She leads with the instinct of a woman and a mother

Cynthia Romero Mamon is a woman of many titles. She is Enchanted Kingdom’s (EK) chief operating officer. But her employees call her “Mother” and “Queen of EK.” She likes to refer to herself as CEO or chief entertainment officer.

She was very easy to spot in the middle of the restaurant in her pink top and big smile. There was a slice of cake with a candle in front of her that said, “Happy birthday!” It was indeed her birthday, and she proudly said that she requested the cake herself.

This writer was her third appointment of the day. She heard Mass and attended a gathering of the Women’s Business Council Philippines, where she serves as secretary. She was set to meet with her family later in the day at a karaoke place where she would presumably sing and dance the night away.

Mamon said that they love performing as a family. Performing is part of their business, too. Her friend, coenchantress and EK’s former creative division head Babic Flores-Faustino, insisted that she take part in the theme park’s production of “Enchanté Musical.”“She always wants me to be on stage so I perform there. I’ve played the role of fairy godmother or the sea queen, you know, because we had an underwater show,” she said. Mamon had a performance with her daughter Bea for Mother’s Day; she has also taken part in their Holy Week presentation, “Cenakulo Rock,” where she played the Virgin Mary in the “Pieta” scene. This is part of her “Evangelitainment” agenda, where one entertains and spreads the word of God. She coined the term.

Faustino’s position was filled by Mamon’s youngest son, Nico, after Faustino died. Mamon said that she still misses her friend. Her eyes twinkled as she talked about Faustino and her talent in putting up original shows for the theme park at a moment’s notice.IT pioneer

Mamon is the first person to try the rides, including the extreme ones, at the park. She would go to different parts of the world to test different attractions and decide which of them they should bring into the country. On the website of EK, a picture of her can be found enjoying one of the rides.

But the business of fun is still a business nonetheless. EK opened in 1995. It was founded by Mamon’s husband Mario and her brother-in-law Rafaelito Minguez. She only came in 2008, at the height of the Asian financial crisis. She led the Sales Marketing Imagineering Leisure and Entertainment (Smile) Division, and now the Integrated Marketing Division. She brought in her fresh ideas and her brand of managing people.

“I took on the challenge. I’m very optimistic, I like to take risks, and I want to learn new things. Then my husband really brought me in and said, ‘Why don’t you just make the change for the better?’ And with God’s help, we turned it around. Since that time, there’s no way to go down anymore,” she said. The reason she was not part of EK’s foundation was that she was left to lead their information technology company, Sun Microsystems Philippines. There were not a lot of women in the male-dominated IT industry in the ’90s.

Inspiring other women

There she met people, including foreign nationals, whom she felt discriminated against her because of her gender. There were benefits that were given to other companies that were not offered to her company, she said. But she confronted them head on and told them that she was not a meek Filipina.

It was hard to imagine the smiling woman in front of me being angry, but there was such authority in her voice as she recounted the incident that captured my attention. She said she threatened to walk away, along with her business. The foreign partners yielded. She proved her worth by bringing in more clients for them.

This was not the last time she fought for things she believes in. She refused to fire people who couldn’t meet quotas that the clients set for them. “That’s not how we do things,” she said. People are not just there for numbers, she added.

Mamon not only broke the glass ceiling in IT, she shattered it. In 2003, she was named among “The Most Powerful Women in Information Technology” by a tech publishing company.

Mamon didn’t realize the doors that she had opened and the impact her presence made until she met other women in the IT industry.

“I attended a seminar and someone said, ‘Ma’am, you’re my idol. You were already with Sun Microsystems when I was a junior engineer,’” she recalled. It’s not uncommon for her to be hear young women say they wanted to be like her. “I wasn’t conscious of that. But when I meet these people, and they’re now also women leaders in their companies, I think, ‘Okay, that’s good.’ I somehow inspired them. But I didn’t realize that because I was just doing my job.”

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Family business

She talked about their theme park as a family-run business. Her children Ionathan, Anna, Carmela and Nico are all involved in the business, in one way or another.

“Our role model is the Mack family of Germany,” Mamon said. The Macks own Mack Rides, which designs amusement rides. “It was started by the grandfather, then the father, and then the children… You must train the next generation to be more creative, more innovative and be attuned to the trends,” she said.

Failing is not an option. Mamon said that they continue what they’ve started for the sake of their employees. When the business began, they had around 300–400 employees; now it’s doubled at 700. She said she continuously instills in her children the value of caring for the cast members’ (employees) happiness. When the employees are happy, they are able to share that with their guests. The staff members who came with her during this interview have been with the company for at least 10 years, she said.

This is what Mamon thinks makes a female leader different. “We’re naturally nurturing. So I guess, we’re also becoming motherly in the workplace. We know how to take care of people and that’s what matters most. It’s not just influencing the mind but really, leading from the heart,” she said. Someone who was led by the heart, Mamon said, will learn to love their work. They will do tasks even without supervision.

“I think we also have intuition. We have a feel of things. So, sometimes I do that, especially if they’re creative ideas. I can sense it. You know when an idea will be a hit. It’s like an instinct,” she said.

“I believe we all have God’s mission for us. So if you’re prayerful, you kind of know already. In fact, I just went to Mass and you know what the priest said? Mark Twain daw said that there are two important moments in our life. One is when we’re born, and the second is when we realize why we were born. So it’s really more of finding our purpose in life.”