What Commerce taught me about life
Application of Principles of Commerce to one’s life
It’s a fact that if you aren’t a science student, you are a second class student. Commerce and Arts student go through so many condescending looks, comments and faces that they get used to it over the years. However, as a student who studied commerce in 11th and 12th, there are certain principles I found worth imbibing in our life. This article is a list of those principles and concepts. One need not apply all the principles but those that fit their circumstances and works for them.
1. Treat yourself as the manager: Every day is a new day with new challenges and new opportunities. Whenever you wake up in the morning, you are a new manager who has taken over your life. You need to bring your day to a successful end at night when the manager goes to sleep. At sleep, the existing manager resigns and the new manager takes his place. The new manager may have to clear up the mess that previous manager had created, but he is not to blame for the works of the previous manager. Hence, he need not take stress for the past, since it was not his fault. This manager will create a plan on how to go about the entire day. Reward your manager with something good if he does his job well.
2. Treat yourself as an owner an owner of One-Person-Company. One-Person-Company is a reality in many countries, including India. Treat your life as One-Person-Company. The company’s name is your name. It’s not just a name, it’s a brand. As an owner of the company, it’s your responsibility that you create and maintain goodwill of your company. Make sure your company progresses and becomes popular. Don’t do any such thing which would attract disrepute to your company. Be trustworthy and productive so that society will invest their time, money and resources in your company.
3. Always consider the opportunity cost. Opportunity cost is the next best opportunity foregone. It’s one of the easiest concepts in economics. However, opportunity cost is the most important concept in life. Every decision that you take, every activity that you do, has an opportunity cost of time and sometimes money. The opportunity cost of time is something which many of us neglect. Always reckon the opportunity cost of your recreational activities and past times.
4. Treat Time as money. ‘Time is money’ is a well-known phrase in the pop-culture. However, everyone should treat time as money, not just for feeling cool, but for making an account of it. Just like we prepare different Accounts in Accountancy, similarly, we should prepare an account for the time. Just like we plan on how to spend money, we should plan on how to spend time. Similarly, we should consider how much time we end up spending and the reasons for the same. We should time everything that we do. Every project, every exam paper, and every session of sitting and studying. Convert the unit of time into unit of money. We treat money as more precious than time. This is because psychologically we see time as unlimited resource while money as limited resource. There are many ways to do this. One way to do this is divide your fees for the entire year by 365 days, and you will see how the worth of your every single day. Divide this amount further by twenty-four hours.
5. Prepare Annual Reports: Prepare daily, weekly or project wise report of your company’s performance. Count in both the ins and outs of your performance. List out the suggestions that you will give to the next manager or yourself for future. Hence, prepare plans and reports and statements of your life.