What qualities define a good leader?

The characteristics associated with good leadership are applicable in business. But what are the attitudes and skills that make a person a good leader? Pilar Oltra, 11Onze agent, explains the keys to good leadership.

Good leadership skills are essential not only for the manager or CEO of a company, but for anyone who has a position of responsibility within the organisation. As the 11Onze agent explains, “it can be anyone involved in a project, and capable of guiding others to develop it”.

Although it is true that there are certain qualities that define good leadership, “there is no single formula, there are no recipes that fit all companies equally“, the context, objectives and culture of the company “are decisive for the leadership style”, says Oltra.

Three leadership styles

Kurt Lewin, an American psychologist of German origin who specialised in the analysis of the behaviour and psychology of organisations, defined three types of leadership in group dynamics: laissez-faire, authoritarian and democratic. Even so, as has happened with standards of morality, the keys to good leadership have evolved over time, “from fear and authority to inviting employees to collaborate,” Oltra says.

We may think that a good leader is made, not born, but as Oltra explains, “innately one can be strategic, decisive, proactive, motivating, empathetic…”. However, anyone in a managerial position within a company can learn the emotional qualities that facilitate good leadership. Therefore, a good leader is both born, and made

11Onze is the community fintech of Catalonia. Open an account by downloading the super app El Canut for Android or iOS and join the revolution!

The latest pension reform will not solve the problem of dwindling social security contributions, and many people are turning to private pension plans as an alternative to supplement public pensions. But are there other options? Is it possible to enjoy our retirement before the age of 50? An ideology that promotes aggressive saving and investment says yes. Lara de Castro, HR Business Partner of 11Onze, explains it to us.

The recent pension reform does not solve the basic problem that there are fewer and fewer contributions to Social Security, which does not give much confidence in the ability of public pensions to guarantee welfare in our retirement. The FIRE movement, which stands for Financial Independence, Retire Early, proposes finding ways to increase income and decrease expenses, along with aggressive investments to accumulate wealth quickly.

De Castro explains, “The goal, if you embrace this movement, is to retire before, or around, 40“. But how is this achieved? There is a predetermined roadmap, to achieve this goal, which uses various strategies that hinge on two basic elements: saving and investing,” adds De Castro.

Once financial independence is achieved, paid work would become optional, allowing us to retire well before the official retirement age. If you still have time and want to know more, watch the video below.

11Onze is the fintech community of Catalonia. Open an account by downloading the super app El Canut on Android and Apple and join the revolution!

Some companies are already established. Others are just starting to grow. And still others are in their infancy. But what allows them all to thrive? Above all, business innovation, the true seed of entrepreneurship. 11Onze’s agent Xevi Esteve gives us the keys to entrepreneurship.

What distinguishes entrepreneurs? Why do entrepreneurs always look for what they are passionate about, while most people prefer a permanent, civil service job? “An entrepreneur is always looking for a business idea,” Esteve begins to explain. Business innovation is precisely the basis of this business idea.

To succeed, this business idea will have to increase productivity, create a new product and satisfy a need. However, no matter how good the idea, it will always have to be accompanied by an economic project, a set of well-thought-out strategies to achieve not only economic but also social benefits. If these four factors are properly intertwined, we have all the points to be a good entrepreneur.

“In fact, these social benefits are becoming increasingly important, the idea that the entrepreneur always develops in a social organisation, a community,” the agent says.  In the end, Esteve explains, an entrepreneurial idea always seeks the well-being of people. 

Entrepreneur vs. businessman

But beyond the four business purposes we have set ourselves, it is very important to know how to find the right people to fulfil these purposes. This is when we talk about good leadership, which, according to Xevi Esteve, is what differentiates an entrepreneur from an ordinary businessman. “An entrepreneur is always in the initial phase of a project. His or her objective is to launch the business idea. This entrepreneur is in charge of organising, deploying and bringing this idea to reality,” he explains. 

Esteve also recalls that, for this reason, the entrepreneur has a much more creative profile than a normal businessman. “He or she is very focused on solving problems and taking on more than one task at a time,” the agent says. In contrast, an entrepreneur is at a much more advanced stage, and is primarily concerned with increasing the company’s profits. In short, an entrepreneur has to manage the company, grow the business, establish strategies and delegate management tasks.

The qualities of entrepreneurship

An entrepreneur can emerge from anywhere in an organisation: spontaneously or as a result of planning to create a new product or add value to the company’s objectives. But above all, according to Esteve, innovation requires two factors. The first is tradition, because creativity is always a cumulative process. “We have to forget the idea that innovation can only come from technological or highly advanced sectors,” he says. The second is the worker condition. “70% of entrepreneurs come from the working classes,” he says.

However, it is true that today there are workplaces that are a good breeding ground for entrepreneurs, such as communication and information industries, science and technology parks or innovation, design and advertising departments. It is from these innovation-friendly spaces that startups or emerging companies.

And what qualities should an entrepreneur have? According to Esteve, at least six: ability to take risks without being reckless; perseverance, patience and self-confidence; practicality or getting down to business; and a lot of organisation and order. In addition, he adds three that are increasingly relevant: ethics, sustainability and good human relations. An entrepreneur is never alone; success is always shared. Do you have any of these characteristics? And, most importantly, do you have any good ideas?

11Onze is the fintech community of Catalonia. Open an account by downloading the super app El Canut on Android and Apple and join the revolution!

Have you made New Year’s resolutions that you don’t think you can keep? It’s happened to all of us: we set out to do something, but then it’s too hard for us. To make our initiative grow, we first need self-esteem, self-improvement, patience and… resilience! The 11Onze agent Laura Bunyol gives us some tips on how to become more resilient.

In psychology, the term “resilience” comes from the Latin word “resilire”, which means “to return.” Resilience, then, is the capacity we have to return to our natural or original state after a traumatic situation or one that has made us change the way we see the world. With the pandemic, we have a good opportunity to find out if we are resilient.

The key to resilience, however, is to return to harmony having learned something we did not previously know, and having incorporated that knowledge into who we are. “Resilience is the ability to see life’s difficulties in a positive light,” Bunyol sums up. Even so, it is often precisely these difficulties that pull us back. Why is it that some people see everything as very difficult and others get through it without a problem?

Resilience is closely linked to self-esteem and our self-concept, in other words, to interpersonal factors. “It has been proven that a person is more resilient if he or she is able to establish healthy emotional relationships, i.e. if he or she is able to love,” 11Onze agent argues. Good mental health can also help us do this.

Laura Bunyol discovered the concept of “resilience” far from home, and has now set out to introduce it into the everyday lives of Catalans. Who am I, what am I here to do in the world, what is my purpose? Resilience calls us back to our inner purpose, tests us and helps us to make our way, and this is good. If you want to know more about resilience, watch the video below!

11Onze is becoming a phenomenon as the first Fintech community in Catalonia. Now, it releases the first version of El Canut, the super app of 11Onze, for Android and Apple. El Canut, the first universal account can be opened in Catalan territory.

Just a few decades ago, the professional profiles that companies are asking for today neither existed nor could be imagined. But, if we look to the future, what are the jobs that will be the ones that will stand out in the labour market? Agent 11Onze Mireia Sitjà takes a look at the five CVs that will set the trend.

If you don’t know how to focus your professional career or if you want to make a change in your CV, these five professions may give you some clues. On the one hand, technology workers and experts in the digital world will stand out and, on the other, in a changing labour market, experts and trainers will be needed to guide us.

1. Programmer, analyst or designer of the internet of things. When we talk about the internet of things, we are referring to all those technological devices that, for one reason or another, work thanks to the network: from mobile phones or computers, of course, to fridges or microwaves. 
2. Nanotech. Nanotechnology may sound like science fiction, but it has been around for a long time and will be even more present in the coming years. Experts believe that it will be the medical field in particular that will need the most nanotechs. Specifically, the profile of the nanomedic, a combination of engineer and doctor, will be needed. 
3. 3D printer. It seemed pure fantasy when it was born just over a decade ago. Even so, in the next few years 3D printing will be essential for all types of industrial design, because it is at the base of an unstoppable process of automation and robotisation.
4. Consultants and labour representatives. As jobs will no longer be as stable as they were twenty years ago, or even before the pandemic, and companies are likely to rely on project-based recruitment, we will increasingly need the support of legal experts to advise us and help us keep our accounts, and also to promote our CV where it is in our best interest.
5. Independent teachers and trainers. To build a good career path, education is essential. However, some experts point out that, in 20 years’ time, young people will no longer be looking for a university degree as we know it today, but that everyone will be building their own studies independently and according to their own interests. It is therefore likely that there will be an increasing need for independent and reputable online trainers in a specific field, not tied to any centre or company, who adapt their classes to the demand of students.

11Onze is becoming a phenomenon as the first Fintech community in Catalonia. Now, it releases the first version of El Canut, the super app of 11Onze, for Android and Apple. El Canut, the first universal account can be opened in Catalan territory.

Have you ever felt a tingling in your belly when you remember a toy from your childhood? Brands seek to differentiate themselves and be unforgettable. When they do so by appealing to emotions and memories, then we are talking about nostalgia marketing. Agent Càrol Rafales gives us a summary.

Beyond love, sadness, empathy or solidarity, there is another feeling that has great power in advertising: nostalgia. Emotions sell and brands know it and take advantage of it. Nostalgia marketing recaptures icons from the past to make consumers relive happy memories. At Christmas, this type of advertisement is the bread and butter.

The mood generated by a memory is very positive and, for this reason, advertisements that use nostalgia connect emotionally very strongly with their customers. Why? Because they allow us to recover a longing, a desire, an ideal; and our brain pushes sad or bad memories to the back burner. Do you want to know what else brands achieve with nostalgia marketing? Do you remember an ad that makes you relive special moments? Watch the video below!

11Onze is becoming a phenomenon as the first Fintech community in Catalonia. Now, it releases the first version of El Canut, the super app of 11Onze, for Android and Apple. El Canut, the first universal account can be opened in Catalan territory.

Whether it is because of the COVID-19 pandemic or the fact that they are reinventing themselves in terms of customer relationship services, banks are revolutionising this year, turning banking as we know it upside down. Apart from the 10 trends that can change in the banking industry this year according to expert Alan McIntyre, let’s go back to the beginnings of banking in Catalonia, because to understand the revolution, it is interesting to understand the beginnings of banking in our country.

Due to our current frenetic lifestyle, we often forget the moment when the most important changes happen: we take it as a fact that life has always been as we know it or as we make it work. In the case of banks, the first Catalan bank in the Middle Ages, called Taula de canvi de Barcelona, consisted of a few wood boards on the street where money was counted, banking operations were carried out, and payments were also made. From this table of change, created in 1401 thanks to the Consell de Cent in Barcelona and considered the first public bank in Europe, the banking world has spun many times. But why do we talk about history at 11Onze? Well, simply because, to understand the world today, we have to understand the beginning of things, and if Catalonia made a change in the banking relationship after the plague of 1348, why not make a banking revolution in the relationship with new customers, which has also been transformed following the 2020 pandemic?

But what does revolution mean? The dictionary defines revolution as “a total, radical change.” To make this change real, the revolutionary gaze focuses on people’s needs. We need to adapt to the new way of living in society, in which we are using less and less cash, therefore the customer no longer looks for an ATM at every corner, nor do they want to go to their branch. The client wants good care that is fast and is carried out through a good web and mobile operating system.

Expert Alan McIntyre of the technology services consulting company Accenture has drawn, in Accenture’s webpage, his annual list of the 10 trends most likely to affect the banking industry in 2021.

1. The first trend on the McIntyre banking revolution list tells us that we must go for it with all possible resources, otherwise we should not even attempt to start a project; this trend can relate much to the context of change that society needs right now, following the 2020 pandemic, when many sectors have been forced to regenerate or die. 
2. The second McIntyre trend is this new normality, which was so widely talked about in the media last year. We link it with the banking world as a new standardization of traditional banking to future banking. 
3. McIntyre’s third trend is defined as the new era of banking applications, where banks will stop interacting with customers as they have done so far, and will be more than banking services within their apps, offering new opportunities to customers. 
4. Fourthly, in this famous banking list we have the tendency towards radical transparency in a bank, where all the information that the customer needs is shared. Here we find an added value: the customer has the power to think for themselves with the information they receive from their bank, which gives them the opportunity to decide by themselves what to do with their money and how.
5. McIntyre’s fifth tendency reminds us that you must be acknowledged not as being the best in something, but as the only one to make change in the banking world possible, be the innovator. 
6. Sixthly, McIntyre points out that cash will no longer be the main point of operations, attaching greater importance to a world that we already have internalised, that of digital payments. 
7. As a seventh trend, he says that banking is embarking on sustainability for a world that acknowledges the macroeconomic consequences of climate change. 
8. McIntyre’s eighth trend is defined as uncertainty in American regulations after the 2021 election period, which may have a direct impact on international economic efforts. 
9. Ninthly, we find the importance of the digital regulator and, as McIntyre’s last trend. 
10. We find that digital banking environments will become much more open and secure, leaving behind the archaic and closed environments typical of the worn-out banking world.

We must wait and see how these McIntyre trends come true. In the meantime, we must see the path every bank takes in this banking revolution, and to what extent this change in the relationship with new customers is made.

11Onze is the community fintech of Catalonia. Open an account by downloading the app El Canut for Android or iOS and join the revolution!

Several companies in Spain are moving towards a four-day working shift, as has already been done in countries such as Iceland, where the experiment has been a success. And the question is inevitable: does this reduction make us more productive, does it improve our well-being?

“People have to work eight hours, rest eight hours and enjoy another eight hours”. This was the slogan of the campaign created by Robert Owen in 1817, almost two centuries ago, to regulate working shifts that exploited workers in factories around the world, in the midst of industrialization. The proposal eventually succeeded, country after country, and reached Catalonia 100 years later.

Specifically, in 1919, thanks to La Canadenca strike, the workers’ movement that won the eight-hour working shift in our country. Today, more than 100 years after that historic moment, it is a good time to ask ourselves if a four-day working shift (35 hours) would be more productive?

Success, experiment, or imposition?

Iceland, with a population of just over 350,000, has been the pioneer country in pushing for shorter working shifts. Between 2015 and 2019, a pilot test was carried out among public sector workers, who went from working the usual 40 hours to 35, and with the same salary. The results were a success. 

As analyzed by Iprofesional, the workers who participated were more productive and improved their well-being. In short, they felt a better balance, both at work and in their personal lives, reduced the level of work-related stress and had more free time to dedicate to their families and hobbies. The experiment was so positive that, today, a large part of Iceland’s workers, approximately 86%, enjoy shorter working shifts for the same salary.

Examples are growing

Spain has not wanted to stay behind, either. The first company to introduce the four-day working shift was the software brand Delsol, which in January 2020 introduced the change to a workforce of 200 workers without any reduction in salary. Companies such as the digital consultancy Good Rebels, the technology company Zacata Systems and the restaurant group La Francachela have also followed this path.

In addition, this July, the UGT and CCOO unions signed an agreement with Telefónica España, which will promote a pilot test that began this October and will last for three months. There is also the recent case of the fashion firm Desigual, where 86% of workers have voted this October in favor of introducing a four-day working shift, three face to face days and one teleworking day, in exchange for a 6.5% reduction in salary. Although the change is already implemented for a workforce of around 500 employees, the majority unions consider both the election of the workers’ representatives and the meetings prior to the vote to be illegitimate, and are prepared to take the company to court.

More productive companies, happier workers

It seems that step by step, however, this new way of working is becoming more and more common. We can also see this in examples such as the 4 Day Week Foundation, which has launched a campaign to collect signatures  from workers around the world. The organization claims that 78% of workers who work four days a week feel happier, while 64% of companies see an increase in productivity. The page, which has already received more than 30,000 signatures, shows a list of the companies where more workers have signed in favor of the measure, the cities where more people have signed the petition and the names of the people who more money have given to the Foundation.

Are we facing a real change in our working shift? For the moment, it is clear that the future of a four-day working shift is on the table. While we are still deciding whether to apply it or not, in our country we are still under the influence of Robert Owen: “Eight hours to work, eight hours to rest and eight hours to enjoy”.

11Onze is becoming a phenomenon as the first Fintech community in Catalonia. Now, it releases the first version of El Canut, the super app of 11Onze, for Android and Apple. El Canut, the first universal account can be opened in Catalan territory.

The term telework was coined in 1973 by physicist Jack Nilles, and the pandemic has made it fashionable again, being one of the most searched words on Google during the lockdown months.

If you think that teleworking is a concept produced by the pandemic, you are wrong: the concept was first christened by the American physicist Jack Nilles in 1973, in the midst of the oil crisis of the 1970s. Nilles’ purpose was to find a reduction of fuel consumption caused by commuting from home to work. 

He managed to improve the life quality of workers and the job quality of companies. Since then, various plans have been made to reconcile work and personal life. From 2006 to 2015, telework fairs have been held where this issue has been addressed as the main objective. The use of the internet has reopened this possibility to be able to have more flexibility and freedom. 

More efficient, but not for everyone

If we talk about numbers, there are probably companies that, relying on telework, can save real-estate costs, among others, as long as their sector is that of services. However, if the company sells products, this will be more complicated as it will need a physical space and people to handle these products. 

Let’s take the example of a company that offers services and therefore could consider not having a physical space and having all its employees work from home, with meetings once a week or even twice a week. Costs could decrease favourably even if there is a premium for the worker, such as subsidizing the costs of internet, electricity, and even providing a share for the purchase of office furniture. 

Workspaces are reinvented

If this happens, there may be an excess of disabled offices and, at the same time, a growing demand for coworking space. This concept, which has been around for years, means sharing the workspace with other people or even companies to reduce costs. Demand has risen significantly in recent months, and may become much more affordable both for the short term and for long seasons. 

What do workers choose?

As for the workers, we can distinguish those who prefer teleworking, those who prefer working in-person, and those who prefer hybrid work. Let’s look at the differences: 

Telework: during the pandemic months, they have learned to be at home, deal with family, work, concentrate, and have virtual meetings. 

The advantages: it takes 2 minutes to sit and turn on the computer, you can do household chores during breaks, you can eat at home, and share more time with family. 

But there are also disadvantages: loss of contact with colleagues, difficulty concentrating in the case of not living alone, and getting out of the routine. 

In-person: probably, if we do a survey, people with children will be in this group, because they are the ones who have suffered the most during the pandemic. Teleworking has its advantages, as we have seen above, but on the contrary, you end up working harder than if you go to the office. For this reason, there are people who prefer to go to work outside the home. That way, they know that, from the time they leave until they return, they are 100% focused on work. 

Hybrid: for many this is the perfect formula, with two or three days in the office and the rest teleworking; the benefits are multiplied. Today, this is the format chosen by many companies, and it looks like it will stay for a long time. 

Let’s take advantage of all we have learned from these months of uncertainty, so each company can assess which format is most efficient for their business and for each person. Flexibility and using the latest digital tools available in the market are key to improving productivity. 

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COVID-19 has brought about changes in our lives, and no one knows if we will return to the previous normal; maybe this will be the new normal. Whatever it is, we have reinvented ourselves and got used to teleworking, the hybrid format, and avoiding social contact. 

We spoke to four Catalan companies to find out how they have adapted to the pandemic.

1. Before the pandemic, had you teleworked?
2. How was the communication and relationship among the staff during the pandemic?
3. Did you have to look for alternative methods, such as online teamwork platforms?
4. How are you living it now? Have you returned to the offices or are you doing a hybrid format?

Luis Rodríguez, Marketing and Sales Director | Bella Aurora

1. No. We mostly work in the office with some flexibility to be able to work from home at specific times, such as family situations or personal arrangements, but very sporadically.
2. Very well, there was a lot of constant communication and a lot of team feeling. People turned to help with the situation, and this allowed us to continue the activity with very little impact. Although the relationship at first cost a little more due to the lack of direct contact, we sought complementary reasons and ways to compensate for this lack of face-to-face contact.
3. The first thing that was done was to provide all the people who did not have it with portable computer equipment and remote connections to work from home. We had already started using some computer tools for remote collaborative work, and with the pandemic we will speed up their use. We mostly use Microsoft applications and in particular we use Teams and Planner very intensely.
4. We have not returned yet, because the situation is not yet fully resolved. We plan to return in early September, when we hope we can all be vaccinated.

Gina Solé, Marketing Manager | Storytel Spain

1. Before the pandemic, I teleworked at very specific times. If one day you are not feeling well, or you have an appointment with the doctor, for example. But there has never been total flexibility.
2. In my case, I joined Storytel in November 2020 and until two weeks ago, I didn’t meet the team in person! It was a weird mix, we knew each other, but at the same time it was weird to see our full bodies. Pandemic communication is reduced to many (perhaps too many) video calls.
3. Yes, we looked for a way to be able to organize all the projects we have on the table and weekly 1-to-1 meetings.

    

4. So far we have not returned. There is free choice to go to the office whenever you want, but Storytel is very aware of the current situation in all the countries where it is present, and we are all teleworking. In addition, they have already implemented a super-flexible post-pandemic telework strategy. Which I find great.

Almudena Cara, People Manager | Buff

1. Yes, we had Home Office policy for a year and a half, one day a week for all people who had to travel more than 30 km or had to work on projects. Precisely in February, we had conducted an assessment survey of both people working from home and their managers to expand groups and days improving aspects.
2. Internal communication became an indispensable element to be able to manage the situation. In the first weeks of the pandemic, communication was almost daily via email and Intranet. At all times, people knew in what situation we were and how we should act. We also intensify the use of the Intranet to give voice to all people in the company by sharing both operational messages (focused on the safety and health of workers), strategic messages (sales evolution and company situation), and messages with more human content. We launched a series of personal interviews called “A day confined with…” where a person from the team told us about how they lived their day to day, recommended activities to do in confinement, books… We even celebrated from the news of a pregnancy to a birth, as well as celebrating St. George’s Day with a Jordi and a Jordina. There was a lot of emotional support to help adjust the work at home for those people who had not experienced it so far: it was not the same to telework by personal choice as by forced obligation, as was the case.
3. Yes, we started using Teams. All meetings, both internal and external, were held online. In this sense, we had no barriers to be able to continue developing our daily activity. Everyone at home had the same equipment we had in the offices (dual screens, elevators, keyboards, helmets, and laptops), making it easy to stay connected at all times.
4. We currently continue to telework, with the possibility of coming one day a week for those who want it, without exceeding a maximum occupancy that we have established while we are in COVID-19 situation. During this period, we took the opportunity to review the telework policy that we had by extending its application to all office people and establishing a hybrid model of 3 days home and 2 in the offices. This model is fully flexible, with a common schedule of 6 hours (from 10 to 16) and the rest flexible, individually manageable. The holding of hybrid meetings has been extended, for which we have equipped different company rooms with systems that provide us with the possibility of holding a face-to-face meeting of more than one person with people in other locations. We are also working on a project to reformulate the offices to promote collaborative work and hot desking, making the offices disappear and prioritizing open spaces of different uses for the moment when we can return with the usual frequency.

Neus Rodríguez, Hospital Medical Visitor | Laboratoris Rovi

1. No, we had never done telework.  
2. Well, adapting to the medium full-tilt. We adapted the communication within the company very quickly. What was and is more complicated are the meetings in hospitals with doctors. We had to look for and think about options that had never been implemented before. 
3. Yes, we use Teams and Zoom to be able to hold team meetings. 
4. In my case, I’m doing hybrid format, that is, half face-to-face and half telework. In the case of Catalonia, medical visits are only allowed in private hospitals.

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