Targets and “captains” of industry
Correspondence between two shrewd observers of the system of production, looking back at modernity and its challenges
Business targets and “captains” of industry. Leaders and leadership. Production organisation lent life by entrepreneurs and managers dedicated to a purpose. Even in the perilous navigation of today. Important topics, for today and for tomorrow. Topics that meet, on nearly a daily basis, with the complexity of the present and uncertainty with respect to the future. Paolo Iacci and Luca Solari – the first, Chairman of ECA Italia and AIDP Promotion; the second, full professor at the University of Milan and founder of OrgTech – reflect on these areas, looking at the evolution of the business system, but through a traditional medium for exchanging ideas: the letter. That’s how Purpose e leadership ibrida. Carteggio su organizzazioni, persone e società (Purpose and Hybrid Leadership: Correspondence on Organisations, People and Society) came to be: the book has a modest page count but hits saturation point in terms of ideas and provocative statements in the areas indicated by the subtitle: in the debate on organisations, people and social mechanisms.
The – literal – correspondence began on 25 April 2019 with a letter from Iacci about ‘Leadership and Deponency’ and ends on 21 May 2002 with one from Solari that reflects on ‘hybrid leadership’. Between them come months of thinking over the change that has occurred over the years that indicates the need for investment in technology, but also new processes, skills and more wide-ranging managerial techniques. The observation around which Iacci and Solari work is that we are faced with a new and more radical demand for well-being from people to whom businesses are still unable to provide a sufficiently comprehensive response, with the Great Resignation representing merely the tip of the iceberg. In other words, the culture of good business also has to revisit the subject of corporate purpose (i.e. why the company was founded) and sustainability as corporate raison d’être. These issues are also connected to a new model of leadership, in civil society as in organisations. Leaders capable of being plural, hybrid, inclusive and an expression of all people, able to adapt to structures and organisations of production that no longer have even the physical characteristics that they once did (at a distance not of centuries, but of a few years).
Iacci and Solari’s book is therefore a sort of journey into a changing modernity. A journey to retrace attentively, always winning and never trivial. There to be read.
Purpose e leadership ibrida. Carteggio su organizzazioni, persone e società (Purpose and Hybrid Leadership: Correspondence on Organisations, People and Society)
Paolo Iacci, Luca Solari
Franco Angeli, 2022
Correspondence between two shrewd observers of the system of production, looking back at modernity and its challenges
Business targets and “captains” of industry. Leaders and leadership. Production organisation lent life by entrepreneurs and managers dedicated to a purpose. Even in the perilous navigation of today. Important topics, for today and for tomorrow. Topics that meet, on nearly a daily basis, with the complexity of the present and uncertainty with respect to the future. Paolo Iacci and Luca Solari – the first, Chairman of ECA Italia and AIDP Promotion; the second, full professor at the University of Milan and founder of OrgTech – reflect on these areas, looking at the evolution of the business system, but through a traditional medium for exchanging ideas: the letter. That’s how Purpose e leadership ibrida. Carteggio su organizzazioni, persone e società (Purpose and Hybrid Leadership: Correspondence on Organisations, People and Society) came to be: the book has a modest page count but hits saturation point in terms of ideas and provocative statements in the areas indicated by the subtitle: in the debate on organisations, people and social mechanisms.
The – literal – correspondence began on 25 April 2019 with a letter from Iacci about ‘Leadership and Deponency’ and ends on 21 May 2002 with one from Solari that reflects on ‘hybrid leadership’. Between them come months of thinking over the change that has occurred over the years that indicates the need for investment in technology, but also new processes, skills and more wide-ranging managerial techniques. The observation around which Iacci and Solari work is that we are faced with a new and more radical demand for well-being from people to whom businesses are still unable to provide a sufficiently comprehensive response, with the Great Resignation representing merely the tip of the iceberg. In other words, the culture of good business also has to revisit the subject of corporate purpose (i.e. why the company was founded) and sustainability as corporate raison d’être. These issues are also connected to a new model of leadership, in civil society as in organisations. Leaders capable of being plural, hybrid, inclusive and an expression of all people, able to adapt to structures and organisations of production that no longer have even the physical characteristics that they once did (at a distance not of centuries, but of a few years).
Iacci and Solari’s book is therefore a sort of journey into a changing modernity. A journey to retrace attentively, always winning and never trivial. There to be read.
Purpose e leadership ibrida. Carteggio su organizzazioni, persone e società (Purpose and Hybrid Leadership: Correspondence on Organisations, People and Society)
Paolo Iacci, Luca Solari
Franco Angeli, 2022