If there was one thing I was lucky with when I was still working in corporate, it was having great people as my bosses. Below are their words which made a significant impact in my life and something that I will always remember.
1. Never fall in love with your brand. -Joseph Charles Cruel (then Senior Product Manager at Universal Robina Corporation when he became my boss; current Assistant Vice President at Asia Brewery, Incorporated)
Chay, as he was fondly called, taught me to always use my mind when making decisions. Feelings would usually cloud one's perspective and can lead to biased output. Falling in love with your brands make you myopic; you might not be able to see its weaknesses or if there is something about it that you need to fix.
While it is imperative to take care of the brands you handle, falling in love with them might be counter-intuitive especially when situation heeds that you should already move on to handling bigger things.
2. Each of us has 24 hours in a day. The only difference is what you do with it. -Bong Serevo (Vice-President, Canon Marketing Philippines, Inc.)
If there was one thing that was notable with Sir Bong, it's that he is always punctual. He arrives at the office at 7AM which makes it hard for his subordinates to do otherwise. In my case, I have almost always been punctual. If I am not, those are rare occasions that probably got me into some kind of emergency. Or in few cases, I really intended to be late.
3. There will be times when you won't need to be kind. However, you need to be fair. -Alan Chng (then President of Canon Marketing Philippines, Inc.; current President of Canon Marketing Thailand)
Disciplining has always been a hard part for me. I have a soft heart. I acknowledge that as my weakness. However, my previous boss gave me a very good guideline which I follow in really tough occasions: just be fair. These words have helped me a lot in evaluating difficult situations and coming up with solutions in the most reasonable and fairest way possible.
4. You could do more by working less. -Lim Kok Hin (President, Canon Marketing Philippines, Inc.)
This is something that I struggled to understand at the beginning but the more Mr Lim talked about this tenet, the more that I appreciated its beauty. It is quite sad that I am only beginning to fully understand this philosophy now that I am out of Canon but I am glad that he was the one who introduced this to me first. The book I am reading now, The 4-Hour Workweek by Tim Ferriss talks a lot about doing more yet working less and it is something that is currently blowing my mind :)
5. There will come a time when you have to choose between your career and your family. Always choose the latter. -Agnes Fernando (she was my direct superior as Assistant Director, Canon Marketing Philippines, Inc.)
This, by far, has been my guiding principle and I am forever thankful to Ms Agnes for giving me this kind of inspiration. Women always seem to be at a disadvantage in the corporate world. While there are many rising female CEOs, few of them would have families to take care of and juggling these two can be quite tough. In many cases, compromises are made because women get pregnant or need to attend to their kids. However, I believe that family should always come first. When you are good at what you do, work is a rubber ball that will bounce back but the years you lose watching your kids grow or nurturing your marriage can never be brought back again.
I hope you enjoyed my first edition of Friday's Five for 2015. How about you? What have you learned from your direct superiors? Share!!! :)
xx,
Balot
