i've migrated my blog to http://markruiz.typepad.com :)

REAL WORLD EDUCATION

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Just wanted to share my ... uhmm, sharing ... i gave to the Ateneo faculty in the recent ISEW
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Good morning everyone. My name is Mark Joaquin Ruiz and i’m an Ateneoholic. I am the product of (16) years of Jesuit educational engineering. Ateneo Grade School Batch ‘91, Ateneo High School Batch ’95, Ateneo College Batch ’99, with a degree in BS-Management Engineering, now part-time faculty in the JG School of Management.

After graduation, like most of my batchmates, i went straight for the jugular of stability. I sought financial sanctuary in the womb of the corporate world. I eventually found myself working for Unilever Philippines --- to this day the only company i can and will ever imagine myself working for --- wherein my growth would accelerate to levels i never thought possible. And yet, crazily enough, it was a life that i eventually said goodbye to.

Although i would love to credit my parents’ genes for my so-called crazy decision, it’s just not right to factor out the (16) years of Jesuit education – the man-for-others mantra -- bubbling constantly at the back of my brain. Looking back, it was this very same Ateneo education which had formed a paradigm of service for me. And truth to tell, sadly it was not so much the subjects or the courses that we offer. It was the faculty (Mr. Pagsi, Fr. Nemy Que, Dax Manacsa, Mrs. Chee Kee, Mr. Tamidles, and so on ... ), the environment, and the culture of the Ateneo that made the most difference in shaping who i am. So we can never discount what profound an impact we can have on our students’ lives.

It was actually around this time that i realized that for most people my age, life offered a bipolar pendulum into which you could swing either way --- either you follow your head, and live a li(f)e of financial stability; or you follow your heart, and much to your parents’ chagrin – you live a life of veritable uncertainty traversing relatively unchartered waters. It was something most of our students would also grapple with.

Having arrived at a state of ‘been there, done that’ in my professional corporate career, i realized that i wanted to prove that there exists a third viable option – to get the proverbial cake and eat it too. Follow your heart, it’s just the right thing to do. Use your head, most definitely. Create an impact, hmmm. And yet, still be able to live and afford the lifestyle that you’ve imagined for yourself, a-ha!

I am – as i was way back then ---still very much hungry. But my hunger now goes beyond increasing market shares, or hitting my targets, or coming up with the next great cross-functional company-impacting initiative. I wanted bigger things, greater things, crazier things. I no longer wanted to be just another cog in the machine. I wanted to build the freaking machine.

For me, all this meant that i had to become an entrepreneur. But mind you, not just any kind of entrepreneur. I wanted to become a strategic entrepreneur who would have a positive impact on society.

So – ‘management engineer’ that i am (coupled with my corporate programming and Jesuit-induced reflectiveness) – i reflected, i thought, i analyzed, and i eventually committed a plan to softcopy in all of its Microsoft Office glory --- a Word-powered vision statement, an Excel-sheet based roadmap, and all the visual digital poetry of my most-beloved PowerPoint.

So in a little over a year since i’ve been out of corporate, i’ve literally been living the dream.

Having been unshackled from a 9-to-5 job, i went after all the things i just wanted to do. Current involvements of mine – a mixture of business endeavours and non-profit organizations -- AdvocomAsia, Rags2Riches, MegaMobile, the Creative Business Council, OneFilipino.Net, and so on and so forth.

But if there’s really one thing that has my passion pump flowing, it’s this --- with the best partners in the world, we set up a Social Business Enterprise, MicroVentures -- a microfinancing business development services company that works in partnership with microentrepreneurs. Our first project is Hapinoy, an endeavor that we really believe can help a lot and a lot of people (http://www.hapinoy.com). We now have 1,000 Hapinoy stores, with the vision of having 100,000 stores by the end of next year. Pardon the scale of the ambition, but we really believe that it can change the world.

Just to share, my latest passion project is The WhyNot? Forum, a business-slash-advocacy on furthering inspiring Filipino ingenuity. It’s a venue wherein we gather the most brilliant Filipinos in a venue and give them (15) minutes each to talk about their passions, ideas, dreams. These talks are then posted online for all the world to see for free! (plugging http://whynotoforum.multiply.com and http://www.whynotforum.com). I guess the tagline of WhyNot? says it all : “Think Big Things. Share Big Dreams. Do Brave Things.”

There’s also one thing in my roadmap that i knew that i really, really wanted to do early on, it was this --- I wanted to teach. And not just teach anywhere – i wanted to teach part-time in the Ateneo. And the subject i wanted to teach was also absolutely crystal, most especially since it was a subject that didn’t exist yet --- i wanted to teach “innovation and creativity’.

The first person in the School of Management that i broached it to actually said no and wanted the safe and trodden path of me just teaching a sales class, since it was my background. But I really didn’t want to do that. Luckily, i eventually linked up with Darwin Yu who was more than willing to bet on both myself, and the class. To give you a fuller idea on why i wanted to teach this, let me share with you snippets from my blog entry i wrote right before i started teaching.

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This incoming semester, I’ll be teaching an elective in the Ateneo College.

The elective I’ll be teaching is something new. It’s called “Business Innovation Management” Given that it’s a new subject, I had to build the syllabus/modules from scratch, which actually turned out to be fun. As the Department Chair said, “A class on Innovation has to be in itself innovative.” I couldn’t agree more, and I took that as a semi-blank check to propose a class that would be as ‘different’ as possible.

If I have a soft spot in my heart for certain advocacies, then my head is consumed by the possibilities of imbuing Innovation and Creativity everywhere. It’s not only something I want to learn, breathe, and experience more of, it’s something I want to actively teach and impart, starting with inarguably some of the best and brightest minds in this country (yes, my blue blood spilling all over here).

I think it’s because the way I see it, we’re in desperate need of NEW new ideas. That’s not a typo, it’s really New x 2. Because our current crop of ‘new ideas’ aren’t really new, if you think about it. We live in a culture of “copy-and-paste” and “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” What was the last product or service or business or suggestion that made you stop and scratch your head, unconsciously thought-bubbling, “Why didn’t I think of that?” I’m not pompously nor self-righteously saying that there aren’t leading lights out there, but they are admittedly few and far in between. More often that not, the comfort zone is to be generically undifferentiated, to seek shelter in the refuge of the herd. Think back - during the peak of their popularity, just how many Litson Manok stands, Shawarma stalls, and Zagu stations did people rush and latch onto, creating conditions wherein supply immediately outstripped demand, causing the total market to erode?

Again. We need NEW new ideas. After all, whatever happened to Filipinos’ innate talent of being truly creative and imaginative?

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I have a confession to make. My favorite class during my four years of quantitative management techniques --- was actually philosophy. Dr. Leovino Garcia, Fr. Nemesio Que – they blew my mind.

But I’ll never forget a line that rang in my head, which i overheard from an upper batchmate when we would --- pun intended – wax philosophical. “The problem with Ateneo teachers is that they teach you about a world that doesn’t exist.” Whoa. That’s not only heavy stuff, that’s downright insulting to all of us here.

So coming into my class, i wanted to flip that. I wanted to prepare my students to the realities of what’s out there. I wanted them to be dreamers, but more than anything, i wanted them to be doers. They would see the world as it is, but wouldn’t be disheartened. In fact, they would be further edged on to remold the real to the ideal. I wanted to spur students who just wouldn’t talk about “what i want to do”, but students who would actually go down, get their hands dirty, and do stuff.

And that is why i didn’t want come into this just as a pure academician. I needed to be an academic-industry practitioner hybrid - for it to make absolute sense in the way that i believed it would make absolute sense. I wanted to be able to show my students that i could eat my own dog food.

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So why – despite the fact that my gas costs so much more than what i get from teaching – do i not only continue to teach, but i still do so loving every minute of it?

I’ve a simple answer : it’s because of the students. It’s because of what they represent for me. It’s because i believe that we as educators are literally shaping our country’s future.

Of course it’s not always a bed of roses. Teaching can sometimes be frustrating, especially if some students are disconnected, apathetic, and have a very narrow worldview. But i guess its precisely our role as educators to shift those paradigms.

But then again, there are also a lot of psychic perks. When you receive an email from a student telling you how your class had inspired them. When you receive feedback on how you’re encouraging them to move forward. And when– especially in this generation of students – you appear in their blogs, it’s just really cool.

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So to end, let me share with you what i believe Ateneo teachers should be and do.

I’ve got three I’s on my list – Ateneo teachers should 1. Inspire, 2. Immerse, and 3. Incite.

1. Inspire

Speaking from the School of Management, it is our responsibility not only to our students, but to our country-at-large, to push and challenge our students to THINK BIG. In this hypercompetitive global arena, our country is just falling way way way behind. It is our moral imperative to generate a generation of leaders and entrepreneurs who will build world-class businesses and create the next wave of sectoral industries. We need visionaries.

2. Immerse

We have to open our students’ eyes and hands to the Real World. We’ve got to encourage entrepreneurialism and practicality, so as to translate grand visions into street-smart on-the-ground applicability.

In my case, I wanted to remove the dangerous programming of schools. And truth to tell, this actually meant being a bit unconventional at times. Surprise, surprise – i gave no quizzes, no long tests. I wasn’t going to build the next generation of innovators on a bedrock of just being rote memorizers . Their grades came from practical outputs and judged and graded using practical means. I wanted my students to be synthetic and entrepreneurial, grounded yet imaginative, practical yet visionary.

Immersing also means exposing our students to the harsh realities of inequality in society, and how it is also part of our servanthood and purpose to do something about it. That’s why in my class, i actually had groups working on a prisoners’ cooperative and a payatas community.

3. Incite

We have to get our students moving. We need to spur them TO ACTION. Ateneans are known to be talkers. I’d much rather we were known as doers. ‘Nuff said.

So to end, i really love to echo this really cool inventor, Dean Kamen in a talk that he gave.

Will our work result in the most brilliant students the country has ever seen ? Will we as educators actually be able to shape the future of our country? Will we make a difference?

I really really don’t know.

But we’re trying.

AMDG. Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam. All for the Greater Glory of God.

Thank you.

Mark Joaquin Ruiz
October 27. 2007
http://ruizmark.blogspot.com

EVERYTHING ELSE IS JUST BULLSHIT

the Hapinoy hype is slowly bubbling up and can border on dangerously distracting. but let me just write this down to remind myself and everybody else ... this is all about our nanays. if this doesn't have any impact on their lives, all of this hype is absolutely freakin' worthless.

HAY, LIFE !
(a.k.a. There's Something About 30)

As i'm writing this, it's early morning and i'm on a beachfront,
feeling cornered by the sea. I'm ipod-plugged, laptop-wired,
nature-inspired. Sporadic waves sputter, dogs wander about sniffing
sand, the wind oscillates yet eventually calms down. There's this
kid, she's running mindlessly across the shoreline, and unlike most
(if not practically all) grown-ups i know, she's not running like
she's racing against time. She's running because – well, let me put it
this way -- she's running because she's just running.

I guess this is as best place as any – a personal sanctuary -- to
spend my last day before i greet the fkkking big 3-0. It feels like a
reverse prison sentence, this age point no longer landing on the line
of 2. I know i'm making more out of it than it should really be – i
mean, what the hell does age mean anyway? It's just a freaking number
after all. But my blood feels richer than it used to be, my spirit's
beautifully heavier than it used to be, my head's lighter in places
that it shouldn't be, and my libido – well, let's just not go there.
Bwahahaha ... *wink*.

And so i'm here. And it's frustratingly hard to actually posit where
"here" is. Or what it even remotely feels like. And so i try to hide
in shadows and mirrors and metaphors, a writer's cop-out if you will.
And all i glimpse is water. Fluid, boundless water. Water that drowns
as much as it cleanses, engulfs as much as it embraces, calms spirits
as much as it creates chaos. Water.

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I had a relatively weird experience the other week. I had a meeting in
a coffee place somewhere in greenhills, my first time to go there
after several months. And i couldn't explain it, but i just felt
downed.

It took me awhile to realize, but that place had negative mojo for me.
When i resigned over a year ago to try my luck out on my own, that was
the place that i would crash. It was around that time that we didn't
really have an office yet, and so it became my little nook in the
universe. Our schedule wasn't exactly brimming with appointments and
to do's. I distinctly remember that there were days that i would just
stay (more like hide) there the whole day - most especially from the
world - 'cause i was afraid that people would think that i was just
really a bum.

And i vividly remember what kept me going during those days, the
emotion and reason still crystal. It was nothing else but the
absolutely stubborn belief ... that i'd get to this point where i am
in now. The absolutely stubborn belief that i'd get to this point
where i am in now.

And where i am now is several steps beyond in-between. The time for
thinking about what to do with my life has long passed, the shaky
starting-out jitters jarringly cleared, this life transition finally
in full gradient. It's making-it-happen time.

And if there's one thing amongst the litany of things i've put on my
plate that i'm dead-set on seeing through (with unimaginably the best
partners in the world), just please check out http://www.hapinoy.com.
It's a dream slowly coming into its own reality.

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I saw this new ad i really love, and its for Arcelor Mittal, the steel
company. It's a picture of two similar images of people from different
perspectives. One guy is staring at the moon. The other image is a guy
in a spacesuit on the moon, staring back at the earth. The tagline
goes, "Boldness changes everything."

And so as i hit the big fkking 3-0 i realize THAT'S IT. THAT'S FKKKN' " IT".

I'M NOT OLDER. I'M BOLDER.

I have a passion project right now, and it's called "The WhyNot? Forum
: Inspiring Filipino Ingenuity". It's actually bloody simple : (7)
ingenious Filipinos, (15) minutes each – sharing their ideas,
passions, dreams (inspired by www.TED.com). As i was trying to capture
the spirit of the forum, trying to distil what it was that made the
speakers' lives so meaningful that they HAVE TO BE SHARED with the
rest of the world, the following line sort of wrote itself : "Think
New Thoughts. Share Big Dreams. Do Brave Things."

And so as i reach the big 3-0, i've decided i will embrace that
spirit. The WhyNot? Spirit. Of limitless possibilities, bold thinking,
the "going for it" imperative. More than anything, I've reached a
stage that i've run out of excuses not to make a big difference. More
than anything, it just wouldn't do justice to this wonderfully
beautiful gift of life -- if it wasn't used for life itself.

I'm fkkkn' 30! And truthfully, absolutely, positively – a bold new
chapter in my life has just begun.

+AMDG

Mark Joaquin Ruiz
September 16, 2007
La Union

H BOMB

jan 22 2007 and so it begins

12 LITTLE THINGS EVERY FILIPINO CAN DO TO HELP OUR COUNTRY

from the book by Alex Lacson
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1. Follow traffic rules. Follow the law.
2. Whenever you buy or pay for anything, always ask for an official receipt.
3. Don't buy smuggled goods. Buy local.
4. When you talk to others, especially foreigners, speak positively about us and our country.
5. Respect your traffic officer, policeman, and soldier.
6. Do not litter. Dispose your garbage properly. Segregate. Recycle. Conserve.
7. Support your church.
8. During elections, do your solemn duty.
9. Pay your employees well.
10. Pay your taxes.
11. Adopt a scholar or a poor child.
12. Be a good parent. Teach your children to follow the law and love our country.

“IF YOU THINK YOU CAN …”

I avoid talking about the details of my entrepreneurial life in this blog. For all intents and purposes, this is practically a public confessional booth - and I really don’t want to reveal all the stuff that’s going on, as some personalities (and even more tricky, partners and/or clients) might chance upon this corner of the universe and recognize what the hell I’m talking about. Even worse, some ideas might be copied before they’re ready to be released to the bigger world. So … for safety, for confidentiality, and for respect, my lips are relatively sealed … for now.

But I will say this - the pace has certainly picked up, most especially these past couple of months. I used to complain to myself that when we were starting out, it’s as if I went from 200 mph to a sluggish 20. But now I’ve revved up back to 3rd gear. And even at this rate, there’s still the 4th and 5th gears to look forward to.

Every meeting, every deal, every new partnership brings my business partner and I one step closer to where we want to be. Of course, there have been stumbling blocks, and sometimes even downright stupid mistakes along the way. I mean, if it’s in your DNA to Think Big, then there are really times that you’re just going to fall flat on your face. But I guess it’s all part of learning and adjusting to the new rules of the game.

Speaking of playing the game, more and more I realize that there are times that it’s really just a discipline of chipping away, of almost clinical patience. You’ve just got to ensure that your head’s clear on what it is exactly you’re trying to achieve. Everything else is just background noise. Personally, it’s all good. Because if this were chess, it’s as if our first round of moves have already been strategically placed.

In fact, yesterday we had a major milestone, a big win amidst the string of small and medium-sized wins we’ve had so far. That’s really all I’m comfortable to share at this point, but come early next year, you’ll definitely hear all about it. It’s all part of The Plan.

Thankfully, The Plan is extremely clear, almost to an obsessive fault. And all the things I’ve started to get involved in – both business and non-business-related – are all part of putting the pieces into place, almost as if I were weaving this elaborate tapestry whose overall pattern will only be revealed through time.

It’s hard to put into words, but it’s really an extremely different rush when you pick the battles you want to fight, choose the spaces you want to play in, and you, well, you just go for it. My to-do list is my own to-do list, not some hand-me-down order from way-on-high. It’s literally saying that these are the things that matter to me, the things that I have decided to invest my self in; In the end, this is what my life’s work will have been about, long after I’m gone.

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Anyway, I had coffee with my former big boss yesterday morning, a catch-up session if you will. Since he’s no longer my big boss, I’ve obviously no ulterior career motive as I transition into my next line of thinking. Let’s just say that he’s one of the very few people who have earned my utmost respect. Our conversation revolved around several topics – starting with the normal how-are-things, how-are-the-people-we-know; and once we dismissed with the niceties, we eventually traversed into other territories.

He was talking about his vision, and my gut instinct told me that this vision had the usual suspects in it. But he wasn’t talking about hitting sales targets, or of accumulating market share and distribution, or of garnering awards. These were natural byproducts of what he really wanted to achieve. For him, his clear intention was to develop a generation of world-class leaders under his watch. And having done my tour of duty under him, I can testify to how many people’s lives he’s literally influenced, molded - and at times, stretched to the limits, hehehe - for the better.

I was thinking about it, and realized even more just how much I owed to this person. He’s been a constant in my seven-year career, a veritable coffee 3-in-1 sachet – coach, mentor, and boss all rolled into one. But if there’s one thing that really has my gratitude pump flowing, it’s this – he believed in me. Way before anybody had any business believing in me, he saw something that nobody else saw (not even myself, at the time), took that, and pushed it to the limits. Ironically, several instances in my career, he showed me what I was capable of doing.

Looking at this rollercoaster ride called my current life, it’s unquantifiable how big a role that belief, coaching, and nurturing plays now. After all, when I decided to take this leap, I did so hinging on nothing else but my own two core beliefs – 1. that this is what I really, really wanted to do, and 2. that I could actually do it. I was leveraging on nothing else but self-confidence, on the almost stubborn mindset that I would eventually be capable of getting it on. I was starting from Base Zero.

I remember when somebody broke my spirit and told me “problema sa ‘yo, masyado kang bilib sa sarili mo.” That really shook me for awhile. After all, what else did I have? What else could I hold onto? Think about it --- take away everything, and we’re left with nothing but faith in God, and belief in ourselves. It’s not brash arrogance nor mindless self-assuredness, believe me. Having confidence is fine, but there’s a fine line that should never be crossed. In the same vein, the other extreme of absolute meekness and false humility, I believe, really won’t get you anywhere either. So let’s shoot for somewhere in the middle - an espresso-shot sized dose of self-confidence; not a whole damn lot, but packs a wallop of a punch.

If you don’t have people who believe in you, who are willing to bet on you, then you’re in for a rough ride, most especially during uncertainty-slash-risk mode. You’ll need warm bodies that will unwaveringly stand by your side, through the ups and downs and sideways of it, no matter what. Family, friends, companions, partners who see you not as who you are now, but who you will eventually become. Not who you are now but who you will eventually become. Actually, to be very blunt about it, it’s times like these that you’ll know who’s real and who’s not.

So find your posse, buckle up, and start believing. This is our time, our ride, our destiny to take. After all, if we don’t go for it, who else will?