Growing up, I was lucky to have my dad play such a huge impact on my childhood years. Despite being a blue-collar worker from an electronics manufacturing plant who worked long hours daily, he made it a point to have dinner as a family every night. He was present and involved in almost every little aspect of both mine and my sister’s life; making every effort to be the best father he could.
As a child, I knew he was a good dad. He did not gamble, indulge in drinking habits or smoke. Every weekend, he will bring the entire family out, sometimes to the mall or to the park, and we will spend time together as a family. Yet despite all the time he spent with us, he was still able to complete his part time studies all the way from Polytechnic to eventually graduating with a MBA from NUS.
Whenever I complained about how hard school was and the amount of homework I had to do as a student, he would often say, “Studying isn’t supposed to be fun. You study hard so you are able to enjoy life with the people you love in the future.”
It was only until I started working did I fully understand the significance of that statement. In honor of Father’s day, I want to thank my dad for taking the time to teach me many important lessons that have helped carried me through life.
1. Prepare for each moment to be a learning moment
Growing up, my dad placed great emphasis on the importance of learning. He taught us that in order to be successful, we have to always keep the spirit of learning alive, though these learning moments may not always be comfortable. In his words, success never comes to those who lead their lives without taking any risks, and no matter how well you plan out your life, something unexpected may always happen. My dad taught me to utilize every experience I have encountered in my life, be it good or bad, and turn it into a learning moment, rather than being deterred by failures. What’s important is to not give up and settle for something lesser just because you lacked the courage.
In a way, taking a leap of faith will always have a binary outcome: one where the situation turns out the way you wanted it to, or not at all. Either way, you’ll definitely gain something out of the experience.
2. Don’t rush to make a decision
By nature, I am impulsive and reckless. I tend to jump to conclusions quickly and sometimes, bridges get burnt along the way. But My dad is not driven by that same “fiery impulse.” He will always make me sit on a decision for a few days before jumping into a conclusion. One such experience would be when I received my first job offer from a prestigious MNC based in Causeway Bay, Hong Kong. Upon receiving the job offer, I immediately wanted to respond to the Human Resource and accept the offer via email. However, I was naive as my sole reason for accepting was merely based on the salary offered, and nothing else. It was after poring through the job contract with my parents did I realize that the package offered wasn’t substantial enough for me to relocate to Hong Kong.
This short experience ingrained in me the life’s mantra of, “Most important decisions deserve a few days.”
3. Make time for your family and friends
I consider myself to be extremely lucky. During the formative years of my life, my dad was always with us. It was only upon the completion of his MBA did he start to fly often and that was when family time together became slightly limited.
Thanks to my dad’s professional life and insane workload, he had to learn to prioritize time for himself, my family and his religious organization; and that took a lot of work. Of all the lessons I’ve learnt from him, this is the one that resonates with me the most. Despite his heavy responsibilities, my dad puts relationships first. Weekly dinner affairs are mandatory for my family (which I always love), and we make it a point to do that at least once a week. It is a moment for my entire family to catch up, share new scientific findings (I come from a family of academics) and relax. In addition to setting aside time to make sure he is available for all of us, my dad also makes it a point to bring the family overseas at least once a year for family bonding.
This lesson can’t be overstated. It is imperative to not be too caught up in work and commitments, and forget to make your personal life a priority. For a start, set aside some dedicated family time as well as for your own personal space. In the long run, this will bring about many benefits and it may even increase your work productivity too: a win-win situation for you.
4. First impressions are everything
When you first start a job, you will often find yourself in the situation whereby there’s not much responsibilities coming your way and that it is easy to start slacking off. However, slacking when you first start a job is disastrous to your career and sets you up for failure. My dad taught me that first impressions count; and that impression will last you a long time.
When I first started my job, I didn’t have much responsibilities and because I was bored out of my mind, I started googling articles such as, “Should you quit your job in your first week?” When I complained to my parents about this, they encouraged me to find something to improve in my workplace and learn from everyone there. This valuable lesson changed my mindset and I started to think out of my jobscope; helping and learning from my colleagues. Because of this, I was able to secure a higher position within three months of working and I got a big pay increment upon the completion of my six months probation. Hard work does translate into career success.
5. You can create value everywhere
One of the life philosophies I’ve grown up with (and emulated by my dad) comes from the president of the Soka Gakkai International, Dr Daisaku Ikeda. In his books, he always talks about the importance of creating value at every moment in our lives. In a way, when you create value, it can be equated to creating opportunity. What I’ve learnt is that sometimes these opportunities don’t look like opportunities. It could be a chance to network, to get to know someone better, or at times it is simply a chance for you to reach out and see what’s ahead. Ultimately, opportunities are created by someone who simply tries everything and not complain about their circumstances.
This, by essence, is the key to creating opportunities in life. “Don’t wait for opportunities to come by! Instead, just get out there and create value. This is akin to planting seeds for opportunities around, that will definitely flourish in the future.’’ That’s something I’ve always heard in multiple iterations over the years. This brings about the question of: what value can you create today? And one that never fail to ask myself every single day.
6. Importance of saving
Turning off the lights when not in use, not having lengthy showers and remembering to switch off all the plugs at the source are sentences I’ve heard all my life. My dad is a very thrifty person and such reminders from him were often met with rolled eyes from both my sister and I. Despite such irritating reminders, in his own way, my dad showed me the importance of saving and not being wasteful.
Making every dollar count led me down the path of personal finance and investments that allowed me to finish paying my hefty tuition fee loans all by myself even before I entered the workforce. He would often urge both my sister and I to save up at least 30% of our pocket money and when we started having our own salaries, to save at least 50% of it into an account just for rainy days.
My dad is someone who believes that you can’t become rich just by being a salary man and putting your savings into a bank account. You will need to put some of your savings into long term and short term investments, from ETFs to bonds and stocks.
In essence, there are many ways to stretch your dollar, from using credit cards that offer high cashback, putting your money into a high interest account or simply doing some smart investments. The best way would be to diversify your portfolio and have funds in a few selected categories.
Regardless of what you decide to do with your life savings, here’s an old adage: don’t ever spend more than what you earn every month. While It’s tempting to splurge when you just receive your paycheck or year end bonus. It’s important to keep in mind that for every extra dollar you save, you are one step closer to achieving your financial goal.
7. Preparation is the Key to Success
During my freshman year in University, I recalled seeing many people mugging furiously at every corner of the school, trying to manage all of their newfound knowledge and committing them to memory.
I felt mentally prepared, and that made a huge difference. The key to doing well is to be prepared of the challenges ahead. You don’t always have to study the entire semester’s worth of lessons in order to get your ‘A’s. You just need to know what’s important, what’s the grading criteria and which assignments to focus more of your energy on.
In a way, my habit of being prepared for seemingly any task can be attributed to the way I have been brought up. One such example would be the planning process prior to our annual family overseas trips. My dad will often allocate certain tasks to both my sister and I, from finding the most reviewed restaurant in a town to the shortest route from one place to another. During those days where the Internet wasn’t a commodity, we had to spend time in the libraries poring through travel guides for information and thick glossy maps. Looking back, these snippets of responsibilities helped cultivate the habit of being prepared in almost all aspects of my life.
Priority management in particular is something that many people in business — even company leaders — still have not mastered. The earlier you learn how to prioritise your tasks and be prepared for them, the better.
Final Thoughts
In part, I have to thank my dad (and of course the world) for inculcating in me my goal setting, money and time management skills. His tough love for both my sister and I, helped propelled us through life and has a huge impact on who we are today. Hopefully these lessons are useful to you as well. On a more personal note, dad, I can’t possibly express how thankful I am for your presence. Happy father’s day. Here’s to another marvellous year ahead.
