Jill Gale de Villa
While in Washington, DC, I had the great pleasure of being treated to lunch by Bobbie Montesa and Cathy Reyes-Angus. Both have been national officers at ADB and are currently professional staff at the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Bobbie has been an AFE member since 2007, and Cathy is a “pending member”—as she is still on leave from ADB.
The topic of the lunch: The Transition. Bobbie (when I asked for Bobbie Montesa—the guard at the front desk informed me “You mean Teresa…we call people by their correct names here”) had made the change 4 years earlier, and Cathy was a real newcomer—only about 3 months on the job at the time.
Bobbie, who has been promoted once and will soon be promoted again, had originally been hired at IMF’s equivalent of ADB’s level 4, her interviewers being impressed with her skills as an archivist. Both Bobbie and Cathy noted that they feel very much appreciated in their jobs, for their competencies and professionalism. And of course the added income is most welcome. Bobbie noted that her first assignment was to put in place customized file plans and retention schedules. This required extensive liaison with all departments to get their buy-in for moving to electronic filing, which was the next step. She is currently managing a large project involving rationalizing the filing space and system and managing eight vendors and six IMF staff to clean up file rooms and advocate digital filing using a new system that she and her team rolled out IMF-wide last year.
On 3 July, serendipitously, Cathy and Bobbie passed in Dulles airport, as Cathy arrived for her new work and Bobbie went to the Philippines for her home leave. Waving through the glass was all they could do to communicate as Cathy and her family disembarked from their Korean Air flight while Bobbie and her husband sat in the waiting room before boarding the same plane.
Bobbie Montesa and Cathy Reyes-Angus in the IMF lobby.
Like Bobbie, Cathy had been hired for the skills she had demonstrated well at ADB—Cathy’s job is communications officer, and she said there hasn’t been a dull moment since her arrival. For one thing, you have to be more self-sufficient in the US—there are fewer supporting staff. Plus, almost on landing, she had to handle communications pertaining to a security issue and then to the earthquake (an unusual event in DC). Cathy noted she has had good mentoring from her supervisors. She said she was looking forward to her first snowfall (the weather obliged—it came just a few days later) and putting her children into school. She misses her helpers in Manila, and is getting used to the commuting. Like ADB, IMF is a huge institution, and work can be very demanding, but Cathy noted she “is enjoying every opportunity to gain knowledge and learn heaps.”