It’s been a roller coaster ride from childishness to maturity and fatherhood. I’ve had good successes and disappointing failures. Many of these have affected acquaintances, friends and family. Life is such that you fall down, get up and continue where you left off. Regardless of the gains and pitfalls, life is still good – and I am luckier than many in the world who have a lot less and suffer more.

I love technology, having started my work interests in the field of computers when display monitors was a roll of paper, the keyboard looked and felt like a typewriter, and saving your files meant punching holes on a long roll of paper. Today, we have the means to telecommute and sit in coffee shops while we surf the world wide web. That’s the span of my experience and love of technology.

I enjoyed the challenges and education of the workplace, and the constant movements between organizational people who muster strategies and instructions on what best to do to achieve the ideal profit. I love collaboration and coordination, managing projects, creating new and better ways to do things, daydreaming of ambitious programs that will better a small part of the business or the larger picture. From staff to supervision, management to directing. At one point, I was a one-man department where I prided myself to be able to gain access and support from people belonging to other teams and departments, and succeed in delivering my expected results. Recently, I ventured into entrepreneurship and learned many lessons on how “not” to do things.

I envision a good lifestyle, from fashion to good living standards and the eccentricities of the upper social network that I can share erstwhile to my wife and children. Of course, it’s still a vision that needs to be fulfilled. Though money is not something you bring to your grave or after-life, it is a means to provide others a better life than what you had.

I love having idols in life and business machinations. The movers and the shakers who takes your breath away when their experiences are shared and their knowledge exchanged with you. I continue to add more idols in my life as I continue meeting, experiencing and adapting the best traits I learn from these idols. It’s even much better if your idol is your personal friend or acquaintance – the experience is more livid.

But, life goes on and life is good. God still continues to be part of my being and the way I deliver myself to others. I have been a devout Catholic since childbirth and even if I opened up to be introduced to other types of faiths, I still came back to my Catholic upbringing; and I am very proud of that. I love God as I love people around me, even if others do not understand and misunderstand my love. As humans, it is very important to continue loving others so that we can say, “life is good!”

Now, it’s time to share. Inspired freedom to share my experiences, my ideals, my thoughts, my ideas and my hopes. I once read a book whose title was “Hope Is Not A Method.” True. Don’t make it a method but continue to hope for the best and plot the method to which you could achieve your aspirations in life. And I “hope” I will succeed in my words that it may be able to help you in you path in life, where “life is good!”

There are, of course, those that think otherwise. For some reason, I may have hurt them or became the reason why they failed a business opportunity or the like. If in my good conscience I know I have done nothing wrong but gave everything my honest and sincere best, then I can sleep soundly and now worry about those who may think “otherwise.” Life is too short to keep hurt feelings or, worse, become vengeful with spite. I grew up with parents who were not perfect but were consistently nice and accommodating to everyone. That character rubbed in on me and made me live life according to those ideals. Despite the ordeals and hurtful encounters, never ever change the goodness in you – ever!

I haven’t written at all only because of the rut I went through. But, like any wounded prey, you lick your wounds, heal yourself, get up and start walking back to the path you came from. That path is still my intention of providing for my wife and children and being able to go back and live with them – near them. A short version of a long story is that I live thousands of miles away from my family but I never relinquished the aspiration to be back with them, forever.

My rut was the result of a few failed projects involving call centers, web development, content development and internet marketing. My realization to all these is that at the end of the day you are still who you want to be, and if those failures make you succumb to brooding and procrastination, you will have failed not only yourself but everyone around you. To be able to get back up on your feet and go back to your chosen path in life is difficult but not impossible. God and faith are very important – don’t be part the 5% population in the world that do not believe in God at all. God moves wonders in you to make a dash back to reality and life, and continue conveying compassion, love and understanding to everyone around.

Notice that many of the world’s richest people are, well, to put in direct perspective, “assholes.” Therefore, nice people don’t necessarily beget wealth – not that much, anyway. I don’t mind that at all. I’ve learned that our aspiration in life must not be about money but peace of mind. Regardless of how people think of you, if you think you have done no one wrong, or if you have sincerely apologized for the wrong that you have done, then there’s nothing from stopping you to live life according to your good principles in life.

Be a good person, no matter what the odds are. Money does grow on trees but it blossoms way above an oak tree – yeah, that tall. You need effort, determination, focus and ambition to have your picking. That’s how wealth is achieved. However, there are other people also trying to do just the same as you are, together in the same tree. If you think kicking them out of the tree to fall and hurt themselves, or trampling on them to speed up your ascent, will make it easier and faster for you to get your wealth, well, think a milion times before doing just that. Because, man, I’ll tell you – it isn’t worth it.

Today, two nice persons by the name of Fred C. and Chris P. have given me renewed life to a new business opportunity that I thought was lost. We recently met, rejuvinated the past intention to market and sell their service in the country, rekindled our professional relationship to a new par, and has now inspired me to rise up from the rut and go back to the path I was once at. Yes, you need people like Fred and Chris who are willing to help you, even if it’s just a nudge. You need people who are willing to support you in what you’re trying to do, people like my newfound friend, Gale P. You need to continue doing the “meet and greet” friendly, unobtrusive networking even if the likelihood of a sale isn’t there – there are always indirect means through your new professional acquaintances that isn’t apparent but will eventually result in closing a sale. Don’t do it out of self-interest because that kind of negative vibe will become obvious later on. Do your networking out of sincere interest to meet, greet and get to know the person well, especially friends and acquaintances you haven’t seen for a long time.

One thing you must always do is “be honest.” Never lie, cheat or steal. You don’t have to be great friends or BFFs but honesty is a quality that draws honest people closer to you than, say, your gift of gab. In the 80-20 rule of life, 20 percent of people may just want to use you. Be careful but be honest. If you can’t help the person who’s asking for money or your valuable time, tell them so. I was once in that situation where I asked people for money (I panicked) and half of them responded back. A big portion of that half said they couldn’t help me because of varied reasons. With sincere gratitude, I admonished appreciation for even just responding back to me. Many of them today are closer to me as friends or business acquaintance than before. The other half stayed silent and I’ll never know why; but that’s okay. They have their own reasons why and I for one cannot even think of judging people. My faith has taught me well that only God can judge us.

I have lived alone since, oh, for almost two years. Prior to that, I lived with my in-laws for about a half a year. I am an only child so maybe that’s the reason why I can survive without have anyone in my humble abode when I come home. After separating from my family, I pursued the course of entrepreneurship and have had my share of successes and failure, more of the latter. Good friends who became my business partners are now gone and, like always, I do not force myself to want someone to like me. Again, they have their reasons. Many other people I know, friends and acquaintances, continue to appreciate me as who I am; and I am thankful for them all the time. If I feel the angst to be around people, I just go to a coffee shop with my notebook computer and get into my creative self of looking for solutions to my issues and my problems. My notebook is my best tool of soltitude, tapping away on the keyboard, verbatim to my thoughts and without the need to edit what I first write. Regardless of my situation, I try to visit my in-laws every weekend and mingle with them on everyday banter of family life or things that have happened.

Recently, my father-in-law got sick and had to go through an Angioplasty surgery. I didn’t have to tell anyone that I felt so much compassion for him and what he was going through. I felt his pain. He is growing old yet continue to work for wealth because, somehow, I understand his need to fulfill many of his childhood aspirations. He is a kind and decent man. Just like me, he is an only child, too. I even asked my Facebook friends for their prayers, and many obliged openly or did it in their own non-public ways. My real father, Antonio Lumanlan Pekson, died 16 years ago and even if my father-in-law isn’t my blood relative, he is the only Dad I have today. (My Mom also lives far away from me.) My Catholic and Filipino traits rub on me to respect my parents and elders, be kind and honest to people, and never cheat, lie or steal – and of course, never kill. With that, I will always love my in-laws in my own humble way.

I’m now trying to get back on the road to recovery. I have been very busy tyring to come up with sales and marketing plans for the service I am trying to sell. KUNNECT is a hosted call center solution that allows any business center or call center, small or large, to perform its customer-centric services without the need for large capital investments, no need for a long set up duration and no expensive upfront fees. I love the product and the service, and I love the people behind it – Fred, Chris and everyone in KUNNECT. It has, as I mentioned, given me a renewed inspiration to fulfill my dreams once again but with the honest feeling that I’m doing the business market some good, too, in providing a cheaper but productive way to do business. And I’m doing it “on my own.” No more business partners. No more suckering myself into believing that good friends are the best kinds of business partners. They will always be my friends but I’ve learned late in life that it’s not always the best combination. Give them something to do on their own is better than working together but feeling you can’t argue about his personal self in the workplace. That’s a fine tightrope to walk.

Love God. Love your family. Love everyone around you even if they do the wrong things. Love your work, something which you spend a third of your life doing – sometimes even more. But most importantly, love yourself, too. To love yourself means you profess a positive aura that becomes very transparent to the people around you – and, like a virus, they get hooked on your positiveness and optimism, and project the same sentiments to others. All told, life is short but life is good, no matter what the odds are. Life is God’s gift to you – so, treasure it to its fullest potential.

Happy halloween!

Online social networking is a misnomer in today’s ever-changing and fast-paced world. It doesn’t matter if you socialize or network through the web – it matters that you also do it face-to-face. In the reality that you network with new business or social acquaintances across the miles, you replace the personal encounter with the second best means of communicating – the telephone. Therefore, if you really want to build a social or business relationship with a network of new (or old) acquaintances, you can only be successful when it’s done “personally.” Thus, online networking is the first step and not the only means to which you build the relationship.

I used BMW with many people I have met through the years and continued to network with them socially and professionally. In times of need, you are never a stranger to one that is a social or business acquaintance. Because of BMW, they always remember you. The easiest way to do so is to send a birthday greeting by e-mail or through the messaging facilities of various online social networking sites. However, to greet one by text-messaging becomes more intimate. A phone call is better. A face-to-face encounter is best. If you acknowledge them during their wedding anniversaries, this brings you up the intimacy scale, or during the wedding of their children. In times of sorrow over the death of a loved one, the sincere effort to offer your condolences overshadows birthdays and marriages – you start to become a true friend (for life) by being there in their most vulnerable times.

In all birthday and anniversary greetings I’ve sent, I always make sure to spend time in creating a personal message on top of the usual greeting. I try to fit the content of my message to the character or personality of the celebrant or recipient, up to my understanding of who the person really is. This can be a quotation that fits well, a joke or a more intimate greeting than the usual stuff. A huge percentage will respond back with sincere thanks and follow up with questions like “how is the family?” or “what type of work are you doing?” This intiates a slew of responses between you and your network and pauses once they are satisfied with your answer (always make it a point to be the last one to respond in this exchange of messages). If the person is within your locality, offer to meet up for coffee after the special day, even for just half-an-hour. Again, business and social networking becomes successful if it’s face-to-face or by voice.

There was a time I needed more projects from North America, I used my BMW roots to touch base with my network. I didn’t get blank responses from my social and business acquaintances because I kept appearing in their lives at least once a year. I reached out (but done cordially with a friendly smile) and many offered to refer me to people they knew who may have projects for me. In fact, one person I have never met face-to-face who used to live in Trinidad and Tobago was now (during that time) living in Toronto. This was James. I eventually called James after an exchange of e-mails and had a pleasant but short conversation where he offered to refer me to someone he knew may be able to help. Lo and behold that person (named Cathy) represented the largest trade publication company in the world – Reed. I did a conference call with Cathy’s team and my team, won their initial trust just based on how we presented ourselves during the call, and Cathy eventually flew to meet up with me, visit our business premises and signed the contract with me. Cathy’s left Reed but we remain good friends until now. She now lives in Arizona doing small projects.

I met James through an e-mail network I joined in 2002. I got the project from Reed in 2006. In those in-between years, I kept in touch with James by e-mail and occassional but rare moments of calling him up when he moved to Canada. With James and many others I networked with, I always made sure they knew more personal facts about me, usually offering information about my family, personal experiences and professional facts. I always believe that 80% of the people in the world a honest and so I make sure to fill in as much information on my profile in many of the online networks I belong to, and to allow a snippet or so of my profile accessible to the public. It took years for James and I to develop some semblace of trust and, when the time came to ask for a favor, he gladly gave it without any inkling to ask for a commission or to cash in on the favor. Today, I give the same BMW effort to Cathy as I did with James. Last year, Cathy referred me to her friend who needed to develop a marketing program which I also implemented.

BMW also worked during the time I was financially down. There was one person I kept communicating with over the years, since I met him in during a job interview a decade ago. He was and still is the President of a large call center. We didn’t see eye to eye on the job but bantered on ideas about business. I continued an e-mail-based relationship with Vic and, when I had something to offer him (like a call center project), I’d call and meet him at his office. The last I met up with him was two years previous and because I had continued to communicate with him, one short e-mail led to his response for a meeting two days later with his personal interest, together with his VP Roland, to help me. Wow! I mean they were never close friends but because of sincere effort to continue communicating with them using BMW, the “stranger” barrier was almost nonexistent and thus trust between each other began to grow.

You might ask, “What about the holiday greetings?” There’s no harm in adding that up to BMW but not everyone are Catholics or Christians who practice Christmas. Father’s or Mother’s Days may not be that important to others, lest those who you do not know if they are married. So, BMW still serves the base principle to network sincerely without appearing to push yourself to the person.

Remember, that’s why they call it “social networking” because that’s precisely why people join these online sites – so network socially. When you start pushing yourself to sell things to people in sites like Facebook or MySpace, you’ll end up alienating yourself from friends and acquaintances. They will stop communicating with you, never respond to your message and start to become a stranger again. This happened to me when I sent a message to a celebrity who I wanted to help me with a new project. No response. A few months later, I sent another message apologizing for the intrusion and of the message itself and the acquaintance relationship started to go back to where we were. Hard lesson to learn.

Of course, there will be others who you will never know the dates of their birthdays, wedding anniversaries and such. But when your conversation with them starts to become more personal, you also open the door to simply ask without being intrusive. “Hey, Mary. I hope you don’t mind if I ask you when your birthday is?” It may take a few weeks, months or even years, but it eventually pays off. Just make sure you have your own reminder system to alert you a day or so before the important date so you don’t miss off. Facebook offers this feature automatically, and so does other online social networking sites. I’ve been a Plaxo member since 2002 and long before Facebook and the rest, this was one of the best online systems that allowed me to get a network’s birth date, remind me a day before and provide me with free e-greeting cards to send. However, stick with something you’re comfortable with.

There are countless more great stories to tell on the results of employing BMW in my social and business networking endeavors. What’s important is that I continue to be a real, live person with a real profile in my web network sites and a barrage of wall posts, messages and e-mails that are consistent in style and content as how I want people to perceive me to be. Remembering BMW is a hassle-free yet very easy way to continue the social and business relationship with people and make yourself mean well above the normal set of online or onsite friends and acquaintances. In due time and time of need, I had no big challenge to ask for their help when I needed it, just as long as it will not inconvenient them in their time or the effort to help me (unless they’re blood relatives). BWM works great on the real world and BMW works the same way in the virtual world, too.

And so, I woke up after just two hours of sleep as I kept tossing and turning on bed trying to get through the day with sunshine and smiles regardless of the problems. After the last discussion about the previous day’s stark mishap, I trekked to Greenhills from Makati City. As a person raised in (Metro) Manila, I’ve always been a “South Boy” and would hardly travel North unless it was at Ortigas Center where the second business district of the metropolitan area is located. At a place where I rarely go, I always keep it in mind to get into the first available parking space and walk to look for the place I intend to go than drive myself insane going in circles trying to find the “best” parking slot.

Who is Randell Tiongson?

I saw Randell’s e-mails months ago by way of a school Yahoo Groups–either LSGH Manos or One La Salle. From there, I e-mailed him about a travel portal project and agreed to met at the Bonifacio High Street in The Fort. I explained my new project and invited him to participate. Randell was informal, quirky, extroverted, extemporaneous, smiling, happy and full of life. From then on, he became part of my Facebook network while keeping tabs on his www.income-tacts.com website which he manages together with other “Registered Financial Planners” in the Philippines. Randell is a public speaker and loves to conduct training sessions, and also writes for a few publications, including the Business Mirror newspaper and Money Sense magazine. Recently, he personally began blogging through www.randelltiongson.com with the help of Carlo Ople, an internet marketing guru who manages www.newmedia.com.ph and consults with corporations wanting to traverse the web but don’t really know how to.

Financial Planning Basics

Randell’s talk on financial planning was geared towards the individual and the family. When he began his presentation, I thought of many friends who should have been at the event to listen to Randell talk, people who were just starting their careers and new mothers and fathers. He repeated the phrase “financial freedom,” reiterating the Filipinos’ need to start getting out of the cultural rut that we’ve been taught, e.g. “When I retire, I expect my children to take care of me,” and become independently secure when retirement does happen. His talk on “credit cards” (the evils of…?) touched on my history as having always depended (and looked for more) credit so that I could buy more stuff I really didn’t need. Randell’s worst-case experience of helping a couple was to find out that the wife had accumulated 13 credit cards and, to Randell’s quip to himself: “I didn’t know there were that many credit card companies in the Philippines!”

Randell Tiongson in his Financial Planning Seminar (1)

Randell touched on many fine points of personal financial planning, including why spouses and families don’t discuss and plan the household’s finance and accounting. I know one family that does that every year but nothing really is implemented as most of the time, it’s the patriarch that dictates what’s going to be done, leaving the other spouse and siblings with nothing but to nod and agree–with eyes rolling up and noses neighing like horses.

Topics about risks, acumen of financial planning and retirement lent an interesting insight, agreeing that many Filipinos tend not to weigh risks and probable earning opportunities. A good formula that Randell shared about retirement is his 20/20 rule: if you are going retire in 20 years from now, you should have started planning for 20 years ago–wow!

The talk ended with a short Q&A session and a raffle of a gift certificate. Randell also gave away copies of back issues of the Money Sense magazine while GBX (the hip shoe brand) gave away T-shirts to everyone who attended. Food was catered by Quick Plate of Randell’s wife, Mia. I networked a bit while eating a hearty plate of sausages and pasta (yummy!), and was introduced to Edwin Ngo, President of 128 Dream Fountain Corporation that carries the GBX brand. I was happy to get inquisitive support from Edwin, Randell and Carlo on my still-in-the-beta-phase travel portal project called “Just Go Philippines.”

Randell Tiongson in his Financial Planning Seminar (2)

In Summary

Many of the things Randell touched on has one way or another crossed my life in theory or practice. However, our cultural weakness is that the typical Filipino is a poor planner and implementer. We plan extravagantly (impossible dream?), spend like the King of Saudi Arabia and die poor or in debt. “Consumer debt,” as Randell also mentioned, is more prevalent than “business debt,” the latter being that we borrow money to create more money.

The North American Filipino Community

I’ve dealt with the Filipino-American and Filipino-Canadian markets through many telemarketing and online projects, besides having lived a few years in Canada and traveling repeatedly in the few U.S. states where the Filipino population is large. I have only met a handful of Filipinos who run their own business; most continue to strive and look for one employment after another. Hardly anyone goes after entrepreneurship. But we love selling bits and pieces and earning, well, bits and pieces, too. I think we call that “paglalako,” similar to our liking for direct selling. Even some Filipino-Chinese have fallen into the “entitlement” trap of our past cultures, that if you study hard, you’ll get a good job, stick to that company forever and retire handsomely. Yeah, right. You think at these trying times the word “handsomely” is still aptly viable?

Ask Randell for Professional Counsel…

…and not just your drinking buddy or your Dad. For those who can afford to cough up a few thousands of Pesos for multiple sessions with Randell so he can help you properly and correctly plan your household or personal finance, especially for the young professionals and new families, I suggest you take the initiative to seek the counsel of someone like Randell so that life in your future and that of your family becomes less painful, more rewarding and simply enjoyable. As my moniker with my company, Workspresso, says: “Work the Way you Want.” That’s how I’ve been aiming to life the remaining decade of my business life–the way I want–of course, with more wealth and more blessings to share.

Kudos, Randell. I do hope there’s a repeat of your free talk so that I will make sure to pull those friends of mine to attend the next time around.

Joy and I were met by Oscar, a gregarious fellow with a husky voice who loved to quip jokes. I followed Joy and we sat down on a table where I met another member, Art. In my conversation with Art, I found out he was a former SGV guy whose professional career focused on Finance, the last being the CFO of telephone company PT&T. He’s now semi-retired as he dabbles on consulting and brokering deals.

After a while, the women were asked to separate from the men to start each of their own session where Joy transferred to the adjacent area. Joy said sometimes everyone is grouped together rather than separated. It kind of reminded me about the single Opus Dei session I agreed to attend in behalf of another friend, Trixie. The “center” I was invited to go to was a place only for men only – no women. We attended mass where the songs were sung in Latin and went to the second floor of the building where a group discussion was to be held.

Going back to the BCBP breakfast event, it was very Catholic; I liked it because despite my inquisitive mind wandering to other faiths and religion, I am still a very proud Roman Catholic. The men sang from a hymn book which I tried to follow. An opening prayer was done by Dindo with mention of me and Adam as “first-timers” to the breakfast session.

Teddy was the “sharer” of the morning. He introduced himself as a member of BCBP for already five years but belonging to another chapter down south of Makati City. His story was both sad and truimphant, mostly on the personal side. At one instance, he had to stop because emotions just overwhelmed him as he read from his prepared script with a few ad libs here and there. While listening to him, I was already inside my head thinking when God will grant me the time where things in my life will simply line up and make things happy for everyone, especially my kids.

After Teddy spoke, Dindo introduced another person for some announcements; afterwhich, a closing prayer was done and the closing hymn was sung.

During the session, I also recalled my days as an active member of the “Couples for Christ” group in Richmond, BC, together with my wife. I enjoyed the camaraderie and prayer sessions we had through the year-and-a-half I was in Richmond. I also recalled playing and singing for the choir of the Canadian Martyrs Catholic Church, also in Richmond.

I believe I enjoyed myself and liked the group. They are warm and friendly, and not intimidating as others would be all over you being a first-time member. It is a group of faithful Catholics that have “business” as a common interest yet want to strengthen their relationship with God. Their mission, as I read the one-pager pamphlet on the breakfast table, says:

The BCBP is a body of Christian men and women whose upbringing, education, training and current life situation have placed them in the midst of the marketplace. Theirs, therefore, is a special calling that motivates them to apply their talents and resources on the ordinary as well as out of the ordinary events and situations in their workplace.

Oscar told me that the next session will be on June 13, this time to be held at a restaurant in Serendra inside The Fort. I think I will be attending their breakfast sessions in the months to come.

Back in the days of my computer programming career, I was dependent on a pen and paper to get things done for the day. I coded using paper, wrote office correspondence first on paper, planned my days, weeks and months on paper and accumulated expert opinions and documents, all on paper, along the way. By the time I got married, I’ve created a bundle of browning loose sheets of paper, three-ring binders, planners and a host of other media to organize paper. Later, I had to throw away a huge portion that I deemed irrelevant in my maturing years.

Many of you start your correspondences and blogs straight on the computer. I also do that today but only because I’ve had some 15-something years of experience organizing my thoughts on paper. I remember the movie “Finding Forrester” starring Sean Connery and Jamal Walace. This is a story about an African-American teenager who finds Sean, playing a Pulitzer-prize winning author, as his mentor in writing. I always remember what Sean told Jamal about writing (and they were both using a typewriter) — the best way to write is to write without thinking. Just keep writing or typing what comes out of your head. If you’re a touch-typist, keep typing while looking around or closing your eyes. Keep typing and typing until your hands tire. Do not attempt to organize your thoughts or you will fail to express what you want to write about. When you’re finished, what you’ve created is called a “draft.” Then, you edit.

Precisely my point — create a business “first” on paper — literally, and create it in a way you temporarily shutdown your filtering system. I’ve always advised this to many friends who seem bewildered about their lives or are in agony over some personal problem: at night, when everyone is asleep, grab your Manila paper (which you bought a few hours ago), draw a circle in middle with the statement of your problem or your intent, and start creating more circles with statements linked to your middle circle regardless if they be issues, possible solutions, givens, names of people and places and the like. Our minds are the most disorganized of things about us and around us. To force ourselves to think in an organized and sequential manner and write down a business plan in one pass is downright impossible.

This doodling activity of circles is actually termed as “mind mapping” and my previous mentor in Avon, John Novosad, taught that to me; thus, it became my new starting point for creating or troubleshooting things around me. There are many other methods you can use; however, if you find one, you must be comfortable in using it all the time. When it comes to creating a business, I earnestly suggest you start it off on paper before going straight to your computer spreadsheet programs.

By the way, the bigger the paper, the more things you can draw on it rather than several pieces of paper. That’s why using a Manila paper is more productive than tens of pieces of typewriting paper (does anyone still use a typewriter?) And one more thing, I seriously suggest doing it at night when everyone in your household is asleep. Do it at your dining table, probably the biggest table in your home. You need the peace to think clearly, with no internal or external noise (unless you live by South Beach where the music never stops) and an ample amount of desk space to scatter your papers and references. And please — switch off the TV or even the radio.

While you’re doodling, do not filter ideas that you may wonder if it fits into your mind map. Just keep inserting your thoughts into the mind map. Using a pencil rather than an ink-based pen allows you some means of erasing. For me, the only time I need to erase is to change my links or “lines” that connect one circle to another – never, ever erase your circles. Those are your ideas or thoughts and must be written on paper regardless if you think it opposes one or many of your other ideas. Just like the first rule on “brainstorming,” no filtering of ideas – there are no right or wrong ideas.

It takes a few more nights to see clearly through the large web of ideas you’ve created the first night. I know that it’s exhilarating not to stop during the first night but please remember you have work or personal responsibilities during the day (except for those working at call centers or the like). So, plan for a few nights like three or five. Keep the same routine of a nigh time mind mapping activity. Do not attempt to start transferring your doodles to your computer — there will be ample time to do that later. The more important thing is to refine the links and lines so that the correct ideas link to each other.

Now comes the cerebral activity where your knowledge, things you learned in school and at work, personal experiences and the intuition you developed plays a vital role — deciding which circles (or ideas) to keep and the ones to discard. Let’s face it — not all your ideas relate to your central theme or topic (the middle circle). My method is getting a thick, red pen and putting a star symbol on the circles I think are related to my topic. Use a thick, blue pen to act as your “delete” button if you think you made a mistake putting a star on a circle. No one is more knowledgeable to decide which circle belongs to your central topic than yourself. You can refer to business books and people of professional or academic stature but the result of your mind mapping activity rests on your laurels.

Now, ask yourself these questions — are you the outline kind of person, someone who feels comfortable with sentences and paragraphs, or one who executes strategies and plans straight into a spreadsheet file? Whatever your comfort levels and proficiencies are, your final mind mapped Manila paper becomes your basis for creating the correct flow to which an action plan evolves, a draft of your financial projection is formed, or even an essay or article is composed in a more structured manner.

Creating your business on paper is one of the best things you could so that correct variables are immediately nestled inside the resulting plan. Before SAPADAPPA and the Ishikawa Diagram, start with a “Mind Map” or the like. And start it out on paper — literally! It pays to doodle first before you write!

You are who you are, growing up during your 20-something years in an environment that honed those characteristics of who you are. When you embark in social networks outside your comfort zones, e.g. home, parents, siblings, you begin to realize that some of the things that make you “you” don’t mix well with the network; and so you adjust. Likewise, you do the same thing in the workplace. You also learn and add new characteristics to your self by observation and “trial and error.”

So, when someone tells you (sometimes forcibly) that “it’s nothing personal,” the truth is it’s always personal. It’s always your personal self mixed with some professional requirements or needs. If you fire someone, it’s not as if some robotic supercomputer has commanded you to inform “John” that the robot is firing him. You or someone else made the “conscious” decision to fire John, a decision made by a person’s mind using personal experiences in the workplace plus other networks and environments. Your persona is always involved even if it is in the workplace.

I always tell my personal stories to people that I work with not because they are wonderful stories to tell but for the reason that I need people to know who I am and why I behave the way I behave, think, decide and so on. Many of those I’ve worked with know I have a mother who lives far away from me and my father died two weeks after I got married. Some know where I spent my childhood days and what school I attended. But knowing all these does not mean “kissing up” to them or to me. Here’s another thing you need to consider — you’ve got be consistent all the time. If you’re the smiling person, always be the smiling person even when problems persist at home.

I’ve had the experience of firing people, and I don’t mean one or five in my lifetime. I’ve fired thousands at one point when I was called the “axe man” responsible for deciding which group or department in a failing company must be shutdown and who should be let go. I knew that the personal side of “me” was involved in the decision process. So, how did I become personal in a professional task like this? I helped in the person’s transition from having no job to creating job opportunities for him.

As an example, I’d like to share with you someone who used to work for me in a previous company. Jane is a sweet, friendly person who was hired by someone and placed in my group to work as one of the three assistants that I already had. The few days she started with me told me how industrious she was, always busy and always looking for work to do. However, in the coming weeks, her weaknesses began to appear. Jane did her work a lot slower than the rest of my assistants. No matter how we all pitched in to try to help, her mental capacity to absorb new information and finish work was just not at par to the requirements of the company we all worked for.  Everyone was starting to do Jane’s work because she was slowing us all down.

So, one night, I already decided that I had to fire her. I sat down at the dinner table one night when everyone in the house were already asleep, got some blank sheets of paper and started to analyze Jane — sort of like a SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats) analysis. Then, I listed down people who I knew that may benefit employing Jane, even fictional types of people like “an Uncle who owned a manpower agency.”

The following day, early in the morning, I called Jane and we went to an empty, private office. I could see from her eyes she was nervous. I used the “Kiss-Kick-Kiss” technique by opening up with her strengths, reading it from the pieces of paper I had scribbled the night before and letting Jane see those pieces of paper flat on the desk. I told her I have decided to ask her to resign. Then, I went to my list of prospective employers where her total characteristics will benefit those companies or places. I also asked her if she knew relatives or acquaintances that fitted the list of fictional types of people and companies I wrote down. We went through a lot of “what if” scenarios and our discussion lasted for two hours. At the end of our meeting, we quickly drew up talking points on what she can honestly answer people if asked why she was leaving, making sure she resigned than being terminated from work. I also told her to give me a call whenever she hits a wall on her job hunting or when she already has work.

I allowed Jane to stay the following day where our group gathered to bid her goodbye with potluck and delivered food and drinks. Like we expected, many asked the same question why she resigned and, at one query, she even winked at me before she answered back. A month later, Jane visited us in the office and told me and everyone else where she currently works and how she enjoys the job. Privately, she thanked me for giving her a sense of her strengths and where she could put that to use.

When I mentioned firing thousands of people, the initial task was an exercise of my brain and my analytical experiences brought into a single spreadsheet. However, in the action of terminating the groups and departments, I ventured into the fire: I personally went to the location of the group and told them that we were shutting them down. Of course, doing so meant a thousand-and-one questions and I was ready to answer their questions. I was also ready to provide post-employment assistance — both monetary and functional — helping them transition to their next job. I prepared all these before I went around the scattered locations, having gotten budgets from my superiors to set up these different support groups. I didn’t get “death threats” but did somehow get course or painful remarks during my face-to-face encounters. But I didn’t chide these remarks; rather, I faced them with truthful answers. If I didn’t know the answer then, I promised to get back to them personally and I did. The moment you become personal with people — letting them know who you really are and seeing how honest you are to them — their anger or frustration dies down and become more open to solutions or next steps.

Whoever your boss is, they should also know the real you. It’s not “ass kissing” as most employees label such action. In my experience, letting my boss know who I am has always worked to my advantage without going against any company policy or unlawful act. Let’s say you’re late because you had a spat with your spouse. If your boss never really knew anything about your wife — who she really is — chances are your tardiness is grounds for some negative action coming from your boss. However, I’ve always made sure my superiors have always known my wife and kids even if they never met them. If there’s a chance to let my family meet my boss, I always strike upon the opportunity because a face is always a stronger recall than just a name or a description. One time in my career when trouble struck in the family, my boss becomes more understanding of the situation. I explained that my work schedule had been clashing with my family’s need for my time and it was already becoming worse with arguments. What did my boss do? She went out of her way to find me an alternative position in the company, which actually became better for my career.

Spouses (or in my case my wife) have always complained about husbands bringing work to the home where, as most of them would say, doesn’t belong there. “Work is work and the family at home doesn’t need to hear about work.” However, I totally disagree — to a certain extent. In a marital relationship, you spouse has got to be your greatest, best friend or BFF! If he or she isn’t, there’s something wrong. Therefore, in times of stress or distress, there’s one person you can rely on for counsel, inner guidance and down-to-earth advise — and that’s your spouse. However, you can’t just jump into a conversation about the office every now and then. In a personal relationship, there is consistency and routine that human nature expects or looks for. So, sharing your office woes only isn’t the way to go; there’s also got to be good times and positive events or activities that has to be told as well. Making it a daily routine, say 10 minutes about the office, is the best foot forward that allows your spouse to share the good, the bad and the ugly. And when the downtimes hit you, it isn’t hard to explain it to your spouse because he or she already knows most of the things you do and that happens in your office.

Also consider your kids. Who do you think are their heroes or role models? I’m sure there’s a time when your child would bug you to bring him or her to your office — and you do (if you haven’t, you’re depriving you child of knowing more about you). Chances are he or she will tell their friends of their trip to dad’s (or mom’s) office, the experiences they encountered, the people they met, the things they say — I mean, you know children and their animated way of story-telling an experience. After that first visit, your children will continue to ask questions about your work and the office, and knowing you strike a conversation on the dinner table about the office every so often relieves your children that all is well with you — their hero or idol (for now).

When I attend a meeting where I get to meet a new person, I always make sure to bring something personal on the table. I can talk about my family and our travels, my peers in high school, my personal achievements and so on. For women, showing your family picture to them grabs the whole “personal and professional” mix up one level in the “trust” spectrum. Why? Business transactions are still made and dealt with by people. People always use their hindsight, gut-feel or intuition to decide the better course for their business or work. Telling someone who you really are provides more positive inputs to their decision making. But don’t lie — there are those who are experienced and learned enough to know if you’re lying. Telling a fib can ricochet badly if it’s later known to be a lie — be careful! The internet has flattened our world and news and stories now travel faster than you can spell “Mississippi.” So, honesty and trust adds value to the decision making process of a person, no matter what you are selling, marketing or presenting; and providing more personal truths about yourself brings more credibility to your professional expertise.

The person in you has to mix with your professional persona. That’s the only way everyone wins. Hiding the truth about yourself isn’t a protectionism action against unwanted thwarts, not unless you yourself are doing something bad, illegal or very negative that you fear the repercussion of similar actions. Your peers in the workplace has to better understand you and the way you do things. Your spouse and children have to know what’s going on with you in the workplace so they can also adjust in your personal abode. Your network of new and old business associates need to know more about you and what makes you or the organization you represent the best candidate for their needs. Everything you do at work is the effect of who you were and who you are today. Letting people around you understand your “human nature” allows them to adjust or to counsel you when the need arises.

In the end, it’s a “Win-Win” scenario. Now, who wouldn’t want a win-win result?

Like what the subtitle of Howard Schultz’s book says, “One cup at a time,” I strongly recommend going to Starbucks for the start of something great in your career, business and the things you do great!

Why on earth would I say that Starbucks is a great place to do your work? Let me sum it up in one long and bold sentence:

“It offers one of the best coffee in the world plus I just love the ambiance of the hissing of its large coffee maker, the resonance of its blenders that creates their famous Frappuccino drink, the jingle of the scoops of ice that make their iced lattes and mocha drinks, the holler of its baristas to whose drink is currently being served at the bar, the chatter of banter and sweet conversations, the slight turning of the page by solitary readers of books, magazines and newspapers, and the keyboard clicks of nonchalant writers and workaholics (like myself) at the surrounding tables.”

Obviously, it’s not just the coffee; the sensation of being in its café adds value to working in a Starbucks coffee shop.

Starbucks is probably the best place to set up your first business meeting that will never hurt your cash pockets. I mean, why spend a ridiculously high sum of money over lunch or dinner for a deal that you have no idea where it’s headed? At the end of the day, it’s all about matching what you offer and what your counterpart is looking for. No matter how expensive, extravagant and image-building the meal is, if your business endeavors do not complement each other, it will never work out. “The meal doesn’t make the deal.” So, the best place to cold-call and start the business relationship in an appeasing atmosphere that allows both you and your new acquaintance to relax while shop-talking is still a Starbucks coffee shop.

Recently, I had the chance to call on bloggers to invite them to write for an upcoming travel portal to the Philippines that I’m involved with. Though the site is (frustratingly) not yet online, I’ve managed to get quite a number of good bloggers on the fold while getting introduced to a new, growing segment of the publishing industry that I never cared to bother myself to know more about. I met most of my prospective writers and photo-journalists in a Starbucks coffee shop, a lot of these done at café along Legaspi corner Rufino streets in Legaspi Village, Makati City. My intent for meeting each one of these budding writers and photographers is to describe the travel portal project in detail, something that my literary abilities cannot correctly express. The relaxed aura of meeting at Starbucks proved to be successful, and many signed up to be part of the project.

So, one might ask where this excessive penchant for Starbucks began. As my agile mind can recall, it started in November of 1994 when I had my first taste of a cup of brewed “to go” Starbucks coffee in Sydney, Australia, right before boarding a boat that would take us to the famous Opera House. The trip to Australia was one of my marital travel adventures – my wife, Carina, and I had a penchant for traveling as much as we can before we decided to have kids – six vacation trips in a span of just a year which brought agitated responses from my then Avon boss, Connie Arboleda (who also became my firstborn’s godmother). I heard of Starbucks only from books and magazines. “Hmm. Not bad” was my smiling response. But that was it. It took a year before I had a chance to go to Vancouver, British Columbia in Canada for the first time when my wife gave birth to our first born, Cara Isabelle. In my three weeks there, I probably drank 3 cups per week, usually the brewed kind, and without my wife knowing that I was slipping in and out of her aunt’s house where we lived. The nearest Starbucks café was a five minute walk along Granville Avenue in the Marpole district of Vancouver, BC, which was also right in front of a Safeway store. It was actually the latter which I used as my alibi to buy nonessential things just to skip out of the house and buy my cup of Starbucks coffee.

When I came back to the Philippines, I actually mailed a proposal letter to Starbucks in Seattle, Washington where I offered to get a franchise for a Philippine store. In those days, e-mail was nonexistent and “Voice over IP” was unknown. I never got a response from them.

In 1997, Starbucks opened its first Philippine store at the 6750 Building along Ayala Avenue in Makati City. It was a partnership with Rustan’s Corporation, a well-known family who has been a business mainstay of department stores, supermarkets and restaurants in the country. I thought they got a franchise from Starbucks Coffee Company, something I attempted to do. A few years later, I read the very first published book by CEO Howard Schultz of his wonderful story of Starbucks and learned that the coffee company does not franchise – it partners with experienced restaurant companies on the basis of its standard partnership demand to create hundreds of branches on an annual basis.

The years went on in my corporate life and I sipped the famous coffee mainly for pleasure. Then, it became an evening ritual and for good reason. At the end of a tiring day in the office, my wife and kids would always demand quality time from me until they all zonked out on bed. Having all these corporate issues and debacles in my head while being with my family was a tough thing to handle. Don’t get me wrong. I love my wife and kids very much but the transition wrought my mind with distraught. I started straying to Starbucks for a moment’s time of peace while trying to readjust before driving back home and welcoming my family with high energy and smiles. I would spend half-an-hour or so sipping my hot, grande, non-fat, one equal latte while simmering the humid air outside (I smoked a lot before) and observing the people around me. Sometimes, I would read a magazine or today’s newspaper that was always available inside the café. I realized that the entire routine was the best relaxing way to downplay my corporate role, adjust and move into my fatherly and spouse role. This went on forever.

I would also use Starbucks as my venue to meet friends, acquaintances, old schoolmates and former office colleagues. The ambiance gave a better venue for entertaining ourselves over our hot or cold drinks and the not-too-heavy offering of meals and pastries. My corporate meetings would also be set on its hallowed grounds and I would guess 50% of the time, something successful came out of my many meetings in a Starbucks café.

When I got a chance to work at an American call center in Guyana (South America), my trip would take me from Manila to a two hour stopover at Narita airport in Japan where I would savor a cup before a longer flight. I would arrive at LAX airport in Los Angeles, California, grab another cup of Starbucks coffee before hailing a Supershuttle van for my one hour trip to Fontana, CA, where my Mom lived. I would stay for 2 or 3 nights before going back to LAX to catch an afternoon flight to Guyana. The plane would take us to Northwest Airlines’ Detroit or Minneapolis St. Paul hub, usually for another two hour layover before going en route to Miami, Florida. The latter was the last leg of my domestic U.S. flights. My next ride was a British West Indies Airways plane (they commonly called it “Beewee”) which had a one hour stopover at Barbados before proceeding to Guyana. Okay, let me count the number of times I would buy a Starbucks cup – five cups in a grueling 36-hour flight from Manila to Guyana, not to mention the fact that I always brought at least 5 big bags of ground coffee because three months without Starbucks would be suicide. That’s why I always have my 2 nights in California. The round trip back to Manila would be the same and the number of cups of Starbucks coffee I sipped would still be the same. This went on for two years with a quarterly home leave for 2 weeks.

One Christmas season, I gave away those “Manila” labeled wide-bottom mugs to my CEO and the people who reported directly to me at the Guyana call center. I wondered why Sean Krivatch, my CEO boss, enthusiastically thanked me days later. I later learned that he and his wife loved the mug because it wouldn’t rock unbalanced on the bed mattress, and their “breakfast in bed” routine quickly added my mugs into their customary habit. “I never thought of it that way but, hey! You’re very much welcome for the mugs.”

After two years, I hastily left my work in Guyana to fly back to Manila because of family problems. Being away regardless of my quarterly visits was a strain on my relationship with my family despite the financial gains. I could call them once every other day and would use the online text messaging system chikka.com to send short messages to my wife’s mobile phone. My computer at our condominium unit along Roxas boulevard only used a dial-up internet connection and my wife was never interested in learning anything that had to do with computers. She was a dentist by profession and that was the extent of her technical knowledge in life.

Back in Manila, I roamed the city streets networking with people who would be interested in my North and South American call center connections while my I fixed my issues with my family. Again, the best place to set up a meeting was Starbucks. By this time, there were so many branches between the cities of Pasig, Makati, Manila and Muntinlupa, places where I had easy access to go to. There would be new encounters with entrepreneurs and corporate managers that may be interested in me or what I had to offer. Friends would drop by to offer their help in referrals. It was actually the best place to meet during this time of my life because it was always a “dutch treat” encounter between me and those I was meeting. If I had to pony-up the treat, it was just a cup of hot or cold coffee, not a big strain on my dwindling savings.

There had been many good and bad encounters for me while sipping my coffee in a Starbucks café. It was the place where my wife and I had a big argument (good thing we were outside). I had my only one-on-one talk with father-in-law out at the Alabang branch before my family and I went to Canada. Starbucks Greenbelt 3 was where I got Frank Lai of Montreal-based GoldTech Systems, Inc. to sign a joint venture partnership deal with Hans Dee of Mannasoft Technology Corporation with the intent to set up GoldTech in the Philippines. Though I was a 10% shareholder of the new company in paper, I reassigned my shares to Frank so he and Hans could equally own the company, fifty-fifty. It was also the place where I first met the heads of another Montreal-based company, Fred Cote and Shawn Privatsky. A year later, I got the contract to represent them in the Philippines. Their company is Proximo Systems, Inc. and the hosted call center solution I was to market and sell in the Philippines was called Kunnect. Though I met Kyujin Hwang, then a Vice-President of U.S. based telecommunications company Airnex Communications, Inc., in another place, I had good (business) relationship-building sessions with Kyu in many Starbucks branches. A most recent meeting in Starbucks was with the CEO of The Travel Outlet of Virginia, Inc., Roy Estaris. The Travel Outlet is a twenty-two year old travel agency company in the U.S. and, after I sent my 17-page business plan cum proposal, I got the contract to develop and manage the content of their upcoming travel portal business, Just Go Philippines (or aptly branded as “JustGo Philippines!”). When on his next trip to the Philippines he brought along his COO Naomi Fitzwilliams, whose birthday happened to be on the night they landed in Manila, my business partner Richard Sia and I bought her a Starbucks item as a birthday gift, a set of six espresso-sized cups each labeled with the different city names Starbucks had a branch in the Philippines.

Back while I was in Canada fixing my family problems, my wife and I joined the choir of the Canadian Martyrs Catholic Church. This was where I met Lennie Cristobal, the choir’s musical director and pianist, and we spent many evenings talking about the choir, musical pieces and life in general in a few of the Starbucks branches in Richmond, BC. During one evening coffee session, he got me to agree to start playing bass guitar pieces since two acoustic guitars playing with no consistency in strumming or plucking sounded awful. I could read musical notes so he gave me simple pieces at the start. I eventually translated his pieces into guitar tabs since I could read tabs faster than standard piano pieces.

On an over-the-border trip from Richmond, BC to Seattle, WA, Carina knew that one of my lifelong dreams was to visit the very first Starbucks coffee shop at Pikes Place and we did. When we were there, my kids, Cara and Aaron, looked at me with confused faces why I looked so happy being inside that small place with hardly any chair to sit. I also bought one of their prepaid cash cards that featured the picture of the Pikes Place branch.

Starbucks will always be part of my routine in life – for work and pleasure. I started this literary piece while sipping a grande, one Splenda Americano in Starbucks-Greenbelt One after a nice meal of Hummus and a Gyro (or Shawarma) at The Mediterranean restaurant inside the same mall. Starbucks always has electrical outlets in its store and is friendly to laptop (or notebook) users like myself. It will always be my personal place to think clearly, organize my thoughts, read a good book or magazine and make it the only place to meet people for business or leisure. Even if I had the financial means to set up my own coffee shop, I wouldn’t do it. I’d rather put up something else and continue to savor what every Starbucks café all over the world consistently offers me – a very good cup of coffee and the best ambience for being your self. Like what the subtitle of Howard Schultz’s book says, “One cup at a time,” I strongly recommend Starbucks for the start of something great in your career, business and thing you do great!

Many people say that online social networking sites like Facebook are not for them. From the many similar remarks I’ve heard, either they’re happy with their current networking site or they think they’re too old or busy to enter social networks. On the latter response, I remember a TV episode of “NUMB3RS” where the dad of Charles Eppes asked his son for his help in creating a profile in Facebook. He realized some of his (old) friends were in Facebook and wanted to join in. The following day, he was having coffee with a long, lost buddy.

But long before I discovered online social networks, I started my web-based networking with a bunch of high school batchmates using e-Groups. In its heyday, Yahoo bought the company and incorporated it into the Yahoo portal as Yahoo Groups, which continues to exist until today. Since its inception, I’ve joined about 50 online groups and also created 8 groups with 5 still very active until now. Then and until now, this was one of the best online social networking using the web as the medium to create conversations (more about “conversations” below). In those days, every article I read said that about 90% of the people who go online use it for reading and writing e-mails (and 10% also surf the net.) Up to now, many have still maintained the group conversations in Yahoo Groups because some who use the internet in the workplace cannot access the popular online social networking sites. Many corporate servers block these sites.

I remember joining Ryze, one of the first online business networking sites before creating a Friendster account in 2002. By 2006, I joined Facebook at the behest of my daughter because I wouldn’t create an account in MySpace which was the first online social network site she joined at age 11. I was also a Plaxo member long before it reinvented itself to a social-cum-business networking site using the brand name “Pulse“. I loved Plaxo because it incorporated an e-Card system, allowing me to be reminded of birthdays and use Plaxo to send them online birthday cards. (Part of my personal motto was “B.M.W.” which means “Birthdays, Marriages and Wakes.” These are the three important dates in a person’s life. When you remember these or are even physically present, that person will usually make you a friend for life.) With much convenience, Plaxo also sent e-mail messages to people I added in my address book to confirm their contact information and which also invited everyone to join Plaxo, which many did. The last good thing about Plaxo was when my Microsoft Outlook crashed, wiping out all my contact data. Through Plaxo, I was able to recover all of them. Then, the last online networking site I registered with was Linked In. In all, I’ve been maintaining only three online social networks — Friendster, Facebook and Linked In. Let me tell you why…

Friendster – www.Friendster.com.

Friendster.com

From the many articles I’ve read about Friendster, they’ve become very popular in Asia, particularly the Philippines and Filipinos around the world. When I was working for a call center in South America, I created one under the name “Ralph Pearson” thinking that I would be using it to network with the U.S. (because it was created in Mountain View, CA and its inital market was North America). Eventually, I shifted to my own name and have been using it since.

I started using Friendster as a networking tool with many of my friends and acquaintances. However, if I were to use this for business networking, I needed to create a profile that depicted who I really was. I also made sure that pictures also depicted my family (to show a semblance of family and balance in life) and some corporate event (lunch meetings or so). My written profile also had to be complete. The important thing was adding stuff in the interests and hobbies portion — you’ve got to be consistent to what you write and who you really are when they do meet me. If you golf, make sure it’s true. If you love New Wave as a genre of music, you’ve got to be prepared to have a conversation solely on that topic. So, make sure your profile is as honest as possible, not just “make believe.”

Going to the Philippines (from Canada) to start my entrepreneurial stint in the call center industry, I was able to recruit hundreds of prospective call center representatives or agents using Friendster. I would search using company names I knew that employed the same profile of agents as I was seeking or using keywords associated to the industry or interests that was common to my search. Mind you, Friendster only allows 50 messages per 24-hour day. So, I would continue recruiting in Friendster everyday for about 3 to 4 weeks and get to hire 20 or so agents. One thing you should be careful is what you type in the text of your private message. Knowing that I was recruiting, I made sure I mentioned details of the compensation and benefits package, company name, location of the call center, if it was a start-up, a sentence about the vision-mission phrase (not statement) and a complete cadre of contact information that allows them to call or personally visit the center. The shorter but very detailed and straight to the point your message is, the better it is.

I would guess about 70% of those who I sent Friendster private messages replied back, even negatively but thanked me nonetheless for inviting them. Like I expected, many referred back to my profile page (which was not set in Private mode and thus allowed anybody to look at it and message me), checking out to see if I was legitimate and, most importantly, if I were the real thing. In the end, I also became online social friends with some people I messaged with.

I used to ask all the call center people I met or worked with if they had a Friendster account. 99% of them resoundingly affirmed my question. This only means Friendster is one of the best “free” medium to recruit people. The huge percentage of its global demographics belongs to the 18-35 yeras of age, the prime, young age of entering the corporate world and going up the business ladder. So, besides recruiting agents, I also invited supervisors and managers, too. This is where I invited, met, interviewed and eventually hired my Operations Manager, Clarice Estrella, for Workspresso Inc. in June of 2008. She still works with us up to now.

Linked In -www.linkedin.com.

Though I was with Ryze for some time, I moved to Linked In because it had better GUI (graphical user interface) and was far easier to use. Within my network, Linked In would allow me the basic activities (adding people in their networks) and that of the groups I belonged to. Like many, I started linking with friends and acquaintances before I trekked to new ones.

Linked In is not my free recruitment tool for entry level or supervisor-level professionals because many that I’ve networked with are managers, entrepreneurs and professionals. Statistically, Linked In’s demographic data rate 49% belonging to the 26-35 years old and 24% in the 36-45 years old range, as compared to the younger crowd in Friendster, with 39% in the 18-25 years old bracket and 36% among the 26-35 years of age.

Leaving a marketing phrase in your Linked In “Status” isn’t going to work. I’ve tried that. You’ve got to go out of your way and find those likely candidates one at a time. There are good search parameters in Linked In that you can use for free, more powerful than the social networking sites. You may leave marketing messages within the groups that you join but many of them do not accept such types of text. If ever they do, my thinking is it wouldn’t even make a dent in interest, readership or eyeballs.

I got many messages from people who were inviting me to resell or market their products or services. The norm was to disregard these messages but, being the networker that I am, I responded cordially even if I was turning them down, but opened the door to other products or services they would have in the future that will be a match to what I did and, of course, letting them also know what I do. There have been plenty near misses on the course of these interactions but a few networks are now on the drawing board pending contracts and agreements between us.

I was also surprised to get positive responses from people who worked with venture capital companies when I peddled the idea (yes, it was only an idea) of a business and I needed seed money to make it work. I probably sent around 30 private messages and got 10 positive responses and 5 asking for more detailed information. Wow! But mind you, it’s still about the good basics of positive correspondence. You’ve got to edit and re-edit your message to perfection.

I created my first group in Linked In called “Call Center Directory Philippines” which now has 164 members since August 10, 2008 — without marketing this group to anyone in my offline and online social or business networks, not a single e-mail to join the group. So, that’s about 18 people joining the group per month on their own accord. Good or bad? I really can’t answer you there. I haven’t done anything other than manually accept the registrations to the group, adding each one to my own Linked In network and welcoming them to the group. I know in time I will find the right idea to use this channel but for now, it remains an open group for anyone with common interests in the call center industry in the Philippines.

Facebook -www.facebook.com.

Statistically, Facebook boasts 185 million subscribers worldwide. The United States has 58 million, Canada has 11 million and the Philippines with 1.17 million. With the latter, 61.3% are female, 40.6% are 18-24 years old, 32.2% are 25-34 years old, 10.9% are 35-44 years old and (surprise) 10.5% are 14-17 years old.

My daughter was 11 years old when she told me to create a Facebook account. At her behest, I did and since I knew the general functions of an online social networking site, I created a profile using the settings and texts that came from my Friendster and Linked In accounts. At first, I was just socializing with many of the people I added to my network belonging to those I met every week or so. I probably logged into Facebook once a week as Frienster was still more popular with the people I worked with.

A few months after I started Workspresso Inc., I went back to Facebook and looked around, wondering how I could use the site as a way to market my company and the things we did. At first, I only sent private messages, much like what I did with Friendster and Linked In. Lo and behold — I usually got no reply. “Hmmm… what’s up with Facebook?” I wondered.

I looked at “Groups” and “Pages” and created my first groups, “JustGo Philippines” and “The Travel Outlet Philippines”, as I was part of both companies — the former as a Project Director and the latter as a Consultant. JustGo Philippines has 189 members and Travel Outlet Philippines with 274. It was probably easier for others to invite their friends to the Travel Outlet since it was also easy to understand that it was a travel agency company promoting itself in Facebook; while JustGo Philippines, a travel portal still in the works, was harder to understand.

However, this March or April, Facebook reengineered its Pages to look more like a wall of streaming messages from its members — or “Fans” as they called it — and I’ve seen many groups trying to switch its members to its page. Egad! Asking people to transfer or move is not going to be easy. I haven’t done so with the groups I created as I do not know how to ask the members and why should they move or transfer. Until I get a “blinding glimpse of the obvious” (famous line from the book “Barbarians at the Gates”) will I attempt to do so.

Which only means that if you intend to do marketing in Facebook by inviting people to be part of your group, “Pages” is a more productive way of doing so than “Groups.” I just hope Facebook has some undercover plan to reinvent “Groups” to something equal or better than “Pages.”

I experimented with “The Travel Outlet Philippines” and sent two global messages on travel packages. For one, I got about 20% inquiring more about it and 3% purchasing for the product. The other package wasn’t that all enticing and I didn’t get a single customer.

I’ve also joined (and unjoined) several groups and pages in Facebook that provide me with information of my interest (and disinterest). There are social groups like “Barangay Merville” which represents 440 people who used to or still live in the gated subdivision I grew up and are now scattered all over the globe. Target, the retail company, is another group and page I belong to and just read how Target hired an experienced Facebook marketer named “AKQA” to help them re-do the things they were doing (see Article).

I’ve created 4 “Pages” in Facebook but have not yet marketed these pages. I also linked my blog to one of the pages that allowed an automatic way of creating content (called “Notes”) in the page and informed the members of the page that a new “Update” was available for viewing at the page. So far, I’m not at the 100 mark of members for that page.

In Summary

So, besides your usual e-mail and existing website, the online social networking does work to a certain degree. Of course, overdoing things (messaging your members everyday) will likely be a downfall to you honest intent of good information and knowledge about you, your organization and the things you do (or sell). You’ve got to be careful in how you present and market yourself in online social networks.

It's all about "conversations."

I remember reading about the internet and know that the idea of the market in the olden times as the best description to how people and organizations should treat it. Historically, markets (as in wet markets or dry markets) were the center stage of a region where people come to buy and sell. However, the other thing about markets during those times were the travelers who would come by and visit the market to tell people of their stories from regions afar, besides selling or trading their wares. In that era and the concept of the internet today which no one in the world owns (just like a public market), what makes it exist and profit are the “conversations” and “interactions” of people among themselves. By definition, a conversation is an oral exchange of sentiments, observations, opinions, or ideas between two or more people. The moment you kill the conversation, you lose the people who may one day buy or sell with you.

Most corporate websites desist from allowing visitors (and even members) to have a conversation with them like leaving a remark or comment on the web page, thinking that many would just curse, cuss or humiliate them. So, they create their websites looking exactly like a catalog. It’s like allowing your prospective market to come in to your store but putting packaging tape on their mouths before they enter. Some may actually buy or transact with you because they need you and your product or service and there’s no one around to provide them the same thing. However, a big percentage would simply move on.

Think about it! Do you think 80% of mankind are evil? Which means everything that you do is under that impression? Don’t penalize the many because of what a few will do. Allow people to have a selection of ways (not just a toll free number) to have a conversation with you through your online storefront. Respond and reply back all the time, even if they cuss. You can opt to remove the bad messages anytime. You can also screen remarks but make sure it’s posted on your site immediately, not days later.

Online social networks and websites are all about “conversations.” And the thing about it is they also must be “Free, Fast and Forever.” To remove one’s ability to start a conversation on the web means killing the only means your site will succeed. The market is “people” and people want to have a meaningful conversation.