I resigned from the construction line last december 2012, so now it's been 7 months I'm not back into the line.
This week, I'm busy "helping" a friend to do some corporate job, henceforth why I didn't bother to update other blogs.
For a two-day corporate seminar training, the consultants giving preach and talks actually got paid more than my monthly pay in my previous engineering consultant company.
2 Day job versus monthly job. But then but then, it all depends with whom you're helping with.
For corporate jobs, I stick my guns and always collaborate with the non-malays friends. Because their jobs get paid more, simply because they command more confidence from companies than Malays.
Many factor weighs in, English, corporate mentality, etc, which Malay lacks than non-malays.
The malays tend to give talks motivational stuff, which tends to be preachy and sweet stuff but nonetheless, I find it useless, especially you are a positive-thinker, and believe me, to do business in corporate world, you need to be positive like the Navy seals/Marine that got trapped under fire from Iraqi insurgents.
Meanwhile, the non-malays focus more on the corporate stuff, talking about CSR, professional writing, those kind of programme that is worthwhile if you are walking up the corporate ladder.
Anyway, for all this "helping" job, I follow one rule which is I should play the "technical" part guy, never the superstar because that is the reason why I was asked to "help" in the first place.
Let the superstar deal with the clients and customers, I'll be the one preparing all the documents, and setting up stuffs, and keep my mouth shut behind the scenes.
This year's experience of doing "freelance helping jobs" teaches me the real reason why my previous consultant engineering boss once told me to drop off the "contractor" thinking line and use "consultant" thinking line, because consultants sells ideas, designs, or drawings, for business.
This is all about values.
Contractor mindset is different, the more you did, the more you got paid, the more OT, the more claim, the more VO job you do, the more money claimed from Client's office.
But not with consultants. Because consultant work on Fees, whereas contractor work on Claims. the thing is, even if Consultants do more paperwork for the job, you only got paid the same fee even though you made more paperwork, design drawing.
And let me be frank, most consulting jobs in this world don't get paid. That's why consultants knew how to distribute their claims periodically, they make sure they got paid before they start, and just after starting.
This is because contractors build the actual physical stuff, which worth and value can be evaluated physically in units, but not so for consultants who sells "ideas" or in construction line, "design ideas".
If once you learn the "ideas", then it depends on you whether you want to pay the teacher or not. And most people are bad students, once they learn, they will tell the teacher to go to hell.
Teaching and consulting are very much the same if viewed in this manner.
My previous boss from the engineering consultant told me many stories, when our Client refuse to pay after we gave out all our drawings and paperwork, in which there's nothing much we can do.
When consultants do not get paid, there's really nothing much can be done.
Because if they "make noise" about it, then they will lose other potential customers, and people wouldn't want to hire them anymore (anything negative about you resulting an overall negative image of you, no such thing as pity in corporate world).
If the consultants pressed too much about payments, then Clients and potential customers will get afraid also.
Experienced consultants know this, so most consultant companies, don't pay big salaries to staffs, because they always allocate certain portion of funds to run the company in case of not getting paid, or not getting any job.
Experienced consultants also played a delicate game with Client/Customers, in which respect is a pillar in this game. Loss of respect will result in loss of profit, no matter how knowledgable you are.
It is all about value, and how much people are willing to pay you is a physical measure of value.
That's why sometimes teachers and lecturers, especially the males, no matter how great or smart the student is, we don't care and we don't give a flying F about the student, we usually draw a line on how close the student can get to you.
Because students are all are like migrating birds, they just be nice to the locals at each place they rested in, but once they had to fly off, they will just forget about the place they rested at.
That's why, do not get sentimental with people in the teaching or consultant line.
It is all about value.
Another example, for this Ramadhan month, there is a dish called Roti John which I like.
The bloody problem with Roti John is, the price of RJ depends on the location of the market. Not because of quality.
In Kajang, the price of RJ differs much.
In Taman Zamrud area, RJ sells around RM2.50 to RM3.00 but never more.
The price in "Kajang Prima" area in Friday wet-market, is around RM2.50-RM3.00, as well as the price of RJ sold in Ramadan market located near Penjara Kajang.
But, if you got to a Ramadan market located near to the Giant big supermarket, (near the Saujana Impian area), the same thick RJ sells at the cheapest price of RM 3.80 to RM 4.50.
The RJ have the same taste, same bread thickness yet the price differs with location.
The reason is, the household near the area that sells cheap RJ, are household for the common guys (poor), but where RJ is expensive, the household in the area are more exclusive (more rich), so the rich guys don't mind paying more for the same RJ.
The Ramadan market near Giant, which sells the expensive RJ, are near to Saujana Impian area, which is where many exclusive people lives, even the actress Nora Danish grew up there, I believe.
That is Malay Muslim business for you. That is what the actual Malay Muslim economics for you. It's not the quality that matters.
It looks bastardly hypocrite, but that is what actually happens. They love talking of stories of Quran, and stories of the Prophet and his Companions, but they are willing to sell food prices at expensive prices just because of profiteering.
People are willing to pay more when they starve, in the end, the Roti John price depends on the how willing are the people in the area to pay for the same Roti John in the Ramadhan fasting month.
It's all about value.
http://www.themalaysianinsider.com/malaysia/article/sowho-is-shooting-the-teachers-and-why
"It seems that the lives of teachers have no value," Normala told Harakahdaily.