TAKING a jeepney for the first time in the Philippines can be quite a daunting prospect for a foreigner used to taking the red double-decker buses of London.
First, I had to memorize the words ibabaw and ilalim to have even the vaguest understanding of the direction in which the vehicle was headed. Then, I acquainted myself with the bizarre concept of banging the roof and shouting “para po!” as soon as I wanted to get off.
Unfortunately, I had not researched how I should pay. My British education taught me to pay the driver directly, so during my very first jeepney experience—I stood up and made my way to the front of the jeepney as it sped along Commonwealth Avenue at around 50 kilometers per hour. As you can imagine, I did not make many new friends that day as I ended up treading on the toes of several other passengers as I squeezed my way to the front.
It was only a few moments later, when I saw the next passenger hop on and pass her fare to the person sat next to her, that I muttered to myself: “Oh, so that is how you do it here in the Philippines!”
Of course, to many Filipinos, the action of paying for a jeepney is as mundane as taking a three-in-one coffee in the morning. And yet to me, this embarrassing experience provided me with a useful cultural understanding. It was my first-ever brush with bayanihan. In the United Kingdom we simply do not have the same spirit of relying on others to get things done.
This incident came a few weeks after I had interviewed Gawad Kalinga (GK) Founder Tony Meloto for the first time, back in February 2012. It was an interview which would go on to alter the direction of my life. Mr. Meloto—or Tito Tony as I now affectionately refer to him—urged me that day to “ditch the shirt and tie and discover the genius of the Filipino poor.” Tony also urged me to see the power of bayanihan to transform this nation.
I promptly quit my job and spent one year visiting GK communities up and down the country—visiting just over 100 of the 2,500 colorful and empowered GK communities nationwide—and detailed my experiences in the book, The Genius of the Poor.
Transferring this core Filipino value of bayanihan to the business setting is the next frontier. Until recently, “doing good” or having a positive social impact was reserved for the charity sector, while doing “well” was about building enterprises, making money or developing our professional careers. The concept that doing good might also make good business sense was a relatively new one to me before I arrived in this country.
Fortunately, the social entrepreneurs I have met and befriended in the Philippines have shown me an exciting new path in which profit and purpose merge to help build a fairer and more prosperous society.
Many of them are based at the Gawad Kalinga Enchanted Farm in Angat, Bulacan—a hub for social entrepreneurs that attracts ambitious young professionals from Manila and beyond who are building proudly Filipino businesses, which leaves no one behind. They are joined by volunteers and interns from some of the top universities and business schools across Europe, who themselves yearn for more purpose-driven careers.
Tito Tony is not alone in seeing so many exciting opportunities to build social enterprises here in the Philippines. With vast amounts of underproductive—and yet highly fertile—land, the Philippines can produce world-class brands of its own to compete with global heavyweights.
I believe, over the coming decade, that we will see the emergence of Filipino brands competing with leading brands around the world. After all, if the Philippines can grow peanuts, then why can it not also produce a market-leading brand of peanut butter?
This is part of the message I share as I speak to different schools, universities and businesses across the Philippines: that every single Filipino is capable and worthy of becoming world-class and that, through integrating core values, such as bayanihan, into how we do business, Filipinos can even help the rest of us around the globe to gain a more complete sense of what world class truly means.
After all, it is not only the Philippines that needs more bayanihan, but citizens across the world, too.
Thomas Graham is a best-selling author and international speaker who believes in the genius of the Pinoy. Thomas is also the cofounder of Make A Difference Travel (www.madtravel.org), a social-tourism enterprise that creates fun and fulfilling travel experiences in partnership with Gawad Kalinga communities. To book Tom as a speaker, e-mail him at tom@madtravel.org.
Image credits: courtesy of Richard Rigby