Who we are
Pino Decandia
While packing before a journey what can’t be missing in your backpack?
A Pilot snap-in, ballpoint pen with medium point and black ink; and a Moleskine, or similar. They always have to be there; I may or may not use them, but I have to see them. I always pull them out, I like them to be seen.
What was the most impactful, transformational experience you had, professionally or private? Why?
What allowed me, and still allows me, to scale back the daily difficulties and be lighter in dealing with them was the traumatic closure of a previous five-year entrepreneurial experience.
The resulting transition from a prosperous phase to a difficult one, with the impacts on a personal and professional level, transformed me in terms of pragmatism on the one hand and disillusionment on the other.
List three values on which you base your actions and your life.
- First, people can change; they don’t oppose change but offer their own vision. To be met.
- Second, needs drive behaviors. If I want to provide help, I must allow them to be clearly expressed. And I need to be ready to be the first to state my needs.
- Third, ideological battles are meaningless. Conta di più capire il problema e cosa si può fare per risolverlo.
What is it in your job that you enjoy the most?
I love when clients look at you as they saw an option they hadn’t thought of. These moments are the reward for all the hard work.
What episode related to your profession would you like everyone to know about? How do you think it can help other colleagues and why?
For several months I disagreed with company’s policy, but I didn’t declare it explicitly, sabotaging myself with a conflict triggered… by myself. This was a period of unnecessary discomfort for everyone. Usually we tell “success stories”, but I think this episode can be helpful because it teaches us that discomfort or needs should always be made explicit, just to offer others the chance to lend a hand. Building a healthy organization is also about learning to handle dissent as openly and constructively as possible.
Add a personal anecdote, the kind you’d put at the bottom of your résumé – or at the beginning, depending on your point of view – under hobbies and interests.
I love stories and those who can tell them. As a result, I’m so passionate about books that, in order to read Ken Follett’s The Pillars Of The Earth, I skipped an exam at the university : Geometry I. I paid for it, of course. The point is, when faced with a great story – as I think that book is – I literally risk to disconnect myself from the rest.