[Staying Focus]

"To create something exceptional, your mindset must be relentlessly focused on the smallest detail." Giorgio Armani



24 hours doesn't seem to be enough for any of us. Taking into account we need to sleep 6 hours and spending another 8-10 hours in the office. We will only be left with a mere 8 hours to do the things we love. So what's this blog all about?
Instead of spending time reading stuffs which doesn't benefit us much like entertainment and soccer news, why not spend some time on learning and sharing our investment knowledge? At least that is what I've intended to do for now.
Staying focus will be the main topic for today or this week depending on how much time I've to spare and to share. What's staying focus and what has it got to do with investing?
There are several areas I want to highlight here. One of it is from individual's perspective. Many of you might agree that with all the technological advancements and Wi-Fi availability, we tend to be distracted all the time either by SMS, MMS, latest celebrity news, soccer updates and the endless list just goes on. If we want to be successful in investing, we must stay focus on our goals. What we would like to achieve by end of this quarter, middle of this year and end of this year. It isn't just about the earnings we've gotten from equities, bonds and foreign exchange but how much we know and understand about this market. I always believed in beginner's luck. Many people might have started well in investment but complacency soon fall in and all of a sudden, they are in debt because everything turned red.
Staying focused means:

1. Maintain a lifestyle in which we always seek to be in tuned with the market.
2. Make the effort to learn more about the economy.
3. Continue to improve our investment strategy by constantly polishing our skills and knowledge.
4. Learn to be humble. Only with a humble spirit we are able to have a receiving spirit that's willing to hear, accept, admit and learn from others and our own mistakes.

From a corporation's perspective, staying focus is extremely important. Just look at what Steve Jobs did to Apple when he returned back. He immediately terminated a number of projects and steered Apple to focus only on delivering 4 types of computer (2 types of desktop and 2 types of laptop). Alan Mulally did the same thing as well when he was first hired from Boeing to Ford. He stayed focused on recreating Ford as a world class brand. Instead of trying to focus on creating Aston Martins, Jaguars, Land Rovers and all other types of vehicles, he decided that Ford should only concentrate on creating small, medium and large size cars and trucks that is the best in their class in terms of safety, quality, fuel efficiency and design. From my perspective, in order for a corporation to grow healthily, it cannot be too diversified. We must be able to identify what's their core business. Which sector are they really involved in? Is it oil and gas, technology, property management, food, agricultural products (palm oil/rubber)? If we are able to associate these companies with their respective sectors and if they have a strong balance sheet with good leadership in place, then the company is in very safe hands and if the time is right, it will definitely grow leaps and bounds.
In summary, staying focused for a company means:

1. >90% of their revenue/earnings were generated from a particular sector/industry.
2. Leaders in those areas.
3. Has a solid balance sheet. If it doesn't, does it mean that they've been using their cash or selling their asset to invest or expand their core business?