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Businessman busted snooping on ex-girlfriend

A broker who sought to rat out his ex-girlfriend to a broker regulator had the tables turned against him when the regulator found out he had breached her privacy rights to support his complaint.

Necker Tsz Wing Kwok alleged to the Insurance Council of British Columbia, Canada, that his ex-girlfriend, who used to work at the same brokerage, was listed as the principal operator of a vehicle when she shouldn’t have been.

In support of his complaint, Kwok showed council staff copies of screen prints from the agency’s internal system, as well as screen shots from the B.C. public insurer’s broker query system.

“When the licensee was questioned about why he had these screen prints, he claimed that he was asked by council staff to provide these screen prints to facilitate review of his complaint about the ex-girlfriend,” council wrote in its intended decision. “Council staff denied ever requesting this information from the licensee.

When council further probed Kwok’s actions, he said he was aware of privacy requirements. He maintained that, apart from the time he obtained the screen shots from the Insurance Corporation of B.C. (ICBC), he had never before accessed ICBC’s systems in an unauthorized manner.

Except, perhaps, for those other 10 times he checked out his ex-girlfriend’s personal information on the ICBC database between November 2011 and July 2012, as the council later found out. (The ex-girlfriend stopped working at the same brokerage as Kwok on Nov. 9, 2011.)


None of the 10 checks occurred with a corresponding ICBC Autoplan transaction, council’s investigation showed. In each instance, the broker was able to view his ex’s vehicle registration information, the name of the vehicle’s registered owner, the principal operator of the vehicle, the principle operator’s driving license number, the vehicle owner’s address and the effective date of insurance coverage.

“[Kwok] initially explained it was necessary for him to determine the ex-girlfriend’s assets as they were involved in litigation resulting from their separation,” council said in its decision. “In a later submission to council, [Kwok] denied that he had accessed the ex-girlfriend’s records with the intention of determining her assets.”

Council suspended Kwok’s license for two years and ordered him to pay a CAD $1,000 fine for inappropriately accessing his ex-girlfriend’s private information.

Council has not published a decision related to the ex-girlfriend, and Kwok's allegations against her have not been proven in a judicial or disciplinary forum.

what the email is more damaging than dope

E-mails 'hurt IQ more than pot'

 extract 2005

LONDON, England -- Workers distracted by phone calls, e-mails and text messages suffer a greater loss of IQ than a person smoking marijuana, a British study shows.


The constant interruptions reduce productivity and leave people feeling tired and lethargic, according to a survey carried out by TNS Research and commissioned by Hewlett Packard.

The survey of 1,100 Britons showed:

Almost two out three people check their electronic messages out of office hours and when on holiday

Half of all workers respond to an e-mail within 60 minutes of receiving one

One in five will break off from a business or social engagement to respond to a message.

Nine out of 10 people thought colleagues who answered messages during face-to-face meetings were rude, while three out of 10 believed it was not only acceptable, but a sign of diligence and efficiency.

But the mental impact of trying to balance a steady inflow of messages with getting on with normal work took its toll, the UK's Press Association reported.

In 80 clinical trials, Dr. Glenn Wilson, a psychiatrist at King's College London University, monitored the IQ of workers throughout the day.

He found the IQ of those who tried to juggle messages and work fell by 10 points -- the equivalent to missing a whole night's sleep and more than double the 4-point fall seen after smoking marijuana.
"This is a very real and widespread phenomenon," Wilson said. "We have found that this obsession with looking at messages, if unchecked, will damage a worker's performance by reducing their mental sharpness.

"Companies should encourage a more balanced and appropriate way of working."
Wilson said the IQ drop was even more significant in the men who took part in the tests.
"The research suggests that we are in danger of being caught up in a 24-hour 'always on' society," said David Smith of Hewlett Packard.

"This is more worrying when you consider the potential impairment on performance and concentration for workers, and the consequent impact on businesses."

9 tips how to sell through social media

There is often confusion about the difference between LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook and how each applies to the sales process. In a nutshell, here is how these platforms fit.

How companies sell with changing of social media, social media consultancy Social Centered Selling unveils how to monetise the phenomena.

1. The sales landscape has changed

Right now, your prospects are reading about your products and services on blogs and in forums. They are scanning YouTube videos, your LinkedIn profile, Focus forums, Tweets and searching on Google for information about what they want to buy and from whom; they are ignoring the text on your website.

Now that social media has arrived on the scene, the classic formula of selling has been disrupted. Buyer 2.0 does not need you to educate them. Using the web and social tools, they are well educated on the features, functionality and pricing of available solutions long before they have their first conversation with sales.

Consider these facts:

Studies by Experian Marketing Services indicate that social networking now accounts for 15% of internet visits:

• Twitter: 100m users.
• LinkedIn: 150 millions
• Google+: 65 millions
• Facebook: 1 billions

2. What buyers want you to know

For sales organisations to succeed in today’s social business environment, they must first accept that buyer behaviour has changed! Buyer 2.0 is web savvy, informed and probably knows more about you than you know about them. In this new world, buyers start the sales process without you, which means that sellers must shift from a transactional approach to the sales process to a solution oriented, value-focused, and socially-connected approach.

These days, most buying decisions now start, move forward, and are very often closed online or over the phone without a single face-to-face meeting. That’s a frightening thought for the sales professional who has long believed that the only way to “close a deal” is to be sitting across the table from the prospect.

In addition to great people and sales skills, salespeople must also demonstrate that they are social media savvy and have strong business acumen. In Selling to the C-Suite, authors Stephen J. Bistritz, Ed.D. and Nicholas A.C. Read conducted extensive research on what buyers want salespeople to know. The question posed was: What has to happen in meetings with salespeople for the executive to feel it was effective?

The answer:

• Demonstrated responsibility
• Listened before proposing a solution
• Understood my business goals
• Displayed knowledge of my industry

Your prospect expects you to understand their business and with social networking tools like LinkedIn and Twitter, and business intelligence tools like InsideView, there is just no excuse for not having done your homework. We’ll get into that in more detail, but for now what you need to understand is that the days of walking in the door blind to your prospect’s issues are over. During the meeting is not the time to ask questions that you should already know the answers to. Meeting preparation is not optional.

3. Understand the technology

LinkedIn is your business networking tool and aids salespeople on the front-end of the sales cycle. Networking, lead generation, opportunity qualification, securing referrals and establishing business credibility in your field are just a few of the ways that you can use LinkedIn to your advantage.

Facebook is more conversational and personal in nature. For business, a Facebook fan page is often used by marketers to create customer loyalty and retention on the back-end of the sales cycle. By cultivating fans, marketing helps to ensure that your company remains front and centre in people’s minds.

Twitter is a micro-blogging tool and the real-time nature of the information being shared is a gold mine of business intelligence. You can follow your competitors to see what kinds of messages they are sending out. Or, follow the company that your prospect works for and stay on top of what kind of information they are sharing, what questions they are asking and the vendors they may be recommending.

4. The social selling approach

Social selling has risks, but sitting on the sidelines is the greatest risk of all!

You have been selling successfully for some time, so you may be asking, why do I need to worry about social media? The answer should be obvious. Your prospects are there! They are checking out what you offer and what your competitors offer. Who do you want them to choose?

Einstein said the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again expecting a different result. Sales approaches that worked five or 10 years ago are just not effective; it is time to let them go. Yes, it will take a little upfront work to establish your foundation, but it is not as complicated as you may think.

Positioning yourself to succeed in a social selling world includes these elements:

• Having a plan.
• Picking the right tools.
• Defining your audience.
• Implementing actionable tactics.
• Crafting your message.
• Measuring and tracking.
• Investing in training!

Financial causes flock to risk

Australia's financial planners are becoming increasingly reliant on risk advice to drive business income.

The findings of CoreData's Annual is at Risk Report,which found that, on average, the proportion of business income derived from insurance advice for advisers has increased to 52.8% in 2012, up from 47.1% in 2011 and 40.4% in 2010.

This reflects a shift in focus in the advice industry from investment growth to asset protection, said CoreData.

“Advisers are looking for utility in the life company's offer, as seen in the focus on competitiveness of pricing options and cover definitions across income protection, term life, trauma and TPD," said CoreData head of advice, wealth and super Kristen Turnbull.

Culture of ageism plagued Finance industry

The vast majority of finance professionals insist age discrimination is prevalent in Australia’s financial services industry. So how can we cure this damaging epidemic?

Seven in 10 Australia-based finance professionals insist age discrimination exists in the financial services industry, and 35% claim to have experienced it personally, according to FinancialCareers’ latest Diversity Survey.

Age discrimination usually means older workers suffering, but the survey found that of those who said they had personally experienced age discrimination, 31% said it was because they were “too young”, while 35% reported it was because they were “too old”.

However, an overwhelming majority of respondents (80%) agree that workers aged 30 and under are adequately valued by their company. When asked the same question about workers aged over 50, the percentage of respondents in agreement dropped to 65%. 

“The industry is regularly accused of suffering from a culture of ageism, and these latest results suggest that there is still a long way to go,” said eFinancialCareers managing director Asia Pacific, George McFerran.

“What’s surprising though is that younger workers are also reporting that they have been discriminated against. This may be a result of increasing pressure in a tight hiring market, where there are currently fewer middle management roles available for younger staff to apply for.”

McFerran said making the effort to support and retain experienced workers is an essential strategy for firms’ long-term success.

“Right now there is a strong argument for financial services companies to put in place deliberate strategies for engaging and retaining older workers to ease skills shortages and sure-up their future for the long term,” said McFerran.

“They bring professional contacts, relationships, credibility and – most of all – experience.  Their expertise during challenging times like these can prevent younger professionals from making potentially unwise decisions due to a lack of perspective that can only be remedied by experience.”

McFerran added that financial services firms should revisit their retention strategies to ensure they are fair and equitable to older professionals, as well their recruitment strategies to ensure older workers are represented in a way that brings long-term value to the organisation.

How to Create Repeat Business Part 2

The feedback was active about my recent article  How to Create Repeat Business I decided to continue with a few more ideas about this important topic.


by... Phillip R Smith  FAICD AII AIM CD

Founding Director of Central Insurance Brokers Perth West Australia

and Aussie Exec Tours Bangkok.

Here’s one more idea you can use after the sale in last week’s Dry Cleaner example...
Always give the customer another chance to spend more money with you when they place their order.  Before the customer returns for their clothes, you could have someone call and say….

“Mr. Smith, when you brought your clothes in yesterday, you indicated on the raffle ticket that your wife’s favorite color was blue.  I thought you might be interested in a limited shipment of exotic blue silk scarves I had exclusively imported from India.  We’ve only got 10 of them left, and I am giving our newest customers the first chance to look at them. They are great anniversary or birthday gifts.  Would you like me to set them aside for you to look at when you pick up your clothes?”


Are you getting the idea?  What intrigues me is how much time and effort a business goes through to get a new customer, and then totally ignores them afterwards.
You have worked hard in your business.  You’ve taken all the risks and you have developed a product or service that can make you some money.  You put your money into advertising and promotion. 

Now it’s time to generate the key to your long-term success and profitability. Your profits are in creating lifetime customers. 
The final portion of this very important concept is to look at your database.  When I do seminars I find out that most of the attendees have an impression that database marketing is simply “direct mail” and that it didn’t work when they tried it.
Nothing can be further from the truth.  Direct Mail is only one small aspect of database marketing.  I’m really talking about the technological ability to mass customize your customer list.  In other words, you use the computer to do your hard work for you.  But the computer has to have the information before it can do the hard work.
What is so often overlooked by many businesses is the “Lifetime Value” of a customer.  With most businesses, the lifetime value is often ‘0’.  They spend needlessly on advertising for new customers and that new customer only buys enough to pay for the acquisition cost and never comes back.  What a waste!

But with database marketing strategies working for you, every customer becomes a potential lifetime profit center, not just a hopeful.  Inexpensive software now allows you to do all kinds of neat and innovative things with your client list.  But, you must create the list first.
The first step you must take is to think very creatively about what you want to accomplish, so that you gather the right information.  And then you have to sort the information for the specific applications you have created to follow-up with your customer and get them to come back and spend more money.
Let me go back to the Dry Cleaner example I used. He could have analyzed his database and discovered that 77% of his clients live within a 10 block area of this store.  80% of those who live nearby have 2 or more children under the age of 10.  With that information in hand he could easily design a promotion of some type that would be very specific.
Let’s suppose that there is a Pizza Parlor next door.  He can propose a Joint Promotion. The Pizza Parlor will offer a 50% off special just to the children of the Dry Cleaners customers.  Now, he can use Direct Mail effectively.
He makes the following offer.  He will buy their 2 kids a 12inch pizza to share, if the parents bring in at leas $25 worth of cleaning during the specified week.  Probably the free offer of food for their kids is almost impossible to pass up, and let’s say that 300 families show up for the offer. Let’s also assume that they didn’t only bring in $25 worth of clothing but $45.
If you do the math it comes out like this.  300 families at $45 average = $13,500.  Deduct the 300 pizzas at half price; probably about $5 is $1500 dollars.
Here it is:
$13,000 Income from Cleaning

1. Minus 244 Advertising Cost
2. Minus 1500 Pizza cost
3. Equals $11,756 in profits.

All because he allowed the customers to spend more money with him.  There are many other benefits from this type of attitude.
His customers really appreciate the effort and creativity that went into this type of promotion, as opposed to just putting an ad in the paper.  His competitors don’t know what is happening, and they are left scratching their heads instead of running right out and copying him. The Dry Cleaner can continue this type of marketing month after month with astounding results.
I’ve come full circle on this concept and I know you get the idea that you can join the endless search for new customers, always worrying about how to get more of them; or, you can approach every customer as the “first” in your business life, and turn them into lifetime “profit centers” by creatively interacting with them.
People want to be recognized, rewarded, and appreciated.  Do it well, and they will reward you with increasing amounts of their business.
Do it poorly, or not at all, and they will reward you with never coming back.  You generally get one chance to convert that prospect to a lifetime profit center.  Don’t blow it, because they won’t give you a second chance.


Forward a copy of this newsletter to a colleague; it may be just what they need to take their business to another level.