Read the interview:
Transformative leadership requires both foresight and courage. Dr. Vea discusses how leaders can imagine multiple futures, create strategies rooted in curiosity and cultural strength, and sustain change through collaboration and steady progress toward long-term goals.
Well, first of all, I guess, an acceptance that status is not an option for the Philippines. You cannot afford to stay in place even for an in place. But things have to change. You know, as they say, you cannot expect a different result if we keep doing the same things. So first is the acceptance of that necessity.
The second thing would be for the leaders to actually develop a worldview. What do you think? What do they think the world needs of the moment? And based on that. Imagine a number of futures, for Philippine universities or for their even for their own university. So, given what we are now, what could we be in 2050?
Future? What future to future three and so on. And, choose what future we want for ourselves. And then, like, you know, like being green capable and so on and being unbounded [for] a number of years based on that, they can develop strategic objectives and just use [them] for planning. You have strategic objectives and you define what outcomes will tell you that you have attained your strategic objectives, so you have your desired outcomes.
Then you can just have lines of action going through each strategic outcome. And then you put in all the measures within the line of action, your budget, everything. So but it starts with, with foresight in or, you know, the imagining of the futures and choosing one of these possible futures.
The culture within the school—if people are curious enough, you know, or people who are wanting, or desiring change—are the people who are open-minded. Would they be committed, or would they be greedy enough if things don’t go as planned?
But they have the integrity to do this, you know, and the endurance to do all those things, because certainly, strategic plans take time. But you can have small wins. And I think what sustained me, what sustained the community, were those wins along the way.
For example, we got the accreditation. So everybody could be proud of that—we even got accreditation. And then, that emboldened us to go for something more and say, “Okay, let’s go for a university ranking. Maybe we’re capable of that.” We were so nervous about it, but we did it. We were nervous with the university ranking, but we also did it after a number of years.
So these are the victories along the way that were celebrated, that boosted our confidence, and sustained us on the path—not least within the university. Outside of the university, we spent time with government. They asked us to join the technical panel, to join study groups. We never refused—not I, not the officers of our university. So they’re members of all these groups, and they spent time talking with government, never tiring of explaining our point of view and what we think.
We weren’t too much into publicizing these things; we preferred to do quiet work in talking with people in the government about these matters. It may not necessarily be outwardly altruistic on our part, because in order to run an institution successfully, one has to influence the environment around it. But that’s the way we look at it.
So we just see where things are, what this is about, and we want these things to happen—for the school board, for funds, for the university to advance. So, you know, that’s part of our attitude toward everything. It’s not inward-looking, but outward-looking in the sense of influencing the environment—for the interests of the school, and for the interests of the country as well.