In May 2024, my life changed radically.

I was living in Lisbon with my partner. We had spent nearly ten years traveling the world together, and after a particularly turbulent final stretch, we decided to settle down for a while in Portugal.

Life was not perfect, and perhaps neither was the relationship, yet when I look back, what remains is a deep sense of nostalgia. We had an apartment close to the river, in the Alcântara neighborhood, and on weekends we would go to Cascais, to our favorite restaurant, Somos um Regalo—a place where the simplicity was part of its charm. You could only order piri-piri chicken—extra spicy, of course—fries, salad, and rice… and, almost as a ritual, the world's best bolo de bolacha, a traditional Portuguese dessert.

After lunch, we would order coffee to go and walk along the riverside until we reached a set of stone steps by the shore. We would sit there, sipping our coffee, letting the warmth of the sun slowly fade into evening, before catching the train back home. There was something quietly complete about those moments.

One day, my husband broke up with me, ending a thirteen-year relationship and shattering my life into pieces.

Do you ever truly heal from a breakup?

Today, I watched a talk by Guy Winch about how to fix a broken heart. Among other things, he suggests making a list of the negative aspects of our exes and keeping it close at hand, so that whenever we begin to idealize them, we can remind ourselves of reality. He also argues that no explanation for a breakup will ever feel fully satisfying.

Having gone through a very difficult breakup—and still being in therapy years later—I have heard these same suggestions from my therapist.

They didn’t work for me.

As I listened, I found myself thinking instead about Brianna Wiest and her essay How the people we once loved become strangers again. It made me wonder whether we ever truly heal from a broken heart, or whether the scars simply remain with us, reshaped but never erased.

The Break Up

At the time, my husband and I had decided to spend a week apart. We were going through a stressful period in our business, and I was struggling with severe depression and anxiety. I traveled to Sofia, hoping to disconnect and focus on composing music for the Alma Alter theater, while he embarked on an exciting train journey from Lisbon to Estonia, meeting entrepreneurs and nomads along the way.

I framed that time apart as a test—an opportunity to understand whether our love was still strong enough, whether it was something we were both willing to fight for.

During my stay in Bulgaria, I came to a painful clarity: I missed him deeply, and more than that, I wanted to be with him. I returned with a sense of certainty, determined to tell him how much I loved him.

I arrived a couple of days earlier and called him the next day. I told him everything I felt, everything I had come to understand in his absence. But his conclusion was the opposite. The relationship, for him, had become a source of pain, and he believed it was time for us to part ways.

That moment broke something in me.

His flight arrived the following day, and I went to the airport to meet him, holding two coffees in my hands. When he walked out, I asked if I could hug him. He said yes. I held him, convinced—perhaps irrationally—that if I could just keep him in my arms, everything might still be okay.

But it wasn’t.

We had the conversation at home, and a few days later, while we were still living in the same apartment, I made a decision. Even though the rental agreement was under my name, even though I had bought most of the furniture and built a circle of friends in Lisbon, I left. I couldn’t stay there any longer, waiting for him to make a move, seeing him every day, sharing the same bedroom while everything between us had already ended.

Tossed Around

What followed felt like an ordeal.

I returned to Sofia and stayed there for a while, until I was diagnosed with prostate cancer. Soon after, I moved to Madrid to undergo treatment. That process added another layer of pain on top of everything else. I was sick, alone, and heartbroken.

The first months were devastating. I felt completely broken. The pain was so intense it almost seemed physical, as though grief had taken on a tangible form within my body.

To make matters worse, we shared a business, which meant I was forced to meet regularly with the person I still loved so deeply. We would talk about work, about numbers, about decisions, pretending—at least on the surface—that everything was normal. But seeing his face, hearing his voice, maintaining that illusion—it destroyed me. After each meeting, I would close the laptop and collapse into tears, sometimes crying until exhaustion took over.

I was in denial.

There were days when I couldn’t even open my laptop, and others when I couldn’t get out of bed. Most days, the grief would surface unexpectedly, triggered by the smallest details: a memory, a habit, a shared joke, the quiet absence of someone who used to be there. Cooking for one instead of two. Living a life that suddenly felt incomplete.

After moving to Madrid to get treated, things got worse.

One of the moments that will remain with me forever is waking up in the hospital after my first exploratory surgery. While I was under anesthesia, I dreamed that he was there, sitting beside me, holding my hand. When I woke up, I was alone.

Anger Didn’t Work For Me

Just like Guy Winch proposes in his TED talk, my therapist suggested that I make a list of negative things about my ex—one each day. I tried, but I couldn’t do it.

It wasn’t because I was idealizing him. Enough time had passed, and we had had difficult, even uncomfortable conversations. He had hurt me. There were things he had done—and things he hadn’t done—that left deep scars. And yet, even now, I would struggle to write that list.

He is not perfect. But neither am I.

My therapist also encouraged me to feel anger—not necessarily toward him, but toward what had happened, toward what could have been handled differently. It is often described as a necessary phase of grief.

But I couldn’t access it. What I felt was not anger, but emptiness. Not rage, but absence. A void.

And that made me think again of Brianna Wiest. Perhaps she is right. Perhaps when you love someone deeply enough—and I loved him more than anyone before—you don’t simply stop loving them. He collided with me and reshaped my entire universe. In many ways, he was my universe, and I was his. I wanted to grow old with him. And once you reach that point, it is no longer just something you feel or believe—it becomes something you are.

Get Your “Why”

There is one point where my experience diverges from what is often advised: the importance of understanding why.

After a year, Miguel and I met again in Lisbon for a company teambuilding event. The day before leaving, I asked to see him. I needed answers.

For a long time, I had not known why he had broken up with me, and in that absence, my mind created its own explanations—often harsh, often self-directed. I convinced myself that I had taken him away from his family and friends, that I had forced him into a nomadic life he did not truly want, that I had isolated him, frustrated his dreams, become someone he no longer recognized.

All these thoughts had one thing in common: blame.

I blamed myself for everything. I carried the entire weight of the relationship’s failure on my shoulders, without truly understanding what had gone wrong.

When we spoke that afternoon, things began to shift. Some of the beliefs I had held onto were not true at all—he had even thought I had cheated on him. Other issues could have been avoided with better communication.

What mattered most was the realization that responsibility was shared. I could have done many things better, yes—but so could he. There was no single point of failure, no single person to blame.

That realization marked a turning point for me.

Understanding that I was not solely responsible was, perhaps, the most important step in my healing process.

Acceptance?

If I had to describe where I am now, I would say I have reached a form of acceptance.

That doesn’t mean I am happy. It simply means I am… okay.

I still have nightmares. I still wake up some days with tears in my eyes, carrying a heaviness that lingers throughout the day. But these moments are less frequent now. The sudden waves of grief no longer arrive without warning. I can even look back at some of the memories we shared with a certain softness.

I have even started seeing someone else, cautiously, trying to rebuild something, or at least to reconnect with that part of myself.

And yet, deep inside, there is still a quiet certainty that something broke that day in May, and that it will never fully be repaired.

My therapist confirmed as much. When I asked her whether I would ever stop grieving, she told me that I probably wouldn’t. That wound will remain with me. It will resurface from time to time—in memories, in places, in fleeting moments: a meal in Cascais, a walk by the river, that last day at the beach in Tavira.

The goal, she said, is not to erase the wound, but to transform it into a scar.

It will always be there, a reminder of what happened, but the pain it carries will become manageable. Perhaps, with time, even something you can look at with a certain tenderness.

The Love That Remains

We all change.

The person you once loved so deeply is no longer there, at least not in the same way. And that’s alright. You are no longer the same person either.

We all have the right to change, to evolve, to move forward.

Perhaps we do not continue loving them in the present, but rather the version of them that existed when they were with us—the memory, the shared moments, the way they made us feel. A kind of ghost that lingers quietly within us. And in that sense, I find myself agreeing with Brianna Wiest.

You never truly stop loving them.

A few days ago, standing on a metro platform in Madrid, something felt painfully familiar. A couple of posters that were part of a public campaign from the government. They looked clever at first glance. Slightly ironic.

We asked AI to design sustainability, and it filled an office with plants.
We asked AI to create innovation, and it plugged a human into an electrical socket.

Below it, the message:

“No todo lo artificial es inteligente.
Hacerlo bien sigue siendo cosa de humanos.”

(Not everything artificial is intelligent. Doing things right is still human's business)

I stayed there for a moment, watching people glance at them. And I couldn’t help but think how this would land for anyone without a technical background. AI is not to be trusted. AI is dangerous. But don't worry. We won't let AI take your job.

Won’t Somebody Think of the Children?

A few days later, El País decided to raise the stakes considerably.

“ChatGPT no pasa la prueba: así pone en peligro la vida de menores.”
(ChatGPT fails the test: this is how it is endangering children's lives)

🙄 Wow. Really? Had a language model escaped a lab? Did ChatGPT possessed a robot and went on a children killing spree? Had it somehow replaced parents, teachers, smartphones, social media platforms, and the internet itself overnight?

No. El País designs a test in which adult psychologists create fictitious minor accounts and deliberately push conversations with ChatGPT toward extreme and pathological scenarios, probing for failures, bypassing safeguards, and escalating interactions until the system inevitably breaks. The outcome of that experiment is then presented as evidence that the tool “endangers children’s lives.”

This framing is deeply problematic. We do not test videogames, social networks, or messaging apps by deliberately forcing worst-case psychological scenarios and then conclude they are inherently dangerous when they fail to act as perfect guardians. We do not demand that Instagram, WhatsApp, TikTok, Discord, Fortnite, or Roblox alert parents every time emotional distress appears, nor do we require private tools to override privacy and notify families in real time. We don’t even impose that burden on friends, teachers, or peers.

This article from El Pais is not serious journalism. It's tabloid material. It is a profound misunderstanding of both technology and mental health, fueled by ideological bigotry against innovation and an eagerness to find a simple scapegoat.

Technology and Innovation

These are not isolated cases. At this point, it feels less like concern and more like a hobby: institutions and the press taking turns panicking about AI. But why?

I’m Spaniard, so Spain is where I’ve experienced this most directly. I’ve spent years building companies — opening them, hiring people, navigating public institutions, and trying to make technology actually work in the real world. And if there is one constant I’ve encountered in Spain, it’s this: entrepreneurship is demonized. Being an entrepreneur is rarely seen as “someone who creates companies and jobs.” More often, it comes with a built-in moral indictment: a would-be employee exploiter, permanently one step away from squeezing workers for profit.

This mindset extends naturally to innovation itself, especially when it threatens the comfortable status quo of labor. And once you understand that, the current panic is hardly surprising. Artificial intelligence just happens to be the latest victim.

But in the case of AI, this reaction is not uniquely Spanish.

Across many countries, governments and mainstream media are struggling with the same problem. El País – as an example – is merely mirroring similar articles from CNN. AI is complex, fast-moving, and deeply disruptive. Understanding it properly requires effort, technical literacy, and a willingness to accept uncomfortable change. Demonizing it is much easier.

How AI Became Responsible for Everything

Jobs, children, democracy, the planet, going bald, A-ha releasing a new album in 2026. Pick your favorite anxiety; AI will be accused of it sooner or later. Spain may offer a particularly clear example of this dynamic, but it is far from alone. Institutions – and perhaps even societies – are far more comfortable warning about change than adapting to it. AI becomes the convenient explanation for everything we’re already anxious about:

• jobs becoming unstable,
• creativity feeling undervalued,
• children spending too much time on screens,
• environmental concerns...

I’ve read pieces blaming AI for destroying employment, as if this were the first time in history that a major technological shift had disrupted the labor market. I’ve also read that AI is destroying the planet, accelerating climate change because servers consume electricity — conveniently ignoring that the same servers already exist to power social media, stream endless video, mine cryptocurrencies, and host the very media outlets publishing those accusations.

I’ve read that AI will make children stupid, passive, incapable of thinking for themselves. I’ve read that it will lead them down dark paths, damage their mental health, even push them toward self-harm. All of this sounds strangely familiar. Television was supposed to rot brains. Video games were supposed to destroy empathy. Social media was supposed to end attention spans – ok, ok, I’ll concede that one. But even the internet itself was once blamed for the collapse of truth. Yeah, I’m old enough to remember all that.

Every industrial revolution has followed the same script. New technologies wipe out entire categories of jobs, create new ones, and force society through uncomfortable transitions. None of it is painless. And — inconvenient as it may be — this process has pushed humanity forward every single time.

Governments, Jobs, and the Work Nobody Wants to Do

And AI is likely the largest and most disruptive industrial revolution we’ve seen so far. It will eliminate some jobs. That’s not speculation; it’s already happening. It will also create new roles, new industries, and new forms of productivity.

Preparing for that requires doing difficult, unglamorous work:

• updating education systems that haven’t changed in decades,
• redesigning labor frameworks for a different economy,
• accepting that some professions will disappear.

That work is slow, complex, and politically uncomfortable.

It’s much easier to warn people about AI than to prepare them for a future shaped by it. Easier to print posters than to rethink institutions. Easier to write alarming headlines than to understand this transition.

What AI Has Actually Done for Me

I use AI every day as a working tool. It hasn’t replaced my job. It doesn’t make decisions for me. I’m still the CEO of Companio — and, last time I checked, ChatGPT wasn’t on the board.

What it has done is dramatically speed things up. Tasks that would have taken me weeks now take hours. I can prepare technical specifications faster, explore design ideas, communicate new features more clearly, sketch small improvements, improve the emails we send to customers, write documentation, fix code bugs, or explore better technical approaches before committing time and resources.

To me, AI has become as essential as the internet or my laptop. Could I work without it? Of course. I could also write all my ideas in a notebook with a pen. How about sending letters instead of emails to my customers via postal mail?

AI is a tool. It’s not Skynet. It’s not planning the end of humanity. What it will do is force us to adapt — just like every other technological shift before it. Horses and carriages gave way to cars. People moved from the countryside to cities, from farms to factories, from manual labor to machines.

Watching an Industrial Revolution Unfold

I suspect that years from now, we’ll look back at campaigns like the one in the Madrid metro, and headlines like the one in El País, and recognize them for what they were: early reactions to a new technology. Just fear, caused by ignorance.

We’ve been here before. When factories spread during the Industrial Revolution, many genuinely believed they would dehumanize society and enslave workers forever. When trains appeared, respected doctors warned that the human body was not designed to withstand such speeds and that organs and bones would suffer irreversible damage. When cars began to replace horses, they were seen as dangerous machines that would bring chaos to cities and destroy established ways of life.

None of those fears stopped progress. They were not remembered as foresight, but as resistance. The world adapted, institutions eventually followed, and society reorganized itself around new realities.

AI belongs in that lineage. It is not a gadget. It is not a passing technological novelty. It is an industrial transformation already underway. Treating it as a moral threat or an anomaly to be contained does not slow it down — it only ensures that adaptation happens elsewhere, and without us.

Institutions and traditional media can choose to understand what is happening, engage with it seriously, and help society prepare for the changes ahead. Or they can cling to fear, exaggeration, and nostalgia, and position themselves — once again — on the wrong side of history.

Progress will move forward regardless. The only open question is who decides to move with it.

Running a digital business in 2025 means connecting the dots between a dozen third-party services, each with their own quirks, bugs, and unexpected behavior. Sometimes these services make improvements. Sometimes, they make decisions. And every once in a while, those decisions have unintended consequences that ripple downstream to companies like ours — and to our customers.

This is one of those times.

Recently, Wise introduced a small but incredibly disruptive change in their OpenBanking connection flow that is quietly but significantly breaking bank account reconnections for thousands of users.

Let me explain.

What Changed (And Why It’s a Big Deal)

Until now, when one of our customers connected their Wise account through our dashboard using the OpenBanking flow via GoCardless, all balances in their multi-currency account were pre-selected by default.

This is the expected behavior. The user selects their account, hits next, and all the currency balances (EUR, USD, GBP, etc.) are included.

But now, Wise changed this behavior. No balances are selected by default. The user must tick each one manually. Seems harmless, but it is not.

Most users are lazy, they are busy, or simply don't have time to spend a lot of time reconnecting their bank accounts. They click next, selecting one account at most. As a result, only one balance gets connected. Our accounting team is left wondering why transactions are missing, only to realize much later that the reconnection is incomplete.

What follows is a frustrating loop:

• The accountant asks the customer to reconnect properly.
• The customer replies angrily: “But I already reconnected my account!”
• Time is lost, data is missing, and the whole workflow breaks down.

Violations of OpenBanking, Data Correctness, and Basic API Principles

The UX change in Wise’s connection flow is frustrating, yes — but it’s only the tip of the iceberg. The deeper problem is something far more serious: Wise repeatedly violates data correctness and integrity principles.

OpenBanking was built on the idea of structured, predictable, precise financial information — not guesswork. But working with Wise’s API often feels like reverse‑engineering a puzzle that keeps changing shape.

1. Wise Assigns the Same Transaction ID to Completely Different Transactions

This is one of the most egregious and recurring issues.

Wise frequently returns multiple transactions — with different dates, amounts, and booking times — using the exact same transactionId. Below is a real example (anonymized):

{
  "transactionId": "1234567890",
  "bookingDate": "2025-05-26",
  "bookingDateTime": "2025-05-26T14:12:35.110491Z",
  "transactionAmount": {
    "amount": "-40000.00",
    "currency": "EUR"
  },
  "creditorName": "John Smith",
  "creditorAccount": { "iban": "XX1234567890" },
  "remittanceInformationUnstructured": "Some remittance info",
  "additionalInformation": "TRANSFER-1234567890",
  "proprietaryBankTransactionCode": "TRANSFER",
  "status": "booked"
},
{
  "transactionId": "1234567890",
  "bookingDate": "2025-06-03",
  "bookingDateTime": "2025-06-03T13:03:02.409548Z",
  "transactionAmount": {
    "amount": "39870.76",
    "currency": "EUR"
  },
  "remittanceInformationUnstructured": "Some remittance info",
  "additionalInformation": "TRANSFER-1234567890",
  "proprietaryBankTransactionCode": "TRANSFER",
  "status": "booked"
}

These are not the same transaction. They are not even variations of the same transaction. They are separate financial events occurring on different dates, in different amounts, with different effects on the account balance.

Yet Wise assigns both the same transaction ID — 1234567890.

Wise “explains” that they consider these entries to be “parts of the same transaction.” But OpenBanking is not supposed to be metaphoric. It is not a story-telling format. It is data. Data must be unambiguous.

If two entries have different amounts and different timestamps, they must have different transaction IDs. That is a foundational rule of any database, ledger, or API.

Even worse: Wise used to assign the same transaction ID to the fee for one of these transactions as well. So there were three different transactions with the same transaction ID. Only after repeated complaints did they start prefixing fee entries with something like FEE-1234567890 — itself a hack that reveals the absence of a strict, enforced standard.

Why This Is a Critical Problem

Our OpenBanking partner does provide a unique internal ID for each entry, but we cannot rely on it — because we reconcile transactions from multiple sources (banking APIs and uploaded bank statements). A transaction coming from OpenBanking and the same transaction coming from a CSV statement must match, not be treated as duplicates.

If a provider like Wise reuses transaction IDs arbitrarily, then reconciliation becomes guesswork. Accounting and financial compliance cannot be based on guesswork.

2. Missing Transactions Entirely: The Case of Wise Investment Accounts

Wise also offers so‑called “investment accounts” — essentially savings/investment products where your balance grows with returns. In the Wise dashboard, users see these returns as incoming transactions.

But in the API? There is no transaction. Just a mysteriously increased balance. This means:

• The balance changes…
• …but no transaction explains it (?).

This breaks every rule of accounting and API design. A balance cannot change without a corresponding entry. Period. Ever.

Because Wise provides no transaction record for these returns, our system must detect this anomaly and then:

• Ask the customer whether they’re using a Wise investment product.
• If yes, mark the account as an “investment account.”
• And — this part pains me — generate “ghost transactions” to keep balances and ledgers coherent.

Yes. We have to invent transactions because Wise doesn’t provide them. It is as terrible as it sounds.

3. These Are Not Isolated Incidents — Fintech APIs Are Some of the Worst Offenders

We experience similar issues regularly not only with Wise –even though they are the main offender–, but also with providers like PayPal, Stripe, and others who:

• Reuse transaction IDs
• Skip or hide transactions.
• Omit required fields
• Mislabel references
• Fail to provide consistent timestamps
• Break their own documentation
• Change API behavior without notice

The Problem With OpenBanking: When “Standards” Are Just Suggestions

The OpenBanking initiative was supposed to unify the way financial data is shared across banks, fintech platforms, and service providers. In theory, it provides a standard interface for accessing banking information across Europe and beyond — based on the UK’s Open Banking Standard and further formalized in technical documents like:

• The Open Banking Read/Write API Specifications
• The PSD2 RTS (Regulatory Technical Standards)
• ISO 20022 and ISO 8583 messaging standards for financial data

But unfortunately OpenBanking doesn’t work like a true, enforced protocol. It functions more like a loosely agreed-upon guideline.

There is no governing body or enforcement mechanism ensuring that all banking providers implement the APIs in a uniform way – or if there is, they're not doing a great job. That means banks are free to interpret — and often misinterpret — key aspects of the standard.

No Standardized Field Definitions or Requirements

Even something as simple as a transaction reference is a mess. Some banks include it; others omit it. In some cases, the “reference” field is not a reference at all, but a vague internal memo, a processor ID, or worse — a meaningless alphanumeric string. This makes it incredibly hard for accounting or reconciliation software to extract meaningful information.

We need to go beyond loose recommendations. We need:

• Clear field definitions and mandatory data requirements.
• Enforcement of semantic consistency in key fields like transactionId, reference, amount, and timestamp.
• A precise definition of what is required in a complete transaction object, and what must be unique.

UI/UX Chaos: A Missing Standard for Authorization Flows

Beyond the API itself, OpenBanking also leaves the user experience completely undefined. Banks can create wildly different authorization flows, interfaces, and logic. This inconsistency introduces serious friction for users and breaks product expectations.

Take Wise again: they recently changed the way users connect accounts. Now, currency balances are not selected by default — which is unlike almost every other bank integration. For an average user who expects all balances to be synced (like before), this leads to confusion, missing data, and accounting issues on our side. All because a checkbox was left unselected by default.

Most users don’t understand what “balance selection” even means — they just want to connect their bank and move on. We shouldn’t be designing APIs and flows that punish the busy user for not reading every checkbox. That’s poor UX design and a broken implementation of OpenBanking principles.

A Call for Real Standards and Enforcement

OpenBanking has great potential — but right now, it’s a wild west of interpretations, half-baked implementations, and zero accountability.

If we want this ecosystem to work, we need:

• Stricter guidelines that are enforceable — not just “good practices”
• A governing body or certification process to ensure cross-provider consistency
• Unified UX patterns for things like balance selection, account permissions, and transaction history
• A developer-centric standard that doesn’t tolerate ambiguity in core fields like transaction ID or reference

Until then, companies like ours are forced to resort to defensive programming, error recovery hacks, and awkward user prompts — just to work around poor or inconsistent implementations by major players.

What Are We Doing?

Let me be clear: we’ve already notified the involved parties of the problem (as we've done with all previous API issues). As GoCardless clients and partners, we were directed to Wise since the issue originates from their API and OpenBanking integration, not GoCardless.

That said, we’re not naïve. We know that in most cases, these support requests go nowhere. We’ve been down this road many times with providers who rarely consider the downstream impact of their changes. So we are taking matters into our own hands through defensive programming and proactive design.

Here’s what we’re implementing, right now:

• An explanatory animation showing how to manually select all balances when connecting a Wise account — to make it visually obvious and idiot-proof.
• An updated FAQ (with the video embedded) that emphasizes — in bold — that all balances must be selected manually.
• A new tool for accountants: They can flag a connected Wise account as needing reconnection due to incomplete balances. This sends an email to the customer explaining what went wrong and what to do.
• A reconnection checker: If we detect fewer balances than before, the customer gets an alert like:

“We noticed you may have missed some balances. Previously we had data about the following balances: EUR (3), USD (2), and GBP (1). Now we only received EUR (2) and USD (1). Please reconnect and select all balances manually.”

• A dashboard popup when connecting or reconnecting Wise accounts that clearly explains the change and requires the customer to confirm:

“Make sure to select all balances!” “Wise now requires you to manually select your balances. To give us complete financial data, please make sure you tick every balance before continuing.”

We’re fast-tracking these fixes because we know this is already affecting customer experience and accounting workflows — and it will only get worse.

A Final Word: When OpenBanking Becomes OpenGuessing

So yes, we’re frustrated. As a bootstrapped startup, we don’t have the luxury of blaming others and moving on. We build workarounds, patch holes, and defend our code from external nonsense, because that’s the only way to survive. But that's far from ideal.

And when someone breaks things that used to work just fine, we’ll call it out — constructively, but clearly.

As I said before, “Honest Disruption” is one of our core values at Companio. That means being willing to say: “This could be better.” And then doing something about it.

👉 Are you a Wise or OpenBanking engineer? We’d love to talk. (I would honestly love to be hired by Wise to audit their API and make sure it becomes a correct, compliant, and reliable API).

👉 Are you a Companio customer having trouble with bank connections? Don't worry, we'll do our best to make it work for you. We always do.

👉 Are you tired of APIs that look great in theory but break in real life? You’re not alone.

We’ve all heard the mantra: “The customer is always right.” But anyone who has run a company — especially one that deals with support, payments, and tech — knows that’s not always the case. Some customers are confused. Some are angry. Some are unreasonable. And once in a while, you encounter one who is downright abusive.

Some time ago, at Companio, we received a message from a customer that was, frankly, one of the most aggressive we’ve ever seen. Insulting, harassing, threatening, completely out of line. Frustrated with a failed payment attempt, he described our company as “a fucking shitty service,” accused us of deliberately making payments difficult, mocked our intelligence, and threatened to spread negative reviews across social media. All because his card was blocked and he refused to read the error message.

It would’ve been easy to simply cancel the contract with the customer and be done with it. But we didn’t. And here’s why: even in the most irrational and emotionally charged feedback, there’s often a sliver of insight. And if you’re willing to look at it without ego, you can use that feedback — however rude — to improve your company.

What Actually Happened

Let’s break it down.

• The customer had a payment fail due to a card block.
• The system advised using a different card.
• He continued to try with the same card. When he realized he needed to add a new card, he simply tried adding the same (blocked) card over and over again.
• Frustrated, he reached out in our chat outside EU business hours (he’s in Mexico).
• Our chat allows messages to be left after hours for follow-up, and we always get back in less than 24 working hours. That was not OK for him.
• Instead, he sent an aggressively worded message full of insults and threats.

Contrary to what I might have decided after receiving such an abusive message, it was thanks to my CS Manager, Jonathan — whose patience and goodwill far exceed my own — that this person remains a customer today. And not just a customer, but a satisfied one.

Once Jonathan responded, things were resolved quickly. We explained the situation, offered to meet at any time that worked for him (accommodating his time zone), and he apologized.

That would’ve been the end of it. But as CEO, I wanted to take it further.

Boundaries Matter

Before we talk about what we learned, let’s be clear about something:

👉 No company should tolerate abusive, insulting, or threatening behavior from customers.

We’ve now added a clause to our Terms and Conditions stating that we reserve the right to terminate the contract immediately and unilaterally in case of such behavior. Our staff deserves safety, respect, and a professional work environment. No sale is worth sacrificing that.

There’s a toxic trend in tech where “customer obsession” means tolerating any kind of behavior, even harassment. That's not acceptable. Boundaries matter. They protect your team, your values, and your brand integrity.

The Lessons Behind the Insults

But even so — even when the tone is abusive — there’s often a signal beneath the noise. Here’s what we took away from the situation:

1. Our error messages weren’t clear enough.

The customer ignored the system’s message because it wasn’t obvious or actionable enough. So we’re improving that. Soon, if a card fails, the system will:

• Detect blocked or repeatedly failed cards
• Clearly inform the customer why the payment failed
• Provide a one-click link to remove the failed card and add a new one
• Immediately retry the payment with the new card
• Try to detect when a payment method is blocked or has failed in the past, so if the customer tries to add this payment method again, they will be asked to confirm that the payment method has been unblocked or can accept payments again.

That change alone will make the process simpler for hundreds of other customers in the future.

2. Our after-hours messaging could be better.

We’re based in the EU. Most of our customers are too. But some are in the Americas, and timezones can be tricky. While our support chat allows messages to be left when we’re offline, it apparently wasn’t obvious enough.

We’re now reviewing all out-of-hours messages to ensure they are crystal clear and helpful. And we’re evaluating more advanced AI support options to assist customers with urgent needs, even when no agent is available.

3. Edge cases matter.

The angry customer wasn’t the norm — far from it. But edge cases are often where the real friction lives. Solving problems for your most frustrated customers often unlocks improvements for everyone else. That’s the paradox: you can learn more from an abusive user than from a dozen frustrated –but polite– ones.

Ego Is the Enemy

It’s natural to get defensive when someone insults your work. Especially when they’re wrong. But defensiveness doesn’t build better companies. Humility does. So does curiosity.

As a bootstrapped startup, we can’t afford to dismiss issues just because they seem edge cases. Every piece of friction, every “WTF moment,” is a chance to improve. That doesn’t mean you bend over backwards for customers who cross the line. But it does mean you should mine every unpleasant encounter for something you can use.

Even when the customer isn’t right — the experience can still be instructive.

A Final Word

At Companio, one of our six core values is Honest Disruption. It means we don’t let ego stand in the way of improvement. We believe in being radically honest — with our customers, our partners, and ourselves. Even when the feedback is badly worded, unfair, or shouted in capital letters, we ask ourselves: Is there a truth hidden in here? Could we have done something better?

Even when a situation becomes uncomfortable, we try to take a deep breath, de-escalate, and learn something. Because that’s what Honest Disruption is about — being brave enough to listen, humble enough to change, and committed enough to do better next time.

And sometimes, that’s exactly what it takes to turn a “fucking shitty service” into a better one.

At Companio, we recently migrated from Google Workspace to Zoho Workplace. It wasn’t because Zoho was better — in fact, it’s a far inferior solution in terms of UX, integrations, and polish. But it is five times cheaper.

When we informed Google of our decision, they offered us a 20% discount and asked if there was anything they could do to keep us. I replied candidly: “Unless you can make your prices five times cheaper to match the competition, there’s nothing you can do. Your service is a necessary evil, not something critical for our business. And it’s HUGELY expensive for what you offer in 2025.”

Google Workspace was costing us around 1,000€/month for 56 users. That’s 1% of our monthly revenue, just for email, calendar, and online meetings. While 1% might not sound like much, for a bootstrapped startup with no outside investment, that number stings. And it grows. Month by month, user by user, as your team scales.

This article is a call to vigilance. If you’re running a bootstrapped startup — or even if you’re VC-funded but want to keep a tight ship — I’ll explain why you should track your expenses monthly, and be especially wary of pay-per-user, per-month services. These are silent killers of your runway and your profitability.

1. Why Bootstrapped Startups Must Be Extra Lean

Startups today are often sold a dream: “Move fast, break things. Use all the best tools. You need to spend money to make money.” You’ll hear that from other founders, from Twitter threads, from VCs, and (surprise) from the SaaS companies selling those tools.

It’s a seductive idea. And if you’re VC-funded with millions in the bank, maybe it makes sense to splurge on every shiny SaaS tool under the sun.

But if you’re bootstrapped, the story is very different.

We don’t have investor money cushioning our bad decisions. We can’t afford to operate inefficiently. We live off of what we earn, and that makes every euro we spend a survival decision.

At Companio, we don’t have foosball tables. Our office is wherever we open our laptop. And we continuously review our expenses. I consider this a core part of my role as CEO: to ask each month — where is our money going, and can we do better?

2. The Hidden Danger of Pay-Per-User/Month Pricing

From all the services you can subscribe to, pay-per-user/per-month services are the ones you need to watch like a hawk.

They start small. Maybe it’s 10€/user/month. You have a team of five, so it’s no big deal. But then you grow to 20 people. Then 50. Then 100. The service increases their prices. They add “premium features.” Suddenly, you’re paying thousands per month just to keep using the same tool you started with.

These pricing models scale linearly with headcount. That might sound reasonable but it’s not. Because tool usage does not scale linearly with value. A customer support rep might use the tool every hour. A marketing assistant might log in twice a month. Yet you’re paying the same for both.

What’s worse, these services often lock you into ecosystems that make switching hard and expensive. This leads to inertia, which is exactly what they want.

This happened to us with Google Workspace. A CTO we hired decided it was time to “professionalize” our setup and move from our internal Linux-based mail and calendar system to Google. It was convenient, yes. But when that CTO left, they left behind a system costing us 1,000€/mo that wasn’t easy to rip out.

And that’s just one example.

3. Practical Advice for Bootstrapped Startups

Here are some hard-earned lessons we’ve learned about avoiding these traps:

1. Hire people who know how to do things, not people who need tools to do things.

A great Linux engineer can set up a robust internal mail/calendar system. A great PM can manage a roadmap in Notion or ClickUp instead of a $30/user/month product suite. Tools don’t replace skills, they should amplify them. But only if the cost makes sense.

2. Keep a running list of all your pay-per-user/per-month services.

Track this monthly. Include:

• Service name
• Price per user
• Number of users
• Total cost

Then ask yourself:

• Are all these users actively using the service?
• Does this tool deliver tangible value to our business?
• Are there cheaper or flat-rate alternatives?

3. Don’t be afraid to switch.

Yes, migration is a hassle. But do the math.

In our case, the savings from just one month of switching to Zoho could pay for a freelancer to handle the entire migration. After that, the savings are pure profit, profit we can invest in things that actually grow the business, like hiring engineers to build features, improve automation, or develop AI systems.

Switching hurts for a few days. Staying with a bad service hurts forever.

4. What We Use Today (and How We Think About Cost)

Here’s how we approach SaaS tools today:

• We favor flat-fee pricing wherever possible.
• We prefer tools that scale with value, not with headcount.
• We periodically audit tools and usage. If a service isn’t being used regularly or delivering value, we cancel it.
• We are not afraid of less polished solutions if they do the job for 1/5 of the cost.

Is Zoho as good as Google Workspace? No. But it gives us email, calendar, and meetings, and costs us 80% less. We can live with a few UX quirks for that tradeoff.

5. Final Thoughts

Running a business is hard enough. Every euro you save on unnecessary tools is a euro you can spend building something that actually matters. Hiring. Product. Customer experience. That’s where your money should go.

Pay-per-user/per-month services are designed to grow quietly until they’re one of your biggest line items. Don’t let them.

Track them. Question them. Replace them when needed. As a founder —especially a bootstrapped one— this is your job.

I was reviewing a new UX proposal for our Annual Report feature…

It suggested showing a popup the moment the user enters the dashboard, reminding them it’s time to submit their report.

My reaction?

Absolutely not.

Let me explain why — with a little story from my very real, very hectic CEO life:

A totally average morning in my world:

Open laptop. ClickUp: 87 notifications. Email: 54 unread.

I choose one at random — it’s from TOOL_X. Apparently TOOL_X has stopped working. No panic yet. I log into their dashboard.

Turns out the company card expired. I need to pay a pending invoice.

Alright — I’ll download the invoice and upload it to Companio for accounting.

I head to Companio to do just that…

“It’s time to prepare your Annual Report!”

My brain, which was deep in another task, screams internally.

I now have two options:

1. Click “Remind me later”, and be interrupted again next time I log in — equally busy, equally stressed, and probably juggling six other tasks.
2. Click “Start now”, get sucked into a 20-minute flow, and then completely forget why I came here in the first place.

And let’s not forget — I still have to generate a new card from my fintech bank, wrestle with TOOL_X’s nightmare of a billing interface, and somehow re-enable the service… assuming I even remember what TOOL_X does by then.

... and there are 87 ClickUp notifications and 53 unread emails waiting for me...

This is why modal popups at entry are bad UX.

💡 Lesson for product teams:

Never assume you know when your user wants to deal with something:

• Even when it’s important.
• Even when you have the best intentions.

Interrupting a user mid-context is like throwing a frisbee at them while they’re defusing a bomb. Distracting, annoying, and rarely ends well.

Instead:

• Use banners or persistent, non-intrusive reminders.
• Let users control the flow.
• Don’t hijack their focus.

Because “Remind me later” almost always means “Forget forever.”

Note: Three years ago, my co-founder Miguel went through the exact same ordeal trying to get his criminal record in Spain. I wrote about it back then, incredulous that something so simple —a five-minute online process in Estonia— could turn into a €200, two-day nightmare here. You can read that story here.

You’d think I’d learned my lesson. But here I am, three years later, needing my own certificate for the international expansion of Companio. I knew what was coming. I braced myself. Maybe, just maybe, the system had improved. Spoiler alert: it hasn’t.

But wait... A Criminal Records certificate? That should be easy, right? In a normal country, maybe. In Spain, it’s an Olympic-level bureaucratic decathlon.

First Plot Twist: You Can’t Sit With Us (Unless You Bank Spanish)

Spain technically lets you get your criminal record online. That is, if you have a bank account in one of a very select list of “trusted financial institutions” that the government seems to have hand-picked from the 2003 Yellow Pages.

So… no Spanish bank account? No criminal record for you. Apparently, nobody in the Ministry of Justice ever imagined that expats, digital nomads, Spaniards banking with foreign fintechs, or literal Spaniards living abroad might ever need to get this done without a Santander account.

Luckily, I was in Madrid at the time. So I decided to take advantage of this extremely rare alignment of bureaucratic planets and do it the old-school way: physically, in person. How quaint.

Day 1: Chaos at the Ministry of Justice and Form 790 (aka Time Travel to 1998)

I show up at the Ministry of Justice office on Calle Bolsa 8, Madrid. It’s Wednesday the 13th (how poetic). I arrive at 12:30 PM—apparently too close to lunchtime (14:00-15:00) to expect anyone to be working.

There’s no reception, just a couple of security guards who silently judge you unless you have an appointment. The catch? You need to get an appointment online before entering. There’s a QR code stuck on a wall for that. Very 2025.

So I scan the code, and I’m immediately served a delicious buffet of broken links, unusable forms, and JavaScript errors. The link to the list of compatible banks? 404. The “Schedule appointment” button? Doesn’t work. I try Chrome. I try Brave. I try Firefox. Nothing. Welcome to Spanish eGovernment: proudly designed to repel citizens.

So I wait. The line keeps growing. Nobody seems to be able to get through. I help a few confused people—one foreigner who doesn’t speak Spanish and can’t use the machines that will give you an access ticket if you already have an appointment (which, of course, are only in Spanish), and a sweet old lady who’s even more lost than I am.

Finally, a clearly exhausted public servant appears and saves the day. She somehow unlocks a secret screen on my phone (which I couldn’t reach with 20+ years of coding experience) and helps me book an appointment. Victory! Or so I think.

On my way back, I fill out the appointment request form. The system, naturally, demands a Spanish phone number. Because of course, everyone in Spain—digital nomads included—must have a Spanish mobile, right? Thankfully, I borrow my father’s.

Enter: Form 790 — The Bureaucratic Crypt

Now, here comes the real treat: Form 790. This is the payment form you must bring to the bank—yes, a real physical bank—to pay your €3.86 fee.

I open the form. It’s like a relic from a forgotten century. Fields are limited to a certain number of characters (including email addresses—so modern, right?), and you must manually input all kinds of details: ID, name, birth city, parents’ names… I’m surprised it didn’t ask for my blood type and favorite color.

I manage to fill it out using my shortest email address (note to myself: get a new email address that doesn’t include my full name), and get ready for Phase 2 of the quest:

Level 2: Print, Pay, Pray

Here’s what comes next in my epic journey to prove I’m not a criminal:

• Find a printing shop that still exists in 2025
• Print the ancient Form 790
• Walk into a traditional Spanish bank and beg them to accept my €3.86 in cash
• Bring the paid & stamped (yes, stamped) form back to the Ministry of Justice
• Hope they’ll issue the certificate in English, with an apostille
• Cross my fingers for a digital version so I can send it to my Irish lawyer

All of this, mind you, for a document that should take 30 seconds and a click in any civilized country (like Estonia). But who needs efficiency when you can relive the glory of analog systems and Kafkaesque bureaucracy?

Day 2: Bureaucracy, Banks, and Begging for €3.86

After surviving the first day of Spanish bureaucratic madness, I approached the second day with military precision. My appointment was at 12:40, but I gave myself a solid three-hour buffer. I had a mission. I was determined. What could possibly go wrong?

Step 1: The Hunt for €3.86 (in Cash, of Course)

Since I don’t have a Spanish bank account (and apparently live in sin because of it), I needed to pay the fee in cash. I had a 10 leva bill from Bulgaria (close to 5€), so I first hit a currency exchange shop to avoid going to an ATM and carrying a lot of cash later.

Exchanging 10 leva to euros felt absurd already, but I hadn’t even started.

Step 2: Printing the Form 790… in Triplicate

Then I found a print shop to get three copies of the sacred form 790. Why three? Because apparently, trees are an infinite resource. One copy for me, one for the bank, one for the ministry. It’s bureaucracy’s version of the Holy Trinity.

Step 3: Bank Roulette — Third Time’s the Charm

Armed with coins and forms, I hit my first bank: Santander.

“No account? No payment,” said the clerk.

I tried explaining, begging, using logic. No dice.

Second bank: BBVA.

Same story, this time without even pretending to be polite.

Desperate, I turned to strategy. Third bank: CaixaBank.

I lied.

I told the clerk I was “in the process of opening a mortgage with them.” Paperwork still pending, of course, but luckily, I had cash. The trick worked. I paid my €3.86 and got the holy stamp from the bank. Victory. My hands were literally shaking when I walked out.

The Appointment That Almost Wasn’t

At 12:15, I arrived at the Ministry of Justice. I went to the self-service machine to print my appointment ticket. I entered my reservation code and… Error: ticket already printed.

Excuse me?

Tried again in another machine. Same thing.

For a moment, I considered standing up and shouting:

“OK, who here printed my ticket using my personal data?!”

But I restrained myself and joined the queue. Again.

After 20 minutes, the front-desk clerk took pity on me and issued an “Urgent” ticket —U530. I could tell she was overwhelmed, the only staffer facing a growing crowd of irritated citizens. I honestly felt sorry for her. She was doing her best in a system not designed for efficiency —but to frustrate people into giving up.

The Waiting Room and the Final Battle

The waiting room screen said “Citizens waiting: 4”, but there were clearly 30+. Maybe the rest of us were just ghosts in the system.

After 40 long minutes, I was finally called in. I handed over the documents, praying silently that I hadn’t missed a stamp, signature, or box. And… miraculously, everything went through.

Well, almost.

Of course, they couldn’t give me the document in English. I mean, why would they? Even though the certificate is generated from a template, even though a dropdown for language would be trivial to implement —nah. Spain doesn’t believe in dropdowns.

But still, I got it. After two full days, three visits to banks, three versions of the form, a made-up mortgage story, and €3.86 in coins, I had my criminal record certificate in hand.

The Best Part? The Gender-Inclusive Criminal Records

You think we’re done? Oh no.

While reviewing the document, I found this gem–that didn't exist in a previous criminal record I got years ago:

“No constan antecedentes penales relativos/as a”

It’s hard to translate this absurdity, but it’s basically saying:

“There are no criminal records related (masculine)/related (feminine) to…”

Here’s the thing: “criminal records” is a masculine noun in Spanish. You don’t need to add a feminine variation. And I’ve yet to meet a female or non-binary criminal record that felt discriminated against 😅. But hey, someone —somewhere— had time to "fix" that line.

Just not the payment system, the online form, or the foreign-language version.

Conclusion: Two Days, €3.86, One Broken System

Let’s sum it up:

• Time spent: 2 full days
• Forms printed: 3 (I actually printed 6 cause I was so scared of making a mistake and not having a backup)
• Banks visited: 3
• Lies told: 1
• Money paid: €3.86
• Online convenience: 0

In Estonia, this would’ve taken 5 minutes online and cost nothing. That’s the reality of digital governance done right. Meanwhile, in Spain, we’re stuck in a Kafkaesque nightmare made of printers, appointment codes, and stamp-hunting adventures.

I couldn’t end this story without mentioning the one person who truly didn’t deserve any of this: the overwhelmed clerk at the information desk of the Ministry of Justice. She was doing her best under impossible circumstances, navigating broken systems, angry citizens, and an avalanche of paperwork with no help in sight. I genuinely felt sorry for her. The problem is not the people —it’s the system. A system so inefficient, so outdated, so irrational, that it feels almost purposely designed to frustrate citizens, waste their time, and make every simple procedure a bureaucratic obstacle course.

We deserve better.

A few days ago, my COO forwarded a short, polite message to our Bulgarian accountant, confirming the decision to end her contract after just one month and thanking her for her time with us.

It caught me off guard. I immediately reached out to both my COO and the accountant to understand what had happened, hoping there was a way to address the issue before things reached that point.

Her reply came quickly, and before I even heard back from Miguel (our COO), the core of the problem was clear.

“[The COO] expects me to do the work of a lawyer, but I am a finance and accounting specialist.”

I’ve seen that same sentiment expressed countless times, in different words, but with the same underlying meaning:

“That’s not in my contract.”

“That’s not my job.”

The Multi-Hat CEO: Leading by Example

Those words—whether spoken directly or hidden between the lines—should be a red flag for any organization. They signal a rigid mindset where roles are narrowly defined, and personal contribution is limited to what’s written on paper.

In my role as CEO, co-founder, and board member of Companio, my job description might look clean and well-defined on paper. Reality, however, is far messier—and far more rewarding. Over the years, I’ve worn more hats than I can count, taking on responsibilities well beyond the traditional scope of a CEO.

I’ve stepped in as CTO, managing the architecture of our systems while leading the company. I’ve served as project manager, keeping timelines on track and ensuring cross-departmental alignment. I’ve been a developer—personally building the first two versions of our platform from scratch, and kickstarting the AI engine that now parses and processes invoices automatically.

I’ve managed engineers as IT Lead, taken calls and answered tickets as a customer support agent, handled accounting for smaller clients to understand our own processes inside-out (including bank reconciliation and invoice processing), and even rolled up my sleeves for content creation: writing blog posts, FAQs, marketing campaigns, and copy.

I’ve dabbled in web design, UI/UX, financial analysis, and administrative work. Of course, today we have a talented team in place to manage each of these areas. But even now, I still write code, manage projects, speak directly with customers, or create content when needed.

This isn’t just a story about versatility. It’s a culture statement: if the CEO can roll up his sleeves and get the dirty work done, everyone in the company should feel empowered—and expected—to do the same.

The Hidden Cost of the “Not My Job” Mindset

The story of our Bulgarian accountant isn’t an isolated case. I remember another instance with a customer support agent who refused to call a customer, claiming that “it’s not in my contract.” This was a CS agent. Picking up the phone and calling customers is one of the most basic, fundamental parts of the role.

The solution to this cultural problem isn’t to cram every conceivable task into a contract in a kind of “defensive hiring” approach. It’s to build a culture of flexibility and adaptability.

Of course, I’m not going to ask anyone to perform a job they’re unqualified for, dislike, or can’t reasonably handle. But in a tech startup, there’s a reasonable scope of related tasks that come with each role. If you’re an accountant, registering companies and managing their books is well within your wheelhouse.

Working at a startup is not the same as working at a massive corporation like Accenture. Yes, you gain benefits—fast-paced growth, flexibility, flat hierarchy, remote work—but those come with an unspoken agreement: you contribute flexibility and adaptability in return.

The “Not My Job” or “Not In My Contract” mindset doesn’t just slow things down. It kills innovation. It signals a deeper issue: a lack of adaptability, an unwillingness to help when the team needs you, and difficulty adjusting when the business pivots or the market changes. These traits are toxic for startups. They must be identified early and addressed systematically—not just to improve workflows, but to protect the culture that fuels the company’s growth.

Killing the “Not My Job” Culture

Startups—and especially digital, fast-moving companies—thrive on creativity, adaptability, and the willingness of people to step outside their comfort zones. In these environments, the most valuable team members are those who are multi-talented, curious, and willing to wear different hats when needed.

The first line of defense against the “Not My Job” culture starts during hiring. Be transparent with candidates from day one. Explain that flexibility is not just a nice-to-have—it’s a cornerstone of your company culture. Make it clear why adaptability matters, and how it directly impacts the success and growth of the company.

The second step is early detection. Employees who hold onto the “Not in my contract” mindset are like sand in the gears of a young company. If you identify someone with this attitude, you need to act quickly. It’s equally important to communicate openly with the rest of the team about why that decision was made. This isn’t about punishing individuals—it’s about protecting the culture and ensuring that the entire team can thrive without obstacles.

At Companio, “Not My Job” and “Not in My Contract” are immediate red flags. They trigger a conversation with the employee to see if there’s a misunderstanding or room for alignment. But, in most cases, these conversations end with a decision to part ways. Experience has taught us that people with this mindset rarely adapt to the pace and flexibility of a startup, even if they try to mask it at the beginning.

A thriving startup culture is built on ownership, not boundaries. When everyone is willing to go beyond the job description, the company moves faster, adapts quicker, and wins together.

After I published my latest post (Stoicism, Patience, and the Journey Through Rock Bottom), I received lots of encouraging messages and emails from all around the world.

Some of them are from people I've met (either online or offline) due to my blog or during my travels. But I've also received messages from people I didn't know.

We All Go Through Shit Sometimes

Many of you have shared your stories with me, of how you are also dealing with a difficult situation, or you went through a breakup or health issues too. Sometimes, very recently. Some of you are going through difficult times right now.

I feel overwhelmed with gratitude. All these messages have really helped me to go through this difficult period. Thank you.

It has also helped me to put things in perspective. We all go through shit sometimes. As John Lennon said: "Everybody had a hard year, everybody had a good time".

It's (Not) Your Fault

The other day, after being discharged, I was talking to an old friend about the experience of waking up alone at the hospital, and how lonely it made me feel. His answer was: "well, that's your fault, what can you expect? You decided to leave Madrid a long time ago".

While it was maybe not his intention, his answer did hurt me. I didn't want anybody to get out of their way to help me. It would have been amazing if someone was there to take me back home, but I didn't expect it. We all have busy lives, and that's totally OK. I was just talking about my feelings at that time.

And even though time changes things, I can't agree with that answer. If one of my friends needed me, and I could help them, time and probably even space won't be an issue. I'd help.

During the years, I've made friends from all around the world, and even in the distance, we keep in touch. I've received more help from my friends in Bulgaria or Portugal than from my old friends (or even family for that matter) from Spain. True friendship, in my opinion, survives through time... And space.

Your true family isn't always the one you're born into. Sometimes, your closest friends aren't the ones you've known the longest.

You Have The Right To...

What's more, I think we all have the right to make mistakes. If you're like me and can't help but judge yourself harshly, let me remind you something:

You have the right to...

• Make mistakes
• Be absent for a while and come back
• Have your own opinions and respect but don't not necessarily agree with the opinions of others
• Change your mind, and then change your mind again
• Try to change what you don't like
• Ask for help
• Feel pain and show it openly
• Not having to justify yourself
• Be sad, or lonely, or furious
• Take time to stop and think what you want to do
• Do less than you are capable of
• Have your own needs that are as important as anybody else's

You Are Not Alone

One of the messages I received resonated particularly with me. Her point was simple yet powerful: You Are Not Alone.

So I just wanted to thank you all for helping me understand that, and also convey a message of hope. No matter how lonely you may occasionally feel. You are NOT alone. Every little thing that you do to help someone, everything you share with others, every person you meet, every friend you make, everyone you know... All of them can, in some way, be there for you.

They may not be that person you want to hold in your arms, or that friend that can take you back home in their car from the hospital, but everybody can offer some consolation, thought, or word that will help you. Sometimes, even the smallest gesture matters.

Don't be afraid or ashamed to ask for help, if you need it. And do help others when they truly need you.

I've decided to try and write daily again. Writing -alongside composing music- has always been a cure for my ailments, a shelter where I can always find solace during hard times. And these are bad times.

Going Downhill

Ever since I broke up with my husband (well, actually, a couple of years before that), my life's been going downhill. I moved to Bulgaria looking for a fresh start, but I started to have some health issues. Eventually, they turned out to be quite serious.

Sick and scared, I came back to Spain to get the best treatment. But being alone here has proven to be tough. Really tough. Yesterday I went through a surgical diagnostic procedure. While I was under the effects of the anesthesia, I dreamed that I woke up and my husband was there, holding my hand.

When I woke up, I was completely alone. Nobody there with me but the nurses.

I started to sob. And I couldn't stop. At the beginning, I didn't want them to see me crying like a baby, so I pretended to be sleping, but eventually I decided I didn't give a f**k. A nice woman came to ask me if I was OK, thinking perhaps that I was in pain or I needed something. I wanted to tell her I was ok, but I could not even speak.

That night, back in my friends' apartment, I woke up and went to the restroom, but I had so much pain that I just felt dizzy and fell to the ground. My friends have a cat. The cat litter was there, and there was cat sand and shit all over the ground. There I stood, for fifteen minutes, unable to get up, alone.

Rock Bottom?

I don't even dare to say that I hope I've reached rock bottom. I'm scared that those words could become an invitation for the universe to hit me even harder. I am lucky, my business is still going well, specially now, after some changes that have made the team stronger and more professional. At least, I can still pay the bills (including the medical ones).

Of course, there are people out there with big problems. Much bigger than mine. I have to be grateful. I can afford to travel to my home country and get the best private healthcare available.

My family is not here. That special person, whose hand I so desperately wanted to hold when I woke up, is not here. But I am in a nice apartment where I can rest and heal, and I got a new place to stay where I will be moving next Wednesday. I have a couple of friends who could maybe come to help me in case of emergency.

Patience And Stoicism

The last three years have been rough. Burning out, anxiety, and depression. Then the break up. Now my health. For three years I've been wondering when I'd start to feel better. When will the universe cut me some slack and allow me to get back on my feet again.

Three years is a long time to be waiting for things to get better.

At the beginning, I felt frustrated, and sad, and furious. I still do some times, like the day before my appointment at the hospital. I entered into this self-pity spiral, wondering why all that was happening to me.

But mostly I try to be patient. Not because I'm strong, or a superhero, or I have this amazing willpower. Simply, because there's really nothing else you can do. You have to keep on fighting. Every single day.

Stoicism teaches you that. You can't control your health, you can't control other people's feelings. You can't control all that shitty stuff that's happening. You can only react to what life throws at you in the best possible way. And that's when decisions are important.

Decisions & Relevance

Every little decision counts. No decision, or sequence of decisions, are going to guarantee that your life would improve. That's -again- not under your control. But you can at least focus on trying to do the right thing and making the wisest decisions you are capable of.

You may take a bad turn, we all do that. Be easy on yourself, and kindly realize when you need to turn around. It's ok to change your mind.

If there's something positive about all this, it's the fact that you learn to relativize everything. We usually worry about the most silly and irrelevant stuff. Politics, family quarrels, social media, the opinions of others... Being strong, being successful, being with someone... Most of that stuff disappears.

You just realize how lucky you can be by just being healthy, having a roof under your head, and being able to share a drink with a friend every now and then, or say to your mom how much you love her.

You learn what's really important in life, and most of it is simpler than you think.

Being grateful

So I am grateful. I feel I have to be for just being here, writing these lines. For still finding space for a laugh with a friend over my terrible taste when choosing the furniture for my new apartment or enjoying a cup of tea.

Sometimes it's easier, and sometimes it's harder. Sometimes you can't help but cry out of frustration, or sadness, or pain. But that's ok too. We have to go through these things. Don't judge yourself. We are not perfect. We all go through hard years. But as George Harrison said "All things must pass". Nothing is forever, neither the good, nor the bad things.

Don't be afraid to ask for help. I find that one particularly hard. Let others be there for you. Call your friends and family. Let them know that you need them. They will be there for you, because you would be there for them.

When they find themselves at a crossroads, some people turn to external entities in search of answers. Some seek them in religion, others in fortune tellers or gurus.

When Life Smacks You In The Face

Some people like me don't look for answers. We just act. Move. Charge ahead. Try to escape from our problems by closing our eyes and leaping forward.

When you are in fight or flight mode, you don't think clearly. You take a decision (which is better than not taking any decision at all), but it may not be the best decision.

Luckily, for those like me, the Universe gives you a wake-up call.

When my life turned upside down after breaking up with the person who had become my partner for the last 13 years of my life, I evaluated my options, and moved to Bulgaria.

Why Bulgaria? Well, because it was easy, affordable, I had friends there, and that was the last place where I remembered being happy.

Rethinking Priorities

However, in a way I was trying to keep my dreams alive. I dreamt of staying there for a while, perhaps keeping on traveling, meeting someone, etc. I also envisioned moving to the UK eventually, to the north, where you can buy an amazing house for the price of a old, dark, and small apartment in Spain.

Then I learned I have a health issue. One of the big ones. Important enough to make me wonder where I could get the best treatment.

And the answer was: Madrid.

It's not just that Madrid has very good healthcare and excellent private clinics and hospitals. It's the fact that I can speak to the doctors in Spanish. That makes a whole difference when you are dealing with delicate stuff.

Stop For A Moment

I realized I was trying to continue with my life as if nothing had happened. I need to stop and take care of what's important for me now. Healing, in every sense of the word. So I have put my dreams, expectations, relationships, and plans on hold. I got to the conclusion that I needed to focus on just feeling better and looking for a safe, stable place.

That conclusion also got me thinking. Miguel and I left Spain almost 10 years ago. We were full of dreams, fears, hopes, and naivety. I can still see us in my mind, with our two oversized suitcases, scared but also super excited.

But that guy does not exist anymore. I am not the same person I was back then, and there's no more "us", it's just "me". My priorities have changed. I can't pretend I am that same guy, innocent, young, overexcited. At 44, I am not getting any younger, or healthier. Maybe it's time for me to settle down and look for a more relaxed and balanced lifestyle.

Back In Madrid

I have been thinking non-stop about that for the last week. It all screams "life cycle change" to me (I should know, I've gone through quite a few). I have not only access to good healthcare in Madrid, and Spanish-speaking doctors. I also have friends here. My parents are just a couple of hours away by train, and the city itself is a safe, familiar place.

And I had forgotten just how beautiful Madrid is. Ok, ok, it may be a little bit gentrified, and some neighborhoods (Sol, Chueca, Lavapies, Latina) can be just too much if you're not a tourist. But it's also full of peaceful and jaw-dropping parks, streets and avenues. Everything is clean and modern, and -contrary to Sofia- I can walk on its streets and boulevards, completely absorbed by its beauty, without breaking an ankle (Sofia's streets are in a very bad state).

I'm gonna miss Sofia, though. Its climate, nature, the people there, my friends, those conversations with a glass of wine on a Tuesday night, how easy is life there, the banitzas... Perhaps Madrid is not the final destination, but simply a stop along the way.

Still, in a way, thinking on getting back gives me peace of mind. I am in dire need of feeling better, of feeling ok again. I don't think I can build anything else before I get that.

So I checked a couple of apartments yesterday. They are expensive as f**k. More than double the rent of my apartment in Sofia. But that's to be expected. The "coming back" shock was eventually bound to happen anyway, as Miguel always told me.

Remember The Future

And that makes me also wonder about my future. Definitely Madrid opens some options for me. I can become an autónomo again (oh my goodness... :) and contribute again to my social security and pension funds.

Am I thinking already like an old guy? Perhaps it's because of how I feel. Perhaps it's because I AM already an old man. Perhaps it's just a phase and I will be traveling through South-East Asia in my 50's. But something tells me I've left that part of my life behind.

Today, I am here. And that's enough for now.

So if you are going through some shit right now, stop and focus on yourself. Learn to love yourself again. Prioritize what's important today, right now. Heal. Take your time. Get off the rat race. Accept change. Accept things are no longer the same, and they will never be. Learn To Say No. It is OK to slow down. It is OK to say "I need time". It is OK to ask for help. It is OK to forgive yourself. I'm still working on all of that.

Take care.

Setting the KPIs for the members of your organization or startup can be a challenging task. It's easy to look for standard KPIs on Google or ask ChatGPT to define some for you, but it is difficult to come up with KPIs that matter and are relevant for your team. In this post, I share my experience setting KPIs that matter, KPIs that will ensure your team gets things done.

What Are KPIs And Why Do They Matter?

On a previous post, I discussed the importance of measuring the KPIs of your business from the first day. Today, we are talking about a different set of KPIs, the indicators that serve you to evaluate the performance of the members of your team.

When your startup or team grows to the point where are no longer 3-4 guys trying to do something new and exciting, but a team of people that need a proper managerial structure, you are reaching the point where you can no longer control everything that's going on in your business. Customer support, IT, finance, marketing... These are now separate areas of departments, and you need a manager in place in each one of them.

One of my biggest mistakes when I reached that stage was trusting the people that were working with me, and thinking that they will be able to do the same great job with a team of 7 people and 200 customers that when 40 employees are serving more than 1000 customers.

You need to be able to measure how the team is doing, and be sure that your managers are committed to keeping the same level of growth, quality customer support, and flawless product development practices. The survival of your business depends on it.

The Best Way Of Setting KPIs That Matter

Looking for "KPIs for XXXXX" on Google or asking ChatGPT to prepare them for you may not yield the best results. Why? Because those KPIs are not going to be tailored to...

• The tasks that your employee is doing
• The tools that your business is using
• The special needs of your business
• Etc

Two HR Analysts in two different companies may have completely different responsibilities and goals. Managers would require this employee to do different things, and the priorities would usually be dictated by the needs of the business at that specific moment. Same for developers, designers, marketing analysts, etc.

Simply put, when you are considering which KPIs to assign to one of your employees, the first question you need to ask yourself is "What do I want this person to do every day, week, month, year?". What you want is the peace of mind of knowing this person is taking care of the tasks that they need to do.

Ideally, you should measure these KPIs at least once a week. I used to dedicate my Mondays to evaluating the KPIs for the IT department.

What You Want To Include In Your KPIs

The type of KPIs you need for an employee will depend on the type of job that employee does in your company.

Ideally, KPIs should range from 0 to 100% and be linked to a monthly bonus or variable part of the employee's salary to ensure motivation for performance improvement. I prefer KPIs to start at 100%, with points deducted for any unmet targets, eventually decreasing the score towards zero if necessary.

In Companio, we follow a 80/20 distribution for salaries. The base salary is 80%, and the remaining 20% is linked to the KPIs.

It's important to be fair and transparent with your KPIs. They should be strict yet realistic and achievable. Employees should be fully informed about their specific KPIs, including how they are measured and applied.

Administrative Jobs

Some jobs are based on a set of tasks that need to be done on a recurrent basis. A perfect example is an HR Manager. You know this person needs to do a series of tasks every day, like:

• Checking open job positions and updating them on different HR platforms
• Screening CVs for new candidates
• Interviewing candidates
• Reviewing leave requests
• Reviewing Onboarding and Off-boarding processes for employees
• Reviewing the payment of payrolls for employees
• Reviewing the payments of payrolls to EOR partners for employees abroad

Your goal would be to find relevant, measurable and objective KPIs for this employee for each one of these tasks. Again, the goal would be different based on the needs of your business and your internal policies. You want to be sure, for example, that there are no pending leave requests for more than 2 days (so request for vacations, paid leaves, or sick leaves from your employees won't be left unanswered for a long time).

Then you need to set weights for those KPIs depending on how important, prioritary or critical this task is in the overall picture.

Example of KPIs for an administrative job

So let's set some KPIs for the tasks of our imaginary HR employee:

• Checking open job positions and updating them on different HR platforms [10%].
  • Number of non-deleted job positions (% of total): -25%
  • Number of non-posted job positions (% of total): -75%
• Screening CVs for new candidates [15%].
  • Number of unscreened CVs for more than 3 days (time is usually critical for hiring top talent) for each position: % of unscreened/position.
• Interviewing candidates [15%]
  • Number of non-scheduled interviews for more than 3 days after a candidate moves to the interview phase: -10%/each.
• Reviewing leave requests [10%]
  • Number of pending leave requests for more than 2 days: -5%/each.
• Reviewing Onboarding and Off-boarding processes for employees [10%]
  • Number of tasks pending for the onboarding or off boarding of employees that depend on the HR manager: -10%/each
  • Number of tasks pending for the onboarding or off boarding of employees that depend on the HR manager: -5%/each (Yes! You want the HR Manager to follow up on these tasks and "encourage" managers and other members of the team to complete their tasks).
• Reviewing the payment of payrolls for employees [40%]
  • Number of pending or unpaid payrolls after time's due: -25%/each.

As you can see, the tolerance level for pending or unfulfilled tasks can vary. For instance, leaving a single payroll unpaid for an employee might be much more critical for you than having several unattended leave requests.

Imagine the values for this week for our HR Manager are as follow:

• Checking open job positions and updating them on different HR platforms [10%].
  • Number of non-deleted job positions (% of total): there were 4 of 5 non-deleted job positions still published: -80% of 25% is -20%.
  • Number of non-posted job positions (% of total): there was 1 non-posted job position of a total of 3 open positions: -33.33% of 75% is -25%.
  • Total: -45% of 10% = -4.5%.
• Screening CVs for new candidates [15%].
  • Number of unscreened CVs for more than 3 days (time is usually critical for hiring the top talent) for each position: % of unscreened/position. There were 50 of 150 (33.33%) unscreened CVs for more than 3 days: -33.33% of 15% is -5% total.
• Interviewing candidates [15%]
  • Number of non-scheduled interviews for more than 3 days after a candidate moves to the interview phase: -10%/each. There were no nonscheduled interviews for more than 3 days: -0% total.
• Reviewing leave requests [10%]
  • Number of pending leave requests for more than 2 days: -5%/each. There were 6 pending leave requests for more than 2 days: that's 30% of 10% which is -3% total.
• Reviewing Onboarding and Off-boarding processes for employees [10%]
  • Number of tasks pending for the onboarding or off boarding of employees that depend on the HR manager: -10%/each. There were 5 of those tasks, so that accounts for -50% of 10%, total -5%.
  • Number of tasks pending for the onboarding or off boarding of employees that depend on the HR manager: -5%/each (Yes! You want the HR Manager to follow up on these tasks and "encourage" managers and other members of the team to complete their tasks). There were 5 of those tasks, so that's 25% of -10%, total -2.5%.
  • The total here is -7.5%.
• Reviewing the payment of payrolls for employees [40%]
  • Number of pending or unpaid payrolls after time's due: -25%/each. Let's imagine that there are 5 unpaid payrolls, so that's -125%, max -100%, of 20%, total -40%.

As you can see, this employee didn't have a stellar week. Their total KPIs are 100% - 4.5% -5% -3% -7.5% -40% = 40%.

The monthly KPIs for that employee will be the average of the KPIs from the 4-5 weeks of that month and will be applied to the variable part of their salary, bonus, etc.

Support Jobs

KPIs for support jobs are usually based on things such as response times, satisfaction levels, reviews, and number of interactions required to solve customer issues. Depending on your support channels (chat, ticket system, social media, email, etc), you may want to first check which values can be measured from the platforms your business is using (average response time? Customer's satisfaction? Ratings and reviews? Average solving time?...).

One crucial aspect of KPIs for customer support jobs is to design them with the expectation that your CS agents will resolve customer issues, not just respond to them. Initially, our KPIs focused on metrics like average response times. However, we soon realized that to keep our customers happy, our CS agents needed to not only respond quickly but also resolve their problems promptly.

Apart from that, typical KPIs you want to set up for your CS agents include:

• Average response time. Response times can be measured in days, hours, or even minutes, depending on your communication channels and the criticality of your services to your customers. A critical service offering support through chat should aim for response times of minutes or even seconds. In contrast, a less critical service with email support can afford to measure response times in hours or even days.
• Average solving time. This is probably more important than the previous one. You don't want your CS agents to just answer your customers, you want them to be proactive and solve their issues as soon as possible. As your number of customers grow, long solving times will be a bottleneck that can overwhelm your CS department.
• Rating: It’s essential to include a rating functionality in your communication channels. Even if you offer support via email, include a link where customers can rate the support they received (typically 1-5 stars). Keep it simple and avoid asking for too much information. Detailed satisfaction surveys can be sent later. For now, you need a quick score to gauge how well the employee is performing.
• Number of pending chats/tickets/emails.
• Number of unsolved issues (a support ticket or chat is not necessarily an issue from a customer, it can be a question about your services).

Depending on your business goals and needs, additional KPIs may be required. At Companio, our CS agents have KPIs related to completing the annual reports for our customers. These reports start at the beginning of the next fiscal year and must be completed by the end of June. By adding KPIs related to the number of annual reports in statuses requiring action, we ensure that CS agents will check them daily to move the reports to the next stage.

Technical Jobs

Some other jobs are not based on a set of recurrent tasks, but are based on the technical or professional skills of the employee. Development, Engineering, and Marketing positions usually fall into this category.

In this context, the employee may have recurring tasks, or you may want to ensure that the scheduled tasks for the week are completed on time. Most importantly, you want to ensure the quality of the employee's work.

To measure this quality, you need to establish a list of measurable criteria that define the employee's performance.

To do this effectively, start by preparing a document that outlines guidelines and best practices for the position. This document should clearly explain what your organization expects from the employee in their role.

For example, at Companio, we created a 'Coding Best Practices' document for our developers. It covers essential aspects such as proper error handling, testing, modularization, good formatting, input validation, and secure coding.

Using this document as a reference, you can develop a list of measurable points. It is crucial to ensure these points can be objectively measured and assigned a value that can be transparently communicated to the employee.

Example of KPIs for a developer

Here is an example of KPIs for a developer, based on a document outlining the best practices and key aspects to consider when building and releasing our software.

For instance, to evaluate 'Error handling and control flow logic,' refer to the guidelines specified in that document. The same applies to 'Modularization,' 'Input validation and sanitization,' and other relevant points.

As mentioned earlier, some of these points may be applicable to your organization, while others may not. You may also need to add completely different KPIs based on your specific goals and requirements.

• % Tasks completed in time [20%]. Every Monday, before scheduling the tasks for the week for each engineer, the IT Manager measures the % of the tasks that were completed the previous week.
• Code quality and best practices [20%].
  • Use of ES6 on backend and ES5 on frontend (this is because you may want to offer maximum support for older browsers). (0-10)
  • Good formatting and styling. (0-10)
  • Modularization. (0-10)
  • Documentation and comments in code. (0-10)
  • Error handling and control of flow logic. (0-10)
  • Avoidance of repeated calculations. (0-10)
  • Proper variable usage and constants declaration. (0-10)
• UI/UX Quality [20%]
  • Error handling and user-friendly messages. (0-10)
  • Internationalization and translation. (0-10)
  • Adherence to design guidelines. (0-10)
  • Basic tests and ensuring basic functionality. (0-10)
• Quality and Testing Coverage [20%]. Here again, in your document, you need to define what's a "critical", "major", or "minor" bug.
  • Critical bugs. Each: -30%
  • Major bugs: Each: -20%
  • Minor bugs: Each: -10%
• Security Compliance [20%].
  • Input validation and sanitization. (0-10)
  • Use of double references for security. (0-10)
  • Prevention of confidential information leaks. (0-10)
  • Separation of requests from behavior. (0-10)
  • Role based access control. (0-10)

You might think that measuring these aspects takes time, and you may be right. However, it not only allows you to evaluate your engineers' work but also serves as a quality control measure. Depending on your organization's needs, these KPIs could be reviewed by someone else, such as the QA Manager.

One effective method we use with our IT engineers is to integrate this process organically into the code review. Initially, we assign a value of 10 for each KPI, measured on a scale from 0 to 10. During the review, if we notice any deficiencies in an area, we quickly review the KPI document and adjust the corresponding value downward. Over time, your managers will become accustomed to this process, and it won't significantly impact their workload.

Creative Jobs

Creative positions, such as UI/UX designers, videographers, or copywriters, present a unique challenge. These employees often work on different projects with entirely different tasks. While some tasks may be recurring, they frequently engage in new and varied work.

Although it is difficult to establish a 'typical' set of KPIs for creatives, you can usually distill your business needs into a set of measurable indicators that apply regardless of the specific projects they are working on.

Some ideas include:

• Percentage of tasks completed in time (supposing you can assign some tasks on a weekly, biweekly or monthly basis to the employee).
• Pending modifications. For example, a designer may need to change some screens from your dashboard, or your copywriter may need to change some parts of your website.
• Amount of time to complete modifications. It's a good idea to set deadlines for tasks, but also quite useful to measure the performance of that employee. While reviewing this KPI for one of our designer, we realized this person was working just 10 hours per week, probably working for somebody else. You need to be able to measure this objectively.

What About Managers?

For managers, it's crucial to ensure their teams are performing well. The most effective way to do this is by linking their KPIs to the KPIs of their team. Therefore, I recommend setting a 'team performance' KPI with a weight of at least 50%.

Additionally, you can include specific tasks for the manager that, while not directly linked to the team, are also important.

Let's look at an example for a CS Manager. Using the previously defined KPIs for the CS agents, we can establish the following KPIs linked to their team's performance:

• Average response time of the whole team
• Average solving time of the whole team
• Etc...

Additionally, let's suppose this manager must also keep track of some important tasks:

• Check customers in onboarding and making sure they are progressing to an active status (from sign-ups to active account).
• Decrease and prevent churn by doing a series of tasks such as: reviewing the chat conversations and tickets of the team and ensuring a quality CS service, talking to churning customers to gather feedback to improve the service, and implementing actionable measures to correct issues.
• Training CS agents and organizing or suggesting workshops and courses for them.

Then, as an example, we can add the following KPIs that will have a weight of 50% of the total KPIs of the CS Manager:

• Average time for onboarding customers to progress to an active status [25%].
  • The maximum acceptable time frame is 30 days. Exceeding this period will result in a 0% KPI score in this area."
  • The optimal value would be 7 days.
  • Then we can easily build a formula (-100/23)*(x-30), where x is the average number of days customers stay in onboarding status.
  • Depending on the significance of this KPI for your organization, you could allow the result of the formula to go negative, thereby decreasing the overall KPI scores if the onboarding time exceeds acceptable limits.
• Churn rates could be measured similarly. [50%]
  • We aim for an optimal churn rate of 0.1% weekly, meaning a loss of 1 customer out of 1,000 each week, or 4 per month, which may be acceptable. Our maximum acceptable churn rate is 0.5%, equating to a loss of 20 customers out of 1,000 each month.
  • The formula would then be -250*(x - 0.5).
  • Note how churn takes 50% in this example as it is usually one of the most important KPIs. You may allow the results of the formula to go negative.
• Number of workshops, courses and training session per week.
  • You may want your CS agents to participate in a training session or workshop regularly. This could be an external course or an internal training session conducted by an employee from another department.
  • One per week can be enough.
  • So the KPI will simply be 100% if the workshop or training session was celebrated, and 0% otherwise. You may want to check that CS Agents are attending too, and even link the attendance to their individual KPIs.

What You DON'T Want To Include In Your KPIs

Identifying effective KPIs took us a considerable amount of time. Similar to vanity metrics, it's easy to establish KPIs and assume they will guarantee your teams' performance and maintain the desired quality level.

However, if not chosen carefully, KPIs can be not only irrelevant but also lead to employees wasting time on reporting and tracking these values.

Subjective KPIs

Avoid using any KPI that cannot be measured objectively with data. In other words, if two managers might derive different values for the same KPI of an employee on their team, it’s best not to use that KPI.

For example, a 'Customer satisfaction' KPI that doesn't rely on customer reviews and ratings is not ideal. While you might say 'we are getting praise on social media,' this is not measurable. Instead, focus on measurable metrics like 'number of positive reviews on Google My Business' or 'number of unpaid endorsing comments or posts on social media from our customers.'

Feedback from managers and opinions

NEVER include manager feedback or subjective opinions about the quality of an employee's work in your KPIs. We made this mistake initially and learned the hard way that it doesn't work. Human beings are inherently subjective.

Some managers may hesitate to give 'bad ratings' to employees, while others may feel compelled to give high ratings due to personal reasons (e.g., the employee is going through an illness, or has helped them in the past), even if the employee's performance is subpar. Additionally, emotions or feelings of friendship towards the employee can skew their perception of the employee's job performance.

Buzzwords

When defining your KPIs, avoid buzzwords like 'Team player' or 'Good communicator.' While these are valuable qualities, they are subjective and rely on personal opinions, making them unreliable as KPIs. If someone is an exceptionally good communicator and team player, it will be noticed by you or their manager. You can then use other methods, such as promotions, to reward those qualities.

Use The Right Tools

It's important to use the right tools to measure KPIs effectively. First, you need a simple method for managers to access and collect the data needed to review their team's KPI values.

At Companio, we use ClickUp to create a series of dashboards that aggregate information from various sources, including our database, chat platform, bug report and early alert systems, and internal reports. With this information, we can measure relevant metrics such as average response times per employee, platform uptime, and crash rates.

Once the data is collected, we use spreadsheets (Google Sheets in our case) where managers can easily input these values on a daily or weekly basis. The spreadsheet then automatically calculates the final KPI values.

That way, you are making it easy to measure the KPIs of your organization with a minimum investment of time from all parties involved.

Conclusion

Setting KPIs this way takes considerably more time than simply searching for 'KPIs for HR Analyst' on Google or asking ChatGPT to do it for you. However, truly understanding the employee's tasks and what you want them to achieve will provide long-term peace of mind.

It's also essential to review KPIs weekly. Have your managers set up 1:1 meetings with their team members to evaluate their work and provide feedback during these sessions.

In my experience, defining KPIs thoughtfully and reviewing them weekly can provide invaluable peace of mind for founders and C-levels.

What's love? Phylosophers, poets, psychologists, musicians, scholars and marketers have been trying to clearly define it for centuries. But the term keeps on eluding a univocal definition.

Perhaps it is because we try to define it with rational terms, and love is an emotion that refuses any logical categorization. But it's one of the few concepts the world spins around (the other two being money and death).

The triangle of love

One of the most famous (and widely used in psychology) definitions of love, or different types of love, comes from Sternberg. Sternberg defines three points in a triangle: commitment, intimacy, and passion.

Depending on which of these points are present in the relationship, and which are absent, he defines eight types of love. The "Consummate love", the one where all intimacy, passion, and commitment are present, is considered the "true" love. Or the one that will last anyway.

I have been thinking about my relationship during the last years, trying to analyze what could have gone wrong. What points of the triangle were eroded, what was missing.

Apart from the stress of running a business together, and many other things that may affect a relationship there was our travels. At a certain point, it was not ok for one of us to keep on traveling. But we never talked about it. Did we assume the other one had different goals, until our paths started to diverge due to lack of commitment?

Has love its own entity? Or it is just a point of view? Can two people experience love differently? Could our love have been "consummate" for me, and just "romantic love" or even "liking/friendship" for him?

Does that mean then that love is nothing but a point of view, a spike of chemicals running wild through your body? That would indicate that love does not really exist. But how can something that does not exist hurt so much?

Keep on talking

If you are a couple, you need to keep the communication channels open. This is easier said than done. Sometimes we avoid talking about things that are uncomfortable or we give up because we think the other one won't understand, or would get angry. We are scared of conflict, of feeling bad or hurting our partner.

But these uncomfortable conversations are necessary if you want to keep the relationship alive. Keep on talking, even if it's difficult, or it hurts. And listen too. Listen to what your partner wants and needs.

Sometimes your positions would look completely opposite, and perhaps they are. But most of the times, it is about overcoming our fears. You need to put your own goals and your partner's on a scale, and seeing if a compromise is possible. There may or may not be a solution, but talking about it (as opposed to assuming) is essential.

This is especially true if you are traveling together. Talk about your travels. Are you feeling comfortable? Are you still excited? Or do you miss a more stable life, your friends, family? What are you or your partner sacrificing in order to carry on with that lifestyle?

Different types of love... Are possible

I was talking to a friend the other day that has an open relationship. Both of them have lovers and fuck with other people. My friend talked about that in such a direct and uninhibited way that it made me wonder if I have become a dinosaur.

It's not that I have something against an open relationship. But when I was listening, I couldn't help but thinking I was receiving investment advice -i.e: don't put all your eggs in the same basket, this one is for security and this one is for excitement-, as opposed to being told what love was.

Nothing wrong with that, and I'm not saying that what I call "love" is the love, or the right way of loving. There's no such thing. And I'm glad seeing my friend so happy, and enjoying life. Another friend has a poly-amorous relationship, and a quite successful one. That warms my heart, if only because it gives me a little hope back.

Me, I still think I'd be happy with just that one person that makes me smile, turns me on, and makes me want to grow older with. Perhaps I'm just an old-fashioned guy.

Reason and emotion

I know all my attempts to rationalize love or to try to understand why it ended are doomed. Love is an emotion.

Maybe what I had was not perfect. It may not tick all of Sternberg's checks. But it was love. At least for me. And I still can't accept it's gone. Fuck the stoics, fuck meditation, fuck Bhuddism.

If love is not an entity, if it does not exist, how much time will it still stay with me? Do I want it to disappear, or is it the only thing I've got left?

It's been a long time since my last post. A lot has happened since then. My life has turned completely upside down, and I have decided to start writing again. Writing, or composing (anything creative really) has always been my way of dealing with things.

So What's Going On?

My marriage came to an end a month ago. The last three years had been difficult for us. The business was demanding more and more time from both of us, and I started to suffer from depression and anxiety. Of course, there were also other considerations. Traveling was not something that my husband wanted to continue on doing, also due to other personal circumstances. I was so consumed by my own mental health issues that I didn't do a good job being there and talking about our goals and where we wanted to be next.

Working together in such a stressful scenario didn't help at all, of course. We decided to give us a couple of weeks apart to think about our marriage and what we wanted to do. I took some time off and traveled to Bulgaria, the last place where I remember being happy. He embarked in a cool project called "Dancing Latitudes", organizing a trip for digital nomads and entrepreneurs from Lisbon to Tallinn.

Those two weeks served me to understand that I loved him and I wanted to be with him, no matter what. Unfortunately, his conclusion was the exact opposite, and so, after thirteen years together, our paths split.

The Ordeal

That was a complete shock for me. I loved him with all my heart (and I still do). He was THE person. I imagined us growing old together, buying a house, selling the business one day, and spending the rest of our lives just enjoying each other's company.

We are in good terms (there was no drama or anything), but I knew I could not continue on living with him for a long time, it was too much for my sanity. We were there, together, like nothing had happened. We would have breakfast together, sometimes go for a walk together. I so desperately wanted to embrace him and tell him how much I loved him, that everything was going to be alright, and ... Well, beg him to be together again.

So I came back to Bulgaria. I was in "Fight or flight" mode, and I wasn't very lucky when I landed in Sofia. It was Sofia's worst June heat wave on record. It was HOT. I got into an old apartment that had a very old bad bed, no mosquito screens, and no AC. I am allergic to mosquitos, so having the windows open was not an option. As a result, I wasn't able to sleep at all, and I had to ask my friends here to let me sleep in their apartment until I was able to find a new place.

I remember it now as a nightmare. I could not even feel secure and comfortable to process what was happening to me.

A Place To Mourn

Fortunately, I was able to find a new apartment in the center, more modern, and even cheaper than the previous one. There I was able to finally get a good night of sleep.

I have bought some stuff from Ikea and Jysk, and I am waiting for my stuff to arrive from Lisbon. I've always been proud of not having any material needs or attachment to physical belongings. However, when we landed in Lisbon, I committed to stop traveling (in an attempt to save my marriage), and so I bought a digital piano to be able to play and compose again, and my father made a beautiful studio desk for the piano. I simply could not let that stuff there.

Bringing it here was also a stressful experience. There are no many couriers that will transport a desk and a huge digital piano from one point of Europe to the other, and it wasn't cheap. Fortunately, it seems I'll have everything here in a couple of days. Fingers crossed.

Now that I am no longer in survival mode, and I have an apartment where I can be comfortable, the bottom of Maslow's pyramid is covered, and I can finally focus on mourning.

The Business

Fortunately, I have been able to delegate some of my responsibilities in other members of my team. Until very recently, I've been the full-time CEO and CTO of Companio, apart from acting as a developer for the challenging stuff (AI and automation). That's a lot to handle if you are a happy and fulfilled person, but trying to keep up that pace while going through a marriage break-up and moving to a new country is simply too much.

I promoted the most senior engineer of my team to IT Manager. He will be taking care of the day-to-day operations of the IT department. He is a great engineer, and has proven that he will be an amazing CTO. He is smart, resourceful and has the business acumen that engineers typically lack. I am just so grateful that he accepted this position with such energy and enthusiasm.

We also hired a VA to take care of all that small administrative tasks that, together, take a lot of your time.

That will allow me to focus on my CEO duties. And more immediately, be able to stop when I feel so overwhelmed I cannot even breathe.

I am happy I was able to do these changes, because I could not have been able to deal with all that I'm going through while working as a full-time CEO, CTO and developer for Companio. Now I wonder why I didn't do these changes before, and if it would have changed something.

Impact On My Mental Health

For the last three years, I embarked on an hectic race to "fix things". I knew our business was killing our marriage (not to mention my mental health).

And so I tried frantically to disengage us from the company, working extra to prepare all kinds of financial reports, finding M&A brokers, generating reports, meeting potential stakeholders, optimizing processes to make sure the business was not tied to the founders... I devoted all my energy to that, it became an obsession for me. "I can fix this", I used to repeat to myself.

It felt like driving a train at full speed, trying to reach the destination before the train breaks down in pieces, and then hearing a screeching sound, looking back and seeing the train shattered in pieces, and being alone, looking back from the engine room of the driver's carriage...

I can't stop thinking what I did wrong, or what I could have done better. Perhaps if I hadn't done this or that, or if I had said this or that, things would have been different. Not knowing that is killing me.

Feeling Like A Ghost

Today I feel like a ghost. I wake up, make up breakfast, and eat it. I work. I go to the gym. I even have friends here and have dinner with them or a beer from time to time. They are helping me a lot. But I still feel like a ghost.

I feel empty. Devoid of a purpose. I don't know why I keep on doing these things, why I wake up every day and keep on with my life. I guess I do it because there's no other alternative. But all these things, the world around me, has no meaning for me anymore. I jumped off the train.

I still love him. I've been told that I just need time and I will stop loving him with time. But a part of me completely rejects the idea of not loving him, and it is utterly scared of the mere idea of not loving him anymore.

That part still hopes that one day, by means of a miracle, he'll miss me, and we will be together and happy again, like we used to. And I feel like that hope is kind of dangerous, but in a way it keeps me alive.

Conclusion

I'd like to finish this post with a bright conclusion. A ray of hope in the darkness. Something that would hint at a happier future.

But I only see darkness right now. I just miss him so much, and I know I need to accept what is happening and start over, but I simply can't. Having friends here helps. Talking to my family helps too (even if they don't necessarily know how to help me). Meditation and mindfulness have managed to bring some stability and steadiness to my mind, but can't help me calm down my broken heart. Stoicism has helped me look at my emotions as simply that, emotions that will pass, and understand that I can only control how I react to what's happening to me. But that alone does not make the pain go away either.

Maybe I just need time...

Writing has always been a great therapy for me, so I will try to write more regularly.

I've been featured in the Spanish media a lot lately. The e-Residency Program of Estonia is making headlines there, as Spain consistently tops the rankings in both e-Residency applications and company incorporations in the Baltic country.

The New Spanish Startup Legislation

In both a recent article on "20 Minutes" (the most widely read online newspaper in Spain) and the COPE (a very popular radio station), I was asked about the Startup Legislation.

I remember skimming through the new Startup Legislation when it was launched in Jan 1, 2023. I was fully aware that with the prevailing business landscape and the lack of political resolve to drive meaningful transformation in the country's system, this law would likely yield minimal impact, and I was right. There were hardly any changes there that would significantly improve the Spanish startup journey or help Spanish entrepreneurs in general.

What I failed to realize was some changes that were aimed at something completely different: squeezing foreign entrepreneurs conducting business in the country through taxes.

Specifically, the new law specifies that directors of a foreign company managing their business from Spain may be considered by the Spanish tax office as a branch of the company with physical premises in the country (?!?!). There is no clear indication of exactly under which conditions (time, residence status, etc) that may happen, which obviously creates a scenario of uncertainty for foreign entrepreneurs who wish to visit the country.

If Spain wanted to attract talent and business with this new legislation... well, good job guys!

Imagine a German entrepreneur who, lured by Spain's "Startup Nation" charm, decides to work from the Canary Islands for just one week, only to find the local tax office deeming her business as Spanish and demanding taxes. If this scenario strikes you as absurd as it does to me, let's dive deeper into the matter.

Going Backwards

This not only defies all rationality but also lacks any legal foundation within EU legislation or the tax treaties established among European nations.

Even more concerning is that this legislation positions Spain as a regressive nation that, failing to grasp the evolving dynamics of our global society, the expanding geographical autonomy, the potential of technology, and the innovative global paradigms for digital business, is attempting to enact laws counter to the very essence of progress.

It's no surprise then that the adoption of remote work in Spain is among the lowest in the EU, three times less than in the Netherlands or Ireland, and the lowest among its neighbors (France and Portugal). This is all related to our work culture.

Nomad VISAs: Squeezing digital nomads

Let's cut to the chase. All these Digital Nomad VISA schemes cropping up in nearly every corner share a simple agenda: snagging taxes from digital nomads.

Numerous countries have taken note of the thriving nomadic and location-independent entrepreneur trend as these individuals cross their borders. However, their understanding of "work" remains rooted in the 20th-century concept of a fixed "place of work," equating it with a physical location where tasks are completed. Consequently, they mistakenly assume that these individuals are operating within their jurisdictions without fulfilling tax obligations, a notion they view as not just wrong, but unequivocally unjust.

This intriguing scenario prompts the following question: If I'm a location-independent entrepreneur temporarily residing in the Canary Islands for a week, conducting online work with my laptop, can it be considered as working in or conducting business in Spain?

Where Does Remote Work Happen?

To anyone well-versed in the realms of remote work and online businesses, the resounding answer is a resolute NO. Here's why:

• The work has no inherent ties to Spanish customers, providers, or suppliers; any connection is purely coincidental.
• The physical location is immaterial. This person's not reliant on Spanish infrastructure beyond the Wi-Fi of a café or co-working space. Her work doesn't occur within a factory, warehouse, or office but thrives in the digital realm, with servers possibly situated in the US and team members scattered across Germany, France, and Brazil.
• She's not setting up long-term residence in the country, merely passing through. She's a temporary visitor, not a permanent resident.
• The kicker? She could be anywhere else, whether Thailand, Argentina, the Philippines, or Germany, and it would make no difference whatsoever (well, perhaps a slightly more unstable internet connection in the Philippines).

If this freelancer hops from Argentina to Bulgaria, with a Madrid layover, spending a few hours working at the airport, should Madrid be deemed her place of work? Should Spain lay claim to taxing her or her business?

I think we all agree that this isn't the case. But what if she's a digital nomad, staying in Spain for one day? And three days, or even a week?

Embracing the Future of Work and the Global, Digital World

You cannot solve a problem with the same mind that created it.
- Albert Einstein

Governments and public institutions have historically moved at a snail's pace in response to technological and social transformations. The COVID-19 pandemic caught us off-guard, thrusting us into the 'new normal,' which prominently features remote work. However, merely allowing people to work from home isn't enough. Remote work has existed long before the pandemic, yet only recently has it entered mainstream culture. But to truly support this evolving work landscape, we need comprehensive legislative changes, and we need them now.

Work is no longer confined to factories, warehouses, or office cubicles. The 9-to-5 grind has given way to a world where people work from their homes, cafes, airports, hotel rooms, and Airbnbs. Flexible hours have become the norm, enabling a balance between work and family life. Work happens anytime, anywhere, requiring nothing more than a laptop.

In this context, the physical location of employees no longer correlates with their place of work. Just as we've evolved our understanding of digital asset ownership (recognizing that copying is not equivalent to stealing), the 21st century demands new rules for determining the location of remote work.

Rethinking the Location of Work

So, where does the work of remote employees, digital nomads, freelancers, and online entrepreneurs take place? One might suggest it happens in the countries where the platforms they use are based. However, this oversimplification doesn't hold in a world where professionals use diverse platforms from various providers (Google, Slack, Zoom, Microsoft), alongside their own infrastructure, which may or may not be located where their business is registered.

Hence, the most sensible solution is to consider that the activity of these professionals occurs in the country of their business's registration or nowhere at all. The legal implications of this shift are substantial. No country should demand remote workers to obtain a 'VISA' to perform their jobs or threaten them with fines (can you envision Thai police raiding every Starbucks in Chiang Mai and Phuket?). Above all, countries like Spain should reevaluate outdated laws, such as the Startup Legislation, and embrace the inevitable change that's already upon us, rather than resisting it.