About Us
If you are reading this web page, this page ceases to be about me. This page is now about us.
I’m just the guy who invited you here. You are reading this because somehow you have an interest in this policy reform advocacy.
Thank you for being here. Let’s talk about us by starting with me.
I’ve been around information technology, organizing and sometimes attending summits, conferences, and exhibitions about information technology. I have volunteered in chamber of commerce projects. I have been to anything with the word “development” attached to it.
The turning point for me was when I started getting involved in program development in non-government organizations like the cooperatives, urban poor associations, and chambers of commerce.
I had the opportunity to work closely with the Department of Trade & Industry and started to know people in the furniture industry, in the gifts, toys & housewares, in the fashion accessories, and other business support organizations.
Being in the information and communications technology business, I gained access to many enterprises. Doing more than 16 years of organizational assessments across many industries, I began to have intimate knowledge about how different business models work in different sectors. I learned different strategic and performance management frameworks like the Balanced Scorecard and the Logical Framework.
This knowledge led me to getting invited to facilitate strategic planning workshops. In the same period, I also became active in advocating the use of licensed software at a time when 99% of software installed in the Philippines were pirated. In the late 1990s, I was working in marketing and developing software for clients. This was also the time when the Asian Financial Crisis was building its momentum.
When the financial crisis hit Asia in 2000, Cebu immediately felt the loss of export revenues from our traditional exports such as garments, gifts, toys, housewares, furniture, and fashion accessories. Cebu endured the closure of factories, layoffs, and the weekly announcements of job loss in the export processing zones. The national government had no plans to mitigate the worst impact of the crisis.
As usual, Cebu had to act on its own. A series of small quiet meetings with political and business leaders led to a concept to transform the economy of Cebu led by the City Government.
The leaders postulated that an economy based on traditional exports alone was no longer a viable strategy towards recovery. They started to play around with a model that can work for Cebu. They look to other countries that have outgrown traditional exports. They looked more seriously into Asia, Europe, and the US eventually focusing on India and the Silicon Valley in the US.
They eventually decided on the Indian and the Silicon Valley Model. A group made up of less than ten individuals were asked to render service. They were told frankly and candidly that their service will not be compensated, they will not be acknowledged, their names will not be in any official document, and they will not even get a certificate of appreciation.
The government does not have a budget for a financial crisis.
The First Cebu Information and Communications Technology Summit 2001
Advocating investment in licensed software got me into speaking engagements in support of the Business Software Alliance or BSA. These speaking engagements in turn led to being invited to other forum on technology issues. I also got into a room where the highest local executive of the city asked a group of individuals to volunteer.
In the later part of 2000 I was offered the opportunity to facilitate a pre-summit workshop organized by Team Asia on behalf of the Office of the Mayor of the City of Cebu.
This engagement in collaboration with TeamAsia started with the Pre-summit Workshops for “Cebu is IT“ in 2001. The pre-summit workshop was held on February 26, 27 and 28, 2001, at Toledo & Danao Rooms of Holiday Plaza Hotel, F. Ramos Street, Cebu City, Philippines.
The Pre-Summit Workshop is a preparatory activity for the Cebu Information Technology Summit. The three-day activity covered Human Resource, Infrastructure, and Policy & Incentives.
The workshop was meant to pre-empt the topics, issues and agenda for the actual IT Summit. I was commissioned by Team Asia to design and manage the workshops given only less than three weeks prior to the pre-summit event to prepare both the process and approach of the workshops.
The pre-summit workshops forecasted the profile of the stakeholders anticipated to attend the Cebu IT Summit.
It was attended by CEOs and leaders of the Chamber of Commerce & Industry, telecommunication companies, utilities, government organizations, foreign venture capitalists and prospective economic zone locators. The event was organized and managed by Team Asia and sponsored by the Cebu Investment Promotion Center.
Notes and recommendations from the workshops and the summit, including my own concept papers supporting the IT Agenda are organized in a paper I prepared entitled, "Cebu's Information Technology Agenda: The Next Step" available in portable digital format (PDF).
Team Asia group for Cebu City headed by Ms. Doris Mongaya was coordinating support for the pre-summit workshop process for Cebu Investment & Promotions Center.
The Information & Communication Technology Summit or what was known as The Cebu IT Summit or Cebu is IT was held at the Ballroom of the Cebu City Marriott Hotel on March 29 & 30, 2001.
I was commissioned to design the Workshop phase of the summit and eventually act as the lead facilitator to manage all workshops for special interest groups representing the major stakeholders of the information technology agenda. The City Government of Cebu wanted to make information technology as one of the key platforms of development for the city.
The Information Technology Agenda was eventually announced by then Honorable Mayor Alvin Garcia of Cebu City at the conclusion of the Cebu IT Summit on March 30, 2001.
The Cebu IT Summit events and workshops were managed by Team Asia. Notes and recommendations from the workshops and the summit including my own concept papers supporting the IT Agenda are organized in a paper I prepared entitled, "Cebu's Information Technology Agenda: The Next Step" available in portable digital format (PDF).
After 2001, my professional career became focused on the ICT evolution in the country. I was jumping from one speaking and consulting engagement after another in between jobs in the ICT sector.
The Cebu Software Development Industry
In 2005, I was endorsed by the DTI to the Canadian International Development Agency or CIDA to be the executive director for a business support organization or BSO.
This BSO put together 30 software development firms in Cebu through a CIDA program called the Private Enterprise Accelerated Resource Linkages Project Phase 2 or what became known as PEARL2. The BSO was called the Cebu Software Development Industry Association, Incorporated or CebuSoft.
I became its first executive director. My mandate was to get the software players recognized collectively as an industry.
Although my education in social entrepreneurship was not deliberate, I was consistently reading about it. It was my work in CebuSoft that introduced me formally to the concept of social entrepreneurship. CIDA through PEARL2 endorsed me to an executive directors course intended to enhance our competence as BSO executive directors.
A four-month accelerated course on social entrepreneurship developed by CIDA through its PEARL2 program ran from May to August 2005. It was attended by a select group of executive directors representing different business support and trade associations from all over the Philippines.
The development program for BSO executive directors was developed in collaboration with the British Columbia Institute of Technology (BCIT) and rolled out by the University of San Carlos (USC) based in Cebu City under CIDA-PEARL2. The Project’s goal is to contribute to the reduction of poverty in the Philippines through equitable and sustainable development.
PEARL2 works directly with Business Support Organizations (BSOs) and Investment Promotion Centers (IPCs) to support the development of Small and Medium Enterprises that create meaningful jobs for both men and women.
The Philippine ICT Road Map 2010
In the same year, I was one of those discretely invited to Tagaytay Highlands on June 4, 2005. The meeting of the ICT leaders of the country was called on by the newly installed President of the Republic, Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo. We were to draft the President’s program called, “Flying High: Philippine Software 2010” which was going to form part of the Philippine ICT Road Map of the president.
The incoming and outgoing presidents of the PCS were there. So were the presidents of ITFP, PSIA (Philippine Software Industry Association), PICS (Philippine Internet Commerce Society), ISSSP (Information Systems Security Society of the Philippines), the Government CIO Forum, and PADEC. As well as the executive directors of ASID (the Association of Solution Integrators in Davao), Phil-NITS (the Philippine National IT Standards Foundation), and CebuSoft.
Together with the leading ICT players were representatives from the private sector, academe (La Salle, Ateneo, Mapua, CEDFIT) and government (Senate, Congress, Supreme Court, BIR, COA, DBP, PMS, TESDA, Dep Ed, and CICT).
(L to R: Elmar Gomez/Mobile Arts, Virgilio "Toy" Paralisan/CebuSoft, Michelle Casio/Mapua IT Center, Dondi Mapa, Ivan Uy/Supreme Court, Caslon Chua/DLSU, Gina Duminy/IT Pros)
According to Dondi Mapa, who later took the job of being a Commissioner for the Commission on ICT, we had sacrificed a weekend away from our families in order to draft a vision and strategy for the Philippine software industry.
The aim of the vision was to generate One Million Jobs in the ICT-enabled and related industries.
The final report of that weekend was submitted to Her Excellency President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo on June 22, at the Cebu ICT Expo.
After my stint in CebuSoft in 2006, I accepted a position in a British international school, Centre for International Education - Global Colleges. A Philippine registered school recognized by the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom. I became an assistant vice president for Administration.
I was responsible, among other things, for the launching of all the school’s social development initiatives. This included the setting up of an enterprise development program for families and the integration of the program into their business studies in basic and higher education curricula.
This is my first hand experience in the design, roll out, and evaluation of an enterprise development program. It was also the time when I started volunteering to be a mentor in local chambers and DTI joint programs for MSME development. It was also in 2006, that the second Cebu ICT Summit was being organized.
Second Cebu Information and Communications Technology Summit 2006
The 2nd Cebu Information and Communications Technology Summit was scheduled May 24-26, 2006.
Prior to this summit is a series of Online Focus Group Discussions I created and managed. Some of those participating may have been delegates in the first summit while others may not have an idea or recollection of what the first summit was all about.
The 2nd Cebu ICT Summit was leveraging on what was achieved in the 1st Cebu ICT Summit in 2001, expanding it, and preparing institutional frameworks to make the gains sustainable.
The foundation and frameworks for subsequent ICT initiatives in the country can be traced back to these two Cebu ICT summits. I discussed this in greater detail in an article summarizing the journey and the outcomes entitled “The Evolution of the Cebu Information Technology” published in my blog on November 26, 2005.
Along with other outcomes expected of that summit was the first provincial ICT council in the Philippines created by the Cebu Provincial Governor Gwendolyn Garcia through Executive Order No. 06, Series of 2006. I became one of the members invited to this council being a representative of the software development industry. I served in this council until the end of Governor Garcia’s term.
I spent almost 3 years in the education sector before moving on to the business process outsourcing industry. I supervise the construction of two landmark facilities in Bacolod City. The facility was built by one of the largest call center firms in Bacolod City.
I eventually assumed the role of facilities manager in the BPO company after the construction of the first facility. I spent my 4 years in Bacolod City eventually returning to Cebu City in 2014 where I resumed my consulting work.
The Journey to Development
When the World Bank Group announced a series of massive open online courses (MOOC) funded by South Korea in 2015 designed for development advocates and policy reformers, I immediately signed up. It was a 3-part series delivered via Coursera.
The first of the series was the Risk and Opportunity: Managing Risk for Development course I completed in February 2016.
The second course was Engaging Citizens: A Game Changer for Development. I completed it in March 2016.
And the last of the series was Financing for Development completed in December 2016.
The learning in that course helped me understand the role of business, citizens, development agencies, and government in creating sustainable programs of development.
In 2017, I was invited to join a family business consulting firm based in Cebu Business Park. As senior consultant in this firm I was able to resume my research on family business enterprises and reconnect with my personal advocacy. I have continued much of my work on developing the family enterprise.
An Introduction to Development Entrepreneurship
It was also 2016 that I got to reconnect with a colleague in development, Rene Sanapo, now working for Asia Foundation advocating the use of development entrepreneurship for policy reform.
In 2018, I was invited to join a seminar on Development Entrepreneurship and started my journey on understanding policy reform. By 2020, I will be joining workshops sponsored by Asia Foundation on a fairly regular basis.
I qualified to join a mentorship program that started last March 2022 funded by Asia Foundation. I chose the recognition of the family enterprise or the family business as a category in business formation as my policy reform agenda.
The mentorship program entitled me as a mentee to avail of a mentor with extensive experience in policy reform work. My mentor in this policy reform advocacy is Atty. Erwin L. Tiamson.
Atty. Erwin L. Tiamson received his Bachelor of Laws degree from San Beda College of Law and was admitted to the Philippine Bar in 1997. Erwin obtained his Bachelor of Arts degree Major in History in the University of the Philippines - Diliman.
Erwin has acquired a well-earned recognition in the field of land administration as Bureau Director of the Land Management Bureau (LMB) and Executive Director of the Land Administration and Management Project (LAMP).
After leaving the government, Erwin joined Atty. Roberto Rafael J. Pulido, and established the Pulido and Tiamson Law Offices. He is the partner in charge of land and natural resources practice of the Firm.
Erwin served as technical advisor and policy consultant with the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR), the National Economic Development Authority (NEDA).
He has collaborated with various international development organizations such as World Bank Group, Australian Agency for International Development (AustAID), and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID).
His most recent projects on policy reform are with Asia Foundation. Asia Foundation supported his land administration and property rights projects.
His work includes the crafting of the 20 year DENR Land Sector Development Framework (LSDF) and the technical study for the Residential Free Patent Bill (now R.A. No. 10023).
He worked as consultant in the crafting of DENR Administrative Order (DAO) No. 2009-05 (Prescribing Guidelines for the Systematic Disposition of A & D land through Miscellaneous Sales Application under R.A. No. 730), DENR DAO 2010-19 (Revised Guidelines in the Reconciliation, Indexing and Reconstruction of Survey Records), DENR DAO No. 2010-12 (Rules and Regulations for the Issuance of free patents to Residential Lands Under Republic Act No. 10023) and DENR DAO 2011-06 (DENR-LGU Partnership on Land Titling) and recently, R.A. No.11231.
He currently teaches Land Titles and Deeds and Property Laws at the Arellano University School of Law and in U.P. College of Engineering.
The Asia Foundation is a non-profit international development organization dedicated to improving people's lives in a rapidly changing Asia. Asia Foundation's work in the region is focused on good governance, women's empowerment and gender equality, inclusive economic growth, environmental and climate action, and regional and international relations, and is guided by sixty years of experience and strong local expertise.
In Mindanao, the Asia Foundation's projects work to improve governance in order to support economic growth, enhance the rule of law, and create peace and development. Using its extensive network of partners, the Foundation assists the government, local NGOs, and the commercial sector in strengthening democratic institutions and fostering long-term economic prosperity.
The Asia Foundation is based in San Francisco and has offices in 18 Asia-Pacific countries as well as Washington, DC. The Foundation receives funding from a diverse group of bilateral and multilateral development agencies, foundations, corporations, and individuals, and works with public and private partners. It contributed $82.7 million in direct program funding in 2021, as well as $1.8 million in textbooks and other educational resources.
Access to high-quality public services raises living standards and boosts economic growth. Coalitions for Change (CfC) is an initiative of the Foundation that collaborates with local leaders in the Philippines to design and implement transformative public policies. To strengthen education, governance, inclusivity, and the economy, 13 new policy initiatives were introduced in 2020. CfC assisted in amending the excise tax law on alcohol and e-cigarettes to increase revenues from $1.4 billion to $1.9 billion in one year in order to strengthen public financing of social programs.
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