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Womenpreneurs Project: an up-close and personal view of women creating power.
Dedication. No matter what we do, without dedication there is no future. Throughout my professional life, I have come to terms with the idea that if you want something to be successful, the only way to do it is by dedicating yourself with body and soul. NO project is valid if you don’t build it from scratch, with your own bare hands. Because the soul of a business is your own soul, your values and your personal touch. There is no middle ground. When you make up your mind about setting up a business, be aware of all the effort, hours of work, sacrifice and time you have to make and use in order to have the best of the results possible. As long as you commit yourself to achieving what you hope and expect it to be, it will be all right and you will be satisfied when you reach the finish line. This is what customers and clients expect when they come to you for help. They want you to offer them a service in which you believe. A project you know like the palm of your hand, because you built it, because it’s yours.
Personal is your presentation card. Proximity and professionalism from a personal point of view. When you really know what it’s at stake, your devotion to the project will increase since the prestige on the line is your own prestige.
The success of any business or job is a whole pack of elements combined, but none of these elements should be left aside because it’s considered less important. They all matter and they are all equally important!
You are your own project, so enjoy the process of raising it, and do it with joy, enthusiasm and responsibility.
ANNA VILA, age 48 FOUNDER and OWNER of CITRIC https://www.citric.ws/ FIELD: digital communications
Anna is the 6th woman to interview for our Womenpreneur Project, and so far, she is the first one whom I have a personal connection with. This interview is the closest for me since Anna is a longtime friend. We’ve known each other for over 15 years, and although we have taken different paths in life, we have shared countless and priceless moments together travelling, growing up and having fun. Anna is mostly a woman who knows how to squeeze life to the max. I admire her because she is a smart, fun and hardworking woman who is always up to a challenge. She is always ready for the next to come.
She is also one of the most creative women I know, that’s definitively why she is the founder and owner of a digital communications business. She is in charge of helping people create their own image, which is indeed a huge responsibility because the future and the progress of the public image of many companies is depends on her and her teams creativity. She actually helped me with mine! She had the early vision of dedicating her career and her future to the digital world at a time when communications and the internet was just a small portion of what’s become. Anna is always a step ahead of what’s coming, She has a very clever idea of what’s on and she is like a chameleon, being able to adapt to any circumstance and changes. No matter how hard they might be. She always survives with excellence.
Anna’s values apply in both her professional and her personal life. No difference. She wants for her clients what she expects for her, the best. She is a fighter, she is an innovative woman, and for sure, she is someone to learn from. This is Anna Vila.
1. Who am I?
It’s a very short and very long question to answer… I’m each one of the experiences I had in my 50s that I will do soon, a series of lived events that have made me who I am.
I am the mother, solo mother, of a beautiful half-African girl, who makes me vibrate every morning. I am lucky to live with her surrounded by nature and relatively close to Barcelona
I am an enterprising woman. I created my project 24 years ago and I am struggling like the first day, constantly adapting and reinventing myself.
Designer by profession, a little geek, lover of beautiful things, adventurous, traveller and looking for the secret of happiness.
2. Could you present your project to me? What led you to undertake?
My project is Citric, a digital communications agency founded in 1996 that, over the years, has helped companies improve their communication in digital environments.
Throughout this time, we have adapted to the needs of the market, always maintaining an axis of creativity and technology. We currently specialize in user experience, strategic branding, interface design and digital project development, working with design thinking and remote co-creation methodologies.
We work for startups, big brands and small big projects: Futbol Club Barcelona, HP, Almirall, Biocentury ...
I started almost 25 years ago by chance, an opportunity arose and I didn’t let it pass.
3. What’s the biggest challenge you’ve encountered as an entrepreneur, and as a woman entrepreneur? And how did you solve it?
The difficulties have varied over time. In the 90s, I was a young entrepreneurial girl in a world of male managers always showed references and high quality projects.
Over time, the difficulties have varied and the most complicated has been the conciliation of my personal and my work life. I can’t say I have found a solution to the struggle it but having my priorities clear has helped me decide without so much guilt.
4. The most important thing you’ve learned from the world of entrepreneurship? What advice would you give to someone who wants to start your own path?
The most important thing is to be confident in what you do, believe in yourself, and surround yourself with a good team.
Knowing your product or service, knowing what it brings to your customers and what your value proposition is.
Being very resilient and adapting to new situations and changing markets; innovating and being alert to what is happening around are also essential.
However, over the years I have learned that what’s important is for things to make sense… Defining a purpose is essential and it has helped me a lot to dedicate some of my time to sharing my professional experience with social impact projects. (I am currently a Technovationgirls’ mentor.)
5.- Do you think that creativity and innovation are key in your own business / project? How do you use them?
For me, they are the key. Innovating puts you in a privileged place in the market, where there is not so much competition and your services add more value.
Creativity is the best tool for thinking differently and a very good way to innovate. At Citric, we are committed to creativity as a way of solving problems and we design co-creation workshops with design thinking methodologies, to define the strategies of projects, jointly with our clients.
6.- Can you tell me the name of an enterprising woman who has served you and / or still serves you as a model?
Frida Kahlo. Great example of creativity, freedom, resilience and innovation
And, in everyday life, any free and courageous intelligent woman who is a good reference in what she does serves as inspiration for me, be it a good mother, a good manager, an entrepreneur or a student.
* Feet why do I want them if I have wings to fly.
Frida Kahlo
Thanks Anna for your sincerity and authenticity. Keep up with the free spirit!
Written by Noèlia Ribó
Pic by Anna Vila
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