Friday, November 02, 2007
Tomas’ management team featured in book
CEBU City Mayor Tomas Osmeña began hiring cum laude and magna cum laude graduates from different fields in 2005 to fill up middle management posts in City Hall.
The practice and the mayor’s management team (MMT) has been featured in the 40th anniversary book of the Ateneo Graduate School of Business.
The recently published book, called “Blue Way: Case Studies on Leadership, Strategy and Ethics,” presented 15 models from the private and public sectors.
Among those included in the case studies are the Municipality of Kawayan, Biliran, GMA Network, Inc., Banco de Oro, Sugar Regulatory Administration and Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas.
While there are two local government units featured, Cebu City Hall is the only model unit from Cebu.
History
Written by Ateneo Graduate School of Business faculty member Hilda Rita Teodoro, the book tackled the history, operating procedures, projects, scheduled meetings, and problems of Cebu City Hall’s MMT.
It filled the fourth chapter with the title, “Cebu City: Reinventing City Hall.”
“Several people came in my office early this year to interview each one in my management team. I thought it was just a case study and not a book. This only shows that the Cebu City Government is an exceptional management model useful for others,” Osmeña said.
Idea
During a news conference this week, he lent several copies of the book to reporters.
The MMT program began in April 2005, with 51 MMT recruits for the first batch and 30 for the second.
Teodoro said most of recruits joined the MMT program “because they were drawn to the idea of helping the mayor reinvent the City Government.”
MMT employees are allowed to choose the area they will work on, with consideration of their field of expertise. They are then assigned to do a study, submit a written report, and, with the mayor’s approval, implement it.
“This is (a) very rare (setup) because they are allowed to do innovations in government. Most innovations in the government are done from above, (specifically) by senior veterans in the service. I gave up on veterans and decided to hire new and bright people and train them myself to do the changes,” the mayor said.
The recruits, however, revealed in the study that they have to grapple with office intrigue, resistance from the department heads, and tedious waiting for supplemental budgets, since MMT was a new program.
“Teaching new people how to change things and strengthen the government system is very unheard of in the management practice,” added Osmeña. (NRC)
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