Out of the Ordinary

“Mag-asawa ka na kasi para ma-promote ka na namin.”

It’s been more than 20 years but I can still recall as fresh as yesterday when the Vice President for Human Resources of the group of cement companies I was working for uttered those words to me.

Funny thing was I was not even thinking of any promotion at that point in my career. I was 28 years old, less than three years out of business school, and was on my second year as treasury manager of the largest cement company in the country.

Things at work were looking up. I had just finished raising P2 billion in long-term commercial papers (a huge amount at the time) to fund the company’s plant expansion. Beyond my job description, I was also executive assistant to our group’s founding chairman, who had been elected chairman of a leading universal bank, and I was tasked to handle all his banking-related activities (and since he was already 76 years old at the time, I ended up interacting with that bank’s officers much more than he did). I was even in charge of organizing our group’s annual Christmas party, and perhaps because I enjoyed performing, always managed to include myself in the program. I was having fun.

And then those words were said. “Mag-asawa ka na kasi para ma-promote ka na namin.” “You should get married so we can promote you.” Even in jest, as ridiculous as these words sound now, at the time they sent a chill that went straight through my bones. I had no plans to get married; at least not to the opposite sex.

Out of Sorts

If there is anything I know, no one is exactly the same — each one of us is an individual with his or her own unique experience. Growing up gay is no exception. In my case, I knew I was gay even before I hit my teenage years and I never went through a phase of fighting it or trying to change who I was. Unlike many gay men I know, I never had a girlfriend. I was never confused. In local showbiz terms – I was always “confirmed.”

But coming from a family with a father in the military, and starting out in a Catholic all-boys grade school, I also knew, to put it mildly, that there was no advantage to being gay. So while I never used a woman to pretend I was straight, I didn’t go around proclaiming I was gay either. Neither did I correct people who assumed I wasn’t. And I tried to ignore how I felt when I would hear some classmates or colleagues (to be fair not a lot, but unfortunately more than too few to ignore ) make fun of gay people. In one ear, out the other, was how I coped with it. And somehow I assumed I could go through life without having this prejudice affect me. Until that moment — was this the end of my career?

Of course it wasn’t, and I did well enough in my job that the company ended up promoting me anyway to assistant vice-president, but by then I had already opened my eyes to seek, not necessarily greener pastures, but certainly more progressive ones. Less than a year after I was promoted, I accepted a job with the Lopez Group, starting out with their telecommunications firm, and in two years eventually joined their broadcast arm, ABS-CBN Broadcasting Corporation.

Out of Bounds

In the year 2000, a few months before my 35th birthday, I was promoted to Chief Finance Officer of ABS-CBN. I was the company’s 4th CFO in four years and was as likely or as an unlikely a choice as any, having just joined the company less than two years earlier as head of treasury and investor relations. Despite the history of rapid turnover in the position, and to the surprise of many, including myself, I remained CFO until I left in 2006, weathering some of the company’s most challenging years in its existence.

Today I am CFO of Maynilad Water, a job I’ve had since the Metro Pacific group won the bid to reprivatize the company in December 2006. It’s been exciting seeing the company evolve from a distressed corporation, unable to deliver on its service obligations while under court-administered debt rehabilitation, into one of the country’s most admired companies, consistently improving and reliably serving its customers as it maintains its financial soundness and profitability. It has not always been smooth sailing, and challenges continue to this day, but I feel lucky to have been there at the start and grateful to be part of this continuing journey.

Out and About

More than two decades since that momentary crisis of confidence triggered by that HR VP’s statement, I still recognize the fear that my younger self felt at the threat of getting off track professionally just because of my sexual orientation. Back then, we did not have a lot of role models to look up to and see what is open to us. We did not have a Tim Cook, the openly-gay CEO of Apple, the world’s most profitable company. Outside of fashion or show business, gay people did not exist.

And while a lot may have changed in the last twenty years, particularly in the US and its attitude towards gay people, the Philippines remains generally conservative, if not necessarily homophobic. I have been fortunate to have worked for companies that have valued capabilities and accomplishments, and as a result I am where I am today. I could remain silent and just continue to smile or laugh off the occasional, if increasingly rare, comments about getting married. But given this particular opportunity to share, I believe I have the responsibility to speak up and be counted.

I am not single because I am a workaholic. I am single only because the state does not recognize gay marriage. But I have been in a loving committed relationship for the past seven years with another gay man, Dr. Keith dela Cruz, a veterinarian who runs his own clinic, Petropolis, in Quezon City, and we are currently building a house in Nuvali.

We no longer live in the Dark Ages but occasionally I would still hear people despair about a gay son, brother, cousin, or nephew. If you are one of those people, don’t. If you know me, or have worked with me, I want you to know that you have dealt with a gay man who is just like any other man or woman, straight or gay, that you come in contact with every day.

And if you know someone who is struggling with being gay, as I once did in my younger days, I would be happy to share my experience and let them know that it gets better.

Originally published on Facebook on June  27, 2014, and in the 3rd Quarter 2014 issue of Ars Ducendi, a publication of the First Pacific Leadership Academy.