May you all have a very…

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by Shienna Calimlim

Being an entreprenuer is very hard to do. When I started to build a business with my team, I’ve learned a lot more than I expected. You know why?  I was a neophyte, I was called a young entrepreneur. I’ve also learned and experienced the things that other students might not have experienced.

With my team (Sweet Seven Teens) I learned that , aside from the experience I gained personally, the financial rewards of having one’s business are enormous. For many individuals like my team members, the primary motivation in engaging in business is the desire to be on top of everything. Entrepreneurship can also satisfy one’s creative drive as well as provide other forms of self-fulfillment. Just a seller has its rewards, it too has its attendant risks. It provides you the potential to earn some money, but at the same time you must be willing to sacrifice long hours of hard work and take on new responsibilities.

Motivation and patience are also needed.  If you don’t motivate your self and your teammates, you may not reach your own goal. Having patience is one of the factors that helped our team overcome problems. You need also to have  persistence, commitment to job contract, desire for efficiency and quality, goal setting, information seeking, self confidence and flexibility. Aside from that I learned to use practical  strategies to influence or persuade customers/ consumers to buy or use our product.

Above all, you need a lot of self confidence, a strong belief in your own capabilities as well as on the abilities of your teammates if you want to be  successful in business.

by Jhen Bandojo

Our team is called the “Sweet Seven Teens” because we are seven teenagers and we produce sweet products like chocolates and refrigerated cake made from Graham.  We tried marketing a lot of products like banana chips, peanuts, hotcakes, quailed eggs in our effort to meet customer needs and wants.

I’ve learned a lot of things with my team through our subject in Sales Management. We were challenged to reach our marketing goal of Php 45,000 in sales.  We pursued our target customers and strove hard to reach our goal. I’ve learned that you have to be patient, honest, cooperative and have a good relationship with your customers , so that you will be successful in what you are doing and gain a lot of valued customers.

The members of our team are very cooperative and supportive to each other. We were not just sharing our ideas but we also listened to the opinion and suggestions of each other, and after the deliberations, we come up with a good concept.

Sometimes our ideas were in conflict and we have heavy arguments among each other on small things,  but later on, we settle our differences and move on. we are not just a “team”, we are also friends. We do believe that in business you have to have good interpersonal relationships with your customers in order to become a successful entreperneur someday.

I find it hard to work with my teammate because of their behavior. They don’t have self-confidence and the lack initiative.

Well, it was a sort of an enjoyment and fun. The best thing I learned about selling is that it’s hard to find a prospect who is readily willing to buy your product.

by Jhon Lacson

Student, Sales & Management

University of Caloocan City

First of all, I’d like to thank our dearest Professor Jaylord F. Pagadora for this wonderful and very challenging selling time in his Sales and Management class. My sales group, EL Kondensada Partnership, is such a blessing to me because I have been part of the passion, enthusiasm, and marketing strategies invested by our team members on how to deal with customers. I have learned so many things with them. I held on stubbornly to my decision and I wanted to implement it right away. But my teammates proved me wrong and I learned to listen to their comments and suggestions. I have learned to always prioritize the customer.

Especially to those who want to run a business, always bear in mind that no one will ever win an argument with the customer. Patience is everything that we all need to learn. Even when customers are slightly wrong, try to listen to them, accept them as they are, and love them. Sometimes, the customer is like a stone which do not respond no matter what you do; your persuasion simply goes for nothing, it passes by him without any reaction or even just a little bit of smile…

Every smile of our customer soothes our weary soul and motivates us to continue what we have started.

My colleagues and I want to thank God for all the knowledge we acquired especially on the strength and weaknesses of our target market and the marketing strategies we need to adopt in order to meet their needs and wants. We also need to devise the “ Presyong Pang-masa”, a filipino term for cheap prices, for a variety of our products such as Polvoron EL Mani, Polvoron EL Pinipig, Yema EL Mani and El Peanut Butter.

To our beloved supporters, EL Kondensada Partnership wants to thank you all for your acceptance especially the University of Caloocan City students. We also would like to thank the Camarin High School students, our parents who supported us in our every production. Finally, we thank our customers who comprise our P45,000 sales target quota. Thank you guys!

Whether we realize our target or not, our very own experience is still such a blessing, all glory to God. Our hope is that our polvoron and yema products will continue to be in the market even after this exciting class project. Thank you again Professor Jaylord Pagadora for the moral support. Thank you God.

By Jade Angelo Gascon
Executive Assistant, On Eagle’s Wings Foundation

Intercession is the last thing I would imagine myself writing about.

Prayer’s fine with me. You know, asking providence for today’s breakfast, lunch, and supper; for courage when deadlines draw nigh; for supernatural strength in times of siesta while I’m at work; and for many other needs critical to my growth and survival as a human being.

Interceding for other people (or creatures) is not easy.

But intercessory prayer has always been something too hard for me to act upon and, honestly, to believe in.

For starters, intercessory prayer (or intercession) is a kind of prayer in which one continuously lifts up the lives (the needs and predicaments) of other people to God. It involves pleading on behalf of others, for others.

It’s hard to do. My family and I have enough trouble to consume much of my precious prayer time already. So why bother praying for a classmate who is heartbroken or a workmate who doesn’t know Christ yet?

It’s also hard to believe in. If God were sovereign, what’s the sense of continuously praying for people? Can’t I just pray once for them, and rest assured that God has it on record already?

At the 20th National Prayer Gathering (NPG) of the Intercessors For the Philippines (IFP) in Cebu on Nov. 17 to 19, all my antiquated misconceptions about intercessory prayer were phased out.

I learned that God calls every Christian to be an intercessor. Peter describes us as a “royal priesthood” (1 Peter 2:9). He alludes here to the role of priests as those who present prayers, thanksgiving and praise to God on behalf of people. Thus, praying for needs that are beyond one’s own benefit should be a habit every Christian must desire to develop as “royal priests.”

An Israelite high priest intercedes to God on behalf of the people

This intercessory duty cannot be performed by hearts that are not transformed. It’s easy to be compelled to pray for friends and family because they are people we care for. But interceding for strangers, enemies, and nations requires compassion of epic proportions.

Indian preacher Sadhu Sundar Selvaraj stressed during the NPG that the key element for intercession is a heart of compassion. Christians will always find excuses to not find time to intercede if there’s no single trace of compassion in their hearts that motivates them to intercede.

Compassion drives the believer’s heart to sacrifice time in prayer for people and nations in need. It fuels our spirit to de-emphasize self-benefitting prayers (these are not unnecessary, though), and move into a prayer attitude that spends more time on other’s needs. Selvaraj also pointed out that, “The act of intercession is the act of meeting with God by falling before him for pleading on behalf of another… You can’t stop praying until the burden is lifted from you.”

The only way to have this kind of compassion that leads to intercession is to sync our heartbeat with God’s. And His heartbeat echoes loudly throughout the Bible. It resonates with Good News to the poor, release to the captives, sight to the blind and freedom to the oppressed (Luke 4:18). This is Jesus’ anointing. This is the character of intercessory prayer. Centrifugal. Sympathetic. Salvational.

I can’t believe I’ve just written about intercession.

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