Financial Samurai

The first winner is Eric, a senior from UCLA!  Eric commented sincerely about his concerns post graduation, and whether or not it is a good idea to go to a “2nd tier” business school or just work for whatever company that hires him first.

We’ll be working with Eric to strategize a plan after UCLA and coach him through the process of finding a job in his desired field of finance, or applying to business school. Read more…

Unless you’re perfect, there will be times when things don’t go your way.  You’re last to be picked in PE class, Yale says, “thank you, but no thank you”, and your girlfriend/boyfriend dumps you for another man/woman.  Do you start sulking?  Or do you get up, get angry, and prove to yourself you’re worth it?

Some people are so afraid of rejection, they never put themselves out there.  They reject themselves before even giving others a chance!

Lame Excuses:

“Why would this school accept me?”

“Why would she want to talk to me?”

“I don’t deserve a raise so I’ll never ask.”

“I’m not good enough to work for this firm, so I won’t bother applying.”

“What if everybody thinks what I say is stupid?”

“My writing is horrible, why would anybody want to read anything of mine?”

These types of thoughts crush dreams, lead to low-self esteem and mediocrity. 

Change the way you view rejection with these 5 strategies: Read more…

“It’s not whether you have your MBA, it’s where it came from,” writes John Micklethwait, Editor-In-Chief of The Economist. I’m sure on at least two levels, he’s upsetting people. On one level, those without MBA’s are going to find it presumptuous that getting an MBA is a foregone conclusion.  On another level, there are thousands of MBA grads who didn’t attend the top tier schools who will take offense as well.

John is smart to be so opinionated because after all, the people who will be buying his magazine are those who have always wondered whether getting an MBA is a good idea.  He forces the assumption that if you picked up his magazine, you must get an MBA, and not just any MBA, but one of the top schools from his polls.

I don’t entirely agree with John, but let’s face reality, getting an MBA is gradually becoming the new standard for newcomers to the world of finance because some go-getter decided it was the right thing to do and succeeded to get others to follow.  The MBA is also too expensive to not try and go to the best school possible (although it’s not the end of the world).  The inertia is too strong to reverse now!

Here are some of the takeaways from the magazine: Read more…

Fascinating video about the progress of technology and social media that everybody should know about.  This is my first attempt at posting up a video, so I hope it doesn’t blow up my site.  Thanks Gen Y Investor for the tips!

For all those who don’t know how to put up a video from YouTube on your site, simply go to your YouTube video, copy the HTML code on the right, past it into your HTML tab in your WordPress, click back to Visual, and edit accordingly!

Tomorrow we will reveal our $1,000 giveaway for those aspiring to get their MBA.  Even if you don’t want to get your MBA, you might know someone who does so stay tuned!

DID YOU KNOW? VERSION 4.0, FALL 2009

Readers, are you ready for the next 5 years?!

Keigu,

Financial Samurai – “Slicing Through Money’s Mysteries”

Follow me on Twitter @FinancialSamurai

Free Money Finance wrote a solid post on how to make “6 Figures in 7 years” over at GRS. By the time I got to his post, there were already 95 comments with a very negative undertone.  When I just questioned whether only 5.6% of the working population makes over $100,000/yr, there was even more negative reaction.  Fellow commenter Sarah wrote, “You are out of touch with reality!” Umm, I didn’t make a statement, I just asked a question.

 A reader e-mails in, “FS, I’ve just had one of the worst freaking days of the year today at work. I’ve been busting my butt for this one client for the past 6 months, and when it was time to do their semi-annual review, we actually got worse in their ranking. To add insult to injury, they also provided some negative feedback, and I’ve known this client for so long. I thought we had a good relationship. I’m so mad because I’ve spent double the effort on them this year, and went backwards. They aren’t even a big client! What would you do? Thanks, Frustrated.”

Hi “Frustrated”, I’m sorry to hear about your situation. I’ve been there before, many of times, and all I’ve wanted to do was give up and yell. What’s important is to NOT act emotionally. Go for a walk, grab a drink, and take some deep breaths before you e-mail/call the client or discuss the issue with your manager. Too many times, people write things they don’t mean in the heat of the moment and end up regretting their actions. You must go about this in a rationale manner.

5 Suggestions For Handling A Difficult Client: Read more…

We Don't Need No Medicine!

I’m pleased to bring you a guest post by faithful reader and commenter, Larry Ludwig (bio below).  He writes a thought provoking piece about challenging the norm of becoming debt free.  You’ll be smarter after reading this, guaranteed!  Enjoy, and as always, feel free to debate away!  Rgds, Financial Samurai

You’ve heard the financial gurus like Dave Ramsey perform pasectomies on his show and Suze Orman with her numerous “I have 50k in debt” guests.  The gurus all say, debt is bad, credit is evil, and being debt free is nirvana, yada yada yada.  While I do think as a whole Americans have too much consumer debt, the goal of being completely debt free is actually a terrible idea. Let me be specific: buying things that depreciate with debt is bad, that big screen TV, new clothing or car.  Most of the financial gurus do not make this distinction and make all debt to be “evil”.

I believe Rich Dad/Poor Dad Robert Kiyosaki has said it best, “There is good and bad debt and being debt free is more risky than having good debt.”.  Now before you go off on my recommendation of Robert and his questionable background, I believe his statement is sound and correct.

The primary reasons are:
•    Opportunity Cost
•    Asset Allocation
•    Inflation
•    Tax Deductions
•    Arbitrage
•    Leverage

Read more…

I was driving downtown to drop my wife off at the museum when a car started drifting dangerously into my lane.  I beeped the horn to alert the driver and when I drove by, the teenage kid in the back seat flicked me off!  I didn’t have a long annoying horn, nor a machine gun type rat-ta-tat-tat beep.  All I did was beep once so we wouldn’t collide.  The father was reading a map and driving at the same time.

I have to admit that my blood started to boil and I was tempted to blast him a new one when their car stopped next to me in front of the light.  Instead, I buzzed down my window, stared intently, and told the kid, “Don’t embarrass your parents.  I beeped at you guys because you were halfway in my lane and didn’t even know it.”

The dad was still clueless as to why I was talking to his punk kid and he also rolled down his window to ask, “What’s up?” Read more…