The Never Delivered Letter of Intention

____ __. _______
Officer-in-Charge
___ - Sultan Kudarat
_______, Sultan Kudarat


Dear Ma'am ____:

I am writing this letter to express my humblest and purest intention not to be renewed as a Business Counselor.

Being a Business Counselor is one of the best upturn that happened to my life. But as time passes by, I realize that I become selfish of only thinking of the benefits I have acquired and will acquire through this experience. I always forget to remember who I was, when all I thought about was serving the people. Now, I only think of reaching the targets and not considering how I affect to the persons I meet everyday.

This experience has changed me a lot, and part of these changes is my continuing self pity and self depreciation. I believe that I am never competent for the career. I am less than what you expect me to be. All this time, I try to push myself to do better but every time I try harder, my heart and my mind resist the changes. My heart tells me that I am misplaced, really misplaced, in this endeavor. This is not me and this will never be me. To put it to perspective, I feel like a fish that is too ambitious to learn how to walk and breathe outside the waters.

After all, I prayed for this. To be honest, I first prayed to be part of DTI. God gave me what I prayed for and maybe this is His way of gradually exposing me to the realities of this world. That we should fit in to what skill and talent He gave us.

I am not deserving for this job. There are better persons who will really fit for this. No matter how hard I try to fix my besmirched esteem, I come to the point of falling more to the abyss of the all consuming void of my depression.

To make it clear, none of the people in our workplace contribute to this dilemma. This decision is powered by my own desire to be free of the standards I put to myself. This is my only opportunity to unleash myself with this burden I created. This is my only chance to start to love myself again.

Please help me bring back myself. Support me, Ma'am, in my decision. Thank you for understanding.


Respectfully yours,


JBA

Insecured

Early this morning, I woke up dull and exhausted. I did not know why I felt that way. Hours later, a sudden thought came to my mind: I am not good enough. I am no good at all.

This is my greatest insecurity. I am not smart. I feel like I’m always left behind by people who are far better than me. I feel alone. I always feel that I am useless. I always reach for the ideals of this society and I always fail. I envy people who succeed in whatever they undertake and I always blame myself for not doing better. I don’t even know how to do better or what’s better.

This insecurity is too much. Why do I always fall?

The Success Story of Elaine's Highland Products

The Humble Beginning

Entrepreneurship has already entered to the senses of Mrs. Roselyn D. Salazar during her early days as she had started buying and selling dry goods with her mother—one of the pioneering entrepreneurs in Masiag, Bagumbayan, Sultan Kudarat.

In 1996, she undertook financing business for farm inputs with an initial capital of 300,000 from her own equity. This project lasted for twelve years before she engaged herself into mini grocery store in 2008 with an initial capital of P1,000,000. In 2008, she merged the grocery store to her newly opened bakeshop and registered it in the name Elaine’s Bakeshop and General Merchandise.

On April 2016, she started venturing into processing and selling of organic food products with an initial capital of P100,000 that was used to invest for additional cooking equipment and pre-operating expenses such as licenses, packing supplies, and inbound logistics of raw materials. Her supplies of raw materials come from her farm at Masiag, Bagumbayan, Sultan Kudarat.

Issues and Challenges

She now concentrated on her organic products. On the early stage after the opening of her new venture, she began contracting sari-sari stores around the neighborhood. She planned to enter malls, eateries, and restaurants within Isulan and Tacurong. She also saw the need for expansion after a certain period of processing when she already could not cover some orders as she also aimed more and more sales.

Negosyo Center Intervention

Mrs. Salazar has attended a couple of seminars conducted at the Negosyo Center of Isulan. One of which was the Seminar on Costing and Pricing where she learned how to derive the cost of her products and how to use these costs to formulate a mark up enough to cover all costs and expenses. The other seminar was on Packaging and Labeling where after such, she introduced to the market her new labeled products. After the her labels were presented, she penetrated Isulan Central Plaza, Bidz Inasal, Carlitos’ Chicken, and Fitmart Tacurong.

On November of 2016, she reached out to the Negosyo Center of Isulan to make her products be included in the mounting of trade fairs in Kalimudan Festival. Fortunately, with Negosyo Center of Isulan, in partnership with the Local Government Unit of Isulan, the request was approved and it paved way for her products to be displayed at the said event. She earned more than P90,000 in this trade fair.

Aspirations

Elaine’s Bakeshop and General Merchandise will expand production plant in Isulan, Sultan Kudarat. The proposed location of the plant will be inside the idle space of the owner’s house. Mrs. Roselyn D. Salazar started to participate in the “Kapatid Mentor Me” Program by the Department of Trade and Industry last October 2016 up till December 2016 and this program has helped her formulate business improvement plan with the active assistance of the Business Counselors of Isulan assign for her.

She also plans to change the name of her entity into Elaine’s Highland Products in conformance to her newly introduced organic goods such as peanut derivatives, banana chips, turmeric, salabat, and MorTurCo (Moringa-Turmeric-Coco Sugar).

Rest assured that the Business Counselors of the Negosyo Center of Isulan will monitor her success in the coming periods.