Autobiography
In the following autobiography sections, I shall articulate my family background and upbringing, personal attributes, life value-set, education, work experiences, and career aspirations, in addition to the motivations for career-path management. Through such articulation, I would like to convey the high premium I have always placed on the continual “Learning”, “Thinking”, and “Problem-Solving”.
Family Background and Upbringing
In 1967, my grandparents founded a clay oven roll shop, which my parents took over and have managed ever since. It was an obligatory family tradition that I helped out in the shop every weekend and school vacations starting from my elementary years. Even as I attended university in northern Taiwan, I have always managed to help out in the shop twice every month, which I have religiously transcended the physical task of making the clay oven rolls as a therapeutic reflection in life; hence I would like to share the impact of such clay oven roll family business has had in my life:
▌The Most Valuable Commodity of Life is My Time
I am an individual who regards time as a precious commodity in life and intends to imbue meaningful tasks into time fragments. Such a value-set was a direct result of how the time of making clay oven rolls has compressed my study time and given my academic goal of attending the top university in Taiwan, NTU, and as much as I needed to invest much time in studying, however, my parents have always asked me to help out in the shop, so I have come to appreciate the importance of optimizing the study time I had, no matter how fragmented they were, and ultimately, the most valuable thing in my life is my time.
▌The Task of Making Clay Oven Rolls was the Best Time for Me to Think Through Problems
As much as I detested the task of making the clay oven rolls in my high school days, I became fond of coming back home to make the rolls during my university days for the fact that I found it to be a meditating time where I was able to think through many issues such as the event-hosting scripts, breakthrough points for many contests, and many light-bulb moments in my current career.
▌Great Fitness is the Cornerstone in any Pursuit of Excellence
Although my grandparents have become part of the old-age population, they are still in excellent physical shape, a testament to maintaining a healthy diet and regular exercise being the key to any life pursuit. So, whenever I was helping out in the shop, spending eight hours standing up in attending to customers was part of the job, which has enabled me to operate and perform tasks over fifteen hours with six hours of sleep. Furthermore, as influenced by my grandparents, I have paid close attention to diet and exercise since my senior high school days, so running has been my go-to exercise since and the mental sanctuary in which I reflect upon things in life.
In 1967, my grandparents founded a clay oven roll shop, which my parents took over and have managed ever since. It was an obligatory family tradition that I helped out in the shop every weekend and school vacations starting from my elementary years. Even as I attended university in northern Taiwan, I have always managed to help out in the shop twice every month, which I have religiously transcended the physical task of making the clay oven rolls as a therapeutic reflection in life; hence I would like to share the impact of such clay oven roll family business has had in my life:
▌The Most Valuable Commodity of Life is My Time
I am an individual who regards time as a precious commodity in life and intends to imbue meaningful tasks into time fragments. Such a value-set was a direct result of how the time of making clay oven rolls has compressed my study time and given my academic goal of attending the top university in Taiwan, NTU, and as much as I needed to invest much time in studying, however, my parents have always asked me to help out in the shop, so I have come to appreciate the importance of optimizing the study time I had, no matter how fragmented they were, and ultimately, the most valuable thing in my life is my time.
▌The Task of Making Clay Oven Rolls was the Best Time for Me to Think Through Problems
As much as I detested the task of making the clay oven rolls in my high school days, I became fond of coming back home to make the rolls during my university days for the fact that I found it to be a meditating time where I was able to think through many issues such as the event-hosting scripts, breakthrough points for many contests, and many light-bulb moments in my current career.
▌Great Fitness is the Cornerstone in any Pursuit of Excellence
Although my grandparents have become part of the old-age population, they are still in excellent physical shape, a testament to maintaining a healthy diet and regular exercise being the key to any life pursuit. So, whenever I was helping out in the shop, spending eight hours standing up in attending to customers was part of the job, which has enabled me to operate and perform tasks over fifteen hours with six hours of sleep. Furthermore, as influenced by my grandparents, I have paid close attention to diet and exercise since my senior high school days, so running has been my go-to exercise since and the mental sanctuary in which I reflect upon things in life.
Personal Attributes and Life Value-Set
Ever since starting high school, I started to consciously and strategically work on my life plan. Through continuous explorations and trials to elevate and set my life goals; hence the process of distilling my life value-set in the past year can outline the most fundamental life outlook of myself as below:
▌Never Pose Limit to My Life Development
Since my junior high school days of winning many public-speaking contests and hosting many school events, I have aspired to become a news anchor, which I have relentlessly worked towards throughout my high school and university years. However, as my life plan did not work out as planned, I started the current German-teaching career and enrolled in the Master Program of the School of International Business at NTU. For someone who has not thought of entering the business domain, I have worked hard in perseverance in learning various facets of the business world, and with that in mind, I no longer wish to set any limitation for my life plan but to keep an open mind to new ventures I am interested in while making plans, setting goals, and taking actions.
▌Keep Challenging New Goals
As for every year of my university days, I would always set a specific goal for myself. For instance, for the freshmen year, I set out to get to know university students from different disciplines, so I chose to enroll in the NCTU Leadership Program; for the sophomore year, the goal was to participate in all types of entrepreneurship contests, and I was selected as part of the YEF Delegation; for the junior year, I strived to learn how to carry out academic research where my phonetics thesis was awarded scholarship prize from the National Science Council, and finally, for my senior year, I received an offer for an exchange student program in Germany while I passed TestDaF® certification in the same year, before starting the current German language teacher role upon my return from Germany; during the year of my military service, I worked efficiently to create German language-teaching materials of three levels, which received ISBN certification from the National Central Library; the two major goals during my post-graduate study was to graduate and operate a professional German-language course. So after I graduated with my Master's Program, I worked diligently to optimize the product offering of my German language-teaching course while starting to learn Japanese, for which I have set the goal of passing N1 language certification in the near future.
▌Always Learning
During the journey of embracing new challenges while elevating my professional standing, I have come to appreciate the value of a persisted learning of knowledge and skills while consulting experts and professionals around me in achieving every stage-goal I have set. Also, the journey experiences have humbled me in the perennial pursuit of excellence, as I shall maintain humility and an open mind to master new things and to learn about new domains, just like I have firmly believed in a German proverb, “Übung macht den Meister”, which means, “Mastery comes from practices”.
Ever since starting high school, I started to consciously and strategically work on my life plan. Through continuous explorations and trials to elevate and set my life goals; hence the process of distilling my life value-set in the past year can outline the most fundamental life outlook of myself as below:
▌Never Pose Limit to My Life Development
Since my junior high school days of winning many public-speaking contests and hosting many school events, I have aspired to become a news anchor, which I have relentlessly worked towards throughout my high school and university years. However, as my life plan did not work out as planned, I started the current German-teaching career and enrolled in the Master Program of the School of International Business at NTU. For someone who has not thought of entering the business domain, I have worked hard in perseverance in learning various facets of the business world, and with that in mind, I no longer wish to set any limitation for my life plan but to keep an open mind to new ventures I am interested in while making plans, setting goals, and taking actions.
▌Keep Challenging New Goals
As for every year of my university days, I would always set a specific goal for myself. For instance, for the freshmen year, I set out to get to know university students from different disciplines, so I chose to enroll in the NCTU Leadership Program; for the sophomore year, the goal was to participate in all types of entrepreneurship contests, and I was selected as part of the YEF Delegation; for the junior year, I strived to learn how to carry out academic research where my phonetics thesis was awarded scholarship prize from the National Science Council, and finally, for my senior year, I received an offer for an exchange student program in Germany while I passed TestDaF® certification in the same year, before starting the current German language teacher role upon my return from Germany; during the year of my military service, I worked efficiently to create German language-teaching materials of three levels, which received ISBN certification from the National Central Library; the two major goals during my post-graduate study was to graduate and operate a professional German-language course. So after I graduated with my Master's Program, I worked diligently to optimize the product offering of my German language-teaching course while starting to learn Japanese, for which I have set the goal of passing N1 language certification in the near future.
▌Always Learning
During the journey of embracing new challenges while elevating my professional standing, I have come to appreciate the value of a persisted learning of knowledge and skills while consulting experts and professionals around me in achieving every stage-goal I have set. Also, the journey experiences have humbled me in the perennial pursuit of excellence, as I shall maintain humility and an open mind to master new things and to learn about new domains, just like I have firmly believed in a German proverb, “Übung macht den Meister”, which means, “Mastery comes from practices”.
Educational Experiences
Below is an outline of my educational experience in terms of the acquired capabilities during the three phases of high school, university, and master program:
▌High School
In the freshman year of junior high school, I found my passion for learning English and recitation and persisted with further learning and practices. And fortunately, my parents were able to sponsor me for a one-year study holiday in New Zealand to further excel my English skills and proficiency, which was more than sufficient for the high school English subjects. However, I decided to enroll in TOEFL school during my freshman and junior years during my senior high school years while achieving passing high-intermediate level GEPT certification, a full-mark (perfect score) GSAT English, and the score of 91 in AST English.
As far as recitation is concerned, I was successful in my first-time participating in the English recitation contest in the freshman year of junior high school, which ushered me into a life-long love affair with English recitation and public speaking. With great faith bestowed upon me by the high school staff, I was entrusted to MC and host many events and ceremonies. In no small part, these previous on-stage experiences have allowed me to be offered the English public announcer's role for the National Day Celebration Ceremony in 2011, which have also garnered the trust from the staff and faculties of NCTU in hosting all major NCTU ceremonies and events.
▌University
As I have spent the entire four years of my university years broadly learning and trying new things, I have, as mentioned previously, always set an annual goal such as tutoring, hosting, entrepreneurship, academic research, and foreign exchange programs, etc., of which the culmination has empowered me to start a business of German language course upon graduating from university with the insight for designing a teaching program that fulfills the need of Taiwanese students with a sensible and sustainable business framework while my academic research in linguistics and phonetics has contributed to refining my German teaching, which was further endowed by having the one-year exchange student experience in Germany under my belt and achieving TestDaF® certification. And ultimately, the assorted experiences and qualifications have become instrumental in the admission into the MBA program in the School of International Business at NTU.
▌Master Program
During the MBA Program, I worked hard in attending courses and writing the dissertation while running my own German language school business. For someone who has never studied management courses, I gradually assembled knowledge from marketing, finance, accounting, and economics, etc. For the last semester of the MBA program, I chose the opportunity of an exchange program to Nanjing’s Southeast University to research the German language-school market in China, from which I have acquired marketing tools such as Bilibili and cctalk and has achieved sound results in the recruitment of students from Mainland China.
Below is an outline of my educational experience in terms of the acquired capabilities during the three phases of high school, university, and master program:
▌High School
In the freshman year of junior high school, I found my passion for learning English and recitation and persisted with further learning and practices. And fortunately, my parents were able to sponsor me for a one-year study holiday in New Zealand to further excel my English skills and proficiency, which was more than sufficient for the high school English subjects. However, I decided to enroll in TOEFL school during my freshman and junior years during my senior high school years while achieving passing high-intermediate level GEPT certification, a full-mark (perfect score) GSAT English, and the score of 91 in AST English.
As far as recitation is concerned, I was successful in my first-time participating in the English recitation contest in the freshman year of junior high school, which ushered me into a life-long love affair with English recitation and public speaking. With great faith bestowed upon me by the high school staff, I was entrusted to MC and host many events and ceremonies. In no small part, these previous on-stage experiences have allowed me to be offered the English public announcer's role for the National Day Celebration Ceremony in 2011, which have also garnered the trust from the staff and faculties of NCTU in hosting all major NCTU ceremonies and events.
▌University
As I have spent the entire four years of my university years broadly learning and trying new things, I have, as mentioned previously, always set an annual goal such as tutoring, hosting, entrepreneurship, academic research, and foreign exchange programs, etc., of which the culmination has empowered me to start a business of German language course upon graduating from university with the insight for designing a teaching program that fulfills the need of Taiwanese students with a sensible and sustainable business framework while my academic research in linguistics and phonetics has contributed to refining my German teaching, which was further endowed by having the one-year exchange student experience in Germany under my belt and achieving TestDaF® certification. And ultimately, the assorted experiences and qualifications have become instrumental in the admission into the MBA program in the School of International Business at NTU.
▌Master Program
During the MBA Program, I worked hard in attending courses and writing the dissertation while running my own German language school business. For someone who has never studied management courses, I gradually assembled knowledge from marketing, finance, accounting, and economics, etc. For the last semester of the MBA program, I chose the opportunity of an exchange program to Nanjing’s Southeast University to research the German language-school market in China, from which I have acquired marketing tools such as Bilibili and cctalk and has achieved sound results in the recruitment of students from Mainland China.
Work Experiences and Takeaways
In August 2015, I completed a one-year exchange program in Germany before graduating with a Bachelor's Degree from the Department of Foreign Languages and Literatures and started my German language-teaching career. In the meantime, I have completed my military service and master's program. I started working full-time in my German language education business, from which I have currently completed 90 hours of German language education videos while having acquired students from multiple countries worldwide, 10,000+ YouTube subscribers, and an average monthly income of US$ 2,400, as I am currently working to build up more entry-level German teaching materials for achieving an eventual book-publishing project.
As teaching is part of my business, amongst the comprehensive job content of writing teaching materials, producing teaching slides for the online lessons, recording the online videos, social media marketing, resolving problems for students, and discovering student needs, I have always thought of one core question, “What more I can do to benefit and inspire my customers?”, as I would like to maximize customer satisfaction in product value but to contribute to customer aspirations, so I have strived to work in the following directions:
▌Maintain Interactions with Customers, and Pay Attention to Customer Needs
As I have kept a communication regimen of issuing a weekly online newsletter to my students, the specific theme of my weekly online newsletter, from the language-education point of view, has always closely associated with learning methods, resources, and mindsets, etc. which is instrumental in maintaining a constructive relationship with students in enhancing their learning motivations, addressing their learning queries, and sharing with me their learning feedback for the online newsletters, and ultimately, allowing me to create more values for my education business.
▌Continual Cross-Discipline Learning to Bring More Values to Customers
As I believe that continual product optimization is the fundamental responsibility to my customers, any products or services created by men shall be continuously enriched with strengthened people-related capabilities, vision, experiences, and wisdom. As much as I work to maintain my German proficiency to solidify the foundation of my German language education business, I would seek to broaden my learning in areas such as distilling customer needs, incentivizing students’ learning motivations, with expended reading and research while sharing my personal learning experience of a new language with my students in my study of the Japanese language.
▌Continual Reflection and Resolution of Issues to Perfect Products.
As a German language teacher, I always shoulder the responsibility of providing ever-improving learning experiences for students, and during the product optimization process, the emergence of issues would naturally require a considerable amount of time invested in testing and verification, which is essential to the benefits of my students, and my professional conscience as an educator and a businessman.
In August 2015, I completed a one-year exchange program in Germany before graduating with a Bachelor's Degree from the Department of Foreign Languages and Literatures and started my German language-teaching career. In the meantime, I have completed my military service and master's program. I started working full-time in my German language education business, from which I have currently completed 90 hours of German language education videos while having acquired students from multiple countries worldwide, 10,000+ YouTube subscribers, and an average monthly income of US$ 2,400, as I am currently working to build up more entry-level German teaching materials for achieving an eventual book-publishing project.
As teaching is part of my business, amongst the comprehensive job content of writing teaching materials, producing teaching slides for the online lessons, recording the online videos, social media marketing, resolving problems for students, and discovering student needs, I have always thought of one core question, “What more I can do to benefit and inspire my customers?”, as I would like to maximize customer satisfaction in product value but to contribute to customer aspirations, so I have strived to work in the following directions:
▌Maintain Interactions with Customers, and Pay Attention to Customer Needs
As I have kept a communication regimen of issuing a weekly online newsletter to my students, the specific theme of my weekly online newsletter, from the language-education point of view, has always closely associated with learning methods, resources, and mindsets, etc. which is instrumental in maintaining a constructive relationship with students in enhancing their learning motivations, addressing their learning queries, and sharing with me their learning feedback for the online newsletters, and ultimately, allowing me to create more values for my education business.
▌Continual Cross-Discipline Learning to Bring More Values to Customers
As I believe that continual product optimization is the fundamental responsibility to my customers, any products or services created by men shall be continuously enriched with strengthened people-related capabilities, vision, experiences, and wisdom. As much as I work to maintain my German proficiency to solidify the foundation of my German language education business, I would seek to broaden my learning in areas such as distilling customer needs, incentivizing students’ learning motivations, with expended reading and research while sharing my personal learning experience of a new language with my students in my study of the Japanese language.
▌Continual Reflection and Resolution of Issues to Perfect Products.
As a German language teacher, I always shoulder the responsibility of providing ever-improving learning experiences for students, and during the product optimization process, the emergence of issues would naturally require a considerable amount of time invested in testing and verification, which is essential to the benefits of my students, and my professional conscience as an educator and a businessman.
Career Aspirations and the Motivations for Career-Path Management
Given the plentitude of the sense of achievement from my current German language educator role, I have always strived to broaden my future career path in perfecting my professional capabilities, wisdom, vision, and experiences, here are the motivations for managing career paths I would like to outline in more details as the followings:
▌Aspiration for More Cross-Discipline Learning Opportunities
From studying English and German languages in the university years to studying the Master Program in the School of Management, my current role as the German language educator has embodied the knowledge in linguistics and business. In operating such a business, I appreciate the importance of cross-discipline learning. As my passion for learning new languages prompted me to enroll in the Department of Foreign Languages, the opportunity of studying MBA has allowed me to discover an interest in the business world. Even with the elementary business management knowledge in digital marketing, customer relationship management, and product optimization, I am inspired to familiarize myself with more knowledge and seeking more opportunities to further elevate my business.
▌Aspiration for More Problem-Solving Opportunities
As I have always enjoyed thinking through and solving problems as part of my daily working routine, I thoroughly enjoy the challenge and opportunity to better my German language-education offering in offering better learning experiences for my students. I would like to empower such pursuit of excellence with a sense of tenacity in the determination I have witnessed and learned throughout history figures and legends where, in the face of difficulties and adversity, the concerted effort to create more values for customers, foster sustainable growth for the business, while guided by the experienced professionals to elevate my analytical and problem-solving capabilities.
▌The Opportunities to Learn from the Elites of Different Disciplines
I have always believed that, while there are many ways to resolve problems, the quality of solutions reflects one’s capabilities, vision, and experiences. Even with the limited source of solutions available to me in the current framework of my German language education business, I would welcome, and look forward to, the opportunity to learn from and to leverage, the seasoned experiences of other quality professionals to broaden my professional horizon to best equip myself for advancing the interests of customers, colleagues, partners, and my professional growth.
Given the plentitude of the sense of achievement from my current German language educator role, I have always strived to broaden my future career path in perfecting my professional capabilities, wisdom, vision, and experiences, here are the motivations for managing career paths I would like to outline in more details as the followings:
▌Aspiration for More Cross-Discipline Learning Opportunities
From studying English and German languages in the university years to studying the Master Program in the School of Management, my current role as the German language educator has embodied the knowledge in linguistics and business. In operating such a business, I appreciate the importance of cross-discipline learning. As my passion for learning new languages prompted me to enroll in the Department of Foreign Languages, the opportunity of studying MBA has allowed me to discover an interest in the business world. Even with the elementary business management knowledge in digital marketing, customer relationship management, and product optimization, I am inspired to familiarize myself with more knowledge and seeking more opportunities to further elevate my business.
▌Aspiration for More Problem-Solving Opportunities
As I have always enjoyed thinking through and solving problems as part of my daily working routine, I thoroughly enjoy the challenge and opportunity to better my German language-education offering in offering better learning experiences for my students. I would like to empower such pursuit of excellence with a sense of tenacity in the determination I have witnessed and learned throughout history figures and legends where, in the face of difficulties and adversity, the concerted effort to create more values for customers, foster sustainable growth for the business, while guided by the experienced professionals to elevate my analytical and problem-solving capabilities.
▌The Opportunities to Learn from the Elites of Different Disciplines
I have always believed that, while there are many ways to resolve problems, the quality of solutions reflects one’s capabilities, vision, and experiences. Even with the limited source of solutions available to me in the current framework of my German language education business, I would welcome, and look forward to, the opportunity to learn from and to leverage, the seasoned experiences of other quality professionals to broaden my professional horizon to best equip myself for advancing the interests of customers, colleagues, partners, and my professional growth.