Power of Determination

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Determination has a very vital importance in making a career or achieving the goals in any field of our life. Determination today leads to success tomorrow. “The difference between the impossible and the possible lies in a person’s determination.” said Tommy Lasorda. These are the positive forecasts of results coming out from determination. It is very easy for anybody to say still more in this regard. Simply to say is one thing and put in practice is another. Determination is the driving force or energy which makes you active to proceed further and further. Sometimes, the person has to face some difficulties during the course of struggle which may make him nervous or disappointed; but your power of determination comes forward to help you to overcome the obstacles.

Here, I am not going to talk about the great persons like Mahatma Gandhi or Abraham Lincoln or many others who with their strong will-power could achieve the goals they dreamt as the mission of their lives for the good of the human kind. The Readers can get the knowledge of their struggles from the hundreds and thousands of the volumes written worldwide about them.

My today’s blog is about a student who, of course, did show his high performance just to make his own career and the benefits of his achievements may be limited to himself or his family; but the lesson which is to be learnt from him is very important for numerous students worldwide. It is said in an English poem, “Sweet are the uses of adversity.” Our Hero of this Article, here, proved how an impossible thing can be converted to possible with power of determination.

Before I introduce the Hero, I would like to remind of my previous Article “A Demise of a Gentleman” to my Readers. Here is the story of that Gentleman’s son – Ashraf. His story is not at all intended for his praise only. There is the inspiration to a great mass of students who get very poor results in their secondary examinations and postpone going further for college education.

Firstly, I’ll quote Henderson for his funny quote quite appropriate here. It is as this: “Fathers send their sons to college either because they went to college or because they didn’t.” In this case, Mr. Ahmadbhai Palasara didn’t go to college as he was needed to join his family business as soon as his Secondary education was over. But he was of the opinion that the next generation must get University education.

Now, we come to Mr. Ashraf. He was admitted to English Medium School near his native place at a time when studying in English Medium was very rare among the villagers. It was very difficult for a kid to study in English Medium then due to lack of conducive environment at home and in the society (as everyone had then studied in Gujarati Medium due to which there was very limited guidance, if at all, as far as studies were concerned). He struggled at school a lot right from the beginning because of lack of understanding of the basics of mathematics, science, etc due to language barrier. As the time passed by, his difficulties only increased and rather than performing well in his studies, he just passed that too with great difficulties. Due to business circumstances, his family had to shift to Ahmedabad when he was in class 4. He then wanted to change the medium to Gujarati so that he can perform better. But his late father inspired him a lot to continue with English Medium. Ashraf says, “Initially, after I decided to continue class 4 in English medium hesitantly in Ahmedabad I felt it tough and repented for my foolish decision of continuing with the medium of instruction as English; but my Pappa encouraged me by saying that the only thing for which they have sent me to English medium school is to have good command over English language which could later help serve the business purpose and I need not worry about good scoring. Later, I came to know that the very simple tip given by him was only for the reason that I should stick to my decision.”

Mr. Ashraf passed his S.S.C.(1994) with very poor result with the scoring of only 55% marks and he feels that it was only a miracle which helped him pass SSC considering his preparations and performance in the exams. It was at this juncture that he felt that he should give a serious thought to what he wants to do in life going forward. There were two options – quit studies and join family business or study further with full heart and soul and perform better. He chose to continue with studies, preferred commerce stream and significantly improved his performance in H.S.C. (1996) by securing 75% marks. Now again decision had to be made – whether he should join the family business or go for further studies in the form of University education and this was the turning point of his life. He was encouraged by the family and friends to join college. He finally decided to study further, but not just simple graduation in commerce. He thought that only graduation or post graduation was just like to add oneself into a great mass of those unlucky people who are wandering here and there to have a job or do something else with no much rewards. My Readers will be surprised to know that he decided to join the advanced course of Chartered Accountancy. This decision was just like to put a large morsel into the narrow and small mouth; but he was determined.

Here, he had the only plus point in favor of his decision that he had good command over English now and he was sure that he could compete with other students with his only weapon of struggle. And lo! He passed his C.A. with merit (33^rd rank) in India at the age of 22 (Nov-2000). This was the specialized professional degree and there was no need of any graduation, but he passed his B.Com.(1999) with 70% marks (May-1999) by the time he passed out C.A. exams. This was not enough for him and he further passed LL.B.- General in 2001. Now he had the degrees of double Graduation and also a specialized degree of C.A...

Our Hero was not satisfied with his C.A. (India) as he was desirous to make his career abroad and for that very purpose he took Uniform C.P.A.(U.S.A.) exams in 2003 and at the very first trial he succeeded in that too. Now, he was double Chartered Accountant and double Graduate. Now, the third degree of the same field was in his mind and that was A.C.C.A. (U.K.). That was also achieved in 2004. At present, he is in Australia and is planning to clear his 4^th degree of the same profession (CA Australia) and he is sure he will. A very simple logic behind this collection of the degrees of Accountancy was that he can make his career anywhere through out the world. He is also planning to pass perhaps his last exam of M.Com. in India at his convenient time – sometime in future.

Now, we will glance through his professional career to see which global firms he has worked with over years.

— Worked in India from August 1997 to April 2002 with various Chartered Accountancy firms (Trushit Chokshi & Associates, Yusuf C Mansuri & Co., Manubhai & Co.)

— Worked with KPMG Muscat (Oman) office (one of the Big4 firms for Audit, Advisory and Tax services globally) from June 2002 until July 2005

— Worked with PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) Dubai (UAE) office (one of the Big4 firms for Audit, Advisory and Tax services globally) from August 2005 to April 2006)

— Currently working with Deloitte Sydney (Australia) office since May 2006

Ashraf is currently a member of the following professional bodies/chapters:

— The Institute of Chartered Accountants of India (ICAI) – India
— Sydney Chapter of ICAI – Sydney, Australia
—Colorado State Board of Accountancy (licensed CPA) – CO, USA
— Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA) – United Kingdom

This is not enough. He also concentrated towards the career of his wife – Rubina. She is M.Com. and also on her way to A.C.C.A. (U.K.). She has recently appeared for the last four papers of total 14 papers and all these four papers are mandatory to be passed all at a time to achieve ACCA qualification.

We will leave the real story of Mr. Ashraf here… The students put in such situation may get inspiration from his struggle with strong determination. Power of determination is like magnet which makes the person to remain sticky to whatever he undertakes for his advancement to the goal. Thomas Alva Edison said, “Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.” My favorite personality Winston Churchill also says, “Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm.”

Above article does not concern only to students. It is equally applicable to all kinds of people for whatever their fields may be. Theodore Roosevelt quotes a common theory in this regard as “Do what you can, with what you have and where you are.”

That’s all, my good Readers.

– Valibhai Musa
Dtd. 17^th July, 2007

P.S. : It will be a matter of surprise to my Readers that after the publication of above Article, Mr. Ashraf has already secured his fourth degree i.e. C.A. (Australia). His Qualifications  can be read as ” B.Com., LL.B., C.A.(India), C.P.A.(U.S.A.), A.C.C.A.(U.K.), C.A.(Australia). Congratulations (Author)

Dtd. : 8th August, 2007

Power of Determination