The construction industry in the country has largely stood still for decades. While cars pilot themselves and phones have replaced wallets, the Philippines continues its love affair with the CHB (concrete hollow block), employing more men to build a home than Lego needs to make a billion bricks. As such, our industry has had to put a lot of faith in one’s integrity, where the difference between a solid house and a disastrous back job is determined by people who either take pride in their work or not.
Considering our industry hasn’t always delivered on its promises to the homeowner, that’s a lot of faith being put on people you don’t know. Whether it’s the slapdash work, the switching of materials or the fraud you hear about at dinner parties, contractors have let many of us down (87% according to one study — higher if it includes two of our own partners who built Magis as a response to their experience).
It wasn’t long ago that construction workers were viewed as professionals. Restoring that view is not going to be easy. Ill-will often goes two-ways and construction workers have a building-sized chip on their shoulders too. It does, after all, hurt when they are looked at with suspicion or shabbily treated by a client. Or when they are penalized for errors yet left untrained to read plans by their uncommitted owners. Or when their jobs suddenly evaporate during a pandemic without warning or reassurance.
Closer to home, we often wonder what our work does to the psyche of our own men — they build for the top architects in the most desirable addresses in the country during the day and experience the polar opposite at night. Surely the irony does not escape them.
Fortunately, we’ve been blessed with a solid core of upright men and women. You will see it immediately when you visit our sites. You will feel camaraderie and joy, but you can also smell the intensity of people who want to do good, meaningful work. If you look our men in the eye, you can tell that they intend to do exactly what they say. You know you have something special when veterans act like owners, telling the rookies that “this is not the way things are done here.” When people start policing their own, it’s a sure sign that people are buying into a collective culture rather than making a mercenary-like go at it.
Understanding motivation was helpful. Weekly conversations brought key drivers to light. “Dangal” (honor and pride of work), “layunin sa buhay” (purpose) and “pamilya” kept outranking “sahod” (pay) as primary motivators. Learning this was gold — it helped us design relevant individual dream-making initiatives instead of a one-size-fits-all program.
Our men want to bring the pride back to their profession. They work hard. They build some of the best representations of modern tropical architecture. They resist, in an industry accustomed to opacity, the temptation to compromise. Above all, they are some of the kindest human beings on the planet.
We are proud of them. This is their story.
June
Efren
Electrical work might belong to the less sexy side of engineering. We often take it for granted because most its services and cables are unseen. Lights go on at a flick of a switch without us giving it much thought.
When one considers, however, that a quarter of residential fires are caused by faulty wiring or short circuits, you can argue that the lives of homeowners largely depend on electricians. Electrical work is not something that you entrust to people whose standards are lower than yours.
Efren was recognized while quarantined for two and a half weeks after being exposed to a Site Engineer who had tested positive for Covid. During isolation, he continued his work remotely, keeping office hours while sitting on Zoom and effectively directing his team’s work at his site.
Efren has showed ferocious effort in getting things done. Pending work keeps him up at night. He self-checks, providing an extra internal layer of audit before independent auditors come in. He has been consistent and dependable. His work has been clean and free of back jobs.
Secret sauce? Efren seeks purpose. He says he wants to leave things better than he found them.
His work ethic is not disjointed from his personal values. He is big on family and dreams of a better life for them. He wants his kids to complete their schooling and live good and successful lives. If this sounds common, it is. But it is one thing to say the right things and another to actually see it through.
Efren recognizes the importance of being a father figure and a role model. While others hit the bar to unwind, he makes it a point to be home for dinner, often a fun boodle fight. He enjoys playing chess or impromptu sing-alongs with his guitar with his kids.
Efren and Sasana, his wife, have three biological children. They have two boys, aged twenty-four and nineteen, and a twenty-two year old girl. The family adopted their neighbor’s daughter whose biological parents were unable to take care of her (now that’s just heroic). Efren says he loves her like a full-blooded member of the family.
We’re proud to introduce you to Efren. It is great to have these kinds of personal values at play in critical parts of our homes. His life story is an inspiration for us. Our hope is that he will inspire you too.
August
Andrian
The world of construction is small and round. You do well and you can dance on the recommendation of an architect. Mess up in one project, and you're very quickly blacklisted by architecture firms. Fair enough.
When a top architect personally calls to give positive feedback and singles out particular people, it’s as good as your best testimonial. Especially when it involves his personal home.
For this alone, Andrian our Employee of the Month for August. But as much as this neatly sums up client interactions with Andrian, there are valuable things we can learn from his overall approach to life. Here are our Top 3:
Instead of cursing the darkness, light a wick.
Andrian wasn’t planning to drop out of school. But as the eldest of seven children, the pressure to help support his family set him on a different path. He first started earning when he was seven, selling vegetables in the morning before going to school.
By fourteen, he took a job in a construction company, presenting himself as someone older to get past the legal restrictions. But there was nothing fictitious about his work ethic. He had the inclination and talent made for construction. He had the curiosity of a tinkerer, learning to take apart broken power tools and fixing them.
Andrian worked his way from a helper to a mason. He invested in training programs, earning NCII certifications as a master plumber and a tile setter. He became a leadman and eventually a foreman. In spite of the physically demanding nature of his job, he attended TESDA training after hours. He had balanced work and school early in life — this was nothing new.
George Bernard Shaw said “Life isn’t about finding yourself. Life is about creating yourself.” Andrian got this bit right.
At this point, I had to stop and tell my son this story. Life in the country can be tough, and many use that as a reason to stop. It is often said that our ability to adapt and respond to whatever life throws at us will determine our future success. This was heroic effort, a champion’s response.
Bring your personal values to the office.
In many ways, Andrian’s sites are informed by his personal values. He values people with initiative. He appreciates problem-solvers and a can-do approach to work. There is no job that is less important than others. A little sense of humor helps.
What most distinguishes Andrian is his care for his men. His colleagues admire his sense of responsibility and attention to their safety. He is vocal, but not because of some puerile notion of command; it comes from thoughtfulness and humanity. He wants to pull people up. Much like an older brother supporting his siblings by selling vegetables.
Know Your Why
Andrian works for his family. He has four children in Quezon Province, two daughters and two sons. He dreams of building a home of his own where he and his children can all be together.
In our sites, this dream isn’t uncommon. Only a handful of our men own their own homes. How this dream visibly drives Andrian is what stands out.
“That’s something that I try to remind myself of a lot, there are costs to going through the motions, but you have to ask yourself if the cost is worth it.”
The more Andrian reviews the truest part of himself, the closer he’ll get to relializing his dreams.
Inspiring stuff, Andrian. Thank you for sharing your story.
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