精讀班

教授開班時把課程目標定為：

﹣ 完成課程後，同學能分析上市公司的年報，並懂得如何尋找值得投資的公司。

﹣ 如何用distress analysis來避免type 1 error。

老板經常希望能上一個給Executive的Financial Analysis精讀班，讓他能很快的掌握一些基本的財務分析，一心以為這給課程的Notes可以幫到他，今天看同學們的反應，相信不大可能！

應同學們的要求，我當上了臨時Miss，把當年剛入行做Audit 給non-accounting background同事的Concept Training加上一些課堂上的內容，給同學開了一個考試前精讀班，感覺非常有趣！

雖然不知道對他們有多大幫助，但很想大家花了時間來學習，能真正的學到一些東西，盡力而為罷！

講了三小時，雖然有點累，同學一句：「難怪英皇補習甘惦，原來精讀班甘有用！」，把我逗得哈哈大笑，果然是高材生，考試時他一定能掌握教授的要求！

Qualified accountant

Qualified accountant is only a title for those who can pass the professional exam. Most of them dun know how to "window dressing" or "cook" the book. They are not necessarily able to understand every financial statement from different industries.

Given a snap shot of a financial statement, without any information about the industry and the company, it is almost impossible to form any analytical opinion. However, Professor seems enjoy playing with his professional knowledge to confuse LPs.

Any financial statement is business oriented. Different industries have different risk items in their financial statements. For example inventories for manufacturing industry, accounts receivable for trading business, re-valuation reserve for property developers, goodwill for IT industry.... Cashflow is critical for any business.

Different industries also have different valuation methods. Asset backing method is mostly adopted for real estate business. Different industries adopt different P/E as a norm. High P/E for high growth business or industries......

Accounting is a business tool. It is business oriented. "Windor dressing" techniques are highly customized.

Type 2 error

Being a CPA, I have never taken any proper accounting related course. I only studied for professional exam. My professional knowledge and experience were gained from PwC by investing my most precious 5 years. After all, I learned that the published financial statements provided the least information for investment decision.

Today, I had my first proper accounting class. Professor Yip gave me a new perspective about how to review a financial statement. You can smell something by checking the thickness of the report, any photos (irrelevant information), any change of comparative figures, any change of auditor or independent director. Sounds .... did I waste 5 years in PcW?

He emphaized how to avoid type 1 error (total loss) by reviewing the financial statement. He also suggested that we should not make any investment if the expected gain is less than 100%... what? yes....100% in 1 year.

If we follow his approach, we will only make type 2 error (miss a good opportunty). What an accountant investment approach!!!

臨時加插的歷史課

EMBA 有一個傳統，每一科完成後都會和教授吃飯，這科是Operation Management，教授是曾淵滄，飯局在九龍塘會。

曾教授在股壇名氣不少，很多同學每天都拜讀他的股評專欄，平時上課，大家總是向他要“Number”，今天晚上的謝師宴，以為是一個2007股價走勢的講座，出奇不異，原來是中史，地理的補習班。

什麼五代十國，五胡亂華，炎王子孫，鄭和下西洋，李世民原來不是漢人，李白是俄羅斯人，西施是越南妹，曾教授是曾子後人，是曾特首的阿叔，原來曾特首也是曾總理的阿叔， 聽得我一頭暮水！

博學的郭同學當上了助教，同樣有本領穿梭於五千年中華文化的時空中。臨時加插的這堂歷史課，讓我手足無措，一度以為自己誤闖周星星的腦震盪工作間！

求學不是求分數

今天又做了一個Group Project，各組的題目一樣，present 的內容大同小異，同組同學和我都是在香港教育制度培育出來的，對於如何「求分」有相同的見解，就像考試捉題目一樣，要知道教授的絕學是什麼，把他的東西發揚光大，應用在各方各面，一般都能取悅他，拿到不錯的分數，這個Sushi Project想爆頭，想出了一招半式，不知道那條Critical Path會否為我們帶來Critical Result!

現在讀書，求學不是求分數，但是難改故有的思維!

Linear Programming

Linear Programming is an optimization technique. Giving a set of constraints, you can work out the optimal result mathematically and systematically. It is a scientific way to maximize resource allocation.

I am thinking how to set up a model for the PM problem of my company.

Constraints:
List of project on hand
HR requirement for each project
Number of available staff and their respective cost

Minimize:
Minimize the staff cost to deliver the existing projects on hand

Well, still dun know how to set up the solver?

Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP)

AHP is the concept of multi-criteria decision making and a decision support technique with the following steps:

Step 1: Developing the AHP Hierarchy
Step 2: Making Judgments about the Criteria and the Decision Alternatives
Step 3: Deriving the Priority from Pair wise Comparison Matrix
Step 4: Measuring the Consistency of the Decision Maker’s Judgments
Step 5: Synthesis -- Construction of an Overall Priority

We have adopted this method on a case study for the decision making of office relocation. It is an interesting model. I will keep a copy of the excel model and will make use of it later for my company. :-)

慾窮千里目，更上一層樓

剛上完了Marketing最後的一課，對自己的表現不大滿意，看來在以後的課目要更加努力，要不就浪費太多時間和金錢！

周南教授的教學非常哲理，學了一大堆「虛、實」，「天時、地利、人緣」，「多就是少，少就是多」，「時勢造英雄，英雄造時勢」，還有「“提錢”通知」，「好好“煙酒”」，他把西方的市場學理論，用了中國人的文化、歷史和哲學作了另類演繹，對我來說，還是挺受落的，反正那些理論以前已經學過。

反而，在整個課程中，從各個learning partners的presentation中得到不少inspiration，各行各業，原來都有一個成功的「必煞技」，不知我們用對了沒有？

可能真的想「慾窮千里目」，就要「更上一層樓」！

善用無用，方為有用

市場學，越學越「玄」。 Interesting and inspiring!

少即是多 Less is more

善用無用，方為有用

無往不利 to go everywhere and make profits
無孔不入 to get in by every opening (crack)
無所不在 to stop at nothing
無微不至 Without any detail not taken care of
無時無刻 at no time, all the times
無為而治 managing by without the manager

攻心為上，攻城為下

“夫用兵之道，攻心為上，攻城為下，心戰為上，兵戰為下.” 【蜀志】

A Beautiful Mind

I learned Prisoner's dilemma from Dr Poon at my first year in the CUHK. He used Nash Equilibrium to explain a lot of market outcomes. I was amazed and liked him a lot. Despite his mathematical approach and grade killer attitude, I took a few more courses taught by him.

Today Dr Hung introduced this games theory in the class. From the face of most of the learning partners, I could tell that they could not follow.

Dr Hung gave me new insight about the "value of guanxi" in Nash Equilibrium. Nash Equilibrium is a lose-lose outcome. Investing in Guanxi may be able to stabilize the win-win outcome by building on going positive expectation.

Tonight Pearl TV showed movie "A beautiful mind". The story was about John Nash. What a co-incident? I watched the movie a few years ago but I did not remember that I had learnt his theory. When I watched it again tonight, I felt I'm so close to this Nobel Prize Winner.

Competitive Analysis

The professor seems picked a good book and a good focus for the EMBA class. I guess he can't be too "econ" to teach a class full of executives.

Porter's Approach was introduced in the class with Six Forces. How are the forces of my company?

1. Threat of new Entrants
- Possible entry barrier: Brand, Technology (not too strong)

2. Rivalry among existing firms
- A few major players but many small players
- High industry growth

3. Threat of substitute products or services
- Substitute exist such as ERP, Workflow

4. Bargaining power of buyers
- Large

5. Bargaining power of suppliers
- Self developed

6. Complements
- Scanners, server, ...

It seems that we are at a quite competitive industry.

Presentation

Each of the learning partners are assigned a presentation topic at the beginning of the course. The presentation order is based the aphibatical order of our last name. Mine was scheduled on the last day of the class.

Today, my partner and I presented the topic about Cultural Gap. I am so glad to partner with someone who has strong sales background. He added lot of creative elements into the presentation including video, sounds effect and graphics. I am also impressed by his commitment and work passion.

It is a good feeling to work with quality people. : )

Type A people

When talked about executiive stress, Professor Leung told us a research result about Heart Attack. The research result found out that Type A people had higher chance of having Heart Attack.

Am I type A?
- Impatient
- Aggressive, competitive, hostile

I guess not. :-) but I better to remind my Type A friends.

Experience sharing

One of the main reason for me to pay a premium for EMBA instead of MBA is for experience sharing from other learning partners. In the first group exercise, the team worked until 2am at my club house. But, it was fun. I learned some insider news of other learning partners company, such as problems of a well known organization famous at excellence management, why the top management of a media company being replaced, ...

Organization ---> complex
human beings -----> complicated

Leadership

We talked about Executive Role and Leadership. In the class, everyone is having an executive role or being a leader in certain areas. However, not every leader have leadership.

Leadership may be trained or in-born. It is about personality or character but not a role. Leadership may have the following elements:
- Uplifting
- Visionary
- Charismatic
- Inspiration
- Intellectual stimulation
- Individualized consideration

I think I am only a good executive but not having much leadership. Although I believe leadership is more in-born than trained, I still hope to learn having more leadership elements in the class. :-)

How can we create a culture of leadership at our company? We need more people with leadership to achieve our vision.

Balanced Scorecard

Balanced scorecard is a framework to help organization alignment.

The scorecard has 4 strategic objectives
1. Financial
2. Customers
3. Internal Process
4. Learning and Growth

Each team or functional department can define their own measurement on the above 4 objectives.

This class reminded me the Appraisal System in PwC. They do have a very objective and systematic way to review staff performance and tie up the firm's objective to staff's objective.

Is it feasible for me to bring this framework to Beijing? We need a system for measurement!

Action item: Work out a plan to share with my partner this weekend :)

Reengineering: Organization Alignment

It is not easy to have a right Vision. It takes lot of effort to formulate strategies. Without the implementation ability, Vision, Mission, Strategies are only BS.

My business partners and I are working on a real case. We have just acquired a company in Beijing which consists of many top talents from renowed universities in China.

How can we share our culture and vision to them? Who can be our facilitators? If we fail to align our culture and vision, we may fail to manage them.

When my partner told me what he was doing in Beijing, I was amazed that he'd done a lot on Organization Alignment by his common sense. He is so talentive in business.

Management Theory: X vs Y

In the 3 hours lesson, Prof Leung led us run through the History of Management from ancient management, Weber's bureaucracy, management theories from Industrial revolution to modern matrix theories.

Among all the models, I like the McGregor Theory X and Theory Y the most.

Theory Y - work is natural
People care about meaning in work, quality of work life, personal growth and sense of achievement.
e.g. build dream, share vision

Theory X - humans are lazy
People are lazy and penalty, stimulus and control behavior are necessary for managment.
e.g. penalty, pressure and quatitative reward driven

McGregor explained the different management styles of my partners. Well, no wonder!

Team Work Exercise: Total Loss

In the team work exercise, each team was reuqired to perform certain tasks.

GAME RULE

Before we started the game, each team had to set a score target for their own team. Any score exceed the target would only be counted by 50% discount. If the team fail to meet the target, their score would be ZERO.

GAME OBJECTIVE

Strategy, Leadership, Team Work, Intuition / Creativity, Risk Management

GAME RESULT

Even having the highest score, we scored ZERO.
We even failed to sell the other learning partners to vote us as the best teamwork team or the most creative team.

Learning
- Risk Management - Certain risk shiuld not be taken
- Goal setting - Too Simple Dimension will lead to short sighted