To go or not to go

Did you know 1: Globe Telecom Inc. president Gerardo Ablaza will probably be still around when the company moves its head office to Bonifacio Global City, consolidating in one place the company’s wireless business under the Globe name, the telephone and Internet business under Innove Communications, and the engineering department.

As everybody knows, Globe has already purchased a property in the central business district.

* * *

Did you know 2: Although auditing companies normally set aside a room for their retired chairman, Isla Lipa & Co./PricewaterhouseCoopers didn’t even bother for Social Security System president Corazon de la Paz.

You see, Cora de la Paz made it clear from the start that she didn’t want the kind of ethical problem arising from any perceived closeness to her former employer.

* * *

Did you know 3: Harvard University has been trying for years to get Jollibee Foods Corp. president and chief executive officer Tony Tan Caktiong to give a talk to its MBA students.

As everybody knows, Jollibee’s experience in beating McDonald’s in the burger and fries business (read: how to beat multinationals at their own game) is a Harvard case study.

To date, Mr. Tan Caktiong’s tight schedule has not placed him near enough to Cambridge, Massachusetts (read: Jollibee’s American outlets are basically in the West Coast).

* * *

Here’s an interesting idea that Operation Smile executive director Jane Frances Calderon Buenaventura is working on – co-branding with consumer goods corporations in search of do-good projects.

Here’s how it works. Corporations ask consumers to pay a little more for their products or service since a portion of the price paid will be given to Operation Smile, an international non-profit organization that surgically corrects cleft palates of children from poor families.

Right now, the cost of cosmetic surgery per Operation Smile patient is about P8,000. Commercially, that same surgical procedure would cost at least three times the amount.

In the Philippines, Operation Smile is chaired by United Coconut Planters Bank president and chief executive officer Jose Querubin, who has set aside personal time for the project (read: Jojo Querubin doesn’t send an assistant to attend the meetings). It was in fact, Jojo Querubin who asked Ms. Buenaventura, the wife of fellow ex-Citibank and now Bank of the Philippine Islands senior vice-president Gil Buenaventura, to join the project full-time.

More than her own working experience before she married, Ms. Buenaventura brings to her new job an emotional commitment to giving children the self-confidence they need by taking away a facial deformity. After all, she has six children of her own, the youngest of whom is still in grade school.