"The hottest love has the coldest end." - Socrates
A single conversation can change everything. Similar to the beginning of my romance with banking, the end of the affair was preceded by a seemingly normal chat with an unusually wise man. I was now 28 years old and battle hardened with almost 6 years of banking experience. The discussion proceeded as follows:
Wise Man: So what brings you to this country?
Tendo: I am here to attend two weddings
Wise Man: When will you get married?
Tendo: Perhaps when I finally make Managing Director (MD) at the bank
Wise Man: Why do you want to make MD?
Tendo: So that I can be rich
Wise Man: What makes you think that making MD is the best return on investment for all the money that your parents put into your education?
Tendo: (Stunned silence)
In the simple Q&A that followed, the wise man broke down my previously held assumptions about employment, wealth creation and purpose. In essence, he cut through the fat of the illusion to reveal the muscle of truth.
The illusion of banking (and perhaps employment in general) is that life gets better as we rise through the ranks. The truth of the matter is that, if you enter a career with the sole intention of arriving at a particular destination (i.e. becoming rich), the journey itself will kill you before you enter the promised land. However, as I later came to realize, if you enter a career for the love of the journey, you will be open to multiple destinations and have a higher probability of fulfillment.
For those of you who have similar stirrings in your soul, you will probably be familiar with my line of response during this dialogue with the wise man..
Wise Man: Have you ever thought of starting your own business?
Tendo: Yes, but the problem is that I have no ideas.
Wise Man: What do you mean?
Tendo: I don't know what business to start. However I think I would be good at executing someone else's business idea
Wise Man: Well then, you should team up with my son. He is all ideas and no execution.
All ideas and no execution. I think that phrase sums up the reason behind the still born nature of most corporate escape plans. In the 8 years that I worked within banking, I heard many of my peers talk about business plans that they almost did/were about to do/are currently working on/could potentially be launched. The similarity behind all these states of quasi-activity is that very few if any of these ideas actually took place. Perhaps it was fear that held them back from launching.
It reminds me of a quote I once read about going out to pursue your dreams and having to leave a place of familiarity:
So I began to hatch a grand escape plan that would simultaneously free me from the micro-management hell of employment and also grant me a six figure US dollar income. Of course, I would later learn that there is virtually no start up that you can self fund and also derive a six figure income within the first 1-3 months. Unless of course you launch a recreational pharmaceutical manufacturing plant.
Given that I had no special aptitude for the sciences, I decided to brain storm business concepts that I could launch while still working for the bank. The first thing I did once I returned home was to register a company whose specific focus would be: general trading. It sounded all-inclusive enough for me to explore just about every idea I could conceive. The greatest challenge I faced was devising some business which would operate as follows:
Morning Hours:
5 am - 8 am
Afternoon Hours:
5 pm - 8 pm
These hours would of course work perfectly for the following professions:
A. Celebrity fitness consultant
B. Traffic policeman
C. School bus driver
I was back to square one. I had the execution capabilities but lacked the ideas. Just when I was about to give up I remembered one of my favorite clients from my stint in the tropical west African country. He too had once been a corporate slave but had managed to open his own trading company. He seemed as smart as I thought I was, and his business appeared to be simple enough. After all, just how difficult could it be importing crude oil from the Middle East and selling it locally at a premium? Ignoring the $20 million start up capital that he had managed to raise, I decided that I would emulate this man. Thus began the adventures of Tendo: banker by day and trader by night.
It was a short lived and humorous adventure.
Next week: Act 1: Scene 7 - The middle of the end
A single conversation can change everything. Similar to the beginning of my romance with banking, the end of the affair was preceded by a seemingly normal chat with an unusually wise man. I was now 28 years old and battle hardened with almost 6 years of banking experience. The discussion proceeded as follows:
Wise Man: So what brings you to this country?
Tendo: I am here to attend two weddings
Wise Man: When will you get married?
Tendo: Perhaps when I finally make Managing Director (MD) at the bank
Wise Man: Why do you want to make MD?
Tendo: So that I can be rich
Wise Man: What makes you think that making MD is the best return on investment for all the money that your parents put into your education?
Tendo: (Stunned silence)
In the simple Q&A that followed, the wise man broke down my previously held assumptions about employment, wealth creation and purpose. In essence, he cut through the fat of the illusion to reveal the muscle of truth.
The illusion of banking (and perhaps employment in general) is that life gets better as we rise through the ranks. The truth of the matter is that, if you enter a career with the sole intention of arriving at a particular destination (i.e. becoming rich), the journey itself will kill you before you enter the promised land. However, as I later came to realize, if you enter a career for the love of the journey, you will be open to multiple destinations and have a higher probability of fulfillment.
 |
| Question: Is money an important thing in your career? Answer: FALSE! (It is everything) |
Wise Man: Have you ever thought of starting your own business?
Tendo: Yes, but the problem is that I have no ideas.
Wise Man: What do you mean?
Tendo: I don't know what business to start. However I think I would be good at executing someone else's business idea
Wise Man: Well then, you should team up with my son. He is all ideas and no execution.
All ideas and no execution. I think that phrase sums up the reason behind the still born nature of most corporate escape plans. In the 8 years that I worked within banking, I heard many of my peers talk about business plans that they almost did/were about to do/are currently working on/could potentially be launched. The similarity behind all these states of quasi-activity is that very few if any of these ideas actually took place. Perhaps it was fear that held them back from launching.
 |
| Once I make a million dollar bonus, I will be free. Wait...maybe 10 million dollars. |
It reminds me of a quote I once read about going out to pursue your dreams and having to leave a place of familiarity:
Behind the glory everyone wants to attain is a degree of discomfort nearly everyone wants to avoid.Ideas sound great until the reality of executing upon such an idea hits you. I loved the idea of leaving the bank to become my own boss until I started hearing horror stories about entrepreneurs who couldn't pay their rent. As I used to tell my friends: "broke isn't a good color on me".
So I began to hatch a grand escape plan that would simultaneously free me from the micro-management hell of employment and also grant me a six figure US dollar income. Of course, I would later learn that there is virtually no start up that you can self fund and also derive a six figure income within the first 1-3 months. Unless of course you launch a recreational pharmaceutical manufacturing plant.
 |
| Drugs are one hell of a business |
Given that I had no special aptitude for the sciences, I decided to brain storm business concepts that I could launch while still working for the bank. The first thing I did once I returned home was to register a company whose specific focus would be: general trading. It sounded all-inclusive enough for me to explore just about every idea I could conceive. The greatest challenge I faced was devising some business which would operate as follows:
Morning Hours:
5 am - 8 am
Afternoon Hours:
5 pm - 8 pm
These hours would of course work perfectly for the following professions:
A. Celebrity fitness consultant
B. Traffic policeman
C. School bus driver
I was back to square one. I had the execution capabilities but lacked the ideas. Just when I was about to give up I remembered one of my favorite clients from my stint in the tropical west African country. He too had once been a corporate slave but had managed to open his own trading company. He seemed as smart as I thought I was, and his business appeared to be simple enough. After all, just how difficult could it be importing crude oil from the Middle East and selling it locally at a premium? Ignoring the $20 million start up capital that he had managed to raise, I decided that I would emulate this man. Thus began the adventures of Tendo: banker by day and trader by night.
It was a short lived and humorous adventure.
Next week: Act 1: Scene 7 - The middle of the end
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