PRFOILE OF JAMES OH AS AT AUG 2018

JAMES OH Chartered Accountant (registered with Malaysia Institute of Accountants), BA (Accountancy) LLB – University of London (UK) Certified Professional Trainer with IPMA (UK), PSMB Certified Trainer Competent Communicator with Toastmaster International. James Oh comes to you as a financial, wealth and mindset specialist. He is an avid thinker, mind-explorer, leader and intensive researcher with more than 30 years of professional working experience in various industries such as trading, construction, aviation, movies investment and distribution. He is richly exposed to both local and international businesses, especially in the negotiations with the world leading aviation financiers, insurance and reinsurance brokers. In the course of his practice, James had held senior specialist, supervisory, managerial and leadership positions by providing success oriented strategic and operational plans to nurture the companies that he had served. His track record includes nurturing a growing company with its founder and obtained a listing for the company on the stock market. He also helped turn the company around when it was badly hit by the Asian Financial Crisis in 1996-1997. James has been featured in numerous media several times. The media include top investment magazine i.e. Smart Investor Magazine, Financial First, Money Compass, Homefinder, FlyMe360, Property Insight, Corporate Voice Journal (MAICSA), Malaysian Institute of Insurance, Journal of Wealth Planning and Management. His articles have been selected and published for the consecutive year in Mira's limited copies of investment supplements for 2016 & 2017. As a writer and researcher, he has also published eight books, specialising in financial literacy, value creation and thinking skills. He has sold his books both locally and internationally through E-Sentral, Smashwords, and Lulu.com. James is a leading authority in the area of business strategy, sustainable growth and innovation.

BUSINESS FINANCE FOR NON FINANCIAL PROFESSIONALS In this Uncertain, Volatile, Complex and Ambiguous business world, there is not only a need to understand financial information, but also to be able to read beyond its facts and figures. As companies strive to sustain its business, sound and appropriate decisions need constantly and consistently to be made to that effect. To play the game well, every player needs to know exactly how to score for their companies. By equipping themselves with the appropriate financial know how, intelligence, participants are in better position to manage their businesses’ operation in terms of revenues, costs, profits and cash. They, therefore, are empowered to make more effective and wise business decisions. This workshop will provide basic financial principles and cover generic financial management tools necessary for decision making. Learning is achieved via case studies, brainstorming and stimulation, to reinforce the theory taught. Participants will also undergo a highly interactive exercises and real life situation which will assist them to experience how transactions are affect the financial statements and what are the key drivers that will lead them to succeed. They will also be taught prepare periodic financial statements via exercise. Financial statements • Understand the key components of a financial statements ; • Familiarise with the business Finance & Accounting terms ; • Apprehend the key underlying accounting concepts used in the preparation of financial statements; • Aware the limitations of Financial Statements; • Quick eye-bird view through 9 pointers; Business Analysis • Know how to interpret financial statements ; and • Analyse the business relationship using the appropriate financial ratios; • What financial statements tell us and what they wouldn’t; • Apply Strategic Thinking to Enhance Business Performance Cash Operating Cycle • Understand the cash operating cycle and what affects a company’s cash flow ; • Monitor and Manage the cash operating cycle Costing • Know the different categories of costs which exist and their implications on costing ; • Understand costing concepts, and apply them in making business decisions Profit versus Cash • Understand the difference of the impact of the transaction on profit and cash ; • Be clear why cash is king! Warning Signals • Discover and appreciate what some of the clear warning signals found in financial statements

OFFICIAL CORPORATE ANNOUNCEMENT

official announcement Grace to everyone, Pleased to announce that my joint venture with the renown training provider, Quantum Leap is still in existence despite being diagnosed with the big C.. and undergoing treatment for it. For more information on this joint venture, please click on the link below: http://www.quantumleap-seminar.com/?s=James+Oh My grateful thanks and appreciation to Mr. TK Chan for giving me an opportunity to promote my enterprise through this platform. This also signals the start of a long lasting business relationship and I am indeed privileged to have Mr. Chan as one of my collaborators. I am indeed blessed to be able to focus on developing new courses to cater for the needs and demands of potential customers. As such, I am seeking more collaborators to help market these training programs. This is a much needed income as I need to generate income to support my family especially my two kids who are currently pursuing tertiary courses. Grateful if anyone can contact me should there be any interest in my programs. Cheers and look forward to hearing from you, With unconditional love, James Oh

MY HEARTFELT THANKS TO TRANSMILE

My heartfelt thanks to Transmile

Hi everyone,

Heartfelt thanks to Transmile for giving me an opportunity to attend the IATA courses as a reward for my sterling performance in the co where I managed to deliver several milestones. Attached below are the certs I have collected from my overseas courses.

The overseas exposure was awesome as I was not only able to enhance my knowledge and know how, but also gain confidence especially when different viewpoints on a given case study surfaced and we could discuss and deal with it very professionally and amicably.

On one occasion I was given a chance to deliver my viewpoints which contradicted with the viewpoints of another senior finance executive from another overseas airline. Surprisingly my group members gave me a wholehearted support and agreed with my viewpoints. .Hmm!! I may have some hidden potential and talents after all. I began to gain more and more confidence and was not afraid to accept more and more challenges. I was able to tackle any tasks albeit those with differing or controversial ideas. My outlook and perspectives broadened correspondingly.

I believe this is one of the best and healthy practices if one wants to progress. Perhaps our education system should be more holistic and the students should be taught to think out of the box. They should not be spoon fed. This is now reflected in our examinations which focus on high order thinking skills (HOTS) questions. In this way, our society and country can progress further.

My hope and vision for the future are that no one should be denied an education because of poverty or other irrelevant reasons. Education should be accessible to all. This is practised by some overseas universities.

Secondly, I hope as our nation progresses the people’s mind would as be opened to accept views which are different and access things from different perspectives.

Please share your views. I would love to hear them.

With unconditional love,

James Oh

TRANSMILE WAS MAKING THE WRONG SHIFT THAT LED TO ITS DEMISE

Transmile was making the wrong shift that led to its demise.

Happy day, everyone.

Transmile is the company that I served the longest. It offered me a platform where I was initially given a free hand to put into practice the concept of lean finance which I have learnt from one of the previous companies which I have served and had implemented the 3S successfully.

My past experience with the other companies I served helped me to navigate the lean finance indicators to constantly improve the company performance. I was very fortunate to be able to master these skills through fine tuning my approach and know how from time to time.

However, this approach was set aside after I was removed from the financial division. I was tasked by the top management to focus and lead the internal audit and risk management unit. I was able to craft the charter for the unit which was approved by them but was never utilised for reasons best known to themselves. As a result, this unit was unable to function as it lacked support from the management.

Prior to my removal from the finance unit, I had achieved many amazing milestones. When I joined the company, it was given a debenture holder to a bank. I also managed to get another bank not only to take over the loan but also to offer it on clean facilities (without collateral securities) with much better rates and conditions.

To achieve this I have to think outside the box to create feasible term loans from the bankers' perspectives in order that they are comfortable enough to grant us facilities on a clean basis.

On top of that, I also took the initiatives to explore cross-border leasing but it could not proceed further as the loan sum was too small.

Other initiatives I adopted was natural hedging where we matched our foreign income with our payments to minimise our forex exposure risk.

Since we are an aviation company, fuel costs can be quite daunting and measures should be taken to ensure its consumption was used efficiently. Naturally, it will be wiser for us to embark on fuel hedging to lock in our profit especially for our fixed term contracts.

I hope I have provided you some insights into the tasks of a financial controller and certain financial tools. I hope that all these will be useful to you all. At the height of my career we also managed to access the Llyold market directly to obtain unbelievable rates for our fleet. I was initially proud to be one of the pioneers of the company. I had put my heart and soul into turning many adversaries into blessings.

On the operations side, my ongoing implementation of certain practices has helped to improve our efficiency by close monitoring and attention to details. The daily collection, cash flow, daily fuel consumption and loading report were always on my radar system.

I have also introduced and implemented short-term strategies, apart from profit rationale exercise, to address the ASEAN financial crisis and reposition our aircraft globally to achieve sustainable business growth and profitability during my term as financial controller cum internal audit head.

I was ever ready to learn and implement anything that was worthwhile and benefited the company. It was also for my own pride, fulfillment as well as my satisfaction. This was the company I prided myself to be in and I was willing to put in all my foresight and business acumen to make it a reputable and well-established venture.

However, it was not meant to be like that. The top management has a different vision from mine. They were unscrupulous and mismanaged the company which led them to go against the law and some of them are now battling criminal charges.

I am so thankful that I am not one of them who were blinded by greed. Thank God for leading me to the right path.

Hope you find this post interesting and useful. Stay tuned for more stories about my experience.

With unconditional love,

James Oh

TRANSMILE - TURNING POINT OF MY CAREER

TRANSMILE - TURNING POINT OF MY CAREER

Turning point of my career

Greetings from Malaysia,

In my preceding post, I mentioned that I was successful in making a claim from the insurance company. As a result, I was given more and more responsibilities. However, this proved detrimental to me. As I demonstrated my capabilities I attracted competitions and backstabbing from some of my cohorts who are possessed with crab mentality. My abilities and flexibility to handle tough situations led to my downfall. I was not appreciated as the top management considered me a threat.

I was then assigned the unenviable task of investigating the practices of the top management’s relatives. I found some malpractices and some which infringed the law but was not given a free hand to handle them. Then I suggested to let the relevant authorities to investigate my findings. The top management turned a deaf ear and refused to take any actions. I was at a loss as to what to do.

My hands were tied and I could not do anything. I was so frustrated but could not leave the company as I was the sole breadwinner.

I then decided to take a firm stand and decided not to pursue further. They then decided to remove me from the internal audit to yet another unit. This time I was to work together with those I was asked to investigate earlier. I was very very miserable and was pushed into a corner and isolated.

Thankfully not long after that the authorities came and discovered that they had fraudulently inflated and overstated their revenues. This eventually led to the demise of the company.

However, rumours were being circulated outside in the business world about the company. The human resource manager had no choice but to force every staff to execute a non-disclosure agreement to cover up all unhealthy practices. However, it is impossible to cover the raging flame with a piece of paper. This shocking news spread like wildfire throughout the media and several top management were charged for falsified accounts.

Thank you, Lord, for sustaining me and guided me not to give in and collaborated with them. I am grateful to Him for giving me the wisdom and the strength to repeal the oppression from the top management of the company. After the turbulence, I have emerged a much stronger person and are able to take up any challenges.

Stay tuned for more exciting insider stories,

With unconditional love,

James Oh

PREDICTION VS CONTROL SITUATION

'The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function.' F. Scott Fitzgerald 

3 DAYS COURSE OUTLINE - LEAN FINANCE

LEAN FINANCE - ENHANCE YOUR FINANCE INTELLIGENCE SKILL AND CAPABILITIES                                                                   

SYNOPSIS

Bring your finance function to the next level of success with lean Finance! Discover how you can provide management with daily performance information needed to support continuous improvement to your organization’s practices and processes. By applying Lean principles, you can provide real-time quantitative insights to the performance of business processes, thus enabling management to take corrective actions and be in control of the processes.

With this, you can reap the benefits that lean finance generates in the form of better quality, shorter lead times as well as the added capabilities gained from personnel, equipment and space.

TRAINING OBJECTIVES:

This programme seeks to enable you to:

  Understand how Lean Finance will lay a Foundation for Success

  Understand the Critical Roles of the Finance Function

  Provide highly competitive competence in your performance,  

 Apply the tools and techniques to provide real time quantitative insight into performance of processes,

  Understand the unprecedented pressure to eliminate waste, boost efficiency and freeing up capacity,

  Eliminating non-value added activities and freeing resources to accelerate lean journey,

  Cultivate a mind-set of continuous improvement

  Do it right the first time and every time

  Use metric to shape behaviour

  Make real improvement by aligning operations to value stream 

COURSE OUTLINE
Day I

Icebreaker

MODULE: 1

Lean Principles and Practices

What are lean principles and practices?

How do they work?

Direct, drive and deliver Value creation through 5Rs

What are 5Rs?

How those 5Rs being employed through Lean Implementation?

MODULE: 2

Financial, Non- Financial Ratios and Lean Performance Indicators

Back to Basics

Why numbers are important?

Numbers are the language of Business Improvement

How to read the story beyond the numbers?

What are the lagging and leading indicators?

Value Stream Concept, approach and uses

What are the “Plain English” Statements?

Metric measurements, how to develop and use them?

MODULE: 3

Holistic Approach

What are the 6Ps?

How to unleash your potentials?

Cause and consequence
How to effectively transformation from Tradition to LEAN?

How to Learn and Grow?

Day II

MODULE: 4

Lean Accounting, Qualitative Aspects and Essential Skill

What is Lean Accounting?
Quality aspects in term of needs, gaps and culture; how to assess
Shape team purpose and productivity; how to
Adopt best practices

Metric measurements shape behaviour: how to

How to apply new strategic tools to create value for the company by looking beyond financial statements
How to effectively employ the new strategic tools and technique? 
Sum up / Q & A / Discussion

MODULE: 5

Qualitative aspects

The following issues will be covered:-

a.     Integrity

b.     Lean thinking

c.     In pursuit of perfection

d.     Culture of empowerment

e.     Conscious to unconscious competencies

f.      Dynamic, enthusiastic, energetic

g.     Innovative, multi- dimensional perspectives

h.     Culture of empowerment

MODULE: 6

Big picture of the organization Success

Use key performance indicators aligned to value creation; how to

Different perspectives and definitions:-

a.     Business acumen,

b.     Enhance Shareholders’ value,

c.     Understand their role in the big picture

d.     In pursuit of Perfection (concept and uses)

End of Day II

Day III

MODULE: 7

Economic and Business Outlook

What need to be done in this Uncertain, Volatile, Complex and Ambiguous World;

Change is certain & how to embrace change mind-set? Discussion

Why and how to focus on new opportunities & priorities

Adopting growth mindset
How to learn, Unlearn and relearn

MODULE: 8

Focus Area, Key opportunities and Priorities

What are the key challenges and opportunities

Mastery, departure and making transformation

Redefine your destination

Lean is a journey per se

How to bring those lessons to your organisation

Lean driver

MODULE: 9

A Plan to Take Home

This session will challenge the participants to think about roadblocks and pitfalls to Lean implementation

Sum Up/ Q & A

Key take-back messages

END OF DAY 3

MINDSET

“Men are not prisoners of fate, but prisoners of their own minds.” - Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Discuss.

It seems that not many people aware of this fact, and no wonder they are subject to manipulation by other who use this opportunity for their own favour.

ENTREPRENEUR THINKING SKILL

"The best way to predict the future is to invent it." Alan Curtis Kay.  

Discuss by commenting on the column provided below.

YOU SURELY GET WHAT YOU LASER FOCUS

You Surely Get What You Laser Focus On

In fact, we are so blessed with a powerful mind that once connected to the Universe our ability to bring out any manifestation into reality is unlimited. This is because all things happen just by way you intended them to be. Sounds simple but not easy to master this skill where your energy will flow to the way you intended to. Hence, practice to stay focus on your goal and the result will eventually turn out exactly from your manifestation. Deliberate practice will make permanent progress. Practice! Practice! Practice that is.

Energy Flow Freely and Naturally. 

Our body function just as a conduit harnesses electricity which naturally flow in a particular-direction no matter what. Similarly, our thoughts once harnessed and directed by our ability to stay focus,  will results in our mind being  "tuned in", “rewired “or “reprogrammed” .

Once we are focused on any event, feeling, or phenomenon in our lives; our success is a surety. The more frequent and longer we focused on that particular sensation, the stronger the feeling we receive from it. Does it make sense to you now? Hence, we always said energy flows where attention/ intention goes. Wherever we focus our attention/intention, energy automatically follow and result will eventually show with action. I must affirm to the accurate effect in my entire life journey so far and it is not luck, as some friends thought.

Therefore, it is crucially important to have sufficient, uninterrupted rest and sleep to recharge your mind appropriately. Once you find your body truly relaxed and recharged, you will be ready to undertake the direction to change for the better. Everything will unfold by itself, and connections to the appropriate people, places or things will take place with ease. In short it is effortless as the energy flows naturally, freely as the way we manifested. That's being "tuned in" or whatever label you normally used.

Attention flows where energy goes. 

Your attention will then be directed / drawn to where the energy was flowing. The energy could easily be like a bright light shining in your eyes naturally. All these energies have affected the senses and its impact will be very much dependent on the intensity, and concentration on our focus point. The more concentrated and intensified our attention, the greater effects on your body and/or behavior. You, too, may have probably experience such effects by your own influence of energy on your environment. Please be more mindful and share with us your experience, if any.

Energy flows where Intention goes. 

Now you see that it boils down to your intention in the first place as it will then direct your energy accordingly. Your source must be right and clear in the first place. Once the source is in place, the rest will follow suit smoothly and easily. Your intention will serve as your GPS and let your GPS be your Captain to direct all your energies. Be comfortable with this weird situation through practice.

Result Shows Where Intention Goes

By synergizing your focus and intention, all energies both from internal and external sources will cooperate in a very harmonious manner to make things happen in the way you directed. It is so harmonious and peaceful that it does not cause any struggle at all. Everything you wished for will naturally and eventually turn out effortlessly, just like the butterfly transformed from the cocoon. Sounds too good to be true? This is because our natural minds probably played the old trick so that you not believe in this simple truth. If it is so, then tame your mind to this effect as our mind naturally want to stay in control and calm to protect us. Follow the natural flow, is against the way we conditioned our mind from the environment we are brought up and more inclined to be intuitive in nature.

Everything is Energy. 

Why I said so?Probably by now, you may have read many books which advocate the same common thing at the end of the day. Those books were written and advocated to one common thing that we can create anything if we can conceive in our mind and truly believe in it. This is because once you have formed the clear image/picture through visualization; energy will flow where your intention directs it to. The movement of the energy is so important for your conscious self to make things crystallize to reality. That’s simple. Momentum will be gathered like the snowball gaining momentum.
By doing so, you basically create your reality by following your energy patterns, and through laser focus and intent that manifest either what you want or what you don't want in your life. The energy is neutral. It goes where you direct it, hence you "get what you exactly focus on." Keep asking yourself as what would you intend to bring into your world today until you find one and make it happen?

CREATIVE VISUALIZATION

Hi everyone,

I have  great news for you. The great news is to help you to realize 

your potential to achieve utmost best version of you.

As some of you may be  well aware that Creative Visualization is a 

far more than just a secret prescribed by extraordinary achievers. It’s

the simplest proven recipe for you to reprogram your subconscious, 

so you experience more success in almost any area of your life. If 

you think our mind is powerful, our subconscious mind is 9 times 

more powerful than our mind. Now, you can imagine how much 

power you can harness, should you master this skill. Here, we intend

to train people to master the form and flow with the formless.

 It doesn’t matter if you want to drive a newer car, take a 5-star family vacation, find a way to get a pay raise, or even if you want to totally transform your life. Creative Visualization is the key. 

What are you waiting for? Come and join us and look out for our 

courses which we will announce from time to time.

Cheers and look forward to seeing you,

James Oh 

Chief Value Creation Specialist 

FINANCE MAVERICK, SPEAKER AND AUTHOR  

http://jamesoh2003.blogspot.com

WHAT LEAN FINANCE ABOUT?

Lean finance if done properly will create strong united teams that will lead team members to do what they are supposed to do. This is part of the cultural change, and the ongoing improvement that comes from lean.

People are then getting more comfortable with an execution-oriented culture and a can-do attitude. That drives them to be impatient for change. They are saying “Why can’t I do it now?”

As such, Lean is something more than just cost reduction. It’s reducing time-to-market, it’s improving service quality, it’s reducing risk exposure, it’s increasing employees’ quality of life. It’s also cost reduction, but the point is to obtain all these other benefits simultaneously.

If you agree and want to reap the benefits lean has promised; look out for our lean courses. 

James Oh 

Value Creation Specialist 

FINANCE MAVERICK, SPEAKER AND AUTHOR 

http://jamesoh2003.blogspot.com

SEPTEMBER 2016 PROGRESS

Dear Friends, followers and Fans, 

September month appeared to be a bit slow for us as we continue to strengthen our foundation by creating few new courses, namely Valuing Investment, Transform Strategies to Results in today's highly competitive market AND Enhance the success of your strategic plans through higher thinking skills and innovation.

However, we never set aside our articles' publication.  One is in Homefinder which has in turn transformed its mode to digital form. Visit http://homefinder.com.my/maintenance-repair/empty-your-mind/ for more info. 

We continue to take advantage of this wave by collaborating with more parties to serve the community which desperately needs more effective solutions to endure these hard times ahead. In this note, we are very fortunate to find more liked mind people to accelerate our journey. 

With this progress, I proudly announced my service as  a value creation specialist with Western Academy Sdn Bhd to front all our HRDF courses and associate trainer with IABT Advanced Business training Sdn Bhd to serve our financial community. 

By leveraging on these two platforms we will definitely accelerate our journey and expand our roles and functions.

One thing I must say , thank you for all the supports you all have given to us. Without your support, we strongly believe all these will remain in our dream.

Cheers and stay tune for more updates