About Me

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Ottawa, Canada
Dr. Charles Lam has since 1971 received training in West Germany (telecom) and university education in U.K. (management) and acquired working experiences in Hong Kong and Canada, in a utility company, Hong Kong Government, a multinational organization and a SME. In his career path, he has acquired qualifications from UK institutions including DBA (1990), MBA (1980) and Chartered Engineer (1978). Since 1986, he has left pure engineering to teaching various subjects of business management in Hong Kong for famous universities of Hong Kong, England and United States. He also has served the society as a member of an advisory committee of the Hong Kong Government for eight years, and as the Hon. Chairman of its Consumer Education Group. Later, he set up his own company to offer services as a consultant, writer and speaker. In his 'Second Half Time', he has been working passionately on integrating Christian values with management knowledge, in the marketplace/workplace ministry, serving hospitals, churches and organizations, as a speaker, consultant, life coach, and the leader of a REST Group based on a life story approach. Charles is currently living with his wife in Canada.

Thursday, August 22, 2013

Strategic responses facing challenges

Strategies for responding to environmental challenges can be categorized in the following way. They are applicable not only to a person, but also to an organisation (including church and NGO), and even a bigger entity (industry, city, country), embracing both ‘external’ and ‘internal’ strategies.

(1) proactive: changing environments surrounding the situation, e.g. culture, laws, rules; influencing others to do likewise; asking for help;…
(2) active responsive: adapting to the surrounding environments (for survival); “In Rome, do what Romans do”, submitting to authority; acting to protect oneself; moving (escaping) away from the situation;…
(3) passive responsive : doing nothing to avoid turbulences; delaying decision making while observing; waiting for an opportunity; …
(4) passive : avoiding to face the situation; pretending not seeing the situation; waiting for luck; giving up planning & steering;…

The decision maker needs first to understand the background relevant to and the character, strengths and weaknesses of the entity . Timing is also important. That is, for it to be effective, he needs to use a situational approach to make a choice.

The favourite choices for most people are (2) and (3).

Wednesday, August 07, 2013

In life management, top-down conceptual thoughts need bottom-up actions to materialise

Preachers, teachers, authors and the like, often talk about the importance of having vision, mission, life purpose, life goals, etc. Full of joy and confidence during the listening and reading, we think that life problems can soon be solved through the input of these concepts. However, often only a short while after reception, concepts are forgotten, life is full of challenges and frustration returns. This is relevant to (internal) conflict management.

We need to start (from low level) actions to implement (high level) concepts to get experiences and then to reflect on these experiences, in order to reinforce these concepts. This is called action learning.

Bottom-up actions: distinguishing wishes from truth--a verse often quoted in sermons is " But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well." (Matthew 6: 33). If a person unfortunately misunderstands the message and separates spiritual life from secular life, then he would just do and think about things 'spiritual' and ignore his 'secular' daily duties and responsibilities. This is relevant to knowledge management.

Bottom-up actions: balancing roles--we need wisdom from God to know how to say 'yes' and 'no' to activities, as we need to play so many roles in life--a family member, a friend, a Christian, a relative, a classmate, a volunteer, etc. It is not too difficult to find out which activities are good in God's eyes. This is relevant to role management.

Bottom-up actions: meeting higher level goals--for example, if I work hard, I can finish (1) this course in a year's time, after which I can (2) apply for that job, so that (3) I can serve some people, following (4) a calling from God. Going from (1) to (4) is bottom-up step-by-step actions. This is relevant to time management.

Bottom-up actions: don't procrastinate--fear of storms outside, falling in love with the comfort zone, fear of failures,....There can be a long list of reasons for not taking the first step. This is relevant to strategic management.

May God help us to take bottom-up actions, to realise our God-given dreams.

Thursday, August 01, 2013

Career planning is spiritual

Some say that career planning is not spiritual, because if we rely on our own power to plan the way forward and not on God's, that is human pride.

However, I think career planning is spiritual because our brain is God's gift, and it is good to use it, guided by God's words.

Indeed, it will be our planning! But if guided by God, it will be His planning too! He is pleased with 
our faithfulness to follow Him.

Therefore, I think that Christians should not just sit (or stand) there and wait for God's telling us when and how to take each and every piece of action. A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step. 

God even wants us to take some risks in moving forward, I believe. Why not? This is a way for us to learn to be a good steward of our
resources: time, energy, money, etc. Sometimes, He even wants to teach us a lesson through our failures!

"Move only when you see a vision", "wait for God's signal", "walk step by step" , etc., might be biblical but could also be noises from outside or internal voices that cheat ourselves. Or could be laziness driven by Satan!

Therefore, the saying that "living in the moment is a blessing"(活在當下就是幸福) could be a myth. This thought may be applicable to people in special situations e.g. living amid a disaster, old aged, being sick; that is, when they can't move forward even though they want to.


But for most people, we do have a choice. Even in very adverse situations, we can use our willpower to overcome barriers and comfort zones. For Christians, we are more blessed as we can get help from brothers and sisters and our Almighty God.