The art of consumption

Networx.com.au Jungle Night....straight from the den

Roses @Moet Chandon Winery @ Yarray Valley Victoria, Australia.

Translating the intanglibles to the tanglibles.
Behaviour association,Cultural conventions, pattern recognition, creating desire.

"We have a slogan around here: we try to put our music in the path of what people do everyday." Mannheim Steamroller (one of the biggest record selling CD of Xmas).
Rather than place their product where thousands of competing choices gather, they strategically focus their attention on consumer behaviour.

Lost in shades of grey

A narrative of memories

red

mix

orange

violet

green

pink

Humanised
We look through the eyes of the world based on our own little stories, woven with our own personal truths and saturated with a drug called emotion.
Reliant on our recollections, and also re-experiencing them.
The most wonderful experiences are the best stories strung together by the threads of constrasting emotions.
To tell a story, to remember the feeling, to thrust upon the world the volatility of it all.

The sky is yours

The Crew

Return of Monkey Magic

Chay lovin' it

King Kong's partner in crime Felis reading abt him in the papers

King Kong Returns

Amateur fishermen...hoping fish take a liking to smelly footwear

Rosebud pier

Stella @ Rosbud pier, Melbourne, AU

Rock formations

Washed up starfish

Felicity's garden

Dream flight simulator

Had a dream where I was simulating flight through my mind by enacting vibrations of my thought patterns. I felt good when I focused my thoughts in the dream and felt light weight. This may be what meditation is all about and I’m not sure if I can replicate it in my waking state.

What the future holds today

World's classist drink coasters, my business start-up at www.coasters.com.au

The measuring stick of effective managment

1. Do I know what is expected of me at work?
2. Do I have the materials and equipment I need to do my work right?
3. At work, do I have the opportunity to do what I do best every day?
4. In the last seven days, have I received recognition or praise for good work?
5. Does my supervisor, or someone at work, seem to care about me as a person?
6. Is there someone at work who encourages my development?
7. At work, do my opinions seem to count?
8. For the mission/purpose of my company make me feel like my work is important?
9. Are my co-workers committed to doing quality work?
10. Do I have a best friend at work?
11. In the last six months, have I talked with someone about my progress?
12. At work, have I had opportunities to learn and grow?

Source: First, break all the rules by Marcus Buckingham isbn 1-4165-0266-1

The Business of Life

Rye Pier, Port Phillip Bay,Victoria, Australia

"..Profits should not be the goal of economic life, Mr. Drucker contended, but rather an indicator of how businesses were doing in motivating their human resources to produce goods and services of value to consumers. " www.businessweek.com

Mr. Drucker viewed nonprofit groups as leaders in the knowledge-driven enterprises that would characterize all economic activity in the future.

But while management practices had been getting better, charities still had room for improvement, especially in producing results, if they were to retain the confidence and trust of the American public. Without that, their existence -- and their ability to promote greater social equality -- would be in jeopardy.

"Convert donors into contributors," urged Mr. Drucker, meaning that if nonprofit groups are to acquire more financial resources, those who give will need to feel more like participants. And learn how to offer volunteers a greater sense of "community and common purpose," he wrote.

I believe if you teach somebody how to work, they'll feed themselves forever, and that's what I want to do. (Ira Fulton)

BSA_retreat

Peter : the thinker "Should I have my flake ...grilled or deep fried..?"

Time in my hands

RMIT Universtity Building 1

Ken's farewell @ Loop & CJ's Birthday

Me, Chay, CJ

Nice Tequila and cinnamon salt with oranges Happy Birthday to The Old Horse! CJ (born in the chinese year of the Horse)

Po, Felis, Lionel having a merry time at Ken's farewell
Lionel:"look... I can look at two things at once"
Felis: "He can too"

Tequila and cinnamon salt with oranges

Ken and me, slightly intoxicated and proud of it.
Have a great trip Ken!!

Socceroos make history!!!

High Street shops, Kew, Melbourne, Australia

Wooohhhoooo !! another historic day in 2005! The Australian soccer team has beaten Uruguay and has finally qualified for the world cup for the first time in 32 years!!

Contemplating the sound between the rain drops

Vu's wedding (Stella, Vu, some guy, Hong, Anne)

Me n Hong ('twas a day that I had 3 Crab claws n 2 bowls of shark fin soup and 1 lobster)
urghhh now I'm turned off expensive seafood

This is the wall that demands your attention.
(rockclimbing at Altona Sports Centre, Melb, Au)

Marketing to the unspoken

The key was knowing the audience and developing a strategy that appealed specifically to them.
"Never ignore the emotional side of anything you are selling."

There are 12 clear points in any venture capital pitch that all need to be addressed, he says. These fall under three headings: what is the opportunity; does the company have the ability to realise the opportunity; and what are the benefits of realising it?

The key to success is understanding the needs of the audience, or as Mr Flett says, "where their heads and hearts are".

The most common mistake is failing to clearly understand the audience. You also have to speak their language, not your own.

recognise the key is maintaining strong customer relations and effective marketing and so he is constantly looking at things like online messaging, email marketing and loyalty programs.
It's not all about traffic though, it's about the quality of the customers.

Horne eschews traditional advertising outlets as he feels they are of limited value for online retailing. Television, for example, is competition while online but he is considering radio as it can be turned on while customers are on the computer.

"You try and shake yourself above the rest, so we want to talk to people. We do lots of emails and follow-ups and closely monitor customer satisfaction."

"It's difficult to compete directly on price as we don't have the purchasing power of the big guys so we have to offer value and customer service as a point of difference,"

Working with management, the unions and other interested parties, he identified the opinion makers; those people regarded as the peers in their field. He involved all levels of the company in dialogue and created decision-making processes that were driven by the people at the coal face.

Often they cannot afford to pay for formal training so they teach their employees on the job. To be a successful teacher you have to be an effective coach.

Love is...

In pursuit of a temporal anonmaly [happiness]

Psychologists know "increasing the number of social contacts a miserable person has is the best way of cheering up".

People who feel battered by unsolvable problems learn to be helpless; they become passive, slower to learn, anxious and sad. There is a need to challenge depressed people's beliefs and thought patterns, not just their behaviour.

"What you feel is a result of what you're thinking, so I was able to monitor my irrational, negative thought processes."

Seligman's core virtues of happiness: wisdom, courage, humanity, justice, temperance and transcendence.

Of the six universal emotions, four - anger, fear, disgust and sadness- are negative and only one, joy, is positive.

"Hedonic treadmill" modern humans, stuck with ancient brains, rapidly and inevitably adapt to good things by taking them for granted.

"The things that you desire are not the things that you end up liking"
The mechanisms of desire are insatiable.
There are things that you we really like and tire of less quickly - having good friend, the beauty of the natural world, spirituality. But our economic system plays into the pyschology of wanting and the psychology of liking gets drowned out.

Increase happiness??

• Write down three things that went well and why, every day for a week.
• Identify your signature strengths and using one them in a new and different way every day for a week.
• Writing a long letter to someone you're grateful to but have never properly thanked, and visiting them to read it out in person.

www.reflectivehappiness.com

Nothing MATTERS

Orchids from Stella's house, Thanks for the great pix hun

The shadows of the day take me away from your presence, and my memories ache from the space left behind.

Certified Practicing Accountant in Training

Felis in studying for her CPA qualification @ Chelsea Beach BEFORE

and AFTERShe can be my accountant any day!!

Beach Bums Melbourne Cup Day

Dead horse

Rude Horse

Return of the Smelly feet

Who's feet are these???

You know you want me...!!!

Today Makybe Diva made history by becoming the only horse Eva! to win the Melbourne Cup three years in a row....whilst we we're doing our own horsing around.