How long have you been with Telefónica and what is your assessment of your time here?
23 years. I think some of the company’s interns are the same age: maybe that’s why I feel a bit like them now, almost a newcomer, a reborn. I have experienced a thousand telephone calls, all of them fascinating, different, full of ideas and admirable professionals. I have never ceased to be amazed by our ability to reinvent ourselves, to anticipate, to dream of technology. One aspect that has always amazed me about Telefónica, and which continues to amaze me, is our culture of thinking big and going together as one. Regardless of responsibility or position. We are a kind of big family.
Is there any project at Telefónica that you feel particularly satisfied with or proud of?
I would say that all of them touched my heart and guts in some way. As I don’t like to sound like a grandfather onion, I would like to tell you about my latest adventure: we are accelerating a specialist approach to digital transformation in the industry, understanding the particularities of the sector. And this implies a big change, both in terms of proposal and offer, as well as in terms of organisation, much more transversal and efficient, analysing what we need to learn (and learn it) and, in short, reaching our customers with real consultative value.
What do you think Telefónica has contributed to society?
In general terms, prosperity. It used to be that towns would sit at a crossroads and need a bridge by a river or a port. Now they need other roads that are virtual, telecommunications in the broadest sense. And this is where Telefónica is. Spanish digital infrastructures are modern and have evolved (and are at the forefront in Europe) because our customers have always trusted us to build them. As you can see, it is reciprocal. And we have a relevant mission in this sense: that society communicates and progresses.
Where do you see Telefónica in the future?
I am very optimistic, although the challenge is enormous. We telecoms operators will soon be “something else” and we are just now discovering it. We had the automation revolution in the 80s and 90s, broadband and mobile in the first decades of the 21st century and now I see a hybrid future, with data exploited and guarded by us, as service or platform integrators. But people are not interested in all this, it’s more than 5G or 6G, it’s about showing them that we will be essential in their digitisation.
Could you live without a mobile phone?
Of course you could! It’s just a tool and if it didn’t exist… then there would be another one. But never without communication.
Help us solve one of humanity’s great enigmas: the potato omelette… With onion or without onion?
With onion, of course. We can’t live life without its condiments.
Nominate another colleague to appear in this section
Mercedes Núñez Sánchez.
