DOF chief urges youth to effect change via public service

July 9, 2017

Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez III has called on socially responsible young Filipinos to pay forward the opportunities given to them by joining the government service, where they can become “enablers of meaningful change”  and play a key role  in revolutionizing the country’s  institutions of governance. Dominguez  said that governance under the new economy driven by constant  innovation needs the young generation of Filipinos to enrich public service and help government adapt to change. “Governance in the new economy demands a completely new set of attitudes. Instead of standardizing everything, governance must be more sensitive to differentiation and peculiarity. Instead of gatekeeping, our public agencies must be more responsive to innovation ," said Dominguez in a recent event that he attended. " It is not private enterprise that should adjust to bureaucratic control but the bureaucracy that must adjust to the changing terrain of enterprise ," he said. “You, the next generation of Filipinos, get it. You are completely at ease with the new set of attitudes. It is, after all your set of attitudes: a profound tolerance for differentiation and a discomfort for uniformity, an eagerness to innovate with a healthy impatience for the inefficient, ” he said. He said that while working in the government is not the most lucrative career option available to fresh graduates, it is, however, a satisfying choice  to take especially for those “who wish to serve their country well , ” as it provides them with the opportunity to help public agencies become “enablers” rather than mere “gatekeepers” and contribute to national efforts to improve the lives of their fellow Filipinos. “It will be to the good of our country for a fresh new generation to come and help revolutionize our institutions of governance. The public service can no longer be the last line of defense of the old order. It must be the cutting edge of an innovative nation, one constantly willing to try out new ways of doing things,” Dominguez said. He said this is why he prefers to surround himself with young people, pointing out, for instance, that his support staff at the Department of Finance (DOF) consists of “highly energetic, dynamic, dedicated and smart” achievers whose average age is below 25. DMS