Guest Speaker's Profile: Joel C. Valdes

Rotarian Joel C. Valdes joined the Rotary Club of Manila in 1995 upon the sponsorship of PP Archit M. Bartolome. Joel, as friends refer to him, is married to Sarah Coronel-Valdes since 1988. They have four children and two grandchildren.

Joel is an AB Economics graduate of the Ateneo de Manila in 1978 and thereafter he completed his Masters in Business Administration from the Asian Institute of Management in 1983.

Joel's professional career spans over four decades. His unique set of skills certainly whetted his problem solving and opportunity seizing capacity. The combined years of public service and the time making a living as an investment banker seemed like a revolving door but was proven gratifying specially in 2001 when he accepted the appointment as Undersecretary of the Department of Finance by a former economics professor, Gloria Macapagal Arroyo who turned Philippine President then.

Joel became instrumental to numerous transactions contributing to nation building in terms of financial management break throughs, state asset privatization, infrastructure development, and corporate governance to name a few. As a whole the interchanging public and private professional ladders served as his building blocks to finally owning his corporate vehicle using his namesake, JOEL C. VALDES & ASSOCIATES, INC. in 2007. What followed since then proved to be the most productive and rewarding years of his professional life while focused on providing various financial advisory and funds arranging services to corporates and infrastructure projects.

Joel likewise held numerous positions with non-government organizations in varying capacities such as the Philippine-Swiss Business Council, Institute of Corporate Directors, Institute of Solidarity for Asia, Management Association of the Philippines, Financial Executives Institute of the Philippines, AIM Alumni Association, and the Ateneo de Manila Alumni Association, among others.