Attitude of an Athlete

We participated in a sportsfest spearheaded by the mother agency where ours is legally attached. I prepared the usual documents: matrix of games where the staff can freely indicate their name.

Everything was proceeding smoothly until some “players” started asking for uniform. They reasoned out to me that “how can they play if they do not have uniforms?” I informed them that fabricating the uniforms is not as easy as 1-2-3 because it has to undergo processes of approval by the top management. Additionally, the procedure of government procurement has to be followed.

When all documents have been prepared, I requested a colleague to request quotation from suppliers. Since there were only 25 players in the office, the suppliers informed us that they cannot make the uniforms because the quantity was way below the minimum (which is 50).

It’s funny that some people considers uniform dictates their performance in a game. That they have the courage to demand uniform even if they do not practice or train for the game. That they play only in the name of uniform.

I am a member of an amateur dragon boat team. I engage in mountaineering and other sports. But I know that you have to work and train hard for the uniform.

It is not something you get just because you agreed to play for the team. You have to honour it by training and giving your best during competition. You have to reassure yourself that you deserve it.

Internship

This year, I took in a student-trainee. An intern. Her email message expressing her interest to be an intern came at the perfect time–when I needed someone to help me with the Annual Report of our office.

When the news about it spread in the office, some officemates referred to the intern as an assistant of our group. I did not like it.

So, when we had a staff meeting, I formally announced about the internship. Along with the introduction of the intern was a reminder to all my officemates that she is not an assistant. She is a student-trainee with a customised learning and development plan.

I feel bad when people refer to interns as merely assistants, whom you can assign dirty jobs or miscellaneous tasks. For me, internship entails responsibility on both parties, the sending university and the accepting organisation.

A university sends its students as interns with high hopes that they could learn skills and knowledge, or gain experience. These learnings can be used by the intern in his/her work after graduation or may be shared plainly to other students.

The accepting organisation, therefore, has a duty to teach or impart knowledge and skills to a student-trainee. The learning and development plan does not include photocopying documents and will never have an item on preparing a good coffee for any staff or the boss.

I hope that the intern will learn valuable lessons related to working in a government office. And when she does, I hope she will use it to upgrade her performance in her future endeavours.

Normal

If 2019 was a “Normal” person, it saw 2020 and all succeeding years as other “Normal” persons.

However, 2020 changed and became an odd “New” person. Because of the major and significant changes, 2020 decided to call 2021 the “Next Normal” person.

When 2021 was born, it became the “New Normal” making 2020 and all years before it as “Old Normal”, maybe “Not Normal”.

When 2022 will come out to the world, will it just be another “Normal” person like 2021, but version 2.0. The upgrade is a result of the strength it gathered from battling up and settling with the COVID-19 pandemic.

What if 2022 or 2023 becomes a “Normal” person like 2019, the version 1.0? Are we going to call it the “Old Normal”? “Modified Normal”? “Normal with High Personality”? “Normal Level 1”?

Everything Is Nothing

The big event is a calendar leaf away. But still no hustle and bustle from the removal of hands on the table. Either they are just calm and graceful under pressure or they simply don’t care.

If they are like the first ones, then it’s a sign of maturity. The perfect formula to win a game is to never lose composure, no matter what. It’s good to have someone brewing something and surprise you at the end. If they are like the other ones, then it’s a sign of management gone wrong.

In an organisation, everybody should be good at recognising signals of inefficiency, mismanagement, and mediocre performance.

What if the top management is disconnected? Can we blame the big bosses? Do they really know what is going on? What if the middle managers are the ones not doing their part and they are just “working” in a nearby café?

Middle Manager (MM) A doesn’t care if an employee resigns because of indirect contact. The other Middle Managers do not care either because they are working on Task A-Z. The Top Manager “manages” everyone; talk about giving orders and checking outputs of rank and file employees and middle managers. So if I resign, nobody would care.

When Employee AA did not renew her contract, Middle Manager F requested a meeting with the Top Manager and all Middle Managers. During the meeting, Middle Manager F voiced out that Employee AA, who is in-charge of Task No. 1, is about to resign. Well, they did not have the time to check on the status of employees before they even started considering non-renewal of their contracts.

Talk about a work environment revolving around the mantra “Everything is nothing until it becomes personal.”

All In A Day’s Work

It’s mid-year and requests to submit performance reports are raining.

I received a request to fill-out a form. When I opened the file, I found out that I only have “viewing” access, thus, I cannot edit the file. When I told the sender that I can only view the file, I got a “you should have requested access”. I am asked to provide and indicate information in a file that can only be accessed or edited upon request.

I was asked to provide information, but I have to request access in order to provide the needed information? What is the logic? I learned that access should be requested to track those who will edit. But then again, they asked me to provide information that should be indicated in the given blank sheet.

This is a prime example to illustrate what the general public say about government service or government agencies or government employees. That government is inefficient. As a government employee, I get offended by such statement. I am always doing my best to provide a good service to people, to give them something they can be proud of. But it is disheartening when your co-government employees are giving the best examples of inefficient government service.

We are not even talking about trust yet. And trust is critical in government service. The people entrusted their lives to government officials and workers, whom they think can guide and assist them in all facets of development. If one government employee cannot trust another government employee, then there is definitely wrong with the way we serve the people.

The online sheet where we would be indicating the needed and requested information was sent to a “known” group of employees. It has several subsheets or tabs assigned per member of the “known” group. Did they think that a member of the “known” group would sabotage or destroy the work or the information provided by the other member in the other subsheet? If I would get a “Yes!”, then I am greatly diminished. We trust them but they don’t trust us. We celebrated our Golden Jubilee years ago, but it is apparent that we have yet to reach the level of maturity where employees do not pull each other back to the ground.

It is saddening that the oath of government employees we recite during a Flag Ceremony is only good for memorisation. And that it has no place at all in a day’s work.

A Family Affair

I have a story about a Father, who received a letter from an organisation about an award for outstanding son or daughter. He has two sons and three daughters, one of them was adopted. His Adopted Child, known as good and respected in their community, also received a similar letter.

The Father decided to nominate one of his daughters, whom we will call Daughter B. She is a good citizen. She helps the Barangay Health Workers and Barangay Nutrition Scholars in feeding programs, conducting Nutrition Month celebration, doing surveys, and others. She graduated in college with high grades, though not enough for a Latin honour.

Since the award is for all the eligible sons and daughters of the province, the people close to the Father thought he’d nominate Daughter A. The one who has always been bringing pride not only to the whole family, but to the entire village. She graduated summa cum laude from a prestigious university in the metropolis. Everyone wants to be her teammate in whatever work because she gets everything in place. She delivers spectacular outputs. She always gets the gold. (The Mother knows that the Father was never supportive of adopting Daughter A.)

The nomination of Daughter B baffled everyone. Why did the Father chose to nominate his second-rate real daughter over his first-class adopted daughter? Why settle for less?

Is the Father jealous that Daughter A is casting a shadow over him? Is the Father unhappy because he could not fully claim the victories of Daughter A as his own just because she was adopted? If yes, then he forfeited the chance of having a trophy in his living room. He forfeited the chance for their village to be known.

He failed to realise that the award is not an honour for the recipient or his family only; it’s a recognition for the whole community. He let envy and pride covered him in darkness.

Let’s make it non-fiction from 8AM to 5PM.

They Said. They Actually Said.

“Apply now. We have a vacant senior position. We would love for you to work with us”, they said.

So, I applied for Job A. I still think, it was my best performance ever in an interview. Fake British accent. Diplomatic statements. I really thought I had it. Months passed, I did not hear a thing about my application. I tried to forget it and convinced myself it’s the way government offices handle job applications. They leave you waiting in agony. They do not care notifying you that they did not select you.

Then, after a year, maybe… they talked to me again and informed me that there is a vacant position, a step lower than the previous. So I did trap myself in their sweet words again. I applied for Job B. But I did not think highly of my performance in the exam and interview. Guess what?! I got hired!

Months into my new position.. everything’s calm. Less stressful than my previous work.

I did not ask why I was not selected the first time I applied. I did not care. Who would even care? I have a job that pays the bills. Maybe I did not want to feel the same disappointment when I applied for Job Zero, had the best exam score, had the best result in psych evaluation, but the big boss still chose the one who was already working in the unit. The selected one left the job after barely three (3) months. The same thing happened with the one who was selected for Job A.

And you would never believe why I was not chosen for Job A. Simply because they do not want an Adam handling a senior position. They thought an Eve could do the job better. Yes, it’s all about Eve.

They thought Eve is better for the position because they had experiences working with Adams before and they were not satisfied. And that’s f***** stereotyping. Adam de la Cruz is no Adan Castillo. And Eve Flores is no Eva Flores. Too much talk about gender equality or gender-responsiveness or gender-sensitivity.

In a funny turn of events, I now handle the Gender and Development program of the office.

Marriage

In areas other than Metro Manila or big cities in the country, getting married is a big deal. It’s like when you reach a particular age, you are expected to get married. And when you hit 30, being single is tantamount to being undesirable or being gay. That was the perspective years ago. And I think, it still is.

In big cities like Manila, where the best universities and big companies are located, some people have different outlook, I think. Marriage is not a priority. Career is higher on everyone’s list. Accumulation of wealth in the form of bank accounts, franchises, investments, and others, is a priority over marriage. But not for Boomers and Gen-X; marriage is still a priority.

Some people get married. They dream of starting their own families. When the official leave they filed come to an end, they go back to work. Then, each day they go to work, the sweetness at the beginning of their married life slowly fades away. Adding to the burden are office works completed and submitted while sitting at the living room or bedroom. Intimate moments start to become less and less frequent. When they reach old age and a husband or wife dies, the other begins to realize that 10 hours of his or her everyday life were spent in the office, maybe seven (7) hours for sleep, two (2) hours for travelling or transferring from one place to another, and five (5) hours shared for all other activities and spending quality time with his/her other half.

So, did we get married just to spend five (5) hours with our husband/wife? What was our purpose then? Or what is our objective in trying to get married? Did we get married just for the sake of it? Are we going to do it just because everyone is doing it?

On resignations and reasons

Train your employees so they can look for better opportunities or greener pastures. But treat them well so they will stay.

Only five months down, but seven has resigned or did not renew contracts. If I were the manager, I would have gone to great heights and examine my capabilities in leading people to prosperity and happiness. If I were the HR manager, I would have crammed to find ways on how to stop the resignation of employees. If I were one of the senior leads, I would have gone an extra mile to find out what happened and what is happening.

But I am not.

I am just the new guy in the other room, struggling to find worthwhile engagement activities to stop workmates from resigning and show them that we are just in a tough stage of a mobile game. But I have yet to receive a strong support from the leaders. Everybody is busy. Everyone is chained to their work. Top management is doing leg works. The rank and file is doing leg works. All of us are doing leg works. All of us are sweating at the bottom level of the pyramid.

I do not know if they have noticed that no one is at the top, no one is steering the boat to progress, no one is leading the way.

And when someone resigns, I can only hear “It’s okay, we can do it.”

“It’s fine, we can manage without them.”

“I can’t understand what is happening. I let them manage, but these things happen.”

“When I was managing staff, things like these did not happen.”

“Do you know the reason? Is she/he going to marry anytime soon?”

It’s funny that they think resignation as a result of getting married.

Denial. No one would like to admit fault. And no one would like to examine the reasons of resignation.

Employees, like me, feel like a paper that they can crumple in a whim. Like a crumpled paper that they can throw into the garbage can just because they feel like doing it.

I do not know what will happen in two years. But let me inform those who are up in (not on) the clouds, “I will survive.”

Quality Aging

Aging has never been more relevant to me than now that I am in my thirties. Twenty years ago, I never pictured this chapter of my life as colourful as now from valuable lessons, painful experiences, and happy moments.

According to National Scientist Gelia Castillo, aging strikes those in government power the hardest. I agree! If you are a director now or holds a high position in the government service, then you are most likely not to age gracefully. When you decide to retire at the age of 65, the first symptoms of not aging gracefully includes anxiety, restlessness, and sudden boredom. A day after your last day at the office, you suddenly realise the sudden slowing down of your life. You no longer need to rush. You do not need to take a bath early. You do not need to pump up the adrenaline at six in the morning. This first retirement day syndrome is, of course, not true to everybody.

People with well-established emotional and social support from family, relatives, and friends would likely not feel sad having more me-time and spending a Thursday morning with cousins.

The working class has a daily routine of home-work-home with occasional inserts made up of booze and out of town trips. The workers, or people from this class, have eyes only for their salaries and bills they need to pay at the end of the month. They have goals of saving money for the enrollment of their children. Have you tried asking the workers how many times in a year they go out for a camping or trekking or simply going out of town? Do you find an answer like “yes, we have an annual trip to Batangas” funny? Or do you feel sad that they do not realise working hard everyday for nothing? That they just work and work and work until they are no longer fit for a hike to the summit of Mount Guiting-Guiting.

You cannot totally blame the working class for not reaping the fruits of their hardwork. Their supervisors or bosses expect them to work on weekends and holidays. Do you think you can enjoy swimming in the waters of Boracay if you know you have a report to submit at 8am on the day you get back to work?

These bosses, if they are not careful on how they treat their subordinates during the last leg of their career, would likely to fall deep into the bog of sadness and anxiety. They will experience difficulty in adjusting from a fast-paced lifestyle to a laid-back, calm state. They will suddenly feel that no one is always available to give the things they need, like in an office where they have staff for almost all kinds of task.

Aging gracefully is like enjoying the Earth for a bit longer. If you would like to experience it, start respecting after-office hours, weekends, and holidays now. We feel happier knowing we can take a rest and spend quality time with our loved ones even for just two days a week.

Take a rest. Age gracefully. And be happy.