‘Experiences are more valuable than things’ – Joanna Delia

People & Skin Founder-CEO Joanna Delia stressed the value of experience over objects, especially after being deprived of valued experiences over the past couple of years.

MaltaCEOs.mt reached out to Dr Delia who expressed her excitement at the fact that face-to-face events are on the rise this year describing this as “heart-warming” and “an obvious act of revenge on the last few years when gatherings of the kind were not allowed.”

She also acknowledged noticing a change in herself and appreciating “decluttering over buying more things,” something which she will also be applying in her gift-buying this year saying that “experiences are better than things” and that it is “better to gift theatre or dance performance tickets.”

As the year draws to a close, Dr Delia also shares her reflections on 2022 and her hopes for 2023. This past year has had its challenges and it looks like the next one will do so too as “the world is bracing itself for a recession.”

However, approached in the right way, businesses can certainly make it through, the Founder-CEO believes, as “this is not the first time that Malta has faced a recession.” Indeed, the country has been quite good at overcoming such situations over the years and has managed to “sail through the past few times this happened”, which is why she feels that the focus should be on people, not money.

In this regard, she remarked that businesses must take care of their members of staff, especially the ones who have been a key part of the company’s success. “An effort to retain them should come before an assumption of a profit margin that continues to increase,” she affirmed.

Furthermore, the Founder-CEO believes consumers are also making “a shift of expenditure” and are now spending more money on “services like catering and entertainment rather than products” which, for businesses, means adapting quickly, and Dr Delia feels that “Malta has been quick to adapt to and up the standards on such services.”

Speaking of her own field, Dr Delia stated the importance for people to educate themselves and expressed her satisfaction at the fact that “the general public is understanding that using science to affect self-improvement and gain confidence, especially after physical trauma or chronic disease is understandable and safe in the right professional hands.”

The medical aesthetic department can be quite tricky since, “despite very clear EU standards, stating that only licensed medical doctors can perform such treatments, a lack of enforcement by the health standards authority has seen a number of illegal injectors brashly advertising their wares on social media” which can end up hindering businesses in the long run.

Looking towards 2023, she expressed her hope that “the authorities invest the effort required to curb these potentially very dangerous situations,” hence allowing businesses to thrive.

Speaking of challenges that businesses encounter as a result of changing market needs, she added that “versatility and creative plasticity are key in times like this” moving on to speak of the necessity for more companies to be actively sustainable in their operations.

“A shift to less product consumption is good for the planet, while long haul transport, which has become so much more expensive should be decreased to a bare minimum,” she noted.

Necessity is the mother of invention, and in this regard, Dr Delia affirmed that “challenges like these are spurs for innovation and businesses who are struggling should learn from this, take more environmentally conscious decisions and diversify.”

Businesses also need to understand that “digital transformation is more sustainable and improves efficiency in every sector. At People&Skin, for instance, we are finally becoming completely paperless – to streamline interactions and save time while enhancing the quality of our service offer,” Dr Delia explained.

“The success of the recent international med-tech conference in Malta is a sure sign that digital progress in the coming years will be a priority, and Saviour for many enterprises,” she stated.

2023 will be a year for companies to understand the importance of sustainability and start implementing some important changes, the Founder-CEO stressed. “I believe that next year and hopefully in all years to come, not one single business decision will be made without taking it into consideration. It might just be a tad of greenwashing initially, but consumers everywhere are starting to make big decisions with curbing climate change as their main priority.”

“I hope that decisions made in hard times take all this into consideration, and that empathy and awareness are stronger than greed. A business’s success is not only measured in profits, but also in reputation, respectability, and legacy,” Dr Delia concluded.