The need of writing a bio myself was not felt until the year 2014 started when I saw a sudden increase of users actively searching “Hasaan” and “Hasaan PakAccountants” with other variants of the same and accessing my author profile page on this website. So I thought lets make even knowing about me simpler. So allow me to open mypedia myself.
Why bother reading about me?
Obvious question and quite a valid one and I agree if you have a slightest of doubt that cost-benefit of time you invest here will yield not so good enough returns I recommend navigating away from this page as there is never something special in the past.
But just in case your curiosity brought you here and now I have your attention as well then I am going full disclosures on this page right from the beginning sharing enough information that suffice your general needs of knowing me. Of course its not going to help you in any of specific needs and for that you can reach out to me easily by visiting contact page.
The basic reason of writing all this up is just to say one very simple thing
If one man can start a professional life with no degree, experience and money and found two very first portals of Pakistan on personal computer running on processor that was slower than your cell phone and connected with internet line as capable as your data package then… what is stopping you?
History/Early life
Well cutting the story short I am just like you people and don’t have 1 pound extra brain or something. Until I turned 16 I always wanted to join Pakistan Air Force to be one of super cool fighter jet pilot. But I missed that flight somehow and my next passion was more like blood driven – Automobiles! It runs in the family actually! Father, Grandfather and the Great grand father, my cousins and even one of my brothers have a lot to do with Machines.
Yup! I wanted and still want to be an automobile engineer but back then I had no idea that the world need you to score good marks in the exam and not passion to follow your dreams. So my score in Intermediate exams failed me to get to any good engineering university in Pakistan to pursue-cum-afford the field of mechanical engineering. Once that option no more available, I was running in circles to get inducted in any kind of engineering. Let it be Software, Chemical, Electronics and even Environmental. But there is one thing named destiny that happened to be more stubborn than me at that time.
When the counting began!
So wasted almost a year and its almost beginning of 2003 with ‘teen’ badge falling off the same year I had to do something already! And then one guy Mr. Arham, my father’s client, was running his own accountancy firm (or business I still don’t know) suggested to do Chartered Accountancy course offered by Institute of Chartered Accountants of Pakistan. And I still know and I pretty sure that Mr. Arham also remember my first response (as he was boiling Haha!) “I don’t want to do job”.
Doing fastest fast forward I started CA course from Professionals’ Academy of Commerce (PAC) and studied up to Module D. Back then until Module D you study 3+3+3+4 = 13 books. In addition to that I got the training in two of the most important things in my life:
PSTC Presentation Skills Training Course: in words of one of my best friend, this is the best thing happened in our lives doing CA. And I can’t agree more. Let me put this straight, this course literally stripped off our entire shyness of any degree at any level and then it was seriously a Nat Geo styled Survival episode! I can’t thank much my mentors, teachers, trainers who helped me learn about myself and not to forgot my friends and classmates it was their jokes, puns and everything in between that helped me survive the worst possible audience 😀
CCPT Computer Course Practical Training: The time I had my hands on first ever PC back in 2000, I was already involved in IT at many different levels all at the same time. Gaming, graphing, designing, learning and so on. But definitive factor that gave me some direction was this course. It helped me understand how IT links up with business world. And no denying if that course was not there, I would have not been writing this very page right now!
One of the most important thing I realised about education with these two courses is sometimes having no real syllabus in place is better than having a syllabus. Why? Because it help you learn even those things that you might have not learnt otherwise if syllabus was there.
And this very realization changed my career and lifestyle!
Career/Professional Life
“I don’t want to do job” remember?
Its not about being arrogant or being proud. The reason why I am still unable to feel like doing job as it limits my freedom. Freedom to think, do, go, experiment, risk and so much more. So instead of just doing a job, I went on with just doing.
I am from no millions minting family where comfort and luxury is daily business. Avoiding the details, I have seen the downs and very downs and then the bottom’s bottom. But there is always a war in everyone’s life and I am no exception.
I started teaching back in 2005. It was free of cost in the beginning for few months and then the first fee came in. Rs. 1000 (9-10 USD) a month it was. And I still can’t believe the many things I was able to mange within that 1000 and still save few hundreds.
That was the start when I get myself embedded teaching accounting at various level starting with high school commerce and teaching Bachelors/Masters and professional qualification students in 1.5 years time with number of students growing every month. And it was late 2007 when I was to afford a motor bike myself. Yup I still have it and still shining MA SHA ALLAH.
Soon it became too hectic as my daily travel, tuition and studies started falling out of balance. I stopped giving home tuition service when I was already popular among students of O/A levels in Lahore. And not to forget that my month end collections were just shy of salary of qualified accountants.
With home tuition put aside I started my own academy at my home teaching only professional qualifications like ACCA, CIMA. I was not taking other students of other qualifications anymore.
Teaching professional level students with no qualification myself was not easy as the biggest hurdle was winning their trust. So I went with an offer to teach first 3-4 subjects of qualification free of cost. And those free lessons came with a million dollar lesson that in words of Joker, “If you are good at something never do it for free”. So that free-professional-teaching failed to take off. But I was still without solid reason to start charging my students. As if I ask for fee, I have to get myself qualified, get a good place with nice environment. And by 2008 I had some tens (if not hundreds) of institute opened up to teach ACCA/CIMA/CFA and GOD knows what not.
With just few days of research I understood that local market is already super saturated with the best possible teachers available and I will be just another guy trying his luck to be part of same band wagon.
Wanting to make my own mark and give new direction, I was unable to get the pieces of puzzle together and spending long hours on world wide web. But that was until I stumbled upon Opentuition.com. Back in 2008 it was still starting up. At that time Kris (opentuition admin) had a very fussy php based chat box which was still doing its job but not helping much. But it was that upgrade that really put me where I am right now.
With the cooperation of admin and some real special help of Mrs. Raz (who happened to be my first every online student) I started teaching ACCA F8 simply by typing messages in the chat window. We had dedicated rooms there for each subject and we used to schedule the sessions using Google calendar. Later those chat sessions went voice sessions and became so popular that the same chat box was hosting some known names in the industry to discuss different subjects. The time I left it, we used to have 100+ students in the chat room if I can remember the count correctly.
That chat box just threw me in completely new direction i.e. teach online.
With that idea in mind, in winter 2008 I already got two students ready to learn from me Raz and Di where Raz gave me that little tap at the back that we always need in the beginning and Di after passing her F5 with me referred numerous students and is still a source of getting to more students. I can’t thank her enough for all the support and help which I am still getting.
Raz pushed me to have to my own website. And this is where my time wasting hobby of learning how websites work and how graphic designing is done I came up with a very odd looking weblog. And I still don’t understand how and why people paid me even after looking at such a horrendous looking webpage :). And that’s what makes me thank ALLAH ALMIGHTY every time. Just in case if you happen to be atheist then you can call it “luck” but even for that you need SOMEONE to make that luck available to you and that ONE is ALLAH. Anyways.
So I found ACCALIVE and in the beginning it was all skype/yahoo based lessons and this went on for few months. But I soon realised two things:
- you can chat but you can’t teach on skype/yahoo
- you can’t teach everyone in classroom even in online classroom
To solve my first problem I got service from WizIQ.com and yes I still use their service. I am super satisfied with their service, though they have started increasing the price on yearly basis since 2011.
To solve my second problem I found another website PakAccountants.com with a view to reach out to more students by providing mix of free/premium study aid.
What’s ahead!
The vision is to set an example that inspire others. There is no such thing as competition but challenge is a real deal. Since ACCALIVE is in the air I have seen many people starting online classes and some even copied to such an extent that I had to take some necessary steps. But again, no one is stopping you from copying as it motivates me get ahead again and I will give you something again to work on so we both are progressing one way or the other.
In near future I have plans to start physical workshops in and out of Pakistan. I will keep you posted as and when that is happening. But if you can help me in that matter in any way or you think you have information that can help me then do share with me by writing to me at [email protected]
And one last bit that might motivate you to have your own startup even if you are doing job, this very day when I am publishing this page [March 14, 2014] AL HUM DO LILLAH I am about to start two new projects in which one of them is again one of a kind a have not been worked upon by anyone from Pakistan. So need lots of prayers and best wishes for existing and new ventures.
Love and regards,
Hasaan Fazal