Ninety-nine individuals coming from 34 different cooperatives and associations across the country participated in a two-day workshop held at Villar Sipag Building C5-Road in Las Piñas City, last February 27 to 28.
The workshop on Strategic Performance Management for Community and Social Enterprises was sponsored by the Senate Committee on Agriculture and Food chaired by Senator Cynthia A. Villar.
Professor Edel Guiza of the Asian Institute of Management acted as the facilitator throughout the activity. On the first day, she had a thorough discussion about Philippine poverty situation and its causes then she spoke about strategic management and strategic performance management for community enterprises.
Community enterprises are cooperatives or social enterprises that are based in, works with and for communities. She mentioned that cooperatives, especially those founded on self-help, self-determination and self-responsibility have attested that they could empower communities and improve lives. Potentials of Philippine cooperatives to reduce poverty, however, have remained “untapped, underutilized, and unrecognized”.
In this cause, the workshop provided its participants with a strategic management perspective to better manage and improve their cooperatives and a crash course on organizational development. The use of strategy map and balanced scorecard was also introduced to aid the participants in achieving their goals, giving importance on executive leadership and collective actions.
On the second day, Director Asterio P. Saliot of Agricultural Training Institute (ATI), talked about the Agriculture and Fishery (AFE) Systems, concerning issues, and ways to improve it. He also discussed the continuing problems of the agricultural sector, policy instruments of agriculture development, the role of government and private sector.
Senator Villar enlightened the participants with her inspirational message and asked them to use what they learned to improve their enterprises and help their communities.
Participants then visited the livelihood programs of Senator Villar to end the workshop.