SOF Spotlight
Quo Vadis Society of Fellows?
ENRIQUE V. ABADESCO, JR. DPM SoF President, 2012-2013
Ric is currently the Managing Director of OrgEffectiveness, a management consulting firm. He is also an independent director of the Human Resource Innovations & Solutions, Inc, senior consultant with Mansmith & Fielders and an adjunct faculty at a number of educational institutions in the Philippines. He is the 2012-2013 President of the Philippine Society of Fellows in People Management and a past president of PMAP. He was formerly senior vice president of San Miguel Corporation and for many years, an expatriate manager with Exxon Chemical Company, based in HongKong, Singapore, Belgium and the United States. He has an MBA from the Asian Institute of Management.
The Philippine Society of Fellows in Personnel Management or SoF, is the association of accredited HRM practitioners within PMAP.
You may have seen a set of letters( such as AFPM, FPM or DPM) attached to the names of some PMAP members. These letters represent titles of peer recognition conferred by the Accreditation Council of SoF. These titles are given to individuals whose credentials and accomplishments meet the Competency Standards of the Society.
The honorific titles include the following: Associate Fellow in Personnel Management( AFPM); Fellow in Personnel Management( FPM) and the highest rank: Diplomate in Personnel Management( DPM).
What is the purpose of the SoF?
The SoF defines its purpose as leading advances in the practice of HRM.
As its 2012-2013 President, my translation of this mission statement is to secure professional status for the HRM practice through government recognition.
This means getting enabling laws passed in both houses of Congress providing for the licensing and professionalization of human resource management practice. While this would place the practice under the supervision of the Professional Regulation Commission, the law provides for a professional regulatory board consisting of recognized experts from the profession and the designation of an accredited professional body such as the SoF. This law will also accelerate the accreditation of academic programs leading to higher standards of practice.
While gains have been made by PMAP over the years in advancing the HRM practice, we think that with dramatic changes in the world and the advances in the knowledge and practice of people management, we need a catalyst to accelerate the public recognition of the HRM practice as a true profession. As the ASEAN region moves towards closer cross border political, economic and trade relations, standardization in practices of the professions may soon become a reality. Getting recognition of HRM practice as a profession by the Philippine government would accelerate the growth of the profession, embed the academic programs of HRM in certified universities and colleges, standardize practices and facilitate cross migration of professionals in the region.
Groundwork for HRM Professionalization
The SoF under the immediate incumbencies of past Presidents Mon Medina and Sylvia Duque have laid the groundwork for getting the body of knowledge required for a true profession promulgated and agreed to.
As HRM practitioners, we all know that a competency framework provides a sound foundation for HRM systems. Aside from being used as its selection template, the SoF Competency Standards has also been accepted as the conceptual base for a reformed program curriculum of the Center of Human Resource Management. Headed by PP Sonny Coloma as chair and PP Lucy Tarriela as its President, a comprehensive training needs analysis is being prepared and will become the basis for the reformulation of a comprehensive CHRM academic curriculum. CHRM programs will henceforth by enhanced by the logic of the competency framework. The streamlining of the CHRM curriculum is an important preparatory step towards the adoption of an academic template for schools offering programs preparatory to the licensure examination.
January I PEOPLE MANAGER 23