Gold and Trust

The worth of trust is equivalent to gold. A trustworthy man is a beloved man that is able to win over everyone's heart without much a problem. You cannot earn that by offering gold to everyone. Some might like to befriend with you simply because of the offering of gold or money. This relationship, however is short lived and would not last longer as it can. While a gold can buy you any material need or even companion, the trust cannot be converted to monetary return. The trust, however will help to fulfill your spiritual engagement and of course earn respect from others, not only for yourself but also your family. Hence, trustworthy is important and pre-requisite in our life.

It is fine for having the gold and trust. For businessman, it simply means they are making money with ethic and good deed. For general public, it means earning a living with dignity. It becomes a crisis when you have to make a choice between gold and trust. You are required to choose either gold or trust such as cheating people by earning the money or providing empty promise in return for love or financial gain.

While everyone will prioritise the trust over gold, in reality we are surrounded by many people who do not mind to sacrify their trustwortiness for own self-interest. This trend is compounded by the individual urge for success in life, peer pressure to do better, family expectation to earn higher than the neighbours, collegues to compete with each others and the fear of losing their advantages due to the competitive world we are living in now. The practice of using GDP and physical measurement for quality of life is not helping either. We tend to compare with each others based on material gain and not how happy we are. Perhaps the happiness index as applied by some countries should be adopted widely and extensively.

Top Down Planning

Malaysian Institute of Planners hosted a delegation from Iraq which include the The Hon. Minister last Saturday. Briefing about the history, challenges, governance system, approaches of Malaysian Planning was given to the guests. They are interested to know the appropriate process of training personnel, governance system and planning practice for the planning and development of the country. All these are related to the professional planning services which include the government, private sector and the academia.

One of the interesting point was raised, that is the hierarchy of planning. It is always the case of having higher level of planning at the Federal or Central Level and zoom it down to the local level. This was done so for the purpose of national interest, coordination at the federal level especially for development projects with national significance, resources allocation as the Federal Government is the central agency to distribute the national wealth as well as the notion of "we know best". However, in view of the emerging trend of community voicing out and demand for their right to be heard and consulted, the need for bottom up planning instead of solely the top down approach is getting higher now. The guest asked about the bottom up approach in planning in which how local planning influences the planning direction at the national level.

Participatory planning is rather important now. People want to be involved, heard and participate in the planning and decision making process. It is now the planning with the people rather than the commonly believe of planning for the people. Thereby, soliciting people's views and proposal at the local level, the closet to the community is critical. It is rightly so as ultimately they will be the users and beneficiary or even the victim for bad planning, not for a short term but perpectually. The Local Planning Authority is facing tremendous pressure now to engage and listen to the stakeholders and to decide the development direction and decision with their input in mind. People are not afraid of voicing out their views and demand for reasonable explaination.

The attitude and approach of planners need changes as well. It is no more a job for technocrat. It is a multi-dicplinary approaches in which human skill is getting very important now. It is not how can you draw a plan better and comply with all the technical requirement only, but how can you engage not only the project proponents to like your plan as well as the stakeholders and authority to buy your idea with pleasure, I think.

Success in Exhibition

I attended 2 exhibitions recently and noticed that for a booth to attract more visitors than others, special strategies are required. These range from the location of the booth, design of the booth, information and material exhibited, free bees, friendly care takers, products or services required by the visitors and of course on site marketing.

In the Guangzhou Fair, MBPJ Booth was a hit amongst the visitors as it was located at the main hall and pedestrian corridor. Visitors visiting the pavillion will have no choice but by passing MBPJ booth even though they have no intention of coming inside the booth. Secondly, the Minangkabau design of the booth is so unique and refreshing for the Chinese visitors that many come over for a photograph session. Even our collegues wearing the Malay and Indian dressing are in demand for photograph shooting. Thirdly is the exhibits must be simple, attractive, informative and photogentic for viewing. Nobody will like to come cross to every exhibition panel to read through the details. Many will not spend time to get to the details unless it is required so for answering some questions in exchanging gift. Forthly, of course offering free gift will be another attraction. Many even come approaching for free bees rather than spending time visiting the booth. However, ensuring that people at least spend some time visiting the booth and not come solely for the free gift, some kind of games in relation to the exhibition should be held. On site marketing is another method to attract attention. For example, scheduled shows such as dancing and magic show will stimulate interest.

For a successful promotion during exhibition, I beleive the above are important ingredients. For this to happen, proper planning and preparation is required.

Good Can Be Better

People always say if good can be better, then good is not good enough. Similarly, if there is room for improvement, then what have achieved is definitely not good enough. This perception did arise because everything we do might not be done in wholeheartedly or with the best efforts or some time constrainted by the circumstances that handicapped the result. I believe everything we do will have room for improvement either immediately or at later stage when the circumstances warrant. Hence, what we do daily is considered a process rather than a result as continue improvement is pending all the time.

Planning is in the similar situation. Thereby planning should be flexible with changes according to the local circumstance, aspiration of the stakeholders or even market forces. Planning for an area might not be possible and feasible presently, but does not means similar consideration cannot be given when the time is right. For example, changing of landuse to a more compatible use should be allowed if the residential houses are no more conducive for living due to traffic and environmental condition. Having said this, a thorough and holistic study is required as the changes can be indefinite and resulted in long term impacts to the surrounding area.

Underground Shopping

Travel with Metro in Guangzhou City is a pleasant experience. While the well connected rail is so accessible, affordable and convenient, shopping underground from the entrance leading to the gate of rail station is equally impressive. Plenty of shops offering variety of goods and services are lined up along the axis to the station. You will not miss it, perhaps you do not want to miss it.

While commercialising the corridor with high pedestrian movement is a commercial decision, the planning itself must be right. Putting some commercial activities along the corridors no doubt will attract attention and customers, it must however according to what we aspire and want. For example, is that ok for having the street artists performing there? Is that right for hawkers cooking and selling food there? We must have a good tenant mix catering to the need of travellers and perhaps shoppers so that walking leading to the rail station is a pleasant experience, and not a boring and unsecure trip.

I wish to see similar happenings in our LRT, commuter and MRT line, one day.

Special Area Planning

I was impressed with the special zone planning in Guangzhou City after a briefing done by the city planners last week. The demarcation of an area for speciality and land use or activities with its own uniqueness and characteristics is not something new, the successful exercution however is something new and difficult.

Most of the time, city planners would like to see their plan comes to reality. However, the implementation stage which come much later is normally failing the plan. It can be the problem of securing financing, disagreement of the market forces, readiness of the stakeholders, capacity of the city managers and etc. Even though implementation is carried out as planned, it might be turned out to be different thing or not according to the plan. For example, although business park is envisioned for Section 13, the development itself without proper coordination might realise the place as another conventional type of commercial centre without its unique features, such as the green business hub with amble accessibility and connectivity.

Guangzhou City manages to differentiate area with its own features. When you are in ThianHe area, it is cosmopolitan like commercial centre and likewise in Baizhou, it is M.I.C.E convention centre. The YueSiao area is the older part of the City with many greenery and historical building and places of interest. Similarly, along the Pearl River is the leisure centre.

For Petaling Jaya, I believe similar exercise has to be carried out. Perhaps starting with the place making exercise should be held. Place making means developing an area with its soul and characteristics. For example, Old Town can be the wholesale centre for PJ. And to encourage related activities there, incentive scheme shall be offered and development should be facilitated. In this respect, Local Authority should play a bigger role for promoting and guiding the development at the level of daily routine. The time of approving and licensing the development projects only without nurturing the growth of an area with its special features is gone, to me.

City Marketing

Marketing a city is not an easy task, especially for the cities without unique identify or do not come with any historical value, special or natural characteristic or with national significance. 21st Century is the era for cities. Cities become the growth engine for the nation. It is the cities that reflecting the true image and characteristics of a country and hence presenting first impression to the visitors and outsiders about how the city is doing. Thereby, getting people acquitte with the city is becoming more and more complicated as all cities are competing each others for attention, in flow of capital and investment, visitors and tourists as well as businesses. Local Governments are pushing unlimited efforts to market their cities. However, not many manage to make it successfully.

Marketing a city is not about putting up exhibition and showing people some nice pictures on places of interest. Marketing a city is about telling people what uniqueness can I offer that you might not seen elsewhere. Even if you have seen elsewhere you might only saw the best here in my city. People travelling to Melbourne for her status as liveable city. Similarly Singapore is known for its' cleanliness, safety and greenery. Bangkok City is known as leisure, shopping and entertainment paradise. Tokyo for its cosmopolitan appearance and etc.

Hence, marketing a city must first started with identifying the unique characteristics of a city or what the city can offer. Without that, it is difficult to tell people what the city all about. For example, people might know Kuala Lumpur because of the Petronas Twin Tower, once the tallest building in the World. People aware about Banglore of India because the city is the World IT Hub. Many know Cambriage or Oxford City because of the renowned university and ambience for studying. It is easy to market a city upon associating the city with symbolic gestures or images.

Guangzhou is known as a business city and it is not uncommon to be labelled as the World Manufacturing City as well. The presence of many products makers, wholesellers, retailers and buyers from all over the World speaks for itself. To facilitate the ease of doing business, The City Government of Guangzhou maintains good friendship with a lot of cities apart from making the urban infrastructure and facilities in tip top condition.

What to market for Petaling Jaya City? It is one of the most vibrant and dynamic city in Malaysia, but globally it is not that significant. I presume this is a big question mark for many...