felipe m medalla : fortifying the foundations for the next generation of strategy leaders speech by mr felipe m medalla, governor of bangko sentral ng pilipinas ( bsp, the central bank of the philippines ), at the bangko sentral ng pilipinas 2018 – 2023 strategy close - out meeting, manila, 23 june 2023. * * * to my colleagues from the monetary board ( mb ) ; our bangko sentral ng pilipinas ( bsp ) family ; and all the awardees, some of whom will get their certificates later, magandang hapon po sa inyong lahat. as you know, because of the school where i came from [ de la salle lipa ], i love [ the color ] green, but yellow is fine, too. i noticed there was just one yellow [ referring to the sector's perceived progress in achieving their strategic outcomes ], and that was the monetary and economics sector. of course, it is very clear why - because a lot of the [ elevated ] inflation has nothing to do with monetary policy. in other words, there is nothing wrong with the color yellow or, maybe, even red. the important point is how much you worked and how much you tried. the color yellow says, " try harder and learn the lessons from the past, " [ but considering ] the extent to which exogenous factors will not change the color. delivering on our three pillars in the face of global and domestic challenges as director caryl [ valdez ]'s presentation shows us, we have done a lot in the past. i have been governor for just a year, but it has been my greatest honor to have worked and served alongside all of you - navigating the challenges of the pandemic, especially at a critical time of history when there was a huge pivot in us [ fed ] monetary policy. of course, the task is getting harder. because of the pandemic, public debt is higher ; the deficit is higher. during times like those, the pressure on the central bank is clearly going to be higher, as you can see in both interest rates and inflation. while a lot of things are outside of our control, what remains constant is [ that ] the bsp has three pillars and will dedicate all its strengths ; all its resources ; and all the hands, the minds, and the mouths in guiding the economy toward price stability ; financial stability ; and

a safe, secure, and efficient payments and settlements system. to use monetary board member ( mbm ) tony [ abacan ]'s favorite phrase, " the three pillars are in good hands. " improving monetary policy formulation through technology in the area of monetary policy formulation, we are investing in better models and leveraging big data and advanced analytics to improve our forecasting and analytical abilities, thereby adding to our toolkit of market surveillance and evidence - based value judgment. 1 / 5 bis - central bankers'speeches the importance of reflection in the ongoing journey toward lifelong improvement by the way, we are in an uncomfortable spot where we do not really know whether what we did was better than what we did not do. because, by their very definition, what we did not know, we do not know what happened at that time. only in a place where you have two alternative universes, where time travel is possible and you could go back in time and play it again, can you now tell the difference between what could have been and what has been. it does require confidence. it requires faith in ourselves. it requires the analytical ability to say, " maybe, we could have done better here. maybe, we missed this one. " as mbm eli [ remolona ] said, that is one important skill we must develop as an institution. [ if we were ] to follow socrates who said, " an unexamined life is not worth living. " oa [ over acting ] naman masyado iyon ; it is still worth living. our ability to always review ourselves and say, " how do we get better? " i guess, [ the answer is ] this exercise of before we do things, we already mapped out what we want to achieve and what strategies we want to employ. doing that is really a great discipline for eventually reviewing ourselves because we must review ourselves relative to the things we put on record as the basis of our actions. harnessing technology to improve banking supervision in the area of financial system regulation and supervision, the implementation of our suptech [ supervisory technology ] roadmap and the strengthening of our competencies in digital bank supervision will help us not just to adapt, but also to proactively respond to fintech [ financial technology ] trends and post - pandemic supervisory challenges. in our pursuit of an inclusive financial system, we are looking at how we can use technology to become more effective in our communication program and to explore non