It’s a people thing

The story of SyCip, Gorres, Velayo & Co. (SGV) is a work in progress.

From a one-man auditing office in 1946, SGV & Co. has grown into a firm of more than 2,000 highly-skilled people holding a wide range of professional disciplines–from accounting to assurance and business advisory to tax and specialty consulting services. After achieving a broad domestic spectrum, the firm is now busy spinning its corporate web to create a solid network in the Asia-Pacific region, including China, Australia, Hong Kong, Japan, South Korea, Malaysia, Singapore, Taiwan, Indonesia, Vietnam and Thailand.

A quick read of the faces that make up the firm tell a tale that’s quite out of the ordinary in corporate circles nowadays: the employees are genuinely happy and satisfied. Far from being the old-corporate-deadbeat stereotypes in stiff-necked corporate jackets, SGV & Co. personnel give off a palpable stream of self-confidence and dependability. This is so because SGV & Co. has placed its people, and their personal and professional progress, on top of its priority list.

Take, for instance, David Balangue, vice-chairman and deputy managing partner of SGV & Co. To Dave, the firm’s working philosophy may be summed up in the word "merit". The company, he explains, is and has always been concerned about its people, going to great lengths to give them all the opportunity for self-enhancement to perk up their personal, as well as professional, outlook. When founder Washington SyCip decided to set up SGV’s management services during the early post-war years to cope with the increasing requirements of government regulations and new businesses and the fast-paced changes wrought by advancements in office technology, he sent one of the audit partners– Artemio Raymundo–to pursue an MBA degree in finance at New York University in 1954. For a broader view of the executive landscape, SyCip later sent other staff members to observe management and consulting services firms in the United States and United Kingdom. After more than 50 years, SGV & Co. continues to help its people get ahead, and Dave counts himself as one of the privileged many.

A magna cum laude graduate from Manuel L. Quezon University, Dave kicked-off his career at SGV & Co. 29 years ago as a working student. Joining the firm in December 1971 as staff auditor, he was sent after graduation to the United States on a scholarship for graduate studies in business and for training with a US correspondent firm. He returned after seven years and was made partner in 1982, just before finishing an eight-year stint with SGV/Arthur Andersen (Korea). Dave now holds a Master of Management, Major in Finance degree (with distinction and recipient of Distinguished Scholar Award) from the Graduate School of Management of Northwestern University in Illinois.

"The value of this company is not based on a balance sheet, nor is it based on the financial statements that we do," he explains. "In this new economy SGV is pursuing, the value proposition has changed significantly." He says that the name of the company, the system, the technology, the people working for SGV, the trust and confidence of its client base–these determine the value of the company. "Value" is not measured simply in terms of assets and liabilities, he adds. The bulk of the value is really something you don’t see in the balance sheet: the people who may work painstakingly 24 hours a day to meet a deadline, and the trust and confidence so readily given by the clients.

Dave relates that even in the beginning, he knew this to be the case. The job interview was a dead give-away, with questions ranging from the technical to the very personal, touching on his experiences, habits and even political convictions. Hence, it gave him the idea that SGV wanted to deal with its employees in a very personal way. As for his own first impression of the company, Dave says, "This is where I want to work."

Julie Christine Ong, senior associate of the Assurance and Business Advisory Division of SGV & Co., tells a different story. Jumpstarting her career as a junior associate, she recalls getting a kind of treatment from the firm that is, to a certain extent, out of the ordinary. Instead of meticulous questioning, Julie was treated to a smooth flow of "testimonials" from partners from the same school (Julie graduated cum laude from the University of Santo Tomas) during a lunch interview for a proposed scholarship at the Asian Institute of Management (AIM). This gave her a pretty clear idea of the way SGV runs the whole gamut of its corporate affairs.

"I’ve always understood that the firm wanted somebody well-rounded, and not just someone who could go to the client and present technical solutions to a given problem," she narrates. "I guess SGV wants people who are very good in technical matters, as well as persons who have strong personal values–the same values that SGV has embraced through the years. There must be some sort of congruence there, or the person cannot grow with the firm. He won’t be able to project what the firm is trying to project." Julie is currently on study leave as an SGV scholar at AIM.

Protacio Tancandong, the partner-in-charge of branches in Visayas and Mindanao and the firm’s concurrent CFO never thought that a provinciano like him would get the much-needed break that he is now enjoying at SGV.

This accounting graduate of the University of San Carlos in Cebu City began his career in the firm almost at the same time as Dave. Through hard work and sheer determination, Cocoy was promoted to partner in 1989, and was assigned partner-in-charge of SGV-Davao, a position he still holds. Three years later, he was designated partner of Arthur Andersen Worldwide Organization (of which SGV & Co. has been a member since 1985). Today, this "SyCip Award" recipient has a Master in Management degree from AIM courtesy of the SGV scholarship program.

Some of the younger generations of associates are also being taken for the thrill of their lives. Take twins Josette and Josephine Abarca–Yet and Yen to friends. Both cum laude graduates from the University of the Philippines in Tacloban, the sisters joined SGV on the prodding of friends. Yet and Yen carved their way into the SGV scene until they were both in senior supervisory positions. It did not take long for other companies to take notice: Yet was asked to work for a client of SGV, as head of Globe Telecom’s Tax Management Department, Treasury and Finance. Yen, on the other hand, continued working for SGV as senior associate of the Financial and Commodity Risk Consulting Department. Now, as senior members of their respective departments, the identical twins commute between Manila and New York City as if the latter was their neighborhood mall.

Even those who leave find themselves drawn back to the world of SGV. Feliza Peralta, a second placer in the 1986 accountancy exams, joined the firm in 1986. Lizette, a U.P. Diliman graduate and a Wharton School MBA scholar, started off in the Tax Department of SGV. After nearly ten years with the firm, she felt she wanted to try something new. However, Lizette pined for the pace at which SGV conducts all its projects. She returned and now describes her stay in SGV simply as "happy".

"Every new client poses a new challenge," she says. "It’s not something that’s repetitive. It’s the variety and series of projects that I miss, the highs and lows, the interplay of personalities–young people who are so vibrant, you won’t believe it. So you have no choice but to stay young as well. SGV took me back and I stayed on, and I know I did the right thing. Now I’m a manager and partner."

In this firm, it’s not who you know that matters; it’s what you know, the group affirms with one voice. As such, in the dog-eat-dog world of business and finance, SGV & Co., now on its 55th year, moves, shifts and changes its course like the breath of fresh air that it is, and has always been, in the world of numbers.