Mondoedo, Juan Nicollo B.

Individual Paper 1: Self-Reflection

I am no longer part of the organization I am going to discuss but I have
learned many things in being part of Santugon Sa Tawag Ng Panahon, or more
popularly known as Santugon. In my stay at Santugon, I rose up the ranks
quickly from being just a core member up to the Deputy Executive Vice President
in a span of just one year. In my function as the Deputy Executive Vice President,
Newstrom defines my role as a combination of a disseminator, resource allocator,
disturbance handler, and entrepreneur. From the given roles, my job was more of
a decision making job wherein I had to reserve rooms for organization activities,
plan when to print campaign materials, reserve studios for photo shoots, and
scheduling the photo shoot around people too.
As a disseminator, I passed on information about the rooms they
requested along with the schedule it is available to us. As resource allocator, I
handled the funds and knowing the best place to get what was needed at the
lowest possible price. As disturbance handler, I troubleshot situations when
reservations had conflicts or if someone else had a reservation in an area that
was needed. As an entrepreneur, I volunteered ideas to streamline processes so
that people may be able to get to what was needed in the least possible time as
well as the least loss of information.
In my time with Santugon, there was a lack of planning, organizing and
controlling from the top management. All that was done by the top management
was an underlining of goals but didnt necessarily underline how the goal was to
be achieved. The lack of adherence to a set plan led to organizational
breakdowns, including one of the top members of management, or my direct
superior, to quit.
The goal for Santugon was to embody the organizations values through
its activities, but most activities were not thought out or did not have enough
planning because it was expected that only one committee was going to do most
of the legwork. The assumption that one committee handled the external

activities, as well as the same committee handling all the logistics for the whole
organization caused a mismanagement in member morale because of the
overwork caused by the expectations. My direct superior was the one who was
affected the most, and in her capacity as the Executive Vice President, she was
antagonized by the rest of the top management causing her to quit. She was
being targeted due to the fact that she had always had an opposing stance to
what the other members of top management wanted. She did so in order to
secure the organizations finances for more pressing matters, such as
outstanding debts and other bigger planned expenditures.
A particular ethical dilemma I faced in my time with the organization was
when I was given the choice to assume the position vacated by my direct
superior, or not. I think this is an ethical dilemma because I had doubts on my
commitment to the organization in seeing how they treated my direct superior
and their assumptions that it was a one-man job. I seriously contemplated on
leaving the organization because of the clear lack of respect towards
administrative members because of their logical decision-making rather than the
more popular passion-based decision framework used in the organization. I had
three choices presented to me during the period: To be the next EVP, to stay in
my position, or to leave the organization. In the end, I chose to stay in the
organization due to my loyalty and being promised that I would have support
from other members due to the nature of the job. I really wanted to leave the
organization at one point, because I had this loyalty to my direct superior and had
become really close. The fact that I heard top management bashing her affected
my commitment to the organization because it seemed like the family agenda
was just a show and a higher level of politics were in place.
I consulted with friends and family about my ethical dilemma because it
has always been a passion of mine to be active in student affairs, and losing the
position or gaining a higher one without guarantee of support, has caused me to
question even my own logic because my wants were conflicting with each other. I
learned that I should be able to trust people outside the organization with the

situations I am in and that I should be logical in making my decision because

ultimately, it is my state of mind that will be affected.
Ultimately, I am currently not a member of Santugon. I quit because I
realized that the real management did not come from the incumbent but from
alumni. I discovered that in my quest to grow, some people take away that
chance from others in order to rehash what they had in their younger years. I
tried, in my best ability, to manage what was going on but it eventually took a toll
on me and I had become tired mentally, emotionally, and physically.
I have grown as a person in my experience with the organization. I have
learned how to troubleshoot difficult situations. I have also learned how to deal
with different types of people, especially those I only sporadically have to
communicate with. I have learned how to balance priorities, and how to give up
some commitments in order to fulfill others. I have learned how to sacrifice my
own time in order to lessen the load on others, and also the fact that most people
will not do the same for you.
References:
Dyck, B, Neubert, M (2010) Management: Current practices and new directions.
Cengage/Houghton Mifflin, Boston
Newstrom, John W. Organizational Behavior: Human Behavior at Work, Twelfth
Edition. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2007. Print.