Timişoara, July 14th 2008 - The design studio X3 Studios launches press.x3studios.com – an online pressroom specifically created to facilitate communication between the company and media representatives.
Nowadays the most difficult thing to achieve is to be understood. Regardless of the industry or field we’re talking about, the background noise is so loud that most of our efforts are directed towards being heard. And when that miracle happens and the world actually listens, we usually lose ourselves. We got so used to shouting into the crowd, yelling out opinions and impressions, without being responsible for them (with all the other chaotic noise, who cares about one more voice).
Maybe that’s the reason why we, as a company, didn’t speak up in some situations others might have. We didn’t want to be part of a crowd too busy hearing only themselves and continuously arguing about their own purpose in life. But we forgot one thing: if we don’t speak out for ourselves, others will. Of course, that does have its advantages, but in the end, your voice should be the one that matters, not the interpretation by others.
And that’s how this blog was born. Its main and foremost purpose is to offer all relevant information about X3 Studios, about who we are and how we think, for all who wish to know us. Not everybody will agree with us at all times - and I really hope you don’t; however, this blog will represent X3 Studios 100% (except Sorin’s daily jokes that would need a whole new approach)
Today, June 11, we launched the official X3 Studios blog in English! We translated most of the posts from the past 6 months for your reading pleasure. In the name of the entire team, I welcome you and have fun!
A process that we started a few months ago is maturing bit by bit - and the first signs are starting to show. I shall return with more details! But for the moment, stay close ;).
After Epica (Calin), Charlotte (Andreea) and Bumblebee (Catalin), it was time for Sorin to receive his car, named Rudolph (don’t ask). And to blow the horn a bit: all these cars are part of the benefits program offered by X3, and they will eventually become private property of each of the guys. . And here are the pictures from the event.
With a bit of delay, here is the second part of the article…
2005
I think this year is the most important one so far in the entire X3 history (short history, to be honest). The beginning of the year was marked by some new arrivals in the design team, Sorin being one of them. And slowly but surely something happened that I hoped would avoid us as a team: cliques - I believe it’s the right term to be used here. We had enough work to keep us going without much pressure, but it wasn’t enough to keep everybody occupied at all times - one of the reasons some discussions emerged, I think.
For almost 2 months now I keep trying to write this article. It’s a lot harder than it seems, trust me. From the very beginning I knew I wanted to talked about X3 and the history of this company - which means the last 6 years of my life (being a true workaholic, there wasn’t much else happening during these years).
I tried to be objective and analyze the company based on easy to follow and measure economic criteria. But that didn’t work - not because I couldn’t read some reports, but because that doesn’t say anything about who we really are, who we were or who we want to become. So, I’ll just be honest and down-right subjective, if I may ;).
On November 23, 2007 the first “meet the thinkers” conference, a concept initiated by the guys at Publica, ctook place in Bucharest with Jonas Ridderstråle and Kjell Nordström as speakers. I had the chance to be present at this event and it was truly an experience worth the effort (financially and trip-wise).
The introductory speech of Andrei Plesu managed to warm up the crowd, who then enjoyed 2 sessions of over 3 hours presented by the 2 gurus. Together with the 500+ audience, I was pleasantly surprised by the rhythm and dynamics of the sessions, the large amount of new information they managed to communicate in an informal, easy to follow way. The dialog between the two speakers and the audience made the time really fly.One idea that really stuck with me, probably because I was faced with it in different forms in the past, which deserves to be noted and applied on any size of organizational structure, is:
The easiest way to determine people to share their values is to hire those people who already behave this way. As a consequence, we’ll see more and more organizations that will recruit people with the right attitude from the company’s point of view, and then train them in accordance with the applicants’ aptitudes.
Karaoke Capitalism, 2003
