Corporate communicators come of age

It seems that corporate communicators have finally come of age. As I sat and listened to the many recipients of IABC Philippines Excel Awards last week, I got the feeling that it might have taken 20 years but the day is finally here. Corporate Communications is finally recognized as an important function in the local corporate scene.

The early 80s were lonely days for a small group of us who founded the Philippine chapter of the International Association of Business Communicators (IABC), a worldwide association based in San Francisco with over 10,000 members, committed to the professional practice of corporate communications. We found a need to put up the chapter because the only other related association then was the PRSP, which however, was too saddled with internal conflicts to be effective. I was, in fact, a director of PRSP then, but gave up after a term.

Together with Ben Milano, who was then working with Chitang Nakpil’s Technology Resource Center, Sonny Coloma, who just moved to the Asian Institute of Management, Al Ballesca, a free lance art director who had just resigned from San Miguel, Leo Gueco, a multimedia specialist and Melvin Martin, fresh from a stint in Ayala and about to go to law practice, we got a charter to establish the local chapter here. The late Raul Locsin invited us to write a regular column on corporate communications in Business Day, which we did for a number of years.

Those were difficult days. Politically, the country was in turmoil. And for corporate communicators, it was the dark ages, for all intents and purposes. If the function was not lumped with HR, it was considered PR, which was seen mainly as publicity and usually regarded as some kind of corporate band aid or worse, the corporate janitor that must clean up management-created mess, after the fact.

We saw it differently. We saw our function as important enough to be taken seriously at the highest levels of management. We thought we should be there when the company is strategizing and not just when it is about to implement. Luckily for me, my boss then, PNOC chairman Ronnie Velasco, thought the same way and gave me top management access. I was present in key meetings, participated in strategizing and spoke with the authority of the CEO when dealing with the public.

Our small group served as a kind of vanguard in the field. Ben Milano was the tech guru of the group. He was the first to talk about making technology adaptable and useful in the workplace. He was talking computers and databases when word processing wasn’t even common place yet. He subsequently joined a United Nations task force that took him on worldwide missions. He was telling us tales of Bangalore years before the Indian city became synonymous with international outsourcing.

Sonny Coloma was wrapping up his corporate career at Far East Bank and starting a new one at AIM when we formed our group. Sonny worked to spread our concept of what corporate communications should be among his MBM students, the up and coming leaders of the local corporate world. He invited us to present case studies in his class now and then, to give a real world taste of the concept.

Leo Gueco, on the other hand, was the pioneer in multimedia productions. I worked with Leo years before at Tony de Joya’s AMA, where he introduced multi-screen, multi-projector presentations that are computer controlled. But those were crude early days and a Meralco voltage fluctuation was enough to cause the computer to go haywire. We always mumbled a prayer before a presentation. It is amazing how everything seems so easy today.

The EDSA Revolution came and we had the honor of making a presentation before the IABC International Conference that year in Kansas City about the role of communications in toppling a dictatorship. We were cover story too, in the IABC magazine. That was one proud moment to be a Filipino. I remember how proudly we wore the convention badge that identified us as from the Philippines.

Then we got a bit busy to take care of our IABC chapter. Some years later, Meralco’s Elpi Cuna, Roni Tapia of BPI and Rey David of Great Wall Advertising led a group to revive it. And they have done a good job of expanding the chapter beyond the handful of people we started with. The Excel Awards night last week is proof that they have accomplished much.

I thought the best responsorial remarks that night was made by Alan Ortiz, the president of Transco, the electricity grid company sliced out of Napocor. Alan has worked long in government in various capacities, giving him sufficient experience to say that government is not communicating and reaching out enough. And, most importantly, it isn’t doing so with credibility.

Alan, in his capacity as CEO of Transco, must spend a large amount of his time traveling the length of the country, visiting forgotten datus in remote areas where the power transmission lines pass, and explain the importance of Transco’s mission. Development programs are nothing unless people are made part of the process of getting it done.

It was also interesting to note that a number of awardees that night were top executives of consumer products companies – Johnson and Johnson and Unilever. They are known to use communication well for marketing but for this evening, they were awarded more for how they used it in improving corporate performance internally.

Tuesday evening last week, I found evidence of top management acceptance of corporate communications as an important CEO function. It is no longer a management after thought, after a crisis has erupted. That was what the IABC Excel award is all about – recognizing the CEO, not the corporate communicator some rungs down the ladder, for effectively using communications in pursuit of corporate objectives.

And if another proof is needed to show this recognition has really happened, the presence of Lopez Group CEO Oscar Lopez, not known for attending events like this, is it. Mr. Lopez has given the corporate communication function top priority, which probably explains why three CEOs of his subsidiaries were awardees that night: Ping de Jesus of North Tollways Corp., Rina Lopez Bautista of Knowledge Channel and Toto Estuar of Maynilad Water.

Congratulations to IABC Philippines, now headed by Cosette Romero, one of my top students when I tried teaching once upon a time at Maryknoll. I have long been inactive at IABC and last Tuesday was the first IABC function I attended in years. And it felt good. It’s nice to see progress happen, specially if you were present at the creation.

OFW in Africa

Got this e-mail from an OFW in Africa.

Seasons Greetings! I’m Mr.Alexander P. Ponsaran. OFW here in Africa. I’m also an avid follower of your column: DEMAND AND SUPPLY. I’ve been faithful subscriber of Philippine STAR even when I was in the Philippines. In the Business Section, I always checked your column first since I find your commentaries REALISTIC...tagos sa puso ika nga...well with the added bonus Dr. E jokes...who can resist your column. Please allow me to comment my two-cents worth of opinion regarding your article entitled : "OFW BONANZA" published this Dec. 12, 2005.

Working abroad is very TOUGH but REWARDING. TOUGH in the sense that you are going to leave your family and fight homesickness. REWARDING in the sense that the salary here is almost five times compared to the Philippines. You only work here for four months that’s already equivalent for a year salary in our country.

Brain drain is a reality...it’s not impending… it’s happening now. Sayang nga at ibang countries ang nakikinabang sa galing at talino ng MGA PINOY! Here we are respected and appreciated even by our European counterparts. If given the right opportunity and equal chances we can excel and will even do better.

Definitely, Africa is not paradise but surely there’s a lot of gold here. I would choose to stay here and earn my gold and choose which paradise I’m going to later.

Communication

Dr. Ernie E has his take on effective communication.

A guy picked this woman up in a nightclub and took her home. While they were walking home he didn’t say a thing.

"You’re not the communicative type, are you?" she said as they were undressing.

"Nah," he replied and pulled out his old fella. "I do all my talking with this."

"Damn," said the girl as she leaned forward to look. "You don’t have much to say, do you?"

Boo Chanco’s e-mail address is [email protected]