Every spendid thing begins with an idea
Is your work place messy and unorganized? If it is; than the right thing to do is to clean up. Make sure that you got the place for everything; no matter how small it is just get a place for it. A clean, tidy and an organized work place is where the money likes to be; no argument. It is where the money and other good things like to associate with, no question about it.
How can you know that your place needs cleaning? One sure answer is, when you can’t find the things that you need and knew pretty well that you saw where they were a day or two earlier. Let’s say that you need a Philips head screw driver to open up your desktop pc and you just can’t find the screw driver that you had used it 2 days ago; then you’d better get organized. Or, when there’s a sudden black-out and you can’t find the flash light which you think it is still in the first draw of your work table. There were numerous cases that you and I had experienced that tell us to get tidy up and get organized.
The examples above tell us that when our work places are messy and things are all over the place, we are wasting valuable time. In time management, the first thing that we have to do before even before getting your planner right; is to get all things at the right places. Time is so precious because unlike money, once its loss it’s unrecoverable – that simple. If you lose a day, you are behind your competitor by one day, and there’s no way that you can be head unless you have to put in 200% effort just to get even and another 100% increase to be ahead, in simple term, you have to put 3 times your normal effort to get head again by just losing one day. That’s why we just can’t afford to let our bad habits to interfere with our ambitions.
Besides, a clean and organized work place is an ideal place to conduct business, rest assured that there won’t be any hidden danger which could strike you when you least expected it. All movements would be smooth and jobs would be conducted swiftly and as a result money would come in quicker.
Start cleaning up by putting or placing things in it proper places. If you can’t find a place for some items, just throw them in a bin which you can sort out later after you complete the cleaning job. No, no… don’t procrastinate; start sorting up the items you collected in the bin and figure out how can you get proper places for them. Well, for some items that got not value to you, just get rid of them by giving them away or sell them off. Label your drawers, cabinets and lockers, they are essential because you can’t see them once you’d locked them up. Place all the frequently used items near to you, an arm length about you or make them visible to you.You see cleaning up your habit and your work place would bring you more good luck than bad ones. It’s simple; just use your 10mins before starting work, 10mins just after lunch and 10 minutes before closing for the day, everyday without fail would bring you good luck. How about that?
To be free from accident one must have a positive mental attitude towards safety, one's jobs, co-workers, the business and to oneself. Mental alertness of this sort could only be attained when absolute focus is given on the tasks that are being performed. Take a very simple task of filling a mug of hot coffee, although we might have done it thousands of times before, we might not realize that our bodily actions for pouring the coffee is being controlled by our mind. Just before this task is being carried out our minds will alert us the important facts like, the coffee is hot, the cup or mug should be on a stable base and remind us not to fill it until its rim. Thus, with all these mental alertness facts the risk of having hot coffee spilled on to our bodies or somebody else’s hands would be eliminated. It’s very natural for us to look and also hearing the sound of pouring hot coffee in a mug before deciding that the coffee has reached a safe height in the mug.
I came across a number of cases where injuries happened when the victims were 
not aware of the imminent dangers that were sort of ‘hidden’. It can be due to the fact that their minds didn’t realize that the situations were dangerous, like the hazards of moving fan belts of an engine of a car or an air hole (the size on the index finger) on the cover of a rotary feeder. In both cases, the victims cut off part of their index fingers because of being ‘curious’ and used their index fingers to assess the situations. I’m sure there are hundred or even thousands of cases similar in nature are happening every day whether at home or at work.
In Japan, one organization has perfected a method that would reduce the risk of accidents by making the mind to always be on the alert. The method is accepted by the general Japanese public as a responsible act and is now being adopted in almost all organizations and businesses in Japan. Many foreign visitors in Japan found that the Japanese Railways Corporation (JR) is very responsive when providing safety service to commuters. Safety announcements, like all commuters must be behind the yellow line are made on every train arrival, are very clear and a must to alerts commuters of the ‘hidden’ dangers on a moving object. Before the train doors are opened, a JR employee on platform duty will look to his right point his fingers while uttering the words ‘line clear’ and he would repeat the same routine when turning to his left. This act, which is translated as ‘finger point and call (FP&C)’, is not only very important to him and his company but also for the safety of the commuters. The JR is world famous of its good safety record and its employees are proud to show off this act.
The FP&C method is very common in Japanese factories and workshop nowadays. It is an accepted as positive behavior that could reduce the risk of accidents. This act will alert the mind on the presence of the dangers (known or unknown) through the main senses of the human body, like sight, feel, and hearing. When I finger point and call on a situation, such as the moving fan belts of a car engine to look for the source of an abnormal sound, I would say out “Fan belt is moving, ok”; through this act I’m actually alerting my mind by making use of the 3 senses routes to my brain. I’m using the speech part of the brain to say out the words which alerts my mind of the dangers; I’m hearing what is being said which also alerts my mind of the danger; I’m seeing the moving belt by pointing it with my index finger at the moving belt while saying the words also alerts my mind through my sight or vision of the danger. Hence, from these FP&C actions the mind gets informed through 3 routes, thus ensuring it to coordinate a careful judgment and movement of my body and hands when carrying out the work. So its no more a myth when we observed an airline pilot said ‘check’ at every step of his take off routine before taking the plane up in the air.
These simple acts of seeing, hearing, feeling and thinking are frequently not completely used for the benefit of reducing the risks of accidents thus resulting in injuries or fatalities. These acts were taken for granted by these victims; just like we take little notice on all the billboards along the road while driving to work because the impact of these advertisements is insignificance to our daily life. Often accidents with serious injuries happened when the victims didn’t adequately assess the potential hazards by using all these senses in combination to have a good assessment of the working conditions before acting. When analyzing such accidents, one might have the impression that the victims had acted carelessly; if only he would pause a while and gave a thought he might have all ten fingers on both hands rather than three on the right hand.
In this post I’ll elaborate on the accidents prevention by structured prediction of accidents carried out by a working team of 4 to 5 co-workers taking the account of actual near misses experienced by the group members as case studies. The structured prediction of an accident focuses on two causal causes of accident; namely unsafe conditions and unsafe acts. It is customary done through brainstorming to lead the formulation of preventive measures of an imaginary worst scenario or injuries that could result if the accident were to actually take place. The group’s mission is to reduce or entirely eliminate the risk in the job that the near accident had taken place, thus making it safe.
Below are the steps to carrying out the structured prediction of accidents.
STEP 1 – Reenacting the near or minor accident
The leader (a supervisor or the manager of the group) will start with an explanation of the case to be studied. The scenario must reflect the actual near miss that took place and experienced by the members of the group. It would be better for the leader did some home work before presenting, like taking photos or video or an accurate sketch to reenact the incident. Usually the person who experienced the near miss would also tell his/her account of the near accident. The group must be absolutely clear about the case’s scenario. The leader should ask questions to the members of the group to ensure that his team members are clear on what actually had happened. It will take about 10 minutes to complete this step.
STEP 2 – Brainstorm on worst scenario 
Focusing on the 2 attributes, unsafe conditions or circumstances and unsafe acts, as mentioned earlier, the leader will start the brainstorming process of getting as much as probable causes as possible from members. All points should be presented or worded as, first is nature of injury than the event and giving the reason of whether it is due to unsafe condition or unsafe act. It is like playing the dominoes in the reverse direction. This way the group members can visualize and can make assessment of the risks of the unsafe conditions or acts.
It is vitally important for all members not to indulge in argument, as it will distract the flow of the brainstorming process. All probable causes must be recorded by the leader. To make sure that records are organized, it is proper to write the probable causes in two columns, one being unsafe conditions and the other is unsafe acts. If the brainstorming process were to be carried out effectively each column would have 10 probable causes. This step can also be competed in 20 minutes.
Some examples of the most probable causes are;
- Paralysis or serious back injury would happen due slip because of water on stairways. – unsafe condition
- Fatal accident could result due to swinging iron beam because site supervisor fails to cordon the swinging path before carrying out the work. – unsafe act
STEP 3 – Risk assessment
Ok now, the group has 10 probabilities in each column and the leader will moderate the discussion by the members to select 3 most dangerous probable causes in respective column. Having selected 3 out of 10 that are ranked as very dangerous and most imminent hazards in the work that being discussed; the leader must record in order of most risky as the top most of the list followed by the lesser ones. This step should take about 10 minutes.
STEP 4 – Formulating preventive measures and immediate implementation
For each cause that the group has thought off, they must now formulate 3 preventive measures for each cause with the aim bringing down the possibility to zero. So, the goup would have a total of 9 preventive measures. However, to implement 9 preventive measures are some what not realistic, thus it most advisable to select the top 3 measures that have most effect in preventive such recurrence of the accident. The leader has the responsibility to document the preventive measure and then forward his report to his boss and to the safety committee or the safety manager. Finally, the group will say aloud the most important measure as to mark the end of their discussion. This would take about 20 minutes.
The structured prediction method (Kiken Yochi) has allowed the Japanese organizations to move one step ahead of an unforeseen event by treating the ‘symptoms’ rather than ‘curing the disease’. Just like the old saying “prevention is better that cure”. This ‘ritual’ can be as elaborate as what I’ve written that takes about 1 hour of meeting time, but now most seasoned organizations employees are conducting the lighter version which only take about 15 to 20 minutes and are carried out daily before commencement of work.
A typical employee who has worked for 5 years and have done this ‘ritual’ daily would already developed his/her mind to be very quick to respond to any unsafe conditions and acts that he would encounter when carrying out his/her duties. His/her eyes and ears mind would always look for hazards because his/her mind is very developed and capable of identifying the dangers. Further, he/she is also accustomed to act immediately to avoid harm on to his/her body or to his/her fellow workers. He/she is said to have developed an ‘instinct’ to fight against hazards.
To me, the message of the slogan ‘Safety First’ is simply aimed at making safety as the top priority in what ever act that we are about to take or execute; whether the act is going to be diving or answer a call on cell phone while driving or slicing a cucumber with a sharp knife for a dish; it can be anything. Since all of our actions (conscious or unconscious) originated from the brain it would be most effective to have a mental picture (visualization) of the outcome of the acts that are about to be executed. Will the action that I’m going to take produce the result as expected, that is, without injury to me or to others? If the answer is yes; it’d better for me to rewind and play back the mental image and start identify the imminent dangers thinking of how to eliminate them. It’s like when a gymnast perfecting a new difficult and dangerous routine; he/she would take a brief moment to visualize the routine before executing it. However, to most people this preparatory step of executing an acted is seen as a wasted moment and argued that if accidents were to happen they will regardless whether we like it or not. I believe that all accidents can surely be prevented.
Safety management has 3 main goals and in order to be effective safety managers have to perform tremendously difficult task in ensuring that all accidents are prevented from occurring. They are responsible to ensure that;
1. zero loss of life
2. zero injuries
3. zero property damage
Imagine that you are the safety manager of a shipbuilding company where hundreds or may be thousands of people are working with sharp metal edges, welding torches, heavy overhead loads and working in confined spaces. Keeping it an accident free place requires more that asking all workers to wear their safety gears or personal protective equipment. The safety manager is just like a musical orchestra conductor; ensuring every little musical note is just played but played with 
feeling and affection.
In Japan, the notion that in every one fatal accident there were 29 minor injuries cases and 300 near accidents cases is wide spread. Every body is aware of such notion. So, it’s a duty of the safety manager to capture all near misses case in order to prevent injuries from happening. All near misses are analyzed, tagged and kept respective databases. Their counter measures were documented and actions were immediately implemented to prevent recurrence. It is the process that the safety manager must adhere strictly in order to eliminate entirely the possibility of having a fatal case. This can only be effective carried out in organizations where communication is efficient where everybody in the organization knows that the information could be used to prevent a serious accident. It would be near to impossible task in organizations where the ‘infrastructure’ of effective communication is not been developed and the people are unaware about such notion as described earlier.
Can an isolated case of near accident experienced by a welder working alone in one end of the shipbuilding yard be reported to his safety manager? The answer is yes, if the welder were to realize that his experience would one day prevent himself or his co-worker from getting killed. Many of us have the tendency to brush away our near misses experiences or somewhat ashamed to make them public or just don’t think that they are important. Well, we need to be otherwise in order for the organization or the community that we belong to live in an accident free environment.
Have you ever seen in real life on in tv the routine of an airline pilot confirming and verify his/her act before getting the plane to fly? For every switch or button that he/she pushes he/she would confirm by pointing and uttering the word “checked” simultaneously. This act is important to ensure that the pilot is on tract of getting the plane ready for take off. It’s one way to remind our brain through the eyes and ears that the action was successfully taken and it’s ok to execute the next step of the process. If this routine is effective for pilots, it would also have the same effect for us to copy like, before crossing a street or before preparing coffee in a pantry. Others who are ignorant of its effectiveness to prevent accidents would regard the act as silly and would find it’s an awkward act to imitate. Think it this way, is it silly for us the copy if we could avoid ourselves or friends from getting killed or paralyzed? I’m sure you have a good answer for that.
An unsafe workplace is one that contributes many problems in any business environment. The problems that surface out from an unsafe workplace include; loss time, defective products or services quality, temporary loss of skill, additional cost and higher turnover rate of employees. The combination these problems will sum up to produce a major impact to reducing your customers’ confidence level towards the business. If your business efficiency is on the reducing trend, my suggestion for you is to start acting in making your business premise (offices, factories, workshops, machines, warehouses, vehicles, tables and servers) a safe and secure place. Money doesn’t have eyes but one thing for sure; that you will drive it away when it ‘sees’ that your workplace is an unsafe one.
We just cannot afford to lose our business money unnecessarily in the present economic conditions. As the crude oil price escalating unstoppably, money is a scarce commodity now, thus prompting many businesses to take actions towards reducing cost; which if taken wrongly would be disastrous the business. Businesses that were established in the post second oil shock period (from 1987) are most venerable compared to those businesses that survived the 1st (1974 to 
1979) and 2nd (1980 to 1986) oil shocks in the present economic situation.
As I came from a Japanese corporation that had gone through these hard times in world business history, I’ve the firsthand knowledge on how did the company sustained harsh effects of sudden increase in oil price; (I was employed in 1976 and took an early retirement in 2000). So, one may ask; what has the price of oil has to do with a safe workplace? The answer is simply, money. With a safe working place you won’t be having the problems as listed earlier and thus can channel your business money for better uses.
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If I were in a mart (Tesco is nearby to where I’m staying) to get some essentials for my home and later decided to get few green apples, I‘d just go to the produce section and get me some green apples. The period between the time I decided and the action taken is just a few seconds apart; I could say that it’s an immediate action. However, if I thought of getting the apples and later was distracted by a phone call that lasted for 3 minutes; I might forget about the green apples entirely. Thus, I didn’t take any action at all; of course I might come back later to get the apples.
So, in an organization of 5 people, for example, with numerous kinds of distractions that are present in a typical office environment; getting all actions done immediately after making the decisions are sometimes just impossible. How many excuses for not taking spontaneously actions have you and I heard since we started working? Countless. Right? Is the situation getting better? Well, if you were to ask me; I’d say that it is getting worst. Why? The numbers of distractions are getting more each day. To name a few are, telephone calls, voice messages, cell phones, instant messages, sms, online conferences, online gaming, pod casting, webinars etc. Everyday our involvements and dependence on these new distractions are escalating and more and more actions are being pushed forward or delayed. Hence, procrastination is gradually gaining its ground in our daily activities.
Many managers just don’t realize that the increasing number of distractions in the office environment is in fact slowing down their people from working efficiently toward the goals of their organizations. They never acknowledged that this is the real culprit behind the excuses that they heard from their people for slow and no actions. Something has to be done to curb this bad influence in order to get actions taken immediately when decisions are made.
I don’t have to explain the reasons why decisions have to be followed by immediate actions. It’s imperative. No entrepreneurs or business owners would have the patience of waiting the implementation of an important project was carried few hours or days after a committee had decided just because everybody who was supposed to be on it was one way or another occupied by the office distractions I had mentioned early. Even though one would argue that the distractions on the average is not significant because not everybody would be contributing to the slow action.
Ok, to understand better, let’s do some simple math. Let’s say that 4 persons were responsible to take an action immediately decided by their manager. 2 were not distracted in any way and contributed 100% on the part of the action, the third person got distracted and was reminded by the 2 guys earlier who had completed their part thus his efficiency was cut down to 75%. The fourth person being so engrossed with the pod casting had totally forgotten about his part of action and as a result he could only complete a day later, thus making his efficiency on taking the action dropped to 20%. So, the question is; what was the efficiency of the group on taking the action? Well the answer is not ((100+100+75+25)/4=74%). The group’s efficiency was dictated by the efficiency of the fourth person, that is, 20%. It only takes one person’s carelessness to make the whole organization in efficient.
One solution that have been effective carried in throughout Japan is taking the actions well before that the decision. Some of you guys may have the idea that I am being ridiculous again. Some of you may argue that such a thing it just impossible. How can people take action in advance before it was decided. Well, just as the Adidas advertisement spells out “Impossible is nothing”. How does the Japanese do it? They call this process by the name ‘Nemawashi’. I would recommend you guys to do a Google search and read some explanations about the process. It simply means the act of cutting the earth around a tree making sure all the roots, taking extra care not to injure the roots hairs and wrapping it up gently with straw mattress; when in the process of replanting the tree to a different location. The most important point here is not to destroy the roots hairs because if they were destroyed it would be useless to plant the trees on a new location. By taking extreme care, all the roots hairs are well intact or as they were, the trees will be as there are and will continue grow no matter where these trees were planted.
I give you a simple analogy about the whole notion of ‘Nemawashi’. Lets said that in about 8 months time a couple are expecting a baby, they would be very busy make preparations so that they won’t be having problems when the time comes, such as the money, the schedule for medical checks and perhaps the arrangement to attend exercises for easy delivery. As the time draws nears other preparations are being made like the room, the cradle, the hospitals and even arrangement with the midwife who is going to deliver the baby. All the people who are going to be involved either in the preparatory stages, during the time of birth and also during the time when the baby is in the hospital getting accustomed the his/her new world are all played the people whose role are similar to the root hairs described above. You see, the couple knew that they going to have a baby in 8 months time for sure, so it’s imperative for them to make all essential preparations for the smooth delivery of the baby. In this analogy, the decision is the date when the baby is born and the preparations are the action taken.
Similarly as in the case of the Japanese organizations, most decisions are ‘known’ earlier through the process of ‘Nemawashi’. People responsible for execution of the strategic plans would make their move first by spreading the words to all people who made up the grass roots level. They should expect that implementation of a strategic plan are closing in and are expected to make the preliminary preparations. This is the top-down communication that is not obvious or unnoticeable to outsiders like you and me. In doing so, the members of the organization are well aware and are ready to take the necessary actions when the time comes. Just as the analogy describe earlier, the couple will know what to do when the baby starts kicking as if telling the mother that he/she is ready to see their faces. 
The ‘Nemawashi’ makes the Japanese type of organizations ‘living’ just as our body utilizes the body chemistry to fight intruders and spontaneously comes out the necessary action plans to stop the intruders from taking charge. Once the body chemistry is in place the body will make the unconscious move to fight until all the remnants of the intruders are destroyed. Thus, in the organizations where ‘Nemawashi’ is perfected, I found that daily meetings or even the monthly meeting of section managers didn’t actually involved formulating strategies but were designed to monitor and to measure the results of actions the were taken by the members at all levels of the company.
The process of ‘Nemawashi’ in a Japanese organization is conducted by all everyday, collecting information, ‘hearing’ what the members’ opinions, conveying ‘instructions’ and propagate what transpired from the company’s president meeting. All the time these same ‘stories’ are being told over and over again to all the employees in the similar fashion as we were bombarded with the same advertisements on television and radio and lately even your browser.
As we grow accustomed to technological advancement and as the technological gadgetries are going into our flesh and blood, group cohesiveness is breaking as the iceberg of the artic melting in the warm current of the North Sea; hence, I can say the human touch of turning the impossible into most probable are losing its grip in organizations that neglect the dynamics of teamwork.
When I first went to Japan for my industrial training in 1978, most of my trainers couldn’t speak English. The only way that I could communicate with them was through my interpreter, Hino-san. Since my training period was short I thought if I could get hold of the written procedures it would help me to cover all the operations on time. I thought it was a smart thing to do; having discovered that they are all handwritten in Japanese (Toshiba had not come out the affordable word processors, pronounced as ‘wapuro’ in Japanese during the time yet); the motivation that I had to getting every operation covered within the period just flew away. “My life is going to be a miserable one for the next 30 days”; I said to myself while pondering what was going to be my next strategy.
Hino-san, 20 years my senior, knew that it was not going to be easy for me; and had arranged the authors of the handwritten procedures to explain what they had written. It was definitely a break for me. So, we started the meeting immediately. Having gone halfway through all the operational procedures, I noticed that most of the authors were elderly with high school background and would be retiring in 4 to 5 years time. Hino-san would always refer them as ‘pro’, I knew he was serious and wasn’t ‘pulling their legs’. He really meant that they were professionals specializing in their field of work. This made me wonder what actually was in Hino-san mind when he referred to them as ‘pro’ because what I understood was; a professional is a person who belongs to a professional club or a society and would provide professional kind of services.
Well many years had passed. Occasionally, I would use the word ‘pro’ to tee-up the skillful seniors to new members of a group without really knowing the true characteristics of a pro or a professional.
Only after 30 years I heard that the word ‘pro’ uttered by Hino-san, I am able list down the true characteristics of a professional. (I hope I am not a slow learner.) To me a pro or professional is anybody who not only confined to doctors, lawyer and golfers; conducts any work that can maintain the his/her livelihood; he can be an online marketer, machinist or taxi driver. I came up with 5 characteristics of a true pro or a professional which I believe can make tremendous change in ones life and make him/her a true professional. These set characteristic I think would agree to Hino-san’s definition of a pro.
As for presenting the 5 characteristics; this time I would do a write up instead of to listing them here like 1, 2, 3 or a, b, c, etc. I know it’s very ‘unprofessional’ of me to do so; but I came across too many blog posts that were like technical writing assignments that were written for grades. When reading a post, particularly the how to…types; I would just jump start and look for the head of the list or number 1 and start my reading from there and I will not read beyond the last number. These posts were set up for quickies I presumed.
When I recollect my encounter with the pros 30 years ago, I recalled that all the handwritten operational procedures were accurate in describing the steps of how the operations must be carried out in order to produce quality products. Each step of the procedures had a unique connection to one another and must be executed precisely at a given interval. It was like the execution of hitting each note on the piano keyboard or the combination of several notes at a given moment when a wonderful melody is played on a piano. These operational procedures were based on many years of data collection and analysis done by the pros. None of the operational procedures were written based on assumptions or inclusive studies or simulations. These professionals kept a detail and comprehensive record showing the effects of varying conditions against the product quality. They never ‘lied’ when writing the operational procedures. True professionals never tempered with the results they got or bluff their way through. Nowadays, the fame and glory of winning are so huge that some professionals resort to cheating which can land them in jail and disgrace. Be a lesson to us, cheaters may get by once or twice or three times but sooner of later that truth will get even with them.
You see, the professionals that Hino-san introduced to me were about 50 years old at that time. I presumed they had started working at the age of between 18 to 20 year old as operators in the company few years after World War 2 (WWII) where resources were a limited and difficult to get. Despite of the hardships and difficulties they put in great efforts into learning while making their livelihoods through the jobs that were given to them. They might have had bad memories during the war but they never dwell on these bad experiences. They kept o
n working diligently recording and maintaining a superb documentation of their experiences which without them the company would not have been able to grow rapidly and making offshore investments. Many among us have the habit of dwelling on the past whether on our successes or failures so much so that these past experiences would dominate our present life and stop us from taking actions base on current situation. Those who take actions base on present situation are the true professionals. We heard many entrepreneurs who failed due to reasons that were either within their controls or that were beyond their reach came back successfully making their millions again. These are the people who never let failure or success to influence their decisions on current matters. A classic example was Thomas A. Edison who failed in his experiments more that 10,000 times before finally discovered the light bulbs and patented it in January 27, 1880 as written by Napoleon Hill in his great book “Think and Grow Rich”. I think if Mr. Edison were to dwell on his failures; I would never be using the electrical light bulb and would be burning candles to study for my high schools exams in the early 1970s.
If you had read part 1 of my 5-parts Positive Thinking series which entitled “Focusing on what’s right”; you would know the importance of this habit in being part of our life. It is thus one of the important characteristics that must be possessed by the people who we referred them as professionals. The professional operators that I was referring earlier surely knew what were expected from them besides earning their living as the machine operators in the factory; they knew was exactly to do, what exactly to measure and what exactly to write because they understand that their efforts would be put in good use for the benefit of the company and ultimately for the benefit of the entire community in which they belong. In another example, by doing what is right for him and fellow players, a world class profession golfer, like Tiger Wood, exhibit a high standard of performance that has made golf a phenomenal sport has attracted millions of new enthusiasts in the past 10 years. All he does is focusing on what he’s good at; that is, winning.
Dedication in ones field is the answer to be good and thus getting the respect from others who benefited from ones work. I read a blog post sometimes last week that told me to be passionate about writing if I have the desire to tell the world and making my readers benefited from my posts. Keep doing in what you are good at is the key note to be a true professional. “A rolling stone gather no moss” and “jack of all trades but master of none” are proverbs that tell us that we will not leave a good impression of our ability if we keep hopping from one field to another. It is like investing your money in businesses or markets that you already knew its return and with no risk, it’ll be much safer rather that gamble it in places that promised high returns only to realized later that your money were all gone. True professionals only concentrate the improving in the fields that their livelihoods are depended on. Being a consultant like me, it’s imperative to be good at what I’m passionate about. So, be a pro and have a desire to master the skill that you are passionate about; this would make your living easy and more meaningful. 
The pros who wrote operational procedures that I mentioned earlier had utilized their power of knowledge to enable that company to go into unknown territories to expand it business. I am sure that they would feel proud that their hard work had resulted in the betterment of lives of people in another country by providing jobs and creating new businesses. They never would have though that it would have a great impact on the livelihood of the people in another part of the world.
The procedures that were shown to me were just the tip of an ice berg of the total work that they had contributed to the company. Other works like the calculations of the machines design and the reliability data of each machine for 20 years in the process lines are powerful information that these people have collected and used in setting up new factories abroad. I refer it as powerful information because it is being use for the benefit of its owner. Knowledge of a professional is only considered powerful if it is being used by the professional to transform into innovations to serve the population and thus makes millions.
You and I can become a pro in our own field if we live up to have the passion of being a professional and possess the 5 characteristics as described above. These are the characteristics that one should posses in order to achieve our goals in life. This law of professionalism that I have presented here is the essential ingredient in today’s living where competition amongst us is just too great and success is measured by the millions we make.
I can now list down each characteristic for your reference;
1. Professionals never lie. In any circumstances we must talk, measure and relate as accurate as possible and with confidence. It is our responsibility that these matters are being correctly conveyed to the people so that the information that we gathered would benefit the public in general.
2. Professionals are not deterred or absorbed by past successes or failures and allowing these past experiences to influence their decisions on current situations. Without looking back they keep on marching into new frontiers discovering new beginnings for others to share what they have discovered.
3. Professionals focus on what is right for them and making decisions that are right for their professions so many would emulate them in their footsteps
4. Professionals are devoted people. Their devotions in the field of their specialty are unparalleled so to open up the opportunity for others to study and be devoted like them; thus ensuring that their professions will never be forgotten.
5. Professionals posses the knowledge that is unique to them and uses them for the benefit of the people believes in them.
Is your work place messy and unorganized? If it is; than the right thing to do is to clean up. Make sure that you got the place for everything; no matter how small it is just get a place for it. A clean, tidy and an organized work place is where the money likes to be; no argument. It is where the money and other good things like to associate with, no question about it.
