Learning My Way Up...

Before I start writing further, I just want to make a note that I'm not the most successful audiologist around. If you look around, there's many more and I'm still learning my way. What I write here are just some experience that I want to share, hoping that it will benefits others in any way.

May 2002

I started my journey as a dispensing audiologist. It is hard because I can only apply not more than 20% of what I learned in university. It is nobodies fault. University can't prepare you for everything. Once you graduated, you have to be in-charge of your career and success. I took 3 months to relearn about everything especially hearing aids technology and troubleshooting. But, the hard work pays back when I was confirmed only after 1 month. Al-hamdulillah! And from there, I climb the stairs of success by venturing into opportunities than are different from others. But finally, the path changes....

Involvement in MLM

After working hard, I was exposed to MLM. Maybe because people thought I have a lot of money that they can persuade me to buy their products. But, the truth is, only you knows how thick is your wallet.I look at this opportunity ambitiously and starts comparing what I can achieve with the same amount of sales that I used to close in dispensing. This is an opportunity that were regretted by many but I cherished the most. Again, I'm not promoting MLM here since I'm not doing any MLM business anymore. But, during this exciting and stressful period of time, I learn a few things:

• When human being is put under a lot of stress, they started to use their creative minds to survive the whole thing. By doing this, they learned a lot about themselves especially their potentials which benefits them later.
• Human being are just human being. They have feelings and the most influential feeling are "FEAR". Fear of everything. Fear of own safety, fear of losing income, fear of...you name it. There's even a scientific name for fear (phobia) just to proof that how influential fear is to human's life.
• Marketing are just a synonym  of making friends. Many thought that by doing MLM you need to "cari orang" and "jumpa orang". By right, you "cari orang" in universal hearing screening and you "jumpa orang" when you try to present the sad news that their child are having some degree of hearing loss. So, what's the husstle of "cari orang" and "jumpa orang"? Again, this is also one kind of fear. Fear of CHANGES and NEW THINGS. Once you've adapted to it, there's no problem anymore. And more interestingly, when you add "professionalism" to it, it is no longer shameful. And when you add "commission and locum" after professionalism, it become an EXECUTIVE and EXCLUSIVITY.
• Expensive are just a thought in your brain. It's how you execute that makes the different. For example, if you feel that selling a RM1500 hearing aid is expensive, it will become expensive. And your customer will sense that you are lack of confident (As how we can sense a salesman is lacking in confidence when we try to buy our handphone/laptop). But if you said to yourself, this technology is superb and worth investing for, your customer will buy it not because you lied to them, but because they are confident on what you have just shown them. And please, don't lie since it can be detected by your customer sooner or later. Besides, what kind of career are you building if it started with a lie.

Going down hill
After a quite successful achievement in MLM, my faith to Allah was tested. My mum (whose my good friend my whole life) was very ill and I have to stop whatever that I'm doing to nurse her. And at that time, I've just bought my new KIA Sportage. Eventhough it's hard but, for the love to my mum, I left the business that I was doing totally and slowly my business went down. But, I didn't loose my income right after that. That's why people say MLM is a sustainable business (but really depend on which company your are in). I still receive bonuses until 4-5 months after a quit and it gives me a recovery period. At that time, I started my home-based frozen food and catering business with the help of my husband (still my boyfriend at that time).

Moral of the story:

• Be truly faithful to Allah. Rezeki doesn't belong to anyone but Allah. If he say he will throw to you rezeki, doesn't matter what you do or where you are, you'll get your share and it will be enough anyhow.
• People like to be rewarded but sometimes reward can be harmful. When working your way towards rewarding career, do take good care of your health and your loved ones because you will regret it if you don't. But, don't forget to reward yourself after a long and tiring journey because even if it is a brief and simple reward, you will be energized and recharged for upcoming task.
• Knowledge is power. Even as simple as MLM business which can be done by just anyone without any qualification and skills needed, you still need to learn the correct way to climb the stairs of success. And again, you'll need the correct mindset and attitude to achieve this. If you copy the steps correctly and willing to learn without prejudice, only Allah can stop you from succeeding and there's always reason behind it.