A forum on choosing our future leaders

I spent my entire afternoon last Wednesday at the Eduardo Aboitiz Development Studies Center (EADSC) to attend the “Understanding Choices Forum: Genuine Leadership and Good Governance: How shall we lead the Philippines in 2010?” With elections already on our radar screen, it’s all go for the 2010 Presidential elections, except for that “minor” interruption by Tropical Storm “Ondoy” and Super Typhoon “Pepeng” that sort of sidelined albeit temporarily all political moves.

I don’t know how many forums like this I have participated in the past 20 years, but like it or not, the Ramon Aboitiz Foundation, Inc. (RAFI) never slows down on its vision and commitment of “Touching People, Shaping the Future” and the Understanding Choices Forum is one such activity that educates a huge number of people on the noble mission that the nation is about to embark in choosing who should be the next leaders of this country.

The opening message for the forum was done by Sir Roberto “Bobby” Aboitiz who provided the impetus for the main topic of the afternoon, asking the pertinent question, “Why is the system not working? Why does it appear that our institutions fail to function as planned? If it is not the system, and it is not the aim as provided for in our constitution, what’s causing the problem?

Sir Bobby’s more relevant query was, “Why does it appear that we have drifted further and further away from the values of honor and character, which once gave us integrity as a people? We may be tempted to answer — it’s our leaders or it’s our institutions that act for and in behalf of vested interests, but, might it be that we are taking the privilege of citizenship for granted?

Perhaps in frustration, Sir Bobby quoted from the 1949 Norman Beasley book entitled “Politics has no morals” and quoted “At no time in our history have we a greater need of men of character in public office…to get it, we must have character as a people.” With that said, the forum started with presentations from Mayor Ramon A. Piang, Sr. of Upi, Maguindanao, Prof. Eddie Alih Chancellor, College of Technology and Oceanography, Mindanao State University and Ms. Tessie Fernandez, Founder and Executive Director of Lihok Pilipina Foundation, Inc. all of whom were Ramon Aboitiz Triennial Awardees. We cannot quote all so let me quote the most important.

Mayor Piang’s presentation “Sharing on Leadership” quoted Dave Ulrich and Kate Sweetman authors of the book entitled “The Leadership Code” that these are the traits of an effective leader: Authenticity, Transparency, Emotional Intelligence, Interpersonal effectiveness, Servant-Leadership, Humility, Being leaders not managers, Building a vision and Ensuring customer centricity.

From this, they identified five rules to decode leadership. Rule 1: Shape the future. Good strategic leaders can confidently answer the question. ”Where are we going?” Rule 2: Make things happen: The leader must focus on the question, “How will we make sure we get to where we’re going? Rule 3: Engage today’s talent. “Who should go with us on our developmental journey? Rule 4: Build the next generation; leaders must develop the next generation and answer the question, “Who stays and sustains the organization for the next generation? Finally, Rule 5: Invest in yourself.

Should we elect a new President or a Boss or a Leader? As Mayor Piang pointed out, The Boss drives his men, the Leader inspires them. The Boss depends on authority, the Leader depends on goodwill. The Boss evokes fear, the Leader radiates love. The Boss says “I”, the Leader say “We”. The Boss shows what’s wrong. The Leader shows, what’s right. The Boss knows how it is done; the Leader shows how to do it. The Boss abuses men, the Leader uses them and finally, the Boss demands respect, the Leader commands respect.”

At the open forum, I gave the audience my usual example of the brand new Philippine bus in 1947, but 63-years later, we are still using the same bus, but it is old and decrepit and the pre-occupation of the Filipino people is, “Who’s gonna drive the bus?” Indeed, if our nation needs fixing or reforms, no matter how good a President we get, nothing will happen unless he is a reformist President. More importantly, we’ve been to a lot of forums looking for solutions to our nation’s problems and still we haven’t got there!

Sir Bobby commented on this and used his Oar “Bugsay” philosophy that he introduced a few months ago during the Aboitiz Future Leaders Summit saying that the country should be akin to a banca or canoe where all of us do our parts and row towards a better run nation, while the President merely holds on to the rudder. I fully concur that it is time to change our old and decrepit bus and go back to the basics of a canoe or banca. Indeed, we are part of the problem and solution in building a better nation.

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