Page 9 - WashingtonSyCip_Bio_Excerpt_2nd_Edition

FOREWORD

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While SGV & Co. celebrates this year its 63 anniversary as a professional services
firm, its story actually began 88 years ago on the 30 day of June 1921, in the year of
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the metal rooster, with the auspicious birth of a baby boy named Washington SyCip.
The boy with a strange name would grow up a wunderkind, skipping grade levels and
excelling in all his subjects from elementary to graduate school. His precociousness
did not dissipate after his formal schooling—and by all indications—never will. But
by the time he established W. SyCip & Co. in 1946, he had assumed another persona
—that of a visionary.

For us in SGV, Wash SyCip—or more aptly, WS to us —is any or all of the following:
father figure, school principal, mentor, conscience, critic, friend, and standard of
integrity. It is very difficult to separate WS from SGV, mainly because he created and
nurtured the firm and influenced over 30,000 professionals who have, at some point
in their careers, been connected to his legacy. When he retired from SGV at the age
of 75 in 1996, we suddenly felt the enormousness of the responsibility that he had
assumed for 50 years.

However, we quickly realized that, true to form, WS had ascertained that a new
generation was prepared to take over and lead SGV to the 21 century. He knew
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that the rules of business were shifting, and while he had laid very solid foundations,
it was time to hand over the reins to younger, more technologically inclined and
globally attuned professionals.

We rose to the challenges of the new millennium with confidence because we knew
that WS had taught us well. In our darkest moments, we would ask ourselves,
“What would WS say? What would he do? What would he not do?” Often, the
introspection would give us the answer but on rare occasions, we would have to
literally seek out his counsel—as would several companies and organizations that

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