Question 1: What are qualities meetings need to be effective?

- Having a leader: The need of a leader is undebatable for every meeting. The
leader has the jurisdiction to determine relevant preparations such as date,
information, invitations and so forth. Moreover, the role of leading and
managing the meeting is also crucial for an effective meeting. Every meeting
needs a leader to guide it, propose problems, motivate participants, gather
suggestions, etc., in order to proceed a productive one.
- Having a stated purpose: The point of having a transparent and specified
purpose is a high-priority quality for a successful meeting. Scrutinizing a
specific aim makes the meeting purposeful, thus saves time and avoids a
desultory and aimless consultation.
- Being shorter instead of longer: Cutting off the excessive time and rambling
points is an effective way of proceeding a short and productive meeting. The
shorter the meeting is, the better for both the organizers and the participants,
though, the meeting must still ensure its core purpose.
- Having an agenda: An agenda, or to be simplified, may be considered as a
meeting schedule. It contains every detail and information about the meeting,
informs the participants the plan and the purpose of the meeting, which helps
them keep track on the meeting effectively and makes it easier for the leader to
manage the meeting, hence the meeting’s productivity is ensured.
Question 2: What are key signs that an idea is great?
- Solving a problem in life: A great idea means it must serve a purpose, meet a
need, to be more specific, it has to involve in solving a problem in life. If its not
created purposefully, it is an inessential and since there is no need for it, it will
not attract any investors nor costumers, hence actualizing it is impossible when
it brings no profit nor need of consumption.
- Being scalable: an idea is not entirely practical or actualizable if it cannot be
scalable. It has to be popularized in order to attract more consumers and
investors, and this can be done with ease in such an informative era. As the
demand grows, the business has to deal with the scalability of the production
scale as well as the increase of other expenses.
- Being an attractive price and a good profit: An idea is considered failure if it
has no demand for consumption nor profitable income. Despite of how
innovative and fresh the idea is, the consumers will not spend a cent if its
considered overprice. The idea must bring its best p-p (price to performance)
version to the table, and the business has to manage the production expense in
order to offer an attractive, though still, a profitable price tag.
Question 3: Why we should start and finish meetings on time?
- When given an exact time limit for completely meeting objectives, people are
more likely to work harder and accomplish them. According to a theory called
 the Parkinson’s law, ‘work will expand to fill the time available for its
completion’, which means how long the meeting is dragged, the result stays the
same, hence following the time strictly saves it for both leader and attendees.
- Whether the leader or attendee has problems such as late for the meeting,
unprofessional preparations, or any kind of interruption during the meeting will
make a bad impression on others and may piss them off by extending the time
of the meeting.
- By starting and ending a meeting on time, leaders are also showing that they
value the time of their attendees as reputation of respect, professionalism and
competence is built. On the other hand, when the start time fluctuates, people
are more likely to show up late, pay no attention to it or even drop the meeting.
Question 4: What do you think you should do to get ahead in your career?
- More contacts mean more relationships, more opportunities, and more helping
hands. Networking creates shots of promotion, a better position, providing
mentorship, new chances of making profit, or simply helps with situations in
personal life. Make sure to prepare ahead of time to be successful at
networking, making contacts for every situation needed or opportunities that
might have come.
- Extra qualifications are not a waste of time, and they truly open many new
opportunities. Instead of wasting time hanging around, doing pointless stuffs,
studying for extra qualifications such as language, social skills, or your
professional field sure is better. It does not just enhance your skills, broaden
your knowledge but also makes your resume look great, widen your path to
promotion or a higher position.
- Joining a professional association not only helps you with your networking, but
also keep you up with date on the happenings in your field like a new
breakthrough, a firm on the verge of bankruptcy or new talents.
Question 5: How are shopping habits changing in our country?
- With such an evolutionary growth of internet, social network and online
business model, the death of high streets is inevitable. Nowadays, its hard to
find any high street which sites traditional stores as most of those businesses
have moved their platform from grounded shops to online business, even
famous brands. The convenience of online shopping is undeniable, which led to
the decrease in demands and sales of traditional stores, thus such model of
business is no longer profitable and to adapt to changes, the number of
grounded shops has been decreased dramatically over the years, along with the
death of high streets. However, high streets are reviving in another form, still a
crowded place which attracts many businesses and investors, called malls.
- As mentioned, the online business model is on a high rise and its convenience
and benefits are uncontroversial, consumers tend to use mobile device in
searching for products before making final decisions. Once the barrier of
 storage and distance are no longer the problems, the diversity of products of
online shopping is endless with different models and competitive price.
Therefore, consumers can spend hours, even days searching for products that
meet their needs before making up their minds. On the other hand, same
privilege is not available at traditional stores due to the limitations of storage
and stock. Moreover, despite the fact that online deals are non-negotiable, there
are a plenty of bargains, discounts and vouchers from both the platform and
businesses. The only downside is the legitimacy and authenticity of products on
online shopping platforms are still controversial.
Question 6: What are the most common stressful situations in your opinion?
- Leading a formal meeting has always been a high-pressure situation from my
point of view. As a meeting leader, there are plenty of pre-works to be done
such as making an agenda, proposing problems, inviting attendees and so forth.
I am always afraid of messing preparations up like choosing an improper place
and time; did I miss any information or any important attendee; are the
problems well-thought? I, self-described, to be quite unsociable and easily
affected by other opinions upon myself so the fear of bad impressions and a
boring, ineffective, and unproductive meeting creates even more stress and
anxiety.
- Dealing with a complaining costumer is another cause of stress for me at work.
A complaining costumer is a pain in the neck in any fields, they constantly
demand for ridiculous privileges, services and discounts which is impossible to
apply unless the place you work for is a charitable organization. Beside of
being irritated by indiscretions, the pressure from the boss of closing deals and
having yourself patience to not violate the rules are also stressful. Though these
costumers might be irritating and frustrating, it is also an opportunity to
improve your emotional control and discipline.
Question 7: What are the most common causes of stress at work?
- Being overloaded with an overwhelming amount of work is a common cause of
stress. This may cause by overtime, working long hours, lack of control over
working activities, making errors constantly, etc. This affects workers both
physically and mentally. Being overloaded with work is the cause of
headaches, insomnia, fatigue, and even digestive symptoms such as diarrhoea
or constipation. Mentally, workers may suffer from anxiety, depression and
may be pessimism by disapproval or pressure from superior. Some help from
colleagues, a short vacation, a day off to rearrange workload or bonuses are the
possible solutions to reduce stress and anxiety from an overwhelming amount
of work.
- Conflict with colleagues or managers is another cause of stress at work.
Conflicts are inevitable, though in some cases it becomes a cause of stress for
employees. Work related disagreement is a common sense and can be solved
 with ease, by listening to each other, self-reflection and find the final
agreement. Though if the last straw is some sort of a personality-based or a
discriminative argument, it may cause mentally damage and ruin the
relationship between people.
Question 8: What are the factors considered before starting a business?
- Every business starts with an idea. An innovative, practical, and purposeful
idea will create a solid foundation and a clear path for the business on the
growth. Though the idea must be well-thought and the most important maxim
is actualizable, both usefully and profitably.
- A targeted market is also a factor needs to be taking into consideration, in order
to attract a particular segment of the market. Creating the targeted market
involves conceptualizing the product, understanding the demand, studying the
target audience, competitors, market share, etc., though these factors need to
fall in the line with the business’ objective, vision, and idea.
- Another factor is total project costs. A high expense comes along with
overprice products; hence the consumers tend to search for other competitors or
give up on the products. Therefore, a profit maximize production chain is a
high-priority factor to decrease the price tag and increase sales. Though, profit
maximization means lowing the price but not the quality of the products.
Ineffective maximization may harm the business instead of making it scalable.
- Competition is a double-edged sword when it comes to business. A well-
prepared start-up with the knowledge about its competitors, market share and
its position will take advantage of competition effectively by making
innovative and attractive products comparing to its rivals, learning from the
competitors’ mistakes, narrow the competition and market share by
cooperation, etc., instead of making accuses of competition and lead itself to
bankruptcy.
- Legitimacy is also an essential factor if you want to start a business. If the
company involves in any kind of violations, it will cost a huge expense for
legitimation or fines, hence the business will be a step closer to the verge of
bankruptcy before making any profit. Moreover, even if the company manage
to overcome trials, there will still be blood stain on the carpet, specially
involving product quality, health care, embezzlement, and sexual
discrimination.
- Despite the fact that a start-up business is some how lack of capital, spending
money on quality staff and head-hunters on the search for talents is not a waste.
Quality and productive manpower will place a solid foundation for a fresh start
and good for the growth of business.
Question 9: What are qualities needed to succeed in sales?
- Sales rely a lot on marketing, though telling lies in order to making sales is not
a part of it. Despite the fact that advertisements and salespeople have a vivid
 and interesting way to talk about their products, which seems too good to be
true, they are creative facts. Honesty is a crucial part of sales because it
provides basic information about products, consumer’s privilege, and business’
services. On the other hand, false advertisements may suffer from avoidance
from customers, or even legal accusations.
- Moreover, interpersonal skills contribute an essential role in a successful
salesperson. Despite the fact that people usually take salespeople for granted,
consider them as a bunch of loquacious theft, it takes years of training to
become a successful salesperson. Active listening, confidence, body language,
control of voice tones, understanding implications, etc. are the required skills to
succeed in sales.
- Knowing your product is a high-priority factor of a salesperson, the more you
know, the better you advertise. The fact of knowing all the advantages and
disadvantages of the product make it easier for a salesperson to close a deal,
because they know how to promote the good points to the view of costumers
and ease the bad ones away from their notice.
Question 10: What should companies do to encourage new ideas?
- The freedom to offer ideas is one way of encouraging employees to contribute
to the company and it is also like a library of solutions for the firm itself. As
there is no limitation for offering ideas, employees will tend to contribute more
of their thoughts, in exchange of approval, reputation and a chance of
promotion. As a result, the company has a combination of low-budget ideas
which may result in actual need.
- Though this should not be limited at any specific level of organization. Great
ideas do not come from the excellences or the managing level only, it may
come from anywhere, anyone.
- In return, the firm may reward individuals with great ideas in form of privileges
like bonuses, incentives, or promotion, as encouragements for their
contributions. In contrast, bad ideas should not be punished or disapproval in
any kind, this may cause conflicts and dissatisfaction among employees.