have these lists stored in a place such as in an application on a computer or in a folder if you’re more traditional with pen and paper.

Not only do lists help to organize our lives, our goals, and our tasks, but lists also hold us accountable just by the fact that they make clear what you have done or what you have not done. There is no arguing with a list because you have either done it or not done it. You can indicate in a list your progress towards the goal or the task but it’s better to simplify it to be blunt to ask of you whether the item is completed or not. If it isn’t done yet, you can go back to it to see how much you have left to do, whether it’s been started yet, or how much you have left to finish. That kind of blunt accountability, which can be lacking in our society, is going to be staring you right in the face, so there is really no hiding from a list because it does not sugarcoat anything or try to come up with an excuse.

I also would like to point out that making too many lists can hinder you from achieving all you would like to get done each day, each week, or beyond. You should be careful not to make too many lists or have too many notes where you start to forget what actually is most vital to get done. I would recommend instead to make one list only for a specific part of your life such as one for exercise, one for work, one for business, one for errands, and perhaps one for future goals. That’s five lists right there on a specific subject so not to become too cluttered or difficult to implement. Lists can help you out a lot up to a point but can become burdensome when you have a dozen lists for ten different parts of your life.

In any list you make, focus on a main goal you wish to achieve for the day and then start to branch out to include weekly tasks and then long-term goals that may take months. Organizing an individual list around immediate, medium-term, and long-term tasks is an effective way to stay on top of each part of your life that will need attention. Having five lists, for example, can be helpful too where you might start the day looking at your exercise task(s) to complete, then move on to work/school, then see about errands, and then see what future goals you are working towards that you can start on. Organizing lists is about as important as making lists to begin with and it’s very important not to make too many lists where you feel like you can’t keep track of them all or have too long of a list where it distracts from your other lists that you’re working on.

You may be thinking to yourself right now, why do you care about making lists so much and why have lists at all? Having list(s) is about building structure in one’s life. You can create good habits from following your lists and you can organize your life in a meaningful and productive way. Also, you alone can hold yourself accountable with lists as it’s only you who knows about the list and is responsible for completing the goals and the tasks that you set up for yourself. No one else is going to hold your hand so it’s up to you alone to be reliable, responsible, and solely in charge of ultimately crossing those important items off your list(s) to help make your life a better, happier, and healthier one.

English Corner – On Writing Memos

“What is a memorandum you may ask? A memorandum or ‘memo’ is a type of written message passed along in a business for internal changes and review. Being able to edit, write, and understand memos is a key part of being successful in the business world.”

What is a memorandum you may ask? A memorandum or ‘memo’ is a type of written message passed along in a business for internal changes and review. Being able to edit, write, and understand memos is a key part of being successful in the business world. Memos are usually shorter in terms of written length and can range from as little as 100 words to about 1000 words depending on the subject matter. Memos are not only used in the business world, but they also carry over to governments as well as to non-governmental organizations (NGOs) at times.

While memos are not as popular anymore due to the rise of electronic mail (e-mail), they are still a fast, secure, and cost-effective way of communicating with other people in the business or company. If you are to work in a business setting, you’ll need to do a wide variety of vocabulary as well as have a good understanding of formal grammar and syntax.

Some key aspects of the memo include the header or title to sum up what the memo is about, the subject line to describe the focus of what the memo’s topic is, and then you have who the memo is addressed to with the To: line and then below that is the From: line to indicate who wrote the memo and where it is from. Then, you have the body paragraph(s) where the ideas of the memo are divulged and then the conclusion which re-states the ideas and sums up the purpose of the memo.              

You also want to make sure that the memo is single spaced or double spaced depending on the guidance you receive from your workplace. If there is an ‘attachment’ such as an image or a text, make sure it is attached to the memo before you send it out and that you indicate that there is an attached file when you write up the memo. Lastly, it is very important to leave your name at the bottom as well as the date at the top so that person who received the memo knows not only who it came from but when it was written to see how fresh or old it is.                                   

Memos place a high emphasis on timeliness but also orderliness while being able to sum up a large amount of information in a short amount of space. Most memos are only a page long but can get up to no more than five pages depending upon the subject or general content you are writing about. The style of any memo you write should always be concise and succinct.

You have to show analytical clarity with your writing. (It has to make sense to the reader). It may be sensitive material so you will have to be your own editor and not rely on others in the company. The content has to be informative, persuasive, and relevant to the audience. When you write or read a memo, you should expect for it to be impactful in some manner to inform the reader.

There are main questions you will want to answer in any memo that you write such as:

  1. What is relevant for the person reading it to be aware of from my memo?
  2. Why does it matter to the business / company / organization?
  3. What is the objective of the memo?
  4. Who is my audience for it?
  5. What is the issue that we are working on?

The most important thing to be aware of when asking these questions is what is the objective?, who are my audience?, and what is the issue I care about? If you forget the other questions, it is very important to remember OAI: objective, audience, issue. As long as you address those three main questions, your memo should be really concise and informative.

When it comes to the actual structure of the memo, the scope of your issue have to be addressed up front as well as the main points you want to focus on. The Subject of your memo should always be both descriptive and short (about 4 to 8 words)

1. Example: How to Increase Our Fourth Quarter Earnings

The ‘bottom line’ or summary sentence must be upfront or at the top of the memo. You should always have a good ‘hook’ to draw in the reader’s attention. You’ll also want to articulate the key points or the recommendations in the first or second sentences of your memo. You have to assume that the reader of the memo may only have time to read one paragraph of it especially if you are in government or in the business world for your career.

You should always be using specific facts and relevant information to bolster your bullet points. You’re going to want to paint a comprehensive picture of the situation at hand and what can be done about it. Always be able to articulate the risks of your reasoning, the possible consequences to your action points, as well as the counterpoints (additional context) if your memo calls for it. The memo should have a logical flow and is not as structured as an essay or article. Lastly, remember to utilize precise language and avoid unnecessary words.

When it comes to what you should always do in memo writing, the Do’s are quite obvious from a writer’s perspective: Choose your words carefully. Be brief and clear as much as possible. Anticipate and address the reader’s questions in them. Avoid leaps in logic and assumptions based on the memo’s content. Proofread or edit your writing thoroughly and consistently. Use correct grammar throughout the entire memo.

The don’ts of memo writing is a bit more difficult but also involve some common sense in addition to having the structure and the techniques memorized. Perhaps most importantly, don’t summarize but analyze instead. Don’t ever use either abbreviations or acronyms to save some space as it is important to spell all the words out to retain their meaning. It’s important to not have unclear terms that will confuse the reader or audience. Keeping any run-on sentences at all in the final version is also a big no-no. You also would not like to have unprofessional or unrelated jargon (vocabulary) that is not related to the memo in the text of what you have wrote.

Memo writing is an advanced form of English writing, but it can be quite useful to know how to do if you are willing to put in the work. For business, government, or NGO purposes, good memo writing will be essential to your career so please make sure to study the structure, the techniques, and the overall uses for memos even after reading this article. Good luck to you and I hope being able to write formal memos will further your business and career goals as an English writer.