Current thoughts: Money or experience? ---> July 18, 2005

Dilemma, dilemma...

Here's the situation:

1 year ago, I started work as the export manager for CV Phanie Lestari, a charcoal exporting company in Indonesia (google it & u'll find me there...). After 1 year & many unsuccessful negotiations with a lot of large firms around the world, I finally clinched 1 big deal worth around S$1 million/year for a minimum of 2 years.

A bit of explanation on how we get paid in this industry. I basically get very little basic pay but the bulk of my income comes from the commission I get from clinching the deal (Exactly how much is trade secret, but it's quite sizable for a starter..).

So I thought I would be earning perpetual income for quite some time if this deal gets extended every year & I wouldn't have to worry about my own expenses anymore.. Turned out that there's no one willing to load charcoal onto their ships from Indonesia & carry it to Israel (there's formally no diplomatic relations between Jakarta & Haifa apparently..), & so gone were my opportunity of getting independent & also my earmarked travelling expenses I promised myself if the deal was successful...

Fast forward 1 year to the future.. Kitty found me an internship with NAB. Had to delay the 1st day till tomorrow because of some bureaucratic red tape issues relating to the Uni. & NAB. Good. All ready to go.. till another MSN message arrived from Haifa just a few hours ago (my client still kept in touch often even though the deal was called off..). He told me he arranged for the shipment already & the deal is back on. After 1 whole year...

To resurrect the deal, I have to send him lots of details of the contract, including the company logo. Given that he informed me only a few hours ago, I could prepare everything except for the company logo, which I have only in print & not in soft copy.

Now comes the dilemma. I could just forget he ever called me & start my 1st day of work tomorrow to find out how it's like to work in a finance (my major in commerce, along with marketing..) firm. Everything would work as usual & I can look forward to a 9-5 job for the rest of my life....

Or I could start work on Wednesday & take tomorrow off to send my client the details he needs and possibly clinch a deal. To understand why this is such a dilemma, I'll have to add that this client has actually contacted me several times over the course of the year to revive the deal. Needless to say, each time it ended up with the proposal being thrown into the bin because of problems mainly relating to the freight. This time round though, he claimed to have spoken to the HQ of the freight company and secured approval straight from there & therefore there shouldn't be any hitches. I have some reservations about that, but yet at the same time I don't want to lose the chance to finally make a sizable sum of money on my own and also secure a perpetuity which would serve as a capital base for my own venture next time, even though the chance of success might be just 10%.

So, money or experience? I made my decision: Money. Called Kitty just now to postpone the work experience till Wed, even though I'd really like to start working there. The thought of securing a large income consumed my mind so much that I just have to try it, even if it may mean another failure in the making.

Spirit of entrepreneurship? hardly. It's just that I've been accustomed to failures so much that it doesn't hurt to give 1 last try on every new thing that comes along. For people that knew me since I was in Singapore, they can vouch for the crazy things that I've done so far in my life, even if it means burning up my life savings up to that stage. I've been in some sort of pyramid schemes, purchased $40 Ipods that haven't & probably will never arrive, etc etc. It may sound crazy, but that's me. I'll try just about anything to make it out on my own, provided it sounds logical to me, even though it (the logic) hasn't served me too well in the past :)