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SCMP Reporter

BUSINESS people around town are receiving a small red box. Inside is a packet of fortune cookies - those American-Chinese biscuits which contain a message.

  In fact these are not fortune cookies, but Fortune cookies, since they come from Steve Marcopoto, Hongkong-based publisher of Fortune magazine.

  Normally, such cookies have aphorisms about love and luck.

  But this is Hongkong. So Steve had them packed with hints about business and management, gleaned from the magazine over the years.

  The first cookie we bit into contained the message: ''Be realistic - demand the impossible'', a slogan by which the bosses of the South China Morning Post have long operated.

  Other Fortune cookie messages:    Turning away a customer by saying ''It's our policy'' enrages him. That's the corporate equivalent of your parents saying: ''Because I said so.''    Take enough tiny steps and pretty soon you outdistance the competition.

   Hire people who are chronic grumblers about the status quo.

   Be willing to accept years of losses to create a new market.

   For every criticism you make of a worker's performance, give him or her four compliments.

   You should not invite your boss to dinner.

  Dumb-bell JO Eddings of the Hongkong stock exchange found a good example of instructions for incredibly dumb consumers. A sign in the building in which her daughter's school, Starters, is located, says:   Tenants are advised to use their key to open the door.

  The key. Of course!   ''After I spent all that money on a battering ram,'' sighed Jo.

   Floating notes  WHAT a strange day it was yesterday. At 10 am it was dark as night. Cars had their lights on, and commuters collided violently on the pavements. (More than usual, we mean.)   By mid-day, floods were blocking roads in Central. A colleague of ours got stranded in a taxi in the middle of a lake which had appeared out of nowhere on Kennedy Road.

  Standard Chartered Bank efficiently sent out reminders to all staff telling them that when the black cloud warning went up - as it did - they should stay at work and not go home. The warning did not last, however, so no free overtime was gained.

  Meanwhile, we received the latest bulletin from the Cathay Pacific Airways tri-Star fleet. It says staff have been looking for a place for their traditional summer fleet party. They are searching for ''a venue which was suited to the vagrancy of the summer weather''.

  What does this mean? Are they going to celebrate in a rubbish dump?    Saint Bernard  WE hear from an ex-cop that the sharp-witted Bernard Long of the Government Information Services, whom we quoted yesterday, had a nickname when he was editor of police magazine Offbeat: The Learned Bong.

  Irony in the soul  OOPS. The Hongkong share market has discounted the political troubles, but the talks are still dragging on, with no breakthrough yesterday.

  Sir Robin McLaren was clearly getting fed up with the fantasising of reporters. ''I do urge you not to rely upon all the things that you yourselves write,'' he said to a pack of news-hounds outside his house.

  But he must have enjoyed the irony when he said the meetings were proceeding ''normally''.

  In other words not proceeding, normally.

  The Beijing Negotiators' Handbook:   Sincerity: Doing it our way.

  Insincerity: Not doing it our way.

  Political Reforms: What the row is all about, and what we refuse to discuss.

  Copyrighter  JONATHAN Zeal of Keith Statham Associates noticed that there is an advertisement in Media for the Times Asia Advertising Awards, organised by the China Times of Taiwan.

  The text explains the secrets of perfect copywriting.

  ''Copywriting is one of the most important factors in creating an advertising. . . China Times awards and recognises the adverting copy that is creative from an empathic viewpoint.''   Huh? The copywriter even describes his own industry incorrectly, calling it ''advertisins'', ''advertsing'' and ''adverting''.

  If whoever wrote this ad is one of the judges, then we hate to imagine the level of the entries. Can it be possible that some don't even come up to his standard?   Double take  A WONDERFUL selection of twisted titles came from Nigel Reid of Ernst and Young:   Oh! What a Lovely Bar: Full-length feature shot in Club Bboss.

  Patman: More adventures from Hongkong's hero.

  The Ping and I: Memoirs from the diary of a JLG member.

  Supermap: The tale of how Gordon Wu transformed southern China into a grid of inter-galactic highways.

  The Man Who Would be Ping: The Martin Lee biography.

  The Rattle of Britain: An in-depth review of JLG negotiating techniques.

  Night Cheat: More goings-on in Wan Chai girlie bars.

  Lien: A guide to Hongkong landlord and tenant legislation.



Cooky, yes, but Fortune favours the brave