 alumni of the month march alumni of the month march from studying law to running a company thirtythree year old patricia bacchus is a force with which to be reckoned this university of guyana alumna and current chair of goinvest has earned numerous accolades including ug s prochancellor s medal for the best graduating law student and the government of guyana prize for the most outstanding law graduate from the hugh wooding law school but ms bacchus is more than the sum of her accomplishments the ug renaissance recently spoke with ms bacchus on her journey ug renaissance ugr where were you born and where did you grow up patricia bacchus pb i was born in berbice and grew up in new amsterdam berbice i attended nursery primary and secondary schools in new amsterdam and left after completing my csecs when i was 16 years old to attend president s college 6th form class to complete my a levels ugr tell us a bit about your family particularly your parents what work did your parents do and how did they affect your upbringing pb my mother gertrude lawrence is an extremely kind and charitable person she is a devout catholic and so i grew up spending a lot of time participating in church related activities such as assisting in the church convent s children and senior citizen s home accompanying my grandfather on outreach programmes to the mental institution and good samaritan home and to the new amsterdam post office where we would rescue abandoned animals and find homes for them my dad murseline bacchus is an attorney atlaw and i should add a rather good one his practice is based in berbice though he has been traveling to georgetown for matters for as long as i can remember he is extremely disciplined and very meticulous with such deep passion for the law that he still goes to his office on sundays to read new books ugr despite having a degree in law you opted to head into business what prompted this career change pb opportunity was what really prompted the career change i was not very keen on practising law and did my specialist clinic in human rights at law school with the intention of perhaps gaining employment in the field of human rights policy and enforcement when i completed my final exams at hugh wooding law school in trinidad in 2006 i returned to guyana to await the publication of grades and graduation during this period i was approached by caribbean container inc to do a short term consultancy aimed at averting foreclosure with responsibility for the legal aspects of the exercise the consultancy was successfully completed in december 2006 and i was thereafter offered and accepted full time employment by caribbean container inc as their legal officer and company secretary ugr from law to business what were the reactions of those around you particularly the reactions of your parents pb my parents were quite happy that i had received an offer even before graduating at the time they both thought it would have been shortterm my father was always desirous of me joining his practice but soon realised that i had very little interest in courtroom advocacy notwithstanding the natural disappointment my parents thankfully did not exert any pressure on me regarding my career choice and have remained very supportive of my work they were quite pleased when in 2006 again before my graduation i was offered and very willingly accepted parttime employment by the then head of department of law at the university of guyana professor aubrey bishop or cch now deceased who was one of my lecturers when i read for the llb ugr has your age and or gender ever positively or negatively impacted your job if so how pb i am oftentimes asked about the impact of my gender and age on my work and my response has always been that perhaps i am oblivious to any covert acts of bias as i have never recognised any or maybe i am simply one of the lucky ones to be working in an environment where those factors have never been to my detriment the former ceo of caribbean container inc ronald webster was a man of merit and so his mentorship was based on an analysis of my professional and personal qualities my appointment as chairperson of the board of cci was made by a board of directors constituted by older men which substantiates the merit based culture of the organisation ugr what are some values that you choose to implement in the administration of not only cci but your life pb fairness is perhaps at the top of the list in terms of values i implement both personally and professionally fairness in deliberations in dealing with people stakeholders customers and employees friends and family and in decision making it is critically important to me that decisions taken pass the fairness test and can be easily substantiated honesty is also very important to me i believe in open and transparent relations for me peace of mind is critical to performance and overall happiness and to maintain this i never want to feel the need to look over my shoulder i also believe in and try my very best to emulate continuous improvement so that whatever i do i can do it well i view life as a continuous learning exercise and always strive to be better tomorrow than i am today this principle permeates every aspect of my personal and professional life and is an important aspect of our organisational culture at cci ugr you initially had an interest in practising human rights law how has this interest tied into your work with cci pb my interest in human rights law stemmed from my desire to protect and promote the interest of people this is a critical element of my management approach at cci where emphasis is placed on the fair treatment of people this ideology permeates all actions of stakeholders including shareholders customers suppliers community residents and employees where the latter is concerned we have been able to put in place contributory private medical insurance and pension plan participation as well as company provided life insurance and personal accident insurance we administer a performance based fair and transparent annual salary review process and also provide profit gain sharing participation for all employees these measures underpin the critical importance of our human resources to the overall performance of the company our restructuring since 2007 and our quest for continuous improvement have enabled bottom line growth where shareholders are now receiving dividends after over 20 years we have a solid and meaningful corporate social responsibility programme whereby we provide support especially to schools within proximity of cci s premises in a number of tangible ways i can say without hesitation that my interest in human rights is being adequately catered to at cci ugr what advice would you give to a university of guyana student regardless of his her major pb i would have to say to strive for excellence and when i say excellence i mean it subjectively do your very best do not short change yourself realise your innate potential personal excellence should not be a competition you should not have to compare your grades with others but you should always ensure that you work assiduously at whatever opportunities you re provided so that you feel contentment in knowing that you ve tried your hardest and done your very best ugr what s next for patricia bacchus pb patricia bacchus is not a fan of rigid longterm planning i believe that planning too rigidly deprives us of recognising novel opportunities so i can only say that i hope to do better tomorrow than i did today i will strive to ensure that cci s performance continues to improve that goinvest the board of which i currently chair continues to evolve into a fair reliable and trusted service provider for investors and that i continue to be motivated so that my efforts in all endeavours can grow from strength to strength webmaster mon 2272017 1123 ms patricia bacchus i view life as a continuous learning exercise and always strive to be better tomorrow than i am today this principle permeates every aspect of my personal and professional life and is an important aspect of our organisational culture at cci alumni ceo of caribbean containers inc  