When the word “gambling” comes into mind, many people seems to think of it as a very dirty word.  It’s often associated to large losses, bankruptcy, robberies and the worst of all “ah long” (Malaysia’s term for “licensed” moneylenders - not too sure if they are legal or illegal).

When Chinese New Year comes about, gambling will once again be the major activity of the Chinese community.  From the good old days where mah-jong was played, the gambling games among the Chinese community has also slowly evolved and many games originating from the casinos such as Poker (especially Texas hold-em now that Facebook made it famous; 5 card studs used to be played before this), BlackJack (the most common of them all), Sandwich (I really wonder where this game came from), Big2 (or better known as “Chor Dai Di” in Cantonese) and a whole lot more.

The million dollar question - Is gambling good for bad?

If I need to have an answer to the above question, this should be how it goes - “Gambling should be good if it is for leisure and within your means”.  In other words:

• Gambling should be treated as an expense, not investment.  Just like entertainment expenditure to watch a movie, play paintball, go karting, bowling, it’s just another entertainment expense.  You don’t expect to make monetary returns out of those, right? So don’t expect out of gambling either.
• Do not borrow to gamble.  It’s alright to lose everything in a gamble as you will be able to regain them (if you are strong enough and are ready to start all over again); but it’s not alright to lose what you never had as it will make it almost impossible to make a comeback.  Just as anyone would say “don’t borrow for luxury”, remember that gambling is a luxurious entertainment.

If the above can be adhered to, then I’ll be able to explain a whole lot of benefits for gambling.  Let me analyze that game by game:

• Mah-jong - One of the old Chinese games where the older generation says it’s good for “excercise”.  For me, it’s a lot about calculation.  The calculation of points in mahjong alone could train a person’s addition and multiplication skills rapidly.  The memory needs to work very fast while playing a game of Mah-jong.  The sense of every tile and the flexibility to change the gameplay according to the environment.  The ability to read the challenges and understand that different competitors approach things differently.  Ability to weight “profit and loss” and “risk taking” in getting small or large gains.
• Blackjack - Not that much to learn here, just more about knowing when to stop and when it’s going to be too risky to go into the business venture.
• Poker - Know your resources.  Predicting your competition.  Ability to refrain to leaking corporate secrets subconciously.  Being unpredictably is good for business.  Attack when least expected.  Knowing when is a good time to “invest”.  Knowing when to “cut losses” and withdraw from an investment (This is crucial, many poker players will see through the final card with the stakes going up; they just don’t pull-out from it because of the high “investment” made in the earlier stages.  This is similiar to how some businessman wouldn’t know how to cut-losses and continued the loss-making ventures).  Ability to remain calm.  In a five card studs, it’s more about analyzing the environment to calculate probabilities.  In Texas hold-em, it’s revolves more around how adaptable are your resources to changing environments.  We will need to learn the differences and play the game differently - just like any business ventures.
• Sandwich - This is my least preffered game.  You’ve got not much control of it.  But at least it helps if you could train yourself to remember what are the cards that are already out and calculate the probability.  Helps when you’re trying to analyze market share some day.
• Big2 - Interesting game.  It trains about how to strategize your resources of 13 cards.  How to put the 13 cards into teams.  Ability to reorganize when required.  The patience and courage to hold on for the final blow (sometimes risk involved since you may end up with 13 cards in your hands; but may be essential if you’re dealt with small cards).  Ability to understand that a team of tiny resources may overcome the most powerful.  Remember Randy Pausch in my previous post? - “We can’t change the cards we are dealt, just how we play the hand”.  This game will help prove the point, it’s all about strategizing your resources to make the best out of it.

There’s a whole lot of games in the list, if we can think about how each game can be strategized to maximize returns, it’s a good game.  Therefore, try putting those into business strategic thinking and you’ll see why I insist that gambling is a foundation of a strategic business mindset; especially for games that you don’t merely push your cash into it (like roulette, keno or slots) but play a part in the gameplay.

My final word about gambling - only gamble with friends, not in the Casino.  Firstly, at least you’ve got a chance of winning.  Secondly, you could make the winner give u a treat if you happen to lose =)

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Tags: blackjack, cut losses, gambling, mahjong, poker, strategic mindset, strategy

This entry was posted by Clayton J.C Tan on Thursday, January 29th, 2009 at 9:50 am and is filed under Leadership & Management. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.