During the recruitment processes at Decide one of the questions candidates ask me is “What are you like here?” It’s a question I truly appreciate, because deep inside I think when we all make the decision to start a new stage in our professional career, if we are really interested we think about what the company is like, the ins and outs. It is not a trivial question; it is an important question. What a company is depends on the people working there. At Decide we are what we are thanks to the people working here.
I must admit that when I’m asked this question, I get a little nervous, I don’t how to define us very well, so in the end I’ve decided to put it down on paper to see if I can do it a bit better.
At Decide we are citizens of the world: from the North and from the South, there are many from the two Castiles, but from “Madrid Madrid”, (as Goyo Jiménez says when referring to people born in the city), there are actually not many. We are in our thirties, (some in their twenties, lest anyone should get mad).
Over lunch we talk about everything and nothing in particular: politics, football, TV series, ethics, films, the ranking of worst meals or the latest news in the press. Or we don’t talk at all (there’s silence), or we have technical conversations, (very, very technical), we discuss cartoon strips, travelling, philosophy…
Sports is a hallmark here: we have skiers, cyclists, runners, five-a-side football players, divers, football and basketball coaches, mountain climbers, swimmers and paddle tennis players. We also have Formula 1 fans, a few Madrid supporters (although football is not our thing), basketball enthusiasts, Nadalists. There are others whose main hobby is their family: DECIDE grows with its present and future mums and dads.
Music, TV series and books are also present at DECIDE. Musical tastes are quite varied: three of our network servers are called Muse, Delorean and Rinocerose (it took me a while to find out!!!). We have just bought some new servers, I hope we call them Cold Play, The Rolling Stones, Franz Ferdinand or something like that. Musically we are very diverse: trance music, classical such as Mozart or The Beatles, party sounds La Madrágora, Belle Sebastian, Def con Dos, Silvio Rodríguez, Joan Baez, Ken Boothe, we even have some guitar players in our team and also a few DJs.
TV series on cable are our speciality: the third season of Game of Thrones comes behind the fifth book someone’s already read. Homeland, Isabel, Sons of Anarchy, The Big Bang Theory, Person of Interest or How I Met Your Mother are a few examples (though yes, as they say around here, I’m sure we all have a dark side). We read from Memories of an Engineer to What I talk about when I talk about running, and Agile Estimating and Planning, or Decision analysis, location models, and scheduling problems, programming in Java Servlet programming, fighting in Moby Dick, or enjoying the Journey to Happiness.
That’s what we watch, listen to and do. Our diversity includes being technologists, demanding, analytical, geeks and techies (meant lovingly), talented, rational, perfectionists, creative and curious, very very demanding, committed…but above all, if there is something that defines us and which is difficult to explain, it is that at DECIDE we are good folks.
But since this is my personal and subjective view, I’ve included here the hashtags and testimonials the Team has sent me.
Individually every person is different but on a company level, at Decide I think we are perfectionists and engaged with our work.
Very orange…close, decent, smiley, creative …, but also a bit grey… technological, persistent, perfectionists…
Excellence Through Curiosity.
Decide aspires day-to-day to achieve excellence in our work. To get there we haven’t always taken the shortest path; but insistence and not forgetting our goal helps make the way clearer.
Generally, you get to know people well when you go through a “difficult” situation with them. At DECIDE we have been through many and if we wanted, with one sentence, to summarise the attitude of our people it would be: “Look on the bright side of life”.
At Decide we are a group composed of a framework and people that turn challenges into successes.
Paraphrasing G.R.R.: We are the sword in the darkness, the fire that burns against the cold, the horn that wakes the sleepers, the shield that guards the realms of men…
A caring team that’s passionate about SW development.
Every person at Decide is unique and special, some are very introverted, extroverted, very intelligent, engaged …but above all, from the first to the last, at Decide we are people, not numbers, not resources…PEOPLE.
People with very different tastes and lives, but with a set of values that we share and that make us a very special company, with a huge will to achieve and a team spirit that pushes us to strive for excellence and to be better every day.
A company of opportunities, where anybody with talent and willingness can find the right environment to do anything they put their mind to do. A good place to develop your potential with no artificial limits.