Written by Tanya
On 17 June 2019, we were privileged to have Bro Heng Hao (“Hao”) give us a talk on innovation through Buddhism, personal branding and smart volunteering.
The title of Hao’s talk is “Why Listen to Me?”. The answer to that question can be summarised into one word — value. Hao’s talk was mostly centred around the importance of creating value. Living in a western society in Australia, Hao realised that people will only bother listening to you if your words carry value. This applies to many other aspects of life too; people will only do something if it brings value to them. Hao mentioned that this value, however, is not restricted to monetary value. For instance, many people would jump at the opportunity to have an unpaid internship at Google. There is no money to be gained from it, but the experience and learning skills one can acquire through such internship is priceless.
With technology advancing at such a fast pace, many jobs will be replaced by it in the future. People of the younger generation are expected to go through multiple career changes throughout their lives. In his talk, Hao shared tips on how the Buddhist teachings and practice can help the younger generation cope better in an ever-changing workforce. In addition, the seismic changes in the workplace and society have also propelled the rise of social enterprises. These days, customers don’t only care about the quality of products or the financial performance of business enterprises but also the value these enterprises can bring to society. Hao explained how startup founders or aspiring startup founders can use the dhamma to make their startups more successful and meaningful. (The advice given by Hao applies to leaders of spiritual associations/organisations too!)
- Innovation through Buddhism
Before launching a startup, it is important to know who your target audience is and what their needs and wants are. This is where one’s Dhamma practice kicks in.
In order to understand your target audience well, you will need to be able to empathise with them. So why is empathy important? Well, if you’re not going to meet the wants and needs of your target audience, none of them will be willing to purchase your startup’s product or service. That’s because your startup has no value to them. Imagine you’re a founder of a startup and you have a new client who is extremely wealthy. Most of us would be too caught up with the prestige of the client to see him/her as an ordinary being with needs and wants. However, for those who understand the first noble truth and those who have a lot of Mettā (loving-kindness) for sentient beings, they understand that all beings suffer, and all beings want to be happy. Such people will help their clients with utmost sincerity regardless of the client’s background and status. Customers are also able to tell whether you’re sincere or not. Therefore, having empathy for others has a high chance of improving your customer retention rate.
As Socrates once said, “true knowledge exists in knowing that you know nothing.” The key to innovation is an open mind. In this ever changing world, innovation is the most critical foundation of a successful business. Being an open minded individual doesn’t only mean being open to various opinions, ideas, cultures, styles but also always keeping in mind that our ideas are not always be the best. Being open minded allows us to eliminate subjective bias and arrive at the truth by evaluating different opinions objectively. In fact, a scientific study has been conducted on open-mindedness and it shows that being open minded leads to greater focus too. Additionally, Hao used a personal experience as an example of how being open minded can lead to innovation. He once had a customer gave him feedback on what he could improve on in his startup. Close minded individuals would have shrugged off the feedback with the mentality that they know more than their customers and the feedback would probably not be beneficial. Fortunately, Brother Heng Hao gave his customer’s feedback some thought and found it to be useful. Imagine if that feedback was forgotten, a really great opportunity would have been missed.
- Smart volunteering
Most startups will have limited resources initially, be it funds, working space, materials, etc. Hence, it is advisable for startup founders to get the help of volunteers instead of hiring people.
Volunteering must come from the heart. There must be some value in volunteering for your organisation or else no one will be willing to help you out for free. The tip on empathising with your target audience can be applied in this aspect as well. Find out what attracts people to volunteer at your organisation and what keeps them motivated to continue volunteering.
For those who plan to be or are already volunteers, be sure that you are actually learning something and improving from it instead of simply going through the motions. Volunteering gives you an opportunity to try new ideas in a caring environment rather than a corporate one (make sure it does not cause detriment to the organisation).
It is highly recommended that you include your volunteering experience in your resume. Instead of simply indicating your position (e.g. co-chairperson, vice president), do take the time to elaborate more on the scope of your volunteering work as hiring managers want to know what you can do and what skills you have gained through your volunteering work.
- Personal branding
When marketing oneself, treat yourself as a startup. Like all businesses, you need to know what your brand is. According to Forbes, a“brand” is what a prospect thinks of when he or she hears the brand name (in this case, your own name). So essentially, your brand comprises of the qualities and attributes people associate you with.
For those who have studied economics and marketing, you most probably would have come across the term “product differentiation”. Marketing yourself is very much like product differentiation. You have to make yourself stand out from your competitors in order to make yourself more attractive to potential employers or clients.
First, you have to find out what your unfair advantage is. It could be having extra skill sets or qualities that your competitors do not. Next, in the age of technology, you need to market yourself on the right platforms. Linkedin is a highly recommended platform as it can help you develop your personal brand and connect with potential employers. Lastly, in this dynamic world, you have to keep upgrading and improving yourself. Hao shared that he applies the Dhamma teachings in his daily life to help him face difficulties and find solutions for challenges. As young practicing Buddhists, we can apply the Buddha’s teachings to make ourselves more efficient and productive.
At the end of his talk, Hao broke the audience into small groups of four or five. Two members per group had to do push ups, planks, or crunches while the other team members list down 34 things they learnt that day. Hao’s aim for this activity was so the audience could take away an important lesson — teamwork and skin in the game. “Skin in the game” was a term coined by world renowned investor, Warren Buffet. The phrase refers to the situation in which high-ranking insiders use their own money to buy stock in the company they are running.
To put it simply, “skin in the game” means that everyone is in the same boat trying to achieve the same goal. Without teamwork, organisations are bound to fail. You could have the individuals on your team with the most desirable skills and experience, but if the team cannot work together, then those skills and experiences don’t matter. Therefore, if you can make these individuals feel like they have “skin in the game”, then you’ll have yourself an invincible team.
(Group photo at the end of Brother Heng Hao’s talk.)
The Dhamma Wheel Reel 