A Measure of Value; An Ounce of Worth

Values, a word tossed around in the corporate training arena with as much casualness as pepper is to salad happens to be the central core of my lessons for upcoming projects. The word itself has become a commodity. What was once inherent in the simple Filipino's culture of breeding is now mostly a binded material purchased for learning.


I find it shattering how majority have lost all sense of value and ethics. Greed, a lust for physical beauty, laziness, a mentality of selfishness, a "this will do" and "who the hell cares" mentality permeate society. Take for instance, what I experienced yesterday.

I was in a small grocery store in front of the tomato sauce isle trying to decide if I should go "Hunts, Del Monte, or Clara Ole" when a male grocery attendant between the ages of 22 to 25 breezed rudely in front of me in the most crass manner. He was muttering something in the vernacular which in English meant " m___f___ke__ r". He headed straight towards a co - worker pointing out how the idiot in the admin office gave him a shirt not his size but wouldn't replace it. Blah! blah!blah!

I stood staring at his back, stunned and grossly appalled. Too bad I was nursing a bad headache or I would have approached him and taught him a thing or two. I am known to do such things, but yesterday wasn't a good day. I was too sick feeling to care. His actions spoke volume of management values.

Not everyone is like him of course! Just a few weeks ago, a pretty lady with the nicest demeanor at the nearby SM Department Store was such a sweet help to me. There was something in her smile, in her voice, in her manner that made me instantly like her. There was a "happy"in her service, a deep down old fashioned genuine kindness and concern sadly lacking in most sales people. Thing is, in today's young workforce who would gripe and demand without yet having proven anything of work value, this lady is a rarity.

And so for people who speak and teach and train, the templates and slides and manuals and handouts that speak and teach of value will roll. However, unless each Filipino takes it upon himself to value himself, so much so that he gives a labor of discipline stamped with love instead of gripe, then and only will this nation move forward and gain that great measure of value, that great ounce of worth - a respect- it so rightfully deserves from the eyes of the world.