Diary of a CEO: 09/19/2004

2004/09/25

Taking the entire family to the series of Fullshot documentary festavial -- I watched " Life " 4 times already, so, go for " The taste of plum " is a flesh choice for me, and taking 2 kids to a documentary the first time is a new experience to them; Miss Kao adapt Director Chang's shooting philosophy, she move the camara and edit it to a controversail documentary; Sound falling asleep in the middle of the film, he must slept over one hours, when woke up and see the screen, it happen to be a scene of cutting deer's horn, this capture his attention , and he told me he love this fime very much, but when I told him he is being sleeping for an hour, he said to us that he only take a nap for 15 minutes. Fruit is like a worm on her seat, move and shake and kick her shoe, it anony the audience in front of her, she can't stand the film and keep saying that this is a boreing film.2 more hours is a little bit long compare to a normal movie, no to mention the content of doucmentary is totally different from a drama; but I still see kids at her age sitting still and enjoy this long story.

I draft my monthly letter to all the enployee, I called it " a CEO chat ", what did a CEO do in the office ? this is in almost every employee's mind , I will try to explain to them on a monthly basis. to build the intimacy with different layer of employee in our company.

the rail way sushi wasn't impressed us a lot, the samply food demostrate in the train cabinet wasn't what we can enjoy at the ready to eat cabinet, this is like a cheat, to seduce you to the table, then asking you to order from the menu instead of having every delicious presentation on the train table. We will not go again. it's expensive as well.

2004/09/24

this is an aminated picture draw by my brother in law.

「Sending Gift」on 3 major festival in Chinese socielty is a common tradition to follow from generation to generation, yesterday, I digested to a new finding, which is an intepretation of " Don't forget me " gesture, 「Returining favor」then can be treated as " I remember you ", the art of sending gift have been a highly appreciated people skill in Chinese ( or Asian / or the whole World ) community; once a Japanese friend told me about a " sending gift " story, he said there once a very rich entertainment cologmerate who wish to send his appreciation to a TV station executive, as it may cause a concern of conflict of interest and corruption / bribery linkage, the boss send the top beef to the station executive -- the KOBE beef, as the flesh meat can only preserve for 12 hours, the receiver have to cook it and eat it immediately, it left no crue of any gift but the paper which wrapped the beef, interesting Humm?

the 3 major Chinese festival are : Lunar New Year, Moon Festival and Dragon Boad Festival; Moon Festival will come on next Tuesday, this week is the busy week for sending gift, I am wondering how big is the enterprize market for moon cake -- the standard gift pack for the festival, and the turn around rate for each pack -- think the receiver send it our for another perosn and the moon cake circulate around; my attitude for this year's gift is " to return the favor passively ", I didn't prepare any moon cake in advacne, but to return for those who send in, returning favor is an even situation. but the fat in moon cake is so high, according to the news, it may high up to 35% of the fat; this is defenitely not healthy at all. I've thinking the returning favor for next year should be the fruit pack, maybe order from the earthquake impact zone.

it seems Sound have been accepted by Forest, the 60% instinct wins, I didn't win the lottery but for this, worth a million times than any cash prize, hope this is not a dream.

Take half day off yesterday to alter my depression about Sound's possible drop out form Forest , I called my wife and said to her that I will met her at SOGO where she exercised everyday; meet at Prads shop, she bought a nylon skirt, this is the wedding anniversary gift for her, next Tuesday will be our 17th anniversay of marriage.

Had a susi launch in the basement restaurant, a chain of KO, the susi is good, after lunch, we decided to go for a art film " 10 minutes old ", she drove to the parking lot at Shemingting, we bought 2 tickets and enjoy our Late before the screening, during the waiting time, our conversation focus on Sound's situtation, we found that we are too ingore about him for the past years and didn't pay decent attention on his growth, thanks to the Forest, this 2 weeks close observation give us new ispiration, to think more about our kids, about his potential ADSD syndrome and a educational process for parent to think, our conclustion is : no matter Forest keep Sound or not, he is our child, this factor won't change and we have to look after her for as long as we could.

10 minutes old is pretty experimental, 9 directors producting 9 episode, 3 of the epsodes which I found interesting and more approching, one is a picture of an old man and his memories about the youth days and the man's thoughs about young, woman, desire ..... very itimacy to me; another is a film talking about time," the present of past is memory, the present of future is expectation, and the longer of present will create more memories " , Goda ( wrong spelling )'s film is the thrid one which inspired me, like mapping the puzzle, he use very short films to come up with the concept of " Time ", I like the way he intepretate things.

we went home and pick up Fruit and for for a Hot Pot dinner, we found this place last week , and l love the mutton they provide, tender with no sheep smell, soup is good and the restaurant is clean; in the restarant, I ran into a person who come and say hello to me, I hardly remember him until he told me he is the person who worked in the real estate company and helping us locate the house in Roservelt Road, this bring back my memory, that was 7 years ago when my wife is preganet -- Sound didn't come to the earth yet, during the dinner , we don't feel comfortable, me and my wife, cause we are always feel that somebody's watching, I pay both bills for grtitude of his helping years ago and to end a rebuilded relationship so to speak.

in the car back home, I said to my wife that this re-house agent must think hard about how to inititative conversation with me during the whole dinner, and I am cautious about his amitious, if this is the human nature, I may be him when seeing some big shot in public places, and thoes big shot may think what I am thinking now, what a crazy idea and what a cruel and true world.

Documentary viewpoint last night on PTS showing the series of " Education Innovation ", this time, they highlight a primary school and how a shool president exercise the school as her persoanl stage to develop her relationship, a very intersting viewpoint, and we think the president must be very angry today.

Have a long coffee with J. the special assistant to us, he mentioned a few things :
1. the lack of accomplishment as a staff : I told him this is a " in control mentality ", when you don't control the resource of your own, you feel helpless to deliver result , and you don't feel the solid feeling of achievement, but a higher level of achievmenent are " Creating new Value " and " Power of Influence ", think about a man who only influence people and making others deploy the resource to his intention and to perform what the leader wished, this is a true leadership and true accomplishment. he may then think from this angle.
2. the role for me and COO : we are more and more looks the same and the complimentary role between us is less significant than before, this is an alarm bell, I should talk it over with COO and see how the functionality I should perform to eliminate this wrong imprssion.
3. Communication with all staff : I shall and will writing message to all user from next month and making it a communication platform to enlighen the spirit again, bringing new hope to all the employee is very important to me.
4. Identify potential talent in the company : I am asking him to help me locate new and potential talent to be deveoped, I will then follow to invite them for a chat.

Ali- the good guy called for a lunch, Fruit will soon join the school and under his supervison, a long time friend and a decent perosn.

2004/09/23

I must recreate the next value of me and to rebuild the confidence in me; I've been quite for too long, this is the sign of depressing, sign of isolation, sigh of withdraw and a sign of failure. No matter how hard the environment and how awful the situation, I am better off than most of the people, I am not starving, not out of job, not in huge debt, not suffer from losing of any beloved; attitude determine the feeling of happiness, I should not forget how I set my cellar phone opening screen " Happiness is decided by oneself ", I need to put myself together, finding a new interest area, new goal ( or to achieving goals I set earlier this year ) and new energy.

Had a relativity long conversation with sounds teaching at Forest Primary School, this gentleman again emphasis on his symbol of ADHD, from the conversation we conducted , I found the evaluation of his adeptness to the school will be a serious test for them, the 2 weeks probation should be ended today, the trial study for 2 weeks is for school, kids and parent to think if Forest is the idea place for the children, I subtlely elaborate the question of " Does the school accept him ? " but the answer is not positive, then I learn a few things about Sound which I didn't pay decent attention before :

1. His people skill or interaction skill with others -- no matter they are kids with the same age or adult, he have problem developing an appropriate relationship with, according to the teacher, he don't know how to make friend with in the peer group, his initiative may even hurt other kids feeling, as for developing relationship with adult, he don't trust them, it take decent time for him to trust adult.
2. Distract by other attraction -- he will be easily seduced or team-up with influence group even they lead him to misbehaver activity, he didn't know how to tell the good guy from the bad guy, as long as someone want to play with him, he treat them as friends, he didn't have the cautions to tell who will hurt him.
3. Emotion in reaction - yell, cry, shout are very often perform when he don't feel right, losing patient in communication with others when in confrontation.
4. Can't be discipline -- always out of conditions and didn't know what to do by the guidance, the ' lost of order " make him a heavy caring kids among other student.

the message from his teacher is clear, Sound didn't improve in his second week of trial study, I feel depress, as we found some great improvement in him over the weekend, the significant behavior change means nothing to the teacher; all I can say is this is the fortune he must face, what a parent can do is understand his deficit and help him whatever we can.

If his entry trial study were rejected, we have to put him back to the normal educations system, as least, all of us ( me, my wife and Sound ) learn a great lesson of how to fairly treat and respect one another; we are prepared, and hope Sound is prepared too.

2004/09/22

initiatative the first coffee break with new on board network engineering manager, he had 10 years experience in the ISP field, a pure techonical guy, Starbucks is the official place for me to conduct the conversation, I drink a bottle of sparking water instead of regualar coffee, asking him about the overall impression for the first 3 weeks with us, a few comments below:
1. appreciate the managers' meeting on every Monday, it gave him a broader view to learn the company operation, this is a flesh experience for him.
2. OP team - the operation maintainance engineering team, need a career before them, some of the staff work the routine for more than 2 years, he's afraid the borening routine and lack of career development will turn to a high turn over rate next year.
3. Back up bandwidth and resource is insufficient, as we scale up repidly, should consider this requirement to secure our service quality.

Dar enjoy aquaism and keep coral , seaweed at home, this is his after work habbit - a pretty expense one according to him, coral - live ones need attentive caring, he keep this habbit for 4 years already, good to know someone's habbit during the coffee.

G company come for second round of " Corporation " approach, this time, we pass the merge and acquisition topic as we reply before, and they focus on two direction -- jointly keep the cost down, take 200,000 plus cutomer base as a whole and devleop application / other service in non-ISP field for the win-win situation, we welcome his ( CEO ) Idea and set a 2 weeks internal brain storming time flame and go back to a more consolidate planning, I like the idea and the way they get near to us, but the CEO who cross his legs and lift one of the leg higher up then the meeting table wasn't a pleasant feeling, this is a basic respect to the party you held meeting with, one leg showing to every attendee will never please onyone. this is my observation.

A Long life is not good enough ; A Good Life is long enough ; this was quoted from " The committed life " a book I begin to read, this is truly inspiring wisdom, we never know how long we will live in the world, but as Woody Allen said from the movie " Nobody can get out this world alive ", every one will face the one and only fairness -- Death, you can only been there once, no more, no less and no matter how rich , poor, fame, no one can escape from it; so, how to live a " Good life " is quite a serious issue, how to commit to the one you love, the thing you believe and the way you do, maybe this is a Mid-life rejuvelization ( or crisis )

The Flying Dagger is a joke , Director Chang ruined his reputation too, I mean is and I am serious; me and my wife went to this movie last night, we watch it on a second-run theater, when the film opened at National Palace museum, it cause great promotion effect, this is the first time a commercial movie premier held at Palace museum, you can image the commotion caused there, I didn't go for the first run as I over heard bad critic about this movie; but my wife said she would like to check the custom / wardrobe as some articles in the magazines mentions about it, so we went last night; buying the bargaining ticket voucher -- 10 tickets for 600 NT, every ticket you can enjoy 2 films at the same time; the first 10 minutes of the film is brilliant, the art presentation, the color and the quality of camera well present this film, we were not disappointed, but after that, all the bad thing happened, a very bad and inconsistent story, good guy turn to bad guy, bad guy change to good guy, blind girl can see, dead man / girl walking, a fighting last for months ( from falling leaves to falling snows ), this is terrible, we heard more than 10 times of laughter during the screening, the laugh was not from us but other audience, they feel the same, this is a ridiculous film. So, I raised a lot of question after seeing it ( thanks God it gave me inspiration to think ):
1. This is a commercial release and apply for Venice Film Festival, how come the story didn't been iron to a logic development ?
2. Why these credited talent accept this terrible movie and join the promotion is such a big scale ( to save the box office because they knew without marketing, it will be dead ? )
3. Why Director Chang ruining himself ? I remember how touched I experiencing seeing his films such as " No one left " " Alive " " Lawsuit of ChiauChu ", why he not improving yet way back to a childish production ?
4. Why the investor didn't check the production stages from time to time and come up with this reduce film?
5. Why there no righteous reporter or critics telling us the truth about this film, I mean honestly.
6. The lines are so stupid as well, no sense , totally nonsense.

I draft the After break even guildance yesterday, haven't been doing power point for months, the result is OK, to make a hard and tough commitment is to set a goal in preferment way, in 2007, 50% of our revenue should come from non ISP business is the key message; didn't put myself in the " Working Status " in the office for too long, I am thinking how to bringing new interest in working, today, I will draft the " Full Contact Fighting " proposal for Kocoro and Firebird, I am not sure is the fighting will relate to Mafia or not, but an animated development will keep the story going without diving ourselves to a business we don't want to get involved.

is this our customers' need ? " Sex, blood, love, ? ", when watching espn broadcasting the extreme sport tournament, I found a world recognize hero in different standard, the player who paticipate on extreme sports are madeled with wounds they carry, the record of wound represent his credit to the fans, the closer they approach death, the greater they are, young and pursuing of speed and touch the blade of danger mixed the extreme games; in a secure and advance world, people will try to reduce the safety net and perform a even danger activity in order to win .......... win what ? Only they knows. I remember reading a book a few years ago, it talked about the extreme sports development cause more dead than before, such as climing everlasting mountain without carrying Oxysigent bottle or conduction risky exercise without safety equipment, and I recall the ' Free or freedom runner " those who are running like in the movie, amazing. I am talking too much without strach.

2004/09/21

Brighten Taiwan's smile is the theme for the national service industry conference; I was invited to attend this grand meeting on Monday, the scheduled full day meeting to highlight the next country development for Taiwan; the conference opened with President Chen's speech, I didn't pay attention to his wording as I am busy scheduling Professor Chuang's Life screening in President Theater; after the grand presentation, break-up meeting take places, I am sitting in the " Culture and Creative Service Industry " team which is chaired by Minster of Culture and Construction and Development ".

the presentation for the break up meeting is too long, it left only 30 minutes for attendee to exchange comment, but as the chairman is patient enough, it extended another 30 minutes for comments, in total 12 persons delivered their message and most of them hold opposition position in 3 flameworks , form MOEA - they are in charge of building the platform and access to skill / finance / tax related issue, for COMDA, they issue a " Activity based Culture event devlopment " and GIO raised " Revitalization of Movie Industry " as the flagship project for C and C Industry; Jonny Duan -- President of Rock Recoad accuse the mis-conduct of policy and regulation which jerpordize the music indusry, one professor from Shita challenge the ideology of context -- the culture event related to TAIWAN OR Chinese speaking territory ? and raise a great doubt about the " back groud " and " quality of people " who can embrass the culture event as natural as westerner.

If I didn't see the National Geogrophic documentary of " Mega structure " and they didn't introduce Dubai and the city in the city -- canel and the 100,000 new city in 10 years, I will not compare our flagship program -- how come we need 12 years to bring a new feel of movie industry -- what a trivial achievment , and Dubai can build the whole land less than 10 years, the effiency and commitment level is so different, how terrible our buauacicy system is ? gathering professionals , scholars , elites and officers in one room, having them release what they want to dump. then forget it, no action plan, no powerful commitment and of course, no proven result; we will take 12 years to survive a dying industry with no cure ? why ?

Life is a big bang in town, I am glad what we did really pay off, but the crowded and over booking tickets cause commotiond as well, I don't know if this is the purpose Director Wu expected, but at lease Hochen is not happy about it, I am fine, you know, what make my feel uncomfortable is the green painting, it from light green to deep green and it will draw a line for the common spirit -- rebirht; President Chen went to see it too early and his show up and support this film may hesitate people who hold different ideology, message of love is an universl language, I hope what I worried won't turn out to be a reality, and I hope those who wish to take advange of the film won't leverage on people's love and passion.

sharing with Professor Chung at noon for this, we share the same and he is very sensetive to it, we all agree that we have to check the other 3 films before drawing to assumption.

every event in Taiwan can easily been converted to political event, I am worry what professor's good intention will in vain.

2004/09/19

Love is the answer; just came back from the French movie " the choire " - the film talking about a rehibilitation school of abnormal behavior teenager, a teach how to use music as the medicine and bring those problem kid a new espect of life; as we know is is a " stroy ", but we were touched so much, why, because " Love is the answer ", eveyone know to use love as the tool can change a person entirely, but my question is : if we didn't shower with true love, how can we dilver the love to those who needed in proper manner ? the behavior correction house is totally different from the alternative education system -- when watching the movie, I knew what's in my wife's mind, the mis-behavior most come from a broken family and encouter with serious socialization problem, how to correct them should be different from how to educate them ; the I come up an assumption, I think those who beliver in " Human fisrt " and build the Forest Elementary School should follow the concpet of " No death panality ", because they all believe in human can be corrected and all believe that with care and love, things will getting better ; yes, this is experimental and this is a highly idea utopium; if what they beleive is true, then there won't be bad guy in the real world and then there won't be crimes; or, the cost of introduction such an idea eduction system is too hight, then people have to sacrifice from the real and curel world ?, no matter how condiderate you want to pretect next genaration or create a harmless environment, you can only control with a limitation, the encounter in the real world will come to you ultimately, no matter you like it or not; socialization is the process for preparing yourself to the world you can't escape.

I like the phase " whenever there a action, there is a reaction " this is quote from Fast Company; Last Friday night, Life -- the documentary film offically open in the therater, I was invited to the opening again, this is the 4th time I watch this film, the emotional level is getting lower, this is the marginal effect, I think those who sit beside me will find me instablily seated in the chair, I love the ending discussion, those powerful VIP delivered the message so deep and clear, their words are the best endosement to the film, I am glad to see what I choose to support win the first round, the the Sunday morning explored more, on Sat. all the seats are full , a lot of people want to see it but no seats avalibale, now the tipping point is reached, the word of mouth is spread out and the deed have been served.

Tonight before the movie, I simply said to my wife that for the last 6 months, no achievement knock on my door, I feel depressed and in low spirit, she undersand it, this is the short message we exchanged before the movie; movie is the only and best remendy to swift my foucs, it gave me new story and new experience, and it is the shelter for my soul escaping. is this good or bad ? I don't know.

Diary of a CEO