Mentors

Forty. I reached that milestone yesterday and as I was planning to write about the lessons I had learned after four decades, I began to think about who were the people I learned from and who had taken the time to mentor me. The only person who doesn’t need a mentor is someone without imperfections and possessed of all the accumulated wisdom of the ages. Simply, everyone can benefit from a mentor someone who has more skills, possesses greater knowledge, or has a different set of life experiences. While the lessons that I have learned are important, I realized that it was equally vital to acknowledge and thank those people who I considered as mentors. The following people took the time to mentor me and teach me some of them perhaps did not even do it consciously but, nevertheless, I learned much from them and for their time and effort at teaching me, I am most grateful.

1. Kundirana. Using the current lingo, this was the “show choir” of our time and from our teachers and advisers like Bro. Gus Boquer, our school head and benefactor, and Montet Acoymo, then our music coach and later the dean of the University of the Philippines College of Music, I learned to appreciate music, singing, culture, and the arts as well as the responsibility of properly representing your school and your country. I took to heart that not only were we a show choir but we were as corny as it sounds singing ambassadors for La Salle Greenhills and the Philippines as we traveled and sang at home and abroad. The idea that you represent something a culture, a group, a people is something that continues to resonate with me and, accordingly, I take pains to present myself well.

2. Estelito Mendoza. You can agree or disagree with his politics but what is unquestionable is he is one of the best lawyers, perhaps the best, in the Philippines. As former solicitor general, he trained his solicitors so well that many, like Justice Santiago Kapunan and Chief Justice Rey Puno, went on to become justices of the Supreme Court. So I was incredibly fortunate that during the five years that I worked with him, he took time not only to review my pleadings but, more importantly, to sit me down and patiently show me my mistakes, correct them, and advise me on how to improve my pleadings. He also allowed me to assist him in important cases before the Supreme Court and the Sandiganbayan. I was privileged to have had the opportunity to not only work with a truly superior legal mind and the fact that he took the time to mentor me, a lawyer barely out of law school, shows a great generosity on his part. For me, the most important lesson that he taught me was how to spot the main issues of a case and how to think strategically and pro-actively: thinking a number of steps ahead and having a “decision tree” or a mental schematic to plan out the flow of a case while anticipating possible problems that may arise.

3. Serge Osmeña. He was a difficult mentor because he did not suffer fools gladly and you had to be on the top of your game and ready with answers when you dealt with him. In 2007, when I was chosen as the Spokesman for the Opposition, Serge was given the difficult task of showing me the ropes and teaching me skills on effective communication. He was the campaign manager and I was the political spokesman. His task was especially difficult because I was not and I still believe that despite my being a candidate in the last elections I am decidedly not a politician. I was, first and foremost, a lawyer and an academic and so dealing with the media was not my forte. He gave me precious advice, the one which most resonated with me was the importance of body language, the non-verbal signals that we put across on TV, and poise. He reminded me that what people remembered after seeing someone interviewed, particularly on TV, was not what the person said the verbal part or even the concepts discussed but rather the impression, which is emotional rather than logical or cerebral, that the person made. I internalized this idea by giving tremendous value to believing in the message or statement that I was delivering and refusing to say things that I didn’t stand for or believe in. My take on Serge’s advice was that genuine sincerity would trump the bombast and doublespeak of politicians and talking heads. Serge is, simply, a media genius and any success that I have had as a political spokesman was in large part due to Serge’s mentoring.     

4. Mayor Alfredo Lim. The quintessential action man. He appointed me as President of the Pamantasan ng Lungsod ng Maynila (The University of the City of Manila) in 2007. As he likes to remind people when we are both at social gatherings, he did not know me from Adam but was impressed with my work as Opposition spokesman and with my credentials and on that basis asked me to be University President. Similar to the experience of Serge Osmeña, Mayor Lim had the difficult task of teaching me how to be a public servant, which, in his view, meant prompt and effective service to the needy. As a lawyer, I had initially an unfortunate tendency to focus too much on the legal and administrative processes, which, at times, undermined or delayed the delivery of social services to the poor. Mayor Lim would constantly remind me that the first priority was service to the needy and that the legal processes should help, not hinder, delivery of service. While he gave me full support and a great amount of autonomy as President of PLM, I was not spared from criticism when it was warranted. Although I’m no longer officially connected with the University, I have taken with me the advocacy of providing the best education for bright young Filipinos without the resources for higher education.

5. Martha Minow. Currently the Dean of Harvard Law School and formerly a professor of constitutional law at Harvard. I’m certain she does not remember me but I had my “wow” moment as a legal scholar in her class when I realized that constitutional law was not dry doctrine and boring cases but a legal field that was very much vibrant and alive, which sought to answer the most fundamental and transcendent issues such as, among others, the nature and purpose of government, the telos of marriage, and race relations. She was able to connect the different strands of American history, culture and law and gave it coherence. While I had many excellent law professors in the Philippines Father Bernas, Andy Bautista, Justice Relova, etc. I never understood the law in that depth before her class. I think the reason she was a good teacher and mentor was that I was ready to be taught at that time, I was already 35 when I took my master’s in law. In contrast, while I was studying law in the Philippines, I was just too young, immature, and focused on extracurricular activities, i.e. partying, to gain any real insight.

Finally, in Greek mythology, Athena, the goddess of wisdom, appears as “Mentor,” the friend of Odysseus, from whom the term “mentor” or father-like teacher is derived. I believe that everyone, regardless of educational or social background, has some wisdom to impart and it is important to note that mentoring not only enriches the student but it also similarly enriches the person teaching. I have been enriched by mentors and I feel a great sense of gratitude towards them. Certainly, there are many others who have mentored me and my not mentioning them shouldn’t lessen the value of what they sought to share with me and I am equally grateful to them. So yesterday, as I turned 40 and I blew out the candles on my birthday cake, one of my birthday wishes was to keep learning from others while at the same time to have the opportunity to return the favor and be someone’s mentor as well.