kmart

I concur. If you are here to do a specific job, other than ESL teaching, it is more stressful trying to meld cultures and biz and do a good job for the company. Same same anywhere in Asia.

Well, i disagree. Managers have to adapt to suit the environment in which they work. If you accept you're managing in Thailand and not try to impose your western sensibilities onto a Thai audience, there are no major issues. At least that's my experience.

I think we forget that we are the foreigners here, not them.

This is true. Good managers have to adapt to their local culture and climate anywhere in the world. Stress notwithstanding. However, if you are servicing and producing high standard goods or services for export to other Western markets then you have to motivate and impose those standards on your local workforce too. This can cause conflict, but again good management will find a way.

If they don't want you,leave. Teach them a lesson. Let them know they cannot

survive without you.

Allow them to become bankrupt without your wise guidance.

It's their country and not yours. If these farang managers are truly skilled, why can't they find work in their own countries?

Why do they insist on being in Thailand, is it their sense

of Thai nationalism or patriotism. Well they aren't Thai, so why don't they help improve their own countries with their

highly educated backgrounds. Sounds like they want to be in Thailand for different reasons.

They are mostly sent here by their companies. Not by choice. To look after their companies interests overseas. This may change in the near future due to the new laws on limited foreign stakes in companies here.

Are you real?

Perhaps it's the inate arrogance of farangs who think they can manage Thai companies (with Thai staff and Thai customers) much better than . . ummm . . Thai managers, that makes them want to get rid of farang management. An arrogance which is summed up in this thread.

Having seen examples of farang managers in Thailand (loud, uncouth, wearing shoddy suits and stinking of beer from last night's whoremongering), I don't blame them for getting rid of them.

This thread is a disgrace.

Bendix _ I could not agree more farangs managers are generally only in Thailand to either escape something back home - or they could not get a job of similar status back home - or they just want an extended social life at the expense of the Thai company.

What absolute rubbish! Don't know which sector you work in, but generally management for a foreigner here can be much more stressful than "back home" as you put it. Social life is nothing to do with it.

The weak point of most Thai companies is always their Thai management, who have generally achieved their position and status through nepotism and age alone. Ability alone is never seemingly factored into promotional movement and a lot of local managers enjoy a status, ego, and position that is inversely proportional to their ability.

Self-sufficiency might be achieved by embarking on a massive revamp of the education system here.

Only this has / will never happen due to the present elite are scared of ceding knowledge and thus power to a self-confident populace that have more than a nationalistic brain-washing as an education.

A return to agrarian self-sufficiency was tried in China with the "Great Leap Forwards" programme that annihilated over 30 million people with the most ironic title ever.

Oh! And lets not forget Cambodia's little foray into agrarian self-sufficiency 30 years ago?

The Minister of Finance was quoted, "Why should we postpone it when we have worked on it for three months. This is Thailand," he added.

Can someone expound on what he means when he says that?

It means they're playing the Nationalism card to justify stupid and unfair measures to take what they have never had the discipline to earn / develop themselves. "This is Thailand" it seems, is a cover-all catchphrase for anything dodgy or ridiculous in this increasingly Kafka-esque country.

Don't see how it could be good for Thailand if their customers are also Western based?

Carry On Trolling!!!

Supermarket trolleys here are very unusual in the fact that unlike the Thais, they seem to have a mind of their own...

Wonder if all this is just a big roll of the SET dice for the connected few?

Well, I tried to question her about why she would be interested in bikini models. She feels inspired or gets glamour ideas? Baffled and confused, I turn to you. Do you know any other girl buying mild pin ups?

You have converted her to lesbianism? j/k m8, the sexual roles and definitions are a bit more blurred here. Relax.

The Ministry Of Inanity strikes again.

Mahattir has too much of a chip on his shoulder from his childhood under the British

for my liking.

His racist and divisive policies have done little to really improve the overal lot

of the ethnic Malay's. Subsidies and preferentail treatment have not encouraged

them to grasp the nettle of modern life.

I'll go further and describe the man as a hypocritical gobshite eager to play the "Islamic spokesman" when referring to anyone else's foreign policies, yet silently cracking down on political rivals at home with his ISA Act to stifle democratic debate.

There is always the time-honoured trick of diverting jihadi radicals over the border to maintain political stability at home, but that is maybe just rumours.

Gonna be cynical here - sorry

Remembering back through several years of ThaiVisa threadsm it seems January is "suicide season" via balconies of tall buildings - around 20 or so last year, and two so far this year.

Is it linked to tourism high season and gullible first timers?

Yep, looks like it .... There are a lot of dubious "suicides" here, and especially in Pattaya; but there appears to be a heck of a lot of guys who are maybe terminally sick, or at the end of their tethers, who decide on a "final fling" here before ending it all. I doubt Thailand would be advertising itself as a "regional hub" in this respect, but it seems to be that way....

Breaking news.

The Finance minister this morning, before the meeting of Cabinet about amemdement of Foreign Business Act.

"Why should we withdraw it? They have not yet seen the details. If they had seen the details, I am sure that they would be happy,'' M.R. Pridiyathorn told reporters.

"Why should we postpone it when we have worked on it for three months. This is Thailand,'' he added.

I have held talks with many investors but they have not seen all of the details and the commerce minister cannot disclose the bill before the cabinet gives its approval,'' he said.

http://www.bangkokpost.com/breaking_news/b...s.php?id=115859

Who are these "M.R." and "M.L." people in the upper echelons of Thai society, btw?

Seems that globalisation is backing Thailand into a corner to protect the status quo of its unfair and exploitative business practises. So expect more knee-jerk protectionism from the people trying desperately to cling on to the gravy train. The phrase; "This is Thailand" has never been used in any sensible business plan.

I think a poster earlier nailed it when they said that it will only be enforceable in Western bars / restaurants, ie; selectively enforced by the cops like every other law here.

I'm not a smoker myself, but in a pub I don't mind other people smoking as long as the place is well ventilated. In a restaurant, I don't like it at all when I'm eating.

The Thais like to adopt laws such as this one from Western countries to make them feel like they're also a developed country. They always end up looking rather ridiculous in that you might have a long road of cigarette smoke-free establishments and restaurants, being used by ten-wheel trucks belching out massive plumes of blue-black <deleted>, night and day.

I don't know what to make of this one, but unless I'm missing on a cultural nuance it ranks as one of the worst:

WORST

"expensive sushi buffet restaurant in bangkok": We were invited by a friend (which is why I didn't leave)....

We enter the restaurant and sit down. The waitress comes over and tells us the bill is 3000 Baht (1000 each). I tell her we just arrived. She looks at me in disdain and tells me, "you pay before eat", then stands there until my friend forked out the cash. I would have left immediately.

That is incredible. Just get up and walk right out.

Allegedly the people responsible are known to the authorities already.

Wouldn't it be nice, just for a change, to have somebody other than a low-grade patsy arrested and and made to serve hard time here? To mibbe restore a bit of public faith?

Obviously someone's snout has been disjointed from the trough of public funds and is getting a little agitated about the fact that they might have to actually work for a living. How about them sewing mailsacks for the rest of their naturals?

It will never happen though. Shady little deals will be done by well-connected smirking little uniformed men in murky corridors. (They have one General per tank you know ) Good here, innit?

I never order anything myself, I let my Thai staff do it and we almost always get great prices and great service!

Good idea. I let my staff and my missus do all the ordering too. No matter what your level of Thai fluency, they always take their foot off the gas when they know you ain't Thai...

In Koh Samui a resturant called ALI's in Cheweng, I have never ever got better service then anywhere in the world. I bought 2 craps...

What did they taste like?

well i know where they are coming from.

its that beggar farang at pratnam thats cracked on to a new scam and je-sus mates, he even looks like mrs toxin. :D

cheers mates.

"Need money for hairspray"

My Thai Friends inform me that if it runs away its not poisonous

if it stays and looks at you generally it is..

Only Snake I encountered was a Baby Cobra

the Volunteer Rescue people came and got it

They usually will always seek an escape route from something bigger than them, unless cornered. Its wise not to follow them.

The term "African American" is a lame get-out clause already. Black or white, you're an American. Thats all.

I find it strange that having defeated the twin political evils of fascism and communism, that we in the Western world have embraced liberal double-speak and totalitarian political correctness so readily.

We must be stupid.

It really does defy the natural order to adopt "affirmative action" or reverse racism to promote somebody who is inept, or in some cases criminally dangerous, through life based on their skin colour. The capitulation to these humourless drones, especially in the UK, is shameful.

i seen this cat at pratnam so he moves around the area.

its a wonder the thais dont give him the arse out of there, as hes taking money from there people.

They might have him working for them already?

A lot of the middle-class Thai "smart set" love this guy for some reason.

Is there a Thai word for "hypocrisy?" The guy's entourage drives past 15 blocks of brothels in Bkk on the way to point his finger at some farang-owned gogo in Pattaya. Smug ######.

Please don't allow yourself to remain "unkilled".

This has happened a couple of times to me when I banked with the Bangkok Bank. The sums missing were small but irritatingly often. I raised a massive stink with the branch manager but he refused to acknowledge any wrongdoing. Just closed my accounts and went to the Kassikorn bank. No problems so far....