Trying to create alliance

Assallamualaikum...

I had my first meeting with my daughter concerning the business plan we are supposed to come up with by late December 2011. This is the first time we sat down to work on it. My daughter came up with the daily operational cost which come up to around $10K per month.

Well, this is just a rough estimate and I feel that a lot of it will be strike off when we present it to my businessman friend / investor. The whole business plan seems to be too shallow so I decided to do some research in the internet and still www.richcontractor.com provides the best advice... I have even posted a comment ...

"Hey Scott,

Appreciate very much that you have created this site and still answering questions up to the present moment.

I have a daughter who’ve worked in a main contractor firm for 4 years as a quantity surveyor and purchaser. Recently a friend of mine who I have consulted about starting up my own business, told me that I am sitting on a gold mine that I have yet to tap on. He was referring to my daughter of course and he is even willing to put up half of the capital as an investor if I can come up with a business plan that will employ my daughter’s expertise.

My daughter is actually quite good in her field landing some high profile contracts for her company. Her work rate is very high (clocking more than 14hrs per day). The way I see it, she could easily survive doing it for her own, like setting up her own business with me. However, eventhough I do not know anything about building construction but I am good with account softwares and internet marketing.

Need your advice on the type of business we should engage ourselves in.

Thank you for your kind attention."

However, as I was writing the comments down it triggers my thoughts to connect with another friend who is a property agent. I sms him to set up an appointment and he agreed to see me in a couple days time... :)

Another opportunity comes...

Assallamualaikum...

I went to a gathering to meet a long time friend who has been staying in Morocco for many years. He came back for the festive season and all of my other secondary school buddies wanted to meet him.

While at the gathering, one of my friend brought out his admiration for people who wants to do business the Islamic way. It quickly grabbed my attention but another friend of mine took his attention away by asking lots and lots of questions on how he managed to be successful running a few companies. I let it slide because that friend of mine obviously wanted the businessman's attention.

A few days passed and I decided to follow up with that businessman friend of mine. Perhaps he can give me some advice on how I can set up my own business. He agreed to meet me.

I picked him up and we went to a cafe. I told him about my venture and he told me that it will not work if I wanted more out of my business. I had to bring up my daughter's jobscope as a Quantity Surveyor and immediately he lit up. He told me that I am sitting on a gold mine if I could engage my daughter in my business plan. We agreed to meet again in a couple of days together with my daughter.

That day soon arrived and there we are, my businessman friend, my daughter and I, all sitting down at the same cafe. My friend asked my daughter to explain the things she can do if we were going into a business of our own. She had always known my passion of running my own business which had led to my current predicament, but what captured her attention that day was the fact that my businessman friend is going to put in a substantial amount of money as an investment if we can come up with a good business plan.

The offer took me by surprise as well... My doas (prayers) is answered again and doa that I will do good this time around...

Another round of fail attempt...

Assallamualaikum...

Well I thought the ticketing business is my ticket to a better life but it proved to be another test given by Allah because I have not garnered enough wisdom yet. The Theme Park held back the tickets that we ordered and close us out due to its unstable ticketing system. I had to refund $20K worth of tickets back to my customers.

Remembering about the Robert Kiyozaki's book that I bought earlier, I started to read it, cover to cover and discovered all the wrong things that I had done when the goings was good for me. Needless to say I was where I started eventhough my friend tried to revive the business by forming a company.

Yes I did fail again but now I am not losing so much money like the first time where I had lost $8K just like that.

Things started to look up ...

Assallamualaikum...

I picked up a car grooming service which I did it with my son and silat students. Managed to get about 8 jobs. At least now I am getting payment from my services. Mostly the jobs come from friends and acquaintances.

During one of the car grooming job, my friend told me that another of my friend was able to get tickets for a Theme Park. I was not particularly fond of this guy so I just let it slide. However, my number was given to him.

That friend contacted me which I ignored at first but I picked up his call and decided to give this ticketing business a try. I leveraged on my network at Facebook and managed to earn $2K in one of the months doing it.

I thought to myself... well finally I found it and I am now truly on my way to do well. I bought a book "Increase your financial IQ" by Robert Kiyozaki but did not read it.

Disastrous things that happen along the way....

Assallamualaikum

I have asked Allah for His guidance whenever I do not know what to do next. He always answers my doa in terms of connecting me with the people who would guide me along the path that I am going to take. I am going describe some of the disastrous things that happen when I decided to start this journey...

Firstly I went to a workshop with a wealth guru that charged me $900 for 2 sessions with him. What I discovered were just techniques how to get one started and needless to say, this is the start of the disastrous section of my journey where eventually I lost $8K before I realize that I am not going anywhere with it.

How I lost the remaining $7.1K are as follows:-

1.  I followed the advice of one of the participant from the wealth guru class to attend a seminar. I was introduced to a Forex Guru which I paid $2.5K to attend his 3 day course. Needless to say I did not recoup any of it since I lost another $3.6K when I traded in FOREX eventually.

2. I was persuaded into signing into another Forex class which I paid $1K for it just to confirm that I do not have what it takes to trade in Forex. This time around I did not go and trade anything after the class, obviously.

I am not bitter after the experience because I take it as wisdom that Allah is giving me through the failures that I had gone through. So I turned to Allah again to get guidance and direction on the next course of action...

Why did I want to do this ?

Assallamualaikum

I will try account everything that leads me to my current situation steering away from any unpleasantness directing to anyone in particular but everything here is my own humble opinion of myself interacting with the conditions around me....

I have always wanted to set up my own business but never had the chance of doing it. It started from the time I finished serving my National Service back in 1986. Back then the culture of setting up your own business was viewed upon by my community as a failure, hence you are doomed even before you started.

I had an opportunity to do a swimming pool cleaning business with a friend of mine who had bought over the company from his boss. However, I did not get permission from my parents to join him. I will not not indulge in the things that happen after that only to say that I was married off to my wonderful wife at the age of 22.

Getting married very early in my life actually is a blessing in disguise because now at the age of 47, I can relight my passion of running my own business. I have found this website http://www.richcontractor.com/my_weblog/2008/11/how-to-become-a-contractor-13-steps-to-becoming-your-own-boss.html very useful out of all the websites that I have googled so far.