Reference Committees
Reference Committees
GEM College of International Business (Global) has established a Global Reference Committee of Corporate and Community Leaders.
Each GEM Campus establishes its Local Reference Committee of Corporate and Community Leaders, and, where there are three or more GEM Campuses in any given country, a National Reference Committee of Corporate and Community Leaders is established.
It is the role and responsibility of Reference Committee Members to dedicate time and energy into the life of the College ensuring its culture is proactive, future and commercially oriented and its education programs are essential to the rapidly changing needs of global business in the 21st Century.
Alex Alexander, Chairman, Global Reference Committee
I was born into a military family, a so-called “Army brat.” After a nomadic youth hopping from Army base to Army base, I joined the Army myself on my eighteenth birthday. I graduated from the Army’s prestigious Noncommissioned Officers Academy in Munich, Germany, made the rank of sergeant at the age of nineteen, and after three years of enlisted service, was accepted into West Point. After graduation from West Point, I served two combat tours in Viet Nam, earned three Bronze Stars, a couple of Army Commendation medals, two Purple Hearts, the Combat Infantryman’s Badge, Ranger tab, Airborne wings, a top-secret security rating, and the rank of captain. All told, the Army defined my life for almost thirty years. Even today, many decades later, I still think of myself as a military man. But the lessons learned in those three decades told me it was time to move on and pursue ambitions better suited to my temperament and abilities.
A Harvard MBA degree jump-started my civilian career, which tracked back and forth through management consulting, banking, teaching college and adult education, business coaching, and finally, where you find me now, as a columnist, author, and occasional consultant. Along the way I worked for organizations such as the First National Bank of Chicago, Crocker Bank (both long ago merged into larger banks), American Express, The Stanford Research Institute (now SRI International), and a company run by the foremost small business coach of the time, Michael Gerber. I held CEO titles three times, first as CEO of a Crocker Bank Subsidiary doing international trade financing, then as interim CEO of a startup bank in Santa Rosa, CA, and finally as founder and CEO of my own business coaching company operating in Australia and the USA.
I have been a student, critic, and practitioner of management and leadership for all my adult life, and in later years a serious student of mind science as applied to management and leadership. Over the past three decades, I have written books and created leading-edge coaching programs focused on business management and leadership and dedicated to helping students and businesspeople become the best possible leaders, entrepreneurs, and business managers.
On the personal side, I have completed eight marathons and a dozen or so triathlons and won gold medals at the age of forty-eight in the diving events of the short-lived World Corporate Games. Even now, I’m still a dedicated “gym rat.”
I have two world-class daughters, Kristen and Erin (they’re the light of my life), and two grandchildren, Liat and Daniel (who are both smarter than I am). The best thing that ever happened to me (after a 23-year false start) was, and is, my wife, the amazing Ali Alexander (nee McKeon), who is everything a woman should be, and more.
I couldn’t bear retirement, so, for the past decade (and counting) I have turned to “giving back” as a columnist, author, and occasional consultant.
Books by Alex Alexander (available at amazon.com)
The Goldfish Effect
Upgrade Your Mind
How your unconscious mind rules your life, and how to take back control.
Published 2023 ISBN 979-8-3878-3600-8
Y’Think?
Essays about the Human Spirit
A compilation of popular Y’Think? columns written by Alex Alexander for a small-town newspaper. These short essays range from humorous anecdotes, to fresh points of view about current affairs, to deeply personal explorations of the human spirit, to whimsy of one kind or another.
Published 2021 ISBN 9798465994439
The Entrepreneur’s Edge
Entrepreneurial Thinking and the Mind/Business Connection
Using modern science of the mind in combination with proven business coaching techniques to develop the entrepreneur within you.
Published 2016 ISBN-10: 9780692524671
To be published in 2025:
LeaderMind
What history and science of the mind tell us about leadership and how to become a better leader
Bishop Efraim M. Tendero, Global Reference Committee Member
Bishop Efraim M. Tendero is Secretary General of The World Evangelical Alliance, which is a global organization of churches founded in 1846 in London,England. Now headquartered in New York, it brings together 129 national alliances of churches, 104 member associations and 6 boards, and is the largest international organization of evangelical churches.
Prior to his above appointment Bishop Tendero served as national director of the Philippine Council of Evangelical Churches (PCEC) from 1993 to 2014. PCEC is the largest network of evangelical Christians in the Philippines composed of 25,000 evangelical churches, 66 denominations, 150 parachurch and mission organizations.
In 2005, he was appointed executive director of the Philippine Relief and Development Services (PHILRADS) and continues to hold the said position till now. PHILRADS, the relief and development arm of PCEC, works hand in hand with local churches in holistic ministries for the poor and the needy, to enable them to become all that God intends them to be. It responds to the emergency needs of disaster victims, provides assistance for their rehabilitation, carries out community development projects, and conducts disaster management seminars for local churches and communities.
Besides providing leadership for PCEC and PHILRADS, Bishop Tendero is the chair of the board of the following organizations: Asian Theological Seminary, Back to the Bible Broadcast, Evangelism Explosion (EE) 3 Philippines, and Philippine Missions Association, and the Youth Commission of the Evangelical Fellowship of Asia. He is also a member of the Youth Commission of the World Evangelical Alliance. He was chair of the General Committee of the Metro Manila Franklin Graham Festival that spearheaded the festival of Franklin Graham in the Philippines in February 2006.
He served as national coordinator for the DAWN (Discipling A Whole Nation) 2000, where he provided leadership for the mobilization of churches in the Philippines that made possible the accomplishment of the movement’s vision of seeing 50,000 local churches planted nationwide by 2000.
Owing to his dynamic preaching, excellent leadership and rich ministry experience, he has become among the country’s favorite speakers on leadership, church growth and missions, and has been invited numerous times to speak not only locally but in 25 other countries. Furthermore, he functions as executive editor of Evangelicals Today—the longest-running Christian magazine in the Philippines.
He also became one of the spiritual advisers of former President Fidel V. Ramos in his capacity as chair of the National Ecumenical Consultative Committee (NECCOM). He is now a member of the Presidential Council for Values Formation. Bishop Tendero was also appointed by President GMA as one of the members of the 50-man Citizen’s Consultative Commission or Concom that went around the country to consult and gather input from various sectors and stakeholders of the nation so as to review and craft possible amendments to the present Constitution, for which he was awarded a Presidential Medal of Merit. He actively represented the Philippines in several International Interfaith Dialogues including the United Nations High Level Inter-religious and Intercultural dialogue for Understanding and Peace.
Bishop Tendero earned his B. A. Theology degree from FEBIAS College of Bible in 1978, cum laude and was the recipient of that year’s Most Outstanding Student Award. He also went to Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in Deerfield, Illinois for his M. Div. (Pastoral Counselling) degree, graduating cum laude. He is listed in the 1989 “Who’s Who Among Students in American Colleges and Universities.” He received three honorary Doctor of Divinity degrees from Asian Theological Seminary, Febias College of Bible, and International School of Theology-Asia.
In recognition of his exemplary leadership in the body of Christ as he fosters unity and advocacy for national transformation, he was given the Distinguished Evangelical Leadership Award, making him the fifth person to receive this prestigious award in the 35 years of PCEC then.
Born in Calapan, Oriental Mindoro Bishop Ef is married to the former Sierry Soriano. The couple are blessed with four children, namely: Elizabeth Esther, Efraim Elijah, Ezra Emmanuel, and Elah Eunice.
Penelope J. Rose, Global Reference Committee Member
Penelope J. Rose was born in Adelaide, South Australia. Her core values of “mateship” and persistence and endurance were shaped by her father, the late John Rose, a Returned Serviceman (veteran) who fought in some of the fiercest theatres of World War II (including Tobruk, El Alamein and the Kokoda Trail in New Guinea).
Penelope completed her secondary education (equivalent to Oxford University O levels) in Adelaide before relocating to the United States in 1983.
Penelope attended New York University before commencing work as Special Assistant to Dr Henry Kissinger (former US Secretary of State) and Ambassador L. Paul Bremer, III, in New York and Washington DC. This appointment was to last 12 years.
In 2005 Penelope became a member of the Global Reference Committee of GEM College of International Business. Since that time, she has contributed to GEM College’s entrepreneurship programs and acted as an advocate for graduate innovators in photonics, laser optics, pico and femto hydro-energy technologies. Other technologies that convert waste streams to income streams, by “closing the loop” in the Circular Economy, and focusing on ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance) metrics have also caught Penelope’s interest.
Penelope is joined on the GEM College Global Reference Committee by Alex Alexander (California), founder of the globally renowned Full Spectrum Business Development program. GEM College holds the exclusive global licensing rights to convert the powerful Full Spectrum business coaching resources, into academic qualifications from Diploma to Graduate Diploma levels. Using the powerful Znanja e-learning system, GEM College is able to deliver its programs all over the world.
GEM College was one of the first privately Registered Training Organizations recognized by the State and Federal Governments of Australia It is fast becoming a national and international education brand with a focus on the development of entrepreneurs. Its courses are delivered by entrepreneurs for entrepreneurs. They practise what they teach!
Penelope is also Lead Analyst, Executive Operations, Office of the Chairman of the Board, for Emergent BioSolutions, which is active in the bio-defense industry in the United States.
Dame Penelope received the Order of Merit of Savoy, issued by His Royal Highness Victor Emmanuel, Duke of Savoy, Prince of Naples, Grand Master of the Dynastic Order in September 2017. This honour was conferred upon Dame Penelope during Holy Mass in the Abbey of Saint Maurice d-Agaune, Switzerland
She was appointed to serve as a Director on the Board of the International Biomedical Research Alliance, a 501 (c) (3) which invests in the development of future leaders in biomedical research through its unique global doctoral training program that leverages the combined expertise of the NIH in the United States and the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge in the United Kingdom.
Penelope resides in Washington, USA and travels extensively to New York, Washington DC and Oxford, Cambridge, and Europe as she liaises between industry and the world’s leading universities and her various philanthropic projects.
Dr Casper (Cas) Olivier, Global Reference Committee Member
Dr Cas Olivier started his career as high school biology, natural science and maths teacher. He progressed to being Head of Department. He subsequently took the position of Senior Education Advisor at the University of Pretoria, and from there was appointed Deputy Director at the National Training Board. The responsibilities of his role included co-ordinating research on training and development and advising the Minister of Labour on vocational education and training related issues. Dr Cas was appointed National Training Advisor within the Department of Labour, where he managed and oversaw national projects to advance training, development and job creation.
Dr Cas ended his career in government in 2003, and has been involved in accredited training of trainers, assessors and moderators. He wrote Maths as easy as Pi, and then authored The DNA of Great Teachers in 2012, which is truly a handbook for professional educators, parents and trainers. Anyone involved in teaching in any form will learn much from this book. The DNA of Great Teachers paved the way for Dr Cas to discover the inborn Thinking Tools – which resulted in the development of Thinking Tools courses for teachers. These have now been registered with the South African Council for Educators. These courses are complemented by courses for students from grade 4 to 12.
Dr Cas published the book: Potential Development using Thinking Tools – The Key to Flipped Teaching in 2020, which describes the theory and practice of Thinking Tools teaching and learning.
The philosophy behind Thinking Tools education:
Learning is future orientated and aimed to accomplish personalised success and wealth by empowering students to become self-regulated learners who are able to think about their thinking (metacognition); able to design and create knowledge and insight; equipped to think differently as they are supported by the development of their emotional and social skills.
GEM College is honoured to be the Australian representative for Dr Cas’s Educational Resources.
Dr Cas’s books are available from the GEM College Storefront, and interactive group professional development courses for teachers and parents can be facilitated on request, through GEM College. Individual placements and group sessions can be scheduled at convenient times.
Please contact the friendly GEM College Team with any enquiries:
