Ascend to the Pinnacle
By Karla Iriza Cerdea

Harold Jose Pardo
CEO, Winsource Solutions

Education:
Bachelor’s Degree in Education Human Development,
Southern Illinois University
Master’s Degree in Business Administration
Ph. D in International Business

 It was said that it didn’t matter where you get, it is the climb and what you learned that truly matters. CEO Harold Jose Pardo’s ascend on what he is right now is comparable to clambering atop the highest peak. “I have always started at the bottom. When I joined the US Navy, I started as a bottom sailor [then] went all up to becoming an officer when I retired. I just find that this is the right thing to do. You have to know the bottom in order to walk,” he explains.

True to his words, he started at the base as an agent for one of our contact centers in the country and was eager to know everything about the call center industry. “I got a few offers to be training manager, to be quality manager, but I didn’t know anything about the industry. I felt I was going to be misrepresenting myself. I didn’t want to go there saying, “Yeah, I can do it,” and turns out there are so many little things that you have to worry about that I don’t know anything about.”

After nine months, he got other offers but it was an offer to become training manager at Winsource Solutions that most appealed to him. He then transitioned into becoming a director for process improvement which comprised training quality and business intelligence. He was offered a job to be a director in another company in Singapore during the point when the president of Winsource resigned and the people that the owner of the company brought weren’t able to run the company.

He gained leverage when another chance came his way. “I was actually going to move there [Singapore] then the company called and said, “Hey, you can’t leave. I need you to run the call center. Stick around, tell me what would it take.” That was eight months ago, I’m still here trying to get the call center  go.”

The climb may be rock- strewn but he remains unfazed by all the challenges that come his way. Amidst the global recession, his company remains thriving.” The recession has a very interesting impact, depending on which direction you look at. In the United States, they are looking at outsourcing as their way of reducing cost creating the same product cheaper. So for us, it’s been great, “explains Harold.

Invincible he may appear to be, he admits to having bad days and tells how he deals with it. “I usually pick up the phone and call my wife. Sometimes she has a perspective that I don’t have and it helps,” shares Harold. Weekends are his family time and he spends it with his wife and son. He says that they like to talk a lot, go out for dinner and travel once in a while.

He also confesses that he is a terrible driver, not in the sense that he drives poorly but does get pretty upset with the things other drivers, jeepney and bus drivers alike,  do to him. “I try to put myself in their position. Goodness gracious, these guys get up four in the morning, own this jeepney that is not very comfortable, and [try to provide] space for another [person] so they can make another 7 or 8 pesos and they’ve been doing this for 20 hours a day. It’s incredible.”
Harold states,” I have to make sure that nobody that works for me will ever need to be a jeepney driver. I have to make sure that the company is successful; that I’m providing jobs and that my goal of going from 400 people to a thousand people actually happens.”

” For me, success is when you look at the end of the day, you look back and the people that surround you are better off because of the things you’ve done. If they are, not just financially but better off in general, you’ve been pretty successful.”

Equipped with his karabiners and ropes, he reveals how he continually manages to reach the peak.” Never stop learning. It not necessarily has to be formal education. Whatever position you become that is the next step up, don’t get comfortable in that position. Keep learning, not just your job but everybody else’s jobs around you.”

Like a daring mountaineer eager to reach another zenith, Harold advises those who want to rise and emerge on top. “Move if you want to move up and continue to educate yourself. I’m 51 years old and I am still learning.”