ITprenuership

ITprenuership
By: Meric Mara

Last night, I had a good conversation with my friends and fellow Rotarians (Rex Britos, Joshua Maquiling and Allan Sanchez) and we've been discussing things on inspiring the new generation about IT and entrepreneurship. Thus, I opted to share these three (3) important things that happened to me and to one of my companies, 8layer Technologies, Inc.

1. MONEY ALONE DOESN’T MATTER, IT is about solving issues in society.

Most of the wrong notions about having a company is that you will become an instant millionaire". It's actually a BIG JOKE. Money is just one of the rewards on how you do things. The most important reward of an entrepreneur is when he/she was able to solve big issues in society. It’s an achievement to us especially if we’re able to succeed without being boastful. Always remember that “Businesses Driven By Values Succeed in the Long Run”. That’s why you have to let your values attract your team to contribute for this country and you will be a successful business owner.

2. IT is a fast evolving industry and a good tool to boost other domains.

Learning new things as much as possible is a good method to sharpen the saw. Read books, talk to the elders, share your knowledge to the community. In short..don't stop learning. Learning changes things. After that, start to act on what you’ve learned. In our company, the term "Aksyon" is very important. Action speaks louder than words.

ie. We don't know anything on Emergency Management but we are trained in Information Technology. Instead of watching and doing nothing, we acted by collaborating with people who are domain experts in emergency management. Then we used IT, from satellite connectivity to call management and dispatch management and incorporating Bigdata and Cyber Security. We believe that we were able to contribute by helping our public servants in doing public service properly with the use of IT. Emergency Management is not a thing of the past now. It is modern and data driven and more effective than before.

In IT, there are lots of domains that we can still improve on as long as collaboration is open and improvement will always be welcome.   

3. Don't lost hope. Magpatuloy at 'wag matakot.

People come and go. It's normal! Most of the time, you will remove people because they violate ethical issues in your company. Sometimes, it's just a strategic approach to streamline your team. Remember that there is a BIG difference between "People and "Right" People". Those who understand and embrace the company vision is far from those who just go to work for the sake of salary. If people who got out or resigned, got terminated from our team became better people, we are very proud of them. We are proud to see people growing and making their way in doing their jobs in helping this country. Simply improve your Human Resource strategy and always be a keeper and protector of the vision so that growth will be fast and whatever happens, you are always on track.

Process is also important. Have time to review the things that you've done yearly and find time to improve it. I remember that we started way back 2005 and executing "Half of 8" Methodology and now its a full fledged methodology that is bespoke and very useful in our organization..it's called 8layer Methodology. Its very important to develop a company-specific design process to automate, monitor and make our operations understandable and easy to cascade to all people in our company.  

I am very proud to say that from 2005 to now, 2021, we are still breathing and doing our contribution to the nation building in our small ways. Imagine this company started without a single penny, all we have is a drive to be More, Be Useful and Be of Service to our fellow Filipinos. Our main investment is our talents, love for our country and love to share and to open source some of our works so that others can learn and evolve it to something that can be beneficial to others.