Darryl Wong

News & Events News & Events News & Events Highlights Darryl Wong believes that entrepreneurs aren’t a special breed. The founder of accounting practice - Daisy Consultants, tackles questions on what he believes are the essentials to make the entrepreneurial dream a reality. Fill in the blank with the adjective that describes you best: I am versatile Please elaborate on why you chose the adjective above. Being versatile means having a varied set of fundamental skills to adapt to most situations. When I founded Daisy Consultants, I had no clients and no other relevant business experience apart from my accounting knowledge. I had to pick things up in areas such as advisory, marketing, business development, creating a sales pitch and even creating my own website to run the business. Fortunately, I figured all this out and Daisy is a successful accounting practice today. What sparked your interest in starting up your business and how did you work towards achieving it? One of the reasons was sustainability. In today’s rate of inflation, one can get an increment in salary for the year and yet still have lower purchasing power as compared to before. In some ways, businesses are inflation-proof as any increase in costs is transferred to the customers via an increase in price. At Daisy, we solve two issues simultaneously, one is the issue of outpacing inflation when it comes to remuneration for professionals, and the second is to provide affordable and quality professional services to businesses. Has the RMIT degree programme at SIM GE equipped you for your current role? Definitely. The programme equipped me with not just accounting knowledge, but also the basic know-how in areas such as business management, marketing, and concepts of economics which can be further expanded upon with additional research. The curriculum was also designed to hone a student’s ability to self-study, instead of being spoon-fed with answers. As a result, I had to adapt and cultivate the discipline to seek the relevant knowledge for my exams. SIM-RMIT’s assignment-based assessments also helped a lot as they were geared towards helping you understand and apply the knowledge and skills gained. How did your involvement as Vice President of Muay Thai enhance your leadership skills? While serving as the Vice President back then, I had the opportunity to organise the Combined Martial Arts Camp, which was a student-initiated collaboration between the various clubs, including Judo, Karate and Wing Chun. It was a three-day camp with about a hundred participants. It was an eye-opening experience having to plan for logistics, itinerary and finances. We also had to solve practical issues that cropped up along the way. I am glad that as a team, the committee ran the event smoothly. Tell us about a common misconception about entrepreneurs that you often hear about. A common misconception is that entrepreneurs are a special breed with special abilities that most people do not possess. Entrepreneurs are just more inclined to thinking out of the box and finding the most efficient way of fulfilling an objective or closing a sale while innovating in the process. Anyone can do this with enough practice, and it is actually liberating to be able to do so. What do you think is a common trait that most entrepreneurs possess? Creativity. Most businesses are in one way or another solving a problem set, so that the consumer would see the value in the solution and pay for it. How do you recover from setbacks? The best way to recover from a setback is to take a step back to analyse and reflect. Accept that setbacks are part and parcel of life - deal with it and learn from it. Most importantly, don't let it stop you from your next venture. If you had one advice to give aspiring entrepreneurs, what would it be? Learn how to identify potential setbacks early, and learn from the setbacks of others as much as possible by studying other business failures. Share your ideas with people whom you trust who will give you honest feedback. Analyse negative feedback to find ways to refine your business plan. Good feedback will become your unique selling point. #IChoseTheSIMPathway #ThisIsMyStory Click here to learn more about the programmes awarded by RMIT University. Posted online, 02 May 2019