Catarina's World

A fair idea acted upon is better than a brilliant one never acted upon. The purpose of any business is, simply put, to develop and make money. And how’s that going to happen if you don’t take action? Why do we have a corporate culture where an abundance of reports are written on how things should be done in theory and then –

If you overdo the contemplating part you will never get anywhere.

only sometimes – acted upon?

Or worse acted upon to the detriment of not only the company but society as a whole. A contributing factor to the global banking crisis was academic people without enough experience having theories that unfortunately didn’t work out in reality.

Why complicate things?

Confusius was right when he said that life is really simple but we make it complicated. And writing theoretical reports instead of acting is a very good example of that.

Conditions are never perfect

Sometimes reports are produced to avoid doing something that companies know has to be done, but really want to avoid. The reports then show share holders that they are doing something and become an excuse for not taking action until conditions are perfect. And they never will be. Passive companies are not going to be winners but active ones are. The only thing you will achieve by postponing action is losing time and money.

What happened to common sense?

Don’t get me wrong, sometimes reports are needed to get optimal results. But for the majority of businesses in this world, does it really make sense to spend a lot of money on writing theoretical reports? What happened to common sense? Most things are actually pretty basic. How much money do you need to bring in to make profit? How will you get that kind of revenue? In most cases you don’t need to write a report to determine that. For most businesses a few meetings, discussions and agreement on a plan of action is sufficient. You swiftly notice when things aren’t working out as planned and then you just change tactics. It has actually happened that I have told companies that what they need is not a report on how to do it, but simply act to get more customers and increase sales. You can argue that I should have produced an expensive report instead of being honest, but you don’t keep clients that way. If you make them pay for what they do not need, it’s just a question of how long it takes before you loose them.

Maybe it’s easy for me since I started my career in journalism and know how to get the information I need and then act to get results. And the same applies to business, I find the information I need, adapt it to the situation at hand and then take the appropriate action.

How many reports are acted upon?

Writing reports is a Western phenomena that has unfortunately spread. Don’t know how many times I have heard about conglomerates, for instance in the Middle East, that have hired an academic to write reports. They mostly spend a lot of money on it but the reports conclusions are seldom acted upon. Wouldn’t it have been better to simply take action to improve, for instance, sales, acquiring new customers, developing products and collecting money? Doing that you would also bring in money.

Start-ups that spend months writing detailed analysis on how to best do what they are going to do frequently run out of money and have to close or, worse, go bankrupt.

Have always applied action style leadership to get results. In business I like to surround myself with action-oriented people. Naturally I do contemplate and analyse but my main focus is on action and I do believe that’s where we need to be in this world to achieve something. If you overdo the contemplating part you will never get anywhere. And how long will you be in business then? Every day thousands of good ideas are buried because people are afraid to act upon them. Got a good idea? Then act upon it!

(Photo: cpask Photo Xpress)

Yes why not? If Caesar was alive today he would easily have got himself elected to what is still the most powerful position in the world. Life today is actually very much like during the Roman Empire. Crassus personifies big business and banks and Cicero, Julius Caesar and Catilina today’s politicians. And as far as dictators go,  Sulla did what that category are doing today already 2,000 years ago.

Gaius Julius Caesar would have felt at home on Capitol Hill and in the White House. He, or Cicero for that matter, would easily have managed to get himself elected president.

The headline “Financial reform compromise rebuffed in Senate” could easily be applied to the Roman Empire. Not least since that’s where the original Senate was located. The difference is that today you read news in the media and in those days Roman citizens talked about news on the Forum.

Roman elections, taxation & justice

Just as in some countries today the elite ruled at the expense of the common man.The main tools for power were already then elections, taxation and courts of law. Making profit was crucial to Roman businessmen. Crassus almost had hundreds of slaves executed just to serve his business interests. He had houses burnt down to buy them for nothing to increase his wealth.

Oportunisism still works

Power corrupts and Cicero, just like any opportunistic politician throughout time, completely changed his policies to get elected (does it sound familiar?). And no doubt a fabulous orator like him would also have been able to convince any electorate today to vote for him.

Envy and opinion can alter history

Shakespeare’s play has wrongly made many people believe Caesar was a tyrant, which is far from the truth. He usually refrained from executing his enemies which was his downfall. Would history have looked different if he hadn’t spared Brutus’ life? And the irony is that Brutus may very well have been his illegitimate son. Can’t help thinking of some royal families where assasination today still seems to be the way to the throne. The Julian dynasty emperors after Caesar however became increasingly more tyrannical, which is not unusual in similar families today.

Human nature doesn’t change

So haven’t we learned from what went wrong with the Roman Empire? Why doesn’t humanity evolve, learn from history and move on? Because it is not big business, the banks or politicians that are at fault. It is human nature. Once a generation has learnt from its mistakes another generation takes over that have yet to learn.

Human nature doesn’t change. Many people, even though they would rather die than admit it, would do anything for money, power and glory. Not to mention fame and just simply feeling important.

Vested interests rule the world

Many of us would like to see a fair world. But the world has never been fair and it’s unlikely that it ever will be. About 15 years ago I told a friend of mine who used to be minister of foreign affairs in Mexico that I would like to see all people in the world eat three meals a day and have basic schooling. He told me, “Catarina, it will never happen because vested interests will not allow it”. In other words powerful countries and people will look after its own interests.

But since empires come and go who does what to whom evens out throughout history. In the future the Chinese and Indians will do to the West what the West has been doing to them.

Makes you wonder what makes today different from the past, doesn’t it? Why should people who genuinely want to make a difference succeed today where caring people in the past failed? Will the fact that the whole world is so interconnected make a difference?

Maybe the most important lesson from history is survival? Marcus Mummius, a Roman army commander put it very well over two thousand years ago: “ When you are hurt (in battle) the worst you can do is stop fighting. If you do the pain takes over and you are finished. I have seen many soldiers die of wounds that shouldn’t have been fatal just because they stopped fighting and gave in to the pain. No you just scream and throw yourself right back into the fight. That way you will neither feel the pain nor bleed to death since the blood will rush to your brain and the arm that holds your sword  to enable you to succeed”.

(photo: genjo m Flickr)

In a controversial interview with the BBC Alessio Rastani, and independent trader, stated that banks and not governments rule the world. Devote 4 minutes to watching Kristine Frazao investigate what he said:

Now with markets moving on Italy and other countries with sovereign debts, it’s a good time to contemplate who really decides what happens in the world economy. Is it more important that traders make profit than what happens to, say, the entire population of Italy? Not to mention the whole world with the recession in Europe getting worse, or at least being prolonged. What can governments do to really counteract what speculators are doing?

Do you agree with Rastani that if we wait for governments to sort out the problems in the world economy we will wait a long time? Are the banks controlling what happens? Is he correct when he says that traders welcome a recession because it enables them to make money faster? Do you agree that it’s easier to make money in a downward market? Will the problems in the world economy go on indefinitely if we expect governments to sort things out? Do you agree with Rastani that the world economy will collapse again? Or do you believe governments will manage to make the global economy work and grow again?

Video: RTAmerica – You Tube

It’s not a coincidence that most successful Western corporations were founded last century. Then it was still possible to build up a highly profitable company in the West. Nowadays however, that’s easier said than done. Western tax authorities, led by Sweden followed by America, are tightening any loopholes there are.

Multinational corporations have already made arrangements to pay as little as possible to the taxman in the West. So they will not be much, if at all, affected by this. However the vast majority of companies are small and medium sized. And for them it isn't always possible to do what the big players do.

In the developing world however, companies can still do what used to be done here which gives them the upper hand. Cannot understand how tax authorities have been allowed, actually instructed, by politicians to hand out all the aces to competitors overseas? You have to play with the cards you have and with the odds stacked against them, Western companies have their hands tied.

Private sector companies generate the main part of taxes and fees that pay for government and the public sector. Hence cannot understand how Western governments can implement taxation laws that slowly but surely make Western corporations unable to compete on the global market? Where is the money going to come from to fund Western authorities? Obviously the problem is that politicians main priority is to be re-elected. They hence take opportunistic decisions to gain short term benefits. But how about keeping the West competitive in the long run? A lot of famous Western brands, such as Volvo, Rolls Royce and Range Rover, have already been sold to the developing world.

Where is the money going to come from to keep the West wealthy when companies are being taxed out of business? Tax authorities in the West are getting more and more militant and EU and US politicians are cooperating to make sure they squeeze as much taxes as possible out of companies. The justice system in Sweden is hence so twisted you are actually better of murdering someone than committing severe economic crimes since your jail sentence will be shorter.

The jobless recovery illustrates the tax problem very well. Many jobs lost will not be replaced, more likely outsourced or moved overseas. Most manufacturing has already moved to the developing world, not because companies wanted to move, but had to in order to be competitive. Fair enough since most Americans and Europeans are not keen on such jobs anyway. Catch is that all countries have a population of everything from brilliant to stupid people. What are Westerners with a low IQ going to do in the future? Non-skilled jobs are in the developing world but how many labourers in the West are prepared to start working in, say, a factory in China? Or Africa for that matter, because some experts believe manufacturing will start moving there since they provide cheaper labour than Asia.

Multinational corporations have already made arrangements to pay as little as possible to the taxman in the West. So they will not be much, if at all, affected by this. However the vast majority of companies are small and medium sized. And for them it isn’t always possible to do what the big players do. So weather they like it or not, they have to start thinking about moving their company head quarters to other parts of the world. Or, like IKEA, transfer ownership to a trust abroad.

Unfortunately politicians are not the do-gooders they ideally should be. Politics is a profession. And like the corporate world they are looking for short term gains. That companies do is one thing, but surely US and European politicians should have the long term welfare of their own countries at heart? Throughout history empires come and go. And the US and European empires are no exceptions. We all know that China, India and Saudi Arabia/the Gulf will take over. But what I cannot understand is why Western politicians are actually speeding up the end of their empires? Wouldn’t it be better to try to remain the leading powers for as long as possible by keeping the good cards? Apparently not since the West seems to be undermining its strenght from within without taking into account what this will do to future generations.

(photo: 427 – flickr)

It seems to me that a few bankers have managed to hijack and contaminate the American Dream. To them it means looking after number one at the expense of others, which is as far from the true meaning as you can get. And the price for that is being paid by Middle America with their drastically reduced spending power.

Americans demanding big banks and Wall Street stop spending millions in taxpayer dollars to lobby against financial reform.

How long will it take before those millions of middle Americans hit by the crisis get their spending power back? And what will happen to the US economy in the meantime?

Let’s face it ,we need to get Middle America up and running again since middle class spending power is the backbone of an economy. You only need to look at Africa in the past to see what happens without it. But now with African middle classes growing, and spending more, their economies are improving.

Can not understand how those US bankers can live with themselves. Not least since many of them attend church on a regular basis. The bible obviously doesn’t have any influence on them but neither, it seems, has the materialistic point of view of wanting their children to grow up in a thriving economy. Instead short term thinking seems to have completely taken over their entire lives.

“We need to put an end to misleading and dishonest practices of banks and institutions regarding credit and debit cards or mortgage, auto and payday loans. Americans don’t choose to be victimized by mysterious fees, changing terms, and pages and pages of fine print”, president Obama said recently. And he is right since much of the blame for this recession can be put on “the irresponsibility of large financial institutions on Wall Street that gambled on risky loans and complex financial products, seeking short-term profits and big bonuses with little regard for long-term consequences.

And since neither going to church nor materialistic common sense seem to have any impact on Wall Street, I unfortunately believe the only way to change their behaviour is to legislate. To avoid a repeat of last year’s meltdown that put the US economy on the brink of collapse, the House of Representatives approval last Friday of the biggest changes in financial regulation since the Great Depression is most likely a step in the right direction?

It’s lamentable that the only way of stopping Wall Street looking after number one at the expense of others seems to be legislation But systematic risks in the economy and dangerous financial products need to be policed somehow. And to get the middle classes up and running again a financial watchdog agency is most likely essential.

One American commenting on Reuters spoke for many Americans when he said: “A Consumer Financial Protection Agency is just the start of the regulatory oversight this country needs to put in place to get Wall Street back under control. The recent behavior and excesses of Wall Street are an embarassment and shame on this country. Anyone working for an investment/banking firm who has benefitted either directly or indirectly from the Big Bail and who is making over $500,000 this year needs to be turned out of their homes, their homes and possessions sold or donated and tax them at the rate the Europeans are taxing their financial criminals this year. Wall Street has become a blight and cancer on the landscape and needs to be brought under control. Middle America is no longer buying their schtick. Even their bought and paid for minions in the US Congress are finding it impossible to peddle their lies. “

As far as I’m concerned innovation and development should be encouraged as well as driving the economy forward into another exciting new decade of success. But risky schemes that threaten the entire economy should not.

Since Wall Street doesn’t seem to learn from their mistakes, change and move on, something needs to be done to protect the middle classes. Otherwise we will have to be content with their spending power being reduced on a continuos basis while their counterparts in Asia and the Middle East increasingly spend more and more money. Doesn’t Wall Street understand that such a development will long term be the end of the American dream? And, worse from their point of view, make sure that “Wall Street” moves to the other side of the world, leaving most US bankers behind.

(Photo: Flickr – SEIU International)

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