USA recognises China’s sovereignty of South China Sea islands

The Americans sailed a warship in the South China Sea as close as 12 nm from the Chinese islands. The big news was splashed across all the major western media that the US was bold and big enough to challenge the Chinese in the waters of China. Big deal! The allies especially the Aquino guy was beaming a wide smile from cheek to cheek and telling his fans that the Americans dare. The Americans are not afraid of China and are beating their chests in front of the Chinese.

So what’s next? The Americans announced that they would sail the South China Sea twice in every three months, to exercise the right of freedom of navigation. The Americans will fly and sail anywhere as they like, in international waters. This must make their allies and believers very happy.

What the Americans are not saying but admitting is that the islands in the South China Sea belonged to China and the Americans would respect and not cross the 12 nm territorial waters of China. Period.

Oh, the Americans are also saying they are not recognizing the Chinese islands. That is true only to the extent that they would not cross the 12 nm line, the Americans would not cross the waters around Chinese islands. This must be something that Xi Jinping and Obama had agreed in his recent visit. The Americans can do whatever they like, have wild dances, parties in the South China Sea, but do not cross into China’s territorial waters. Those are off limits. And the Americans were doing just that and Xi Jinping is not saying a word. There was an agreement for a circus performance by the American sailors to entertain the Japanese and the Pinoys and the need for a pyrrhic victory for the American people, particularly the hawks in Washington. We did it, we showed the Chinese our fist. Just don’t go over board.

The other agreement is that China would continue to do what it wants to do in the islands with no interference from the Americans. It was a waltz of two elephants to entertain the little states in the South China Sea. The realities and new status quo, the islands belong to China and also the Americans would be sailing the South China Sea.

What about the countries around the South China Sea? They would have to live with the new realities. Nothing change except a bigger American presence in the region. There is no issue on freedom of navigation. The Americans can sail to any part of the South China Sea as long as they keep out of China’s territorial waters around the islands. And as a side benefit, the frightened Japanese and Pinoys would welcome the Americans to station troops in their countries. Clark and Subic would welcome the Americans back to give a kick start to the Filipino economy.

Singapore Education – There is nothing wrong with it

There is a wise saying, don’t fix it if there is nothing wrong. And that is exactly what is happening to our education system. What is so wrong with our education system that needs fixing? The only thing I can see is that they are trying to do too much with our students, wanting every child to be a superman. Actually more than superman, they want them to be man of steel, can sing and can dance, can be artist, can be engineers or scientists or what not, all rolled into one. And that this not all, they want to be mountain climbers, adventurers, humanitarians and entrepreneurs.  Come off it, ask yourself if you can even be good in two of the items mentioned. What happens is that a child would not have time to be good in anything. But then that is not true either. Our children, the best of the best, are extremely talented in their pursuit of excellence. They know what they want and what matters and would not be made a fool and be misled into doing the unnecessary. Their straight As are not flukes and confirmed by all the best universities in the world.

What then is wrong with our education system and policies? No, there is nothing wrong. It is the reckless and irresponsible policies of hiring rubbish from around the world and calling them talents and treating our children as no talents. How silly can they be? We have the best universities and a no nonsense examination system that would not allow cheatings or buying of fake certificates and degrees, and we go around the world, into little villages and slum cities to dig into their dustbins to pick up the craps, bring them home and call them talents. And we replaced our own talents, strong in the hard disciplines with cheap talkers with fake degrees?

Now there is this myth that is circulating like a bad joke. Singaporeans have no talents, no skill sets, unemployable, not good enough for top management. The best are from unknown village universities. The big question is that no one, not a single turkey in authority, in the govt, in business, in the academia, not a single educator, is brave enough or sensible enough to talk back. No one thinks this nonsensical myth needs to be debunked. No one thinks it is his duty and responsibility to defend our education system, that the products of our education system are genuine, the real mccoys, no bluff, that they are really good stuff. They choose to believe in this myth, that the products of our education system are rubbish, unusable, unemployable.

When the sick jokers from the 3^rd World come here to insult and rubbish our talents, calling the products of our world class education system as duds, while the fakes are brought in to replace them, everyone nods his head like a donkey, like hearing a gospel truth.

Would there be anyone standing up to defend our education system? Would the govt put this right by new policies to ensure our best are employed in good jobs and not be turned into temporary staff or be underemployed?  If the govt also believes in this myth, that we have no talents and the products of our world best education system are duds, no amount of tweaking and magic will be able to make our students better. They are already the best of the best. But we allowed others to put a dounce hat on them and called them no talents.

Did anyone get what I am saying? Did anyone see anything wrong with our education system and policies and the stupidity of our employment policies? If they cannot see anything wrong, they would be barking up the wrong tree, blaming our education system, that the products of our education system are a waste of time and resources.

Who is responsible for this mess and to perpetuate this silly myth at the expense of our citizens and their well being?

GE2015 – Lessons learnt

The biggest lesson learnt from the GE2015 911 effect must be the importance of being relevant as opposition parties to stay in touch with issues and matters that affect the people and their interests. Chee Soon Juan caught the drift and demanded more transparency in accounting to what really happened in the hepatitis C crisis. What happened, when did it happened, who said what and when, who was informed what and when. These simple questions are going to rub some people the wrong way and instead of answering them, may be retorted with more questions or challenges.

Following closely behind the heels of Chee Soon Juan is the WP. WP had for the last few years avoided questioning the govt on current issues and adopted a strategy of looking after their constituents and their backyards. Work the ground real hard to show the people that the WP was very good in municipal affairs.

The result of the GE was punishing in a way. The WP must have done a lot of soul searching to find out what’s wrong and must have concluded that keeping quiet on current and national issues would not do. As politicians they cannot afford to shut up and only open their mouths during a GE.

And there you are, Leon Perera, the second generation leaders that would likely take over from Low Thia Khiang and Sylvia Lim, has changed tack. They are going to speak up and take the bull by the horns. Here is a clip of what Leon Perera said on the hepatitis C crisis.

‘In the case of the Committee of Inquiry into the 15 and 17 Dec 2011 MRT breakdowns and the 8 Dec 2013 Little India Riots, the deliberations of the committee were made public so as to strengthen public confidence in the security and public transport systems respectively. In this case, we recommend that the deliberations of the committee likewise be made public. The Hepatitis C outbreak is at least as grave an incident as the MRT breakdowns and Little India riot, with serious implications for the public confidence of Singaporeans and foreign stake-holders in our vital national institutions. So as to facilitate this and in line with the norms established by the COIs relating to the MRT breakdowns and the Little India riots, we recommend that the current review committee be reconstituted as a Committee of Inquiry (COI) under the Inquiries Act.’

Yes, the new blood in the WP understood what should be done, what the people expected them to do. As opposition politicians, they must engage the ruling party all the way to the next GE on issues that affect the people. There is no running away or walking away if they want to win the hearts and minds of the people. They must continuously be there to speak up for the people, not to wait until the next GE.

The other nonsensical parties also have learnt their lessons. They are nonsensical parties and should just shut up, not be seen and not be heard, and hopefully not be seen and heard again in the next GE.

Tan Jee Say and whatever that is left in the opposition that thinks they are not nonsensical parties must also take the cue and stand up and be counted. Don’t reappear only in the next GE. The battle starts now and either they stay on to fight or take flight.

This is a brave new change in the WP, to stand up to face the music no matter how loud or unpleasant, to fight on, to represent the people and to fight for their well being at all times. To ask unpleasant and uncomfortable questions and not to shy away from a fight is now the new strategy of the WP.

Lean-Sizing Solution for Singapore – How it Works

Going Lean - The Best Organisation for the Marketplace

By MIKOspace

 

Singapore wants to maintain a low but sustainable foreign workforce growth as she engages with increasing decline of the local labour force.   In essence, Singapore needs to learn to grow its economy and to do more with less.  It means going beyond hitherto low human productivity growth to deploy new mind-sets to unleash unconventional innovative approaches to everything that Singapore managers and workers have been accustomed to doing so far. 

 

“Problems cannot be solved with the same mind-set that created them.”

― Albert Einstein

 

The empowered lean business corporation is the proven most effective organisation. No business success is based solely on technology.  Quality people make products/services distinctive through superior quality and total customer satisfaction.  And it is their commitment, determination and resourcefulness which drive the business organisation to achieve excellence and advances in technology and systems for a sustainable excellence in the marketplace. 

 

The Secret of Successful Lean Organisations is Empowered People.

 

Empowered people in a company have a profound sense of control and ownership over their jobs.  A high-commitment human resource strategy will encourage empowered employees to take on more responsibilities, emphasising mutuality or team synergy and produces a stronger commitment to excellence.  Within such a corporate culture, and guided by leadership providing clear mission and strategic directions, your people will focus on getting the job done, and having more responsibility further makes their work more challenging and rewarding.

 

Exceptional management leadership in lean business organisations focus on corporate values such as openness, honesty, self-direction, development and the promotion of innovations in the workplace. 

 

The fundamental management task is to motivate ingenious, creative and responsible marketplace-oriented contributions from its people.

 

HOW TO BEGIN TO GO LEAN?

It starts with a strategic business review and planning to clarify the future direction and nature of the business given the increasing crunch in manpower.   Only then will it be possible to design, develop and build the most effective organisation that will “do more with less”..  "Business" and "Organisation" are not the same thing.  A Business applies resources to create superior products and services to meet the market needs; whereas Organisation is the way in which those resources are administered; referring to the systems, structure, jobs and corporate culture.

 

Companies who want to command continuously sustaining competitive positions in their current marketplace must continually renew their organisations.  They do this by changing the organisational "shape" and "size", reducing “layers” and increasing the “span” of responsibilities as well as embedding “agility” and “adaptability” in their corporate culture to engage new and dynamic challenges in the changing marketplace environments.

 

The values, beliefs and norms that constitute corporate culture also provide the cohesiveness for corporate activities and affect the implementation of the flexible corporate strategies by the language and manner that strategy is communicated from one organisational level to another, vertically as well as horizontally.  Shared values and beliefs define the fundamental character of a lean business organisation, providing that unique organisational personality that distinguishes it from all others.

 

The Human Talent Oracle empowers organisations and people with a greater awareness of your corporate values as well as helps to develop an ongoing organisational response, driven by these values, to the ever-changing and competitive business operating environment and marketplace.  The Mission as a Human Talent Oracle is to facilitate the growth of lean business organisations and empower the people inside to achieve greater effectiveness and success through understanding and discovering the value of leadership in human resource management.

 

The “Secret” in growing effective Lean Business Organisations is High-Commitment People Teams nurtured from the foundation supported by the corporate pillars of Leadership, Culture and Strategy. 

 

This is how you can “Grow Big by Going Lean”, through working on the following sequential areas:

 

[1] Culture Development & Strategic Planning

[2] Strategic Human Talent Management

[3] Lean Sizing and Organisational Development

[4] Training and Development for Fewer Jobs with Higher Pay

[5] Corporate Employee Conversations Strategy

[6] Impact Oriented Rewards Sharing System

[7] Continuous Corporate Values Reinforcement

 

 

Related:

The Secret to Lean-Size Singapore Economy

Tweaking or major changes to the Education Policy?

We have been hearing a lot of noise about what the education system should be like and how this new ideal education system will be good for the students and the future of the country.  We have had many education ministers and everyone went into the ministry, poked their fingers here and there and claimed that things would be better. The plight of our graduates not getting good jobs, not employable, dearth of talents in banking and finance, in IT and in dunno what industries speaks for itself. Can I safely say that our education system and policies to date are a big flop despite the glowing comments, achievements and accolades showered on us, and the students aceing their exams here and overseas in the best universities?

No, I am wrong, our education is the best in the world or among the best in the world? Really, then why are the new ministers talking about more changes and more good things to come? Ong Ye Kung said, ‘Singapore is in a position to develop its own system by combining the best of examples set by other countries.’ Did the past education ministers did this? No? Must be or else there is no need to talk about it now.

So, who has the best system for us to copy? The rigours of European education or the pragmatism of the American system? Actually in reality both the European and American systems are not that good except in the ranking systems and the biases built up over the years that they were good. The best education today is in India. The proof is in the pudding. Just look at the flood of Indian talents into our country. You can see them everywhere, in the private sector and the public sector, they are the leading light to bring Singapore forward to the next century. They have all the talents we need.

There is no reason to reinvent the wheel and hope for the best. Just adapt the Indian education system and we will have all the talents we need to bring the country forward.  Stop messing around and sending more missions overseas to study other country’s education system. We know which country has the best education system and we have been sending our recruitment agents there to get the best here.

But of course if change is a must, then think very carefully what education is all about. It would be good if education is just for education’s sake, to get an all round education. They called it holistic, hopefully not full of holes. Very few of our young have millionaire ministers as parents and can get a holistic education and no need to work after graduation. We do not need an education that produces misfits and duds that are not employable like what we are seeing today.

The most important thing said by Ong Ye Kung is this, ‘…One that requires employers, education institutions and training providers and society to more in tandem.’ What is the key missing in our education system today? Two words, employers and tandem. The educationists or MOE can have all their wet dreams of what education is all about and what they want. They can be very holistic to produce graduates who know a little of everything but in reality nothing, no skills. A wholesome person, knows a bit of this and that but no core skills that the employers want. Why would employers want such holistic graduates that did not have the skills they want? This could be the reason why the employers are going into little villages all over the 3^rd World, to dig into their dustbins, and say, these are the talents we need and want.

The employers must have a say in the education system. Or the employers must be handcuffed and told, you employ our graduates from our holistic system. Without the employers involved, without pointing a gun at the head of the employers to employ our best graduates from our world best education system, we are wasting the time and money of our children to get an education that would end up as a piece of paper, cannot be eaten.

It is ok to fool around, oops, sorry, wrong choice of words, on our education system. Let’s be real. Make sure their education ends up with good employment or make sure the employers must employ them. Be mindful of what you do to the education system and the lives of our young. This is not play play thing. Not masak masak. Many of them need to earn a living after passing out from our education system.

What do you think?