The 2008/09 Merdeka Award 3rd Lecture Series brought the inevitably interesting Royal Professor Ungku Aziz Ungku Abdul Hamid, the winner of the Merdeka Award for the Education & Community category. The event held at the Kuala Lumpur Convention Centre attracted a sizeable audience. Entitled Quest for Success, it was claimed by Pak Ungku as his favourite subject to talk about. The lecture was divided into 4 different parts. He also suggested some books for each part.
1) Food, Diet and Health: What to eat for success?
Ungku Aziz is 87 years old, and yet he is obviously still wise, and apparently is still fit physically. What does he eat?
“People always ask me about my diet that made me so strong until today. I really don’t want to get into that conversation. I always told them to take a big onion and eat it raw, once, or perhaps twice a day. That usually ends the conversation!”
Ending the comical anecdote, he says that he eats lots of salad. And he eats salad as the food, not a side dish or an appetizer. He takes them at least twice a day. In the morning, Pak Ungku takes a glass of water, and never takes anything but fruit until lunch.
Basically, our diet should be a poise of protein vs starch, meat vs non-meat etc. For example, if we take lots of starch, balance it by taking lots of veggies. Essentially, there must be a good balance between cooked food (or junk food!) and life food.
Take optimum amount of water, that is about 3-4 small bottles per day. Shockingly, it is not good to take water while eating. Only drink water about half an hour after having your meal. This will avoid the water from diluting the nutrients in our food.
Ungku Aziz drinks lots of tea, and considers coffee as not good for the body and mind. Juices are good, so long as you squeeze them yourself instead of taking them out of the juice box from the supermarket shelves. Also, eat lots of raw fruit.
Lastly, Pak Ungku says: SUGAR IS POISON!!!
Suggested book:
Fit for Life, not Fat for Life by Harvey Diamond, 200.
2) Tools for Success: How to think for success?
Pak Ungku is a personal friend of Edward de Bono, the forefront writer of lateral and creative thinking. He buys almost all of de Bono’s thinking skills, which are elaborated in his books.
“Just look into any of de Bono’s book. Any book will do, because these writers, they just ‘goreng’ the same thing over and over again and produce new books every year!”
Among of de Bono’s famous thinking skills are
· PO = use a stimulating word to start thinking. Say ‘PO!’, or any other word that stimulates your brain to start working.
· AGO = Aims, Goals and Objectives.
· COF = Consider all factors
· OPV = Other person’s point of view.
· APC = Alternatives, Possibilities, and Choices.
Don’t accept things as they are. There are always alternatives in everything.
Avoid falling into the intelligent trap, which is standing to firmly on your argument. The more you argue, the more you think that you are right.
Mind mapping is also a good way of thinking in order. Ungku Aziz share some of the mind map taken from Tony Buzan’s book.
Suggested Books:
Thinking Course by Edward de Bono, 1982
The Mind Map Book by Tony Buzan, 1982
Head First by Tony Buzan, 1993
3) Philosophy of Strategies: How to go about being successful?“You all familiar with the word ‘KIASU’? It simply means ‘I win, you loose’. Singaporeans are a good example of kiasu people!”
To be successful, one needs to decide their principles. What length are you willing to go to be successful? Famous figures in history have lined up some options on this. Being kiasu, is of course, is one principle you can apply.
To strategize means to plan ahead. A good plan takes into consideration all factors, and they must be based on a basic principle. One good strategy to be successful is to create something out of nothing. ‘Skim Cepat Kaya’ is a good example of creating something out of nothing, but of course the moral value in that is very much questionable. The insurance scheme is also a product of creating something out of nothing, and those are very much accepted. Ungku Aziz himself coined the idea of forming Tabung Haji, an idea to help the poor to be able to perform the Hajj, and that idea came out of nothing.
Master Sun Tzu listed down 5 fundamentals of strategy in his famous ‘The Art of War’;
• The Way = the common goal for motivation
• The Heaven = Nature, environment
• The Earth = situation (near, far, easy, difficult)
• The Command = Leadership
• The Discipline = Organisation and chain of command.
Many thinks that ‘the cause justifies the deed’ (matlamat menghalalkan cara) is a wrong way of getting things done, but ironically, it was those leaders that was loved by his people. Tun Mahathir is undoubtedly very Machiavellian during his 23 year as Malaysian Prime Minister, but still many Malaysian would give anything to have him back as Prime Minister now. It is a matter of knowing how to be feared and loved at the same time. Be a fox, and be a lion. Be cunning, and be furious.
Suggested Books:
The 36 Strategies of the Chinese: Adapting An Ancient Chinese
Wisdom to the Business World by Wee Chow Hou & Lan Luh Luh, 1988
The Art of War by Sun Tzu (2,500 years ago)
The Prince On the Art of Power by Niccolo Machiavelli, 1532
4) Leadership: Be the one who heads success.
“With a compass and a map, you should never be lost”.
Being lost is a crisis. But crisis is an opportunity to do things that cannot be done during calmness. Crisis is opportunity. It is during economic crisis that working people became entrepreneurs. It is during war that soldiers become heroes. It is during trade disputes that Union Leaders become fighters for workers’ rights. It is during critical surgeries that doctors become life saviors.
It is just a question of whether you want to become a vanguard or a mud guard.
Dequared says, ‘I think, therefore I am’, Unku Aziz says ‘I lead, therefore I am’.
Do you want to become a manager or a leader?
“Politicians are not managers…they are lousy managers!”
Suggested books:
Leader’s Window by J.D.W Beck & N.M Yeager, 1994
Level 5 Leadership by Jim Collins, HBR 2001
Aku seorang jejaka metro
