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The proud “Manifesto of Machining” and international success for brands and industrial design

Industrial pride above all else. Or better, “pride in machining” when it comes to the Federmeccanica manifesto on a new strategy for manufacturing, which the federation presented last Thursday in Rome at the event “Uniti per il rilancio dell’industria” (Together to revitalise industry), which saw the involvement of business leaders from more than sixty area branches of Confindustria (including industrial districts, value chains, and the most dynamic companies), all working to send a strong message to government and to politicians (that, without investment, Italy is doomed and that what is needed is new industrial policies that promote innovation and enable businesses to face the challenges of “Industry 4.0”, i.e. the fourth industrial revolution), while at the same time reiterating the capabilities of the country’s business leaders and their commitment to recovery. But looking at the businesses that produce goods and export them, we could also speak of pride in chemicals, in food and agriculture, in home automation, and in pharmaceuticals, or pride in rubber and cement, in wood and textiles, in cars, motorcycles and bicycles, and so on and so forth throughout all of the segments of manufacturing that, despite the crisis, are holding up Italy’s economy and earning points in competitiveness, innovation, growth and the creation of jobs. On its own, the machining sector is worth 8% of GDP and accounts for 45.9% of all of the value added by manufacturing, although it is also struggling under the weight of the drop in production capacity, down 32.6% since 2007, prior to the crisis (largely due to the stagnation of the domestic market). In its various forms, machining represents the most dynamic part of Italian exports, even outperforming the traditional cornerstones of Italy’s production, namely interior design, clothing, and food and agriculture. In short, Italy the “machining breadbasket” to recall the evocative phrase coined way back in the early 1950s by Vittorio Valletta, then the chairman of Fiat, when it was can manufacturing that was the pillar of industrial and social development for the entire nation.

A tradition of machining and an openness to the future, if we think that a good share of the modules of the International Space Station – where we now find the Italian female astronaut, Samantha Cristoforetti – were made right here in Italy, a fact that well represents Italy’s engineering excellence and the role it plays in the economy as a whole according to Carlo Andrea Finotto, writing in the 25 November edition of Il Sole24Ore.

There is another Italian success story, one that sounds comforting in these difficult times for Italy’s economy, that also depends in large part on the sophisticated growth of this culture of engineering (in the form of innovation, research, and increasingly advanced automation). As reported in Il Sole24Ore on 26 November, Italy leads the way in European patents and innovation is more vibrant than it ever has been. The news is that, in 2014, Italy retained its second place in the international top 20 in filings for industrial design patents at 10.15% of all patent filings worldwide, behind Germany (at 22.7%), but well in front of the United Kingdom (at 6.96), France and Spain, and the country is in a solid fourth place in terms of “brands”, behind Germany, the U.S., and the U.K. Innovation is happening, and a lot of it. We’re filing patents. We’re promoting quality and building brands. We’re competing, and not just in large-scale enterprise, but in small and medium enterprise, too, and in the industrial districts, which are being reborn thanks to unique synergies between their strong ties to areas with extraordinary capacities for manufacturing and their ability to expand internationally in specialist, high-value niches (as reported by Paola Dubini, a professor at Bocconi, in the “Nova” insert of Il Sole24Ore on 26 November). Too bad the public sector still invests far too little in research and innovation, given that, in 2011 (the most recent year for which data is available), the only sector that posted growth in research and development spending was that of businesses, up 2.3%, while public sector spending declined 1.3% (source: Confindustria). In fact, in 2012, Italy invested just 1.27% of GDP in research and development, which is far behind the 2.98% of Germany and 2.29% of France.

So businesses are active, but they are being left to stand on their own in terms of innovation, confirmation of the strength of Italy’s brands and patents and a testimony to the marked improvement in the country’s culture of enterprise, of the “fourth capitalism” found throughout the northern part of the nation, of its family businesses that are, none the less, able to face the challenges of business management and of increasingly open, increasingly competitive global markets. Italian industry does have a future, in spite of it all.

Industrial pride above all else. Or better, “pride in machining” when it comes to the Federmeccanica manifesto on a new strategy for manufacturing, which the federation presented last Thursday in Rome at the event “Uniti per il rilancio dell’industria” (Together to revitalise industry), which saw the involvement of business leaders from more than sixty area branches of Confindustria (including industrial districts, value chains, and the most dynamic companies), all working to send a strong message to government and to politicians (that, without investment, Italy is doomed and that what is needed is new industrial policies that promote innovation and enable businesses to face the challenges of “Industry 4.0”, i.e. the fourth industrial revolution), while at the same time reiterating the capabilities of the country’s business leaders and their commitment to recovery. But looking at the businesses that produce goods and export them, we could also speak of pride in chemicals, in food and agriculture, in home automation, and in pharmaceuticals, or pride in rubber and cement, in wood and textiles, in cars, motorcycles and bicycles, and so on and so forth throughout all of the segments of manufacturing that, despite the crisis, are holding up Italy’s economy and earning points in competitiveness, innovation, growth and the creation of jobs. On its own, the machining sector is worth 8% of GDP and accounts for 45.9% of all of the value added by manufacturing, although it is also struggling under the weight of the drop in production capacity, down 32.6% since 2007, prior to the crisis (largely due to the stagnation of the domestic market). In its various forms, machining represents the most dynamic part of Italian exports, even outperforming the traditional cornerstones of Italy’s production, namely interior design, clothing, and food and agriculture. In short, Italy the “machining breadbasket” to recall the evocative phrase coined way back in the early 1950s by Vittorio Valletta, then the chairman of Fiat, when it was can manufacturing that was the pillar of industrial and social development for the entire nation.

A tradition of machining and an openness to the future, if we think that a good share of the modules of the International Space Station – where we now find the Italian female astronaut, Samantha Cristoforetti – were made right here in Italy, a fact that well represents Italy’s engineering excellence and the role it plays in the economy as a whole according to Carlo Andrea Finotto, writing in the 25 November edition of Il Sole24Ore.

There is another Italian success story, one that sounds comforting in these difficult times for Italy’s economy, that also depends in large part on the sophisticated growth of this culture of engineering (in the form of innovation, research, and increasingly advanced automation). As reported in Il Sole24Ore on 26 November, Italy leads the way in European patents and innovation is more vibrant than it ever has been. The news is that, in 2014, Italy retained its second place in the international top 20 in filings for industrial design patents at 10.15% of all patent filings worldwide, behind Germany (at 22.7%), but well in front of the United Kingdom (at 6.96), France and Spain, and the country is in a solid fourth place in terms of “brands”, behind Germany, the U.S., and the U.K. Innovation is happening, and a lot of it. We’re filing patents. We’re promoting quality and building brands. We’re competing, and not just in large-scale enterprise, but in small and medium enterprise, too, and in the industrial districts, which are being reborn thanks to unique synergies between their strong ties to areas with extraordinary capacities for manufacturing and their ability to expand internationally in specialist, high-value niches (as reported by Paola Dubini, a professor at Bocconi, in the “Nova” insert of Il Sole24Ore on 26 November). Too bad the public sector still invests far too little in research and innovation, given that, in 2011 (the most recent year for which data is available), the only sector that posted growth in research and development spending was that of businesses, up 2.3%, while public sector spending declined 1.3% (source: Confindustria). In fact, in 2012, Italy invested just 1.27% of GDP in research and development, which is far behind the 2.98% of Germany and 2.29% of France.

So businesses are active, but they are being left to stand on their own in terms of innovation, confirmation of the strength of Italy’s brands and patents and a testimony to the marked improvement in the country’s culture of enterprise, of the “fourth capitalism” found throughout the northern part of the nation, of its family businesses that are, none the less, able to face the challenges of business management and of increasingly open, increasingly competitive global markets. Italian industry does have a future, in spite of it all.

Home-grown entrepreneurs

To understand an entrepreneur and how he works, you need to know one – or more than one – because textbook theory is useful, but practice in business and management is – at the end of the day – an entirely different matter, particularly in such complex times as those we are living in today. Therefore, studying the stories of other businesses is crucial to understanding the businesses themselves. 

This is what Eugenio Dal Pane (author and teacher, as well as publisher) has sought to do with his recently published “Il lampo. Storia di genti mecchaniche”, in which he tells the true story of a particular business.

The story is that of CM, an engineering and machinery firm established in 1974 in Lugo, in the province of Ravenna, which grew over time in a manner shared by many other Italian firms. Today, CM manufactures fork lifts and similar machinery, exports to 35 countries, and owns three patents. Dal Pane begins his story with simple clarity: “It is 20 March 1974. Two young men, Domenico Calonaci (24) and Gabriele Calini (26), go to a notary public to establish CM.” He then continues in this same vein as he seeks to answer a series of questions: “Who is an entrepreneur? What drives a man or a woman to invest their talents and make sacrifices in order to build something good for themselves and for others, a journey made of both happiness and pain, hope and the daily dramas of life? What factors enable a business to grow and to thrive over time?”

CM’s story serves to find the right sort of answers. It starts from the foundation of the company in the offices of that notary public before moving on to the innovations that they came up with in the workshop and their early explorations at industry trade shows, with their first employees hired as something of a surprise (and told as if in a novel: “A sixteen-year-old girl passed by that narrow workshop door on her bicycle taking her nephews to preschool, unaware of what destiny had in store for her.”), and on to their first patent. Dal Pane then tells – or rather has those who were actually involved tell us – the story of how they got their ideas for new products, how they organized the production and sales, what happens when life comes crashing down upon the business, and where that resilience that drives an entrepreneur ever forward, despite it all, comes from. He also describes the milestones that are common to all businesses, the maturing of the business, conquests and defeat, the definition of company values (such as “professionalism”), the use of new tools of production and knowledge management, the value of employees, and the true meaning of teamwork.

Dal Pane’s book can be read right through in a morning. It is packed with just what is needed and flows just as it should. It also includes a nice afterword by Paol Preti (who teaches the Organisation of Small and Medium Enterprise at Bocconi), who writes something about entrepreneurs that may, on the surface, appear obvious: “Not heroes or modern-day legends, but men and women for whom our society has a particular need and to whom we should be grateful for the role that they play, even if they are already well rewarded for their efforts – at least when things are going well.”

Il lampo. Storia di genti meccaniche

Eugenio Dal Pane

Itaca, 2014 

To understand an entrepreneur and how he works, you need to know one – or more than one – because textbook theory is useful, but practice in business and management is – at the end of the day – an entirely different matter, particularly in such complex times as those we are living in today. Therefore, studying the stories of other businesses is crucial to understanding the businesses themselves. 

This is what Eugenio Dal Pane (author and teacher, as well as publisher) has sought to do with his recently published “Il lampo. Storia di genti mecchaniche”, in which he tells the true story of a particular business.

The story is that of CM, an engineering and machinery firm established in 1974 in Lugo, in the province of Ravenna, which grew over time in a manner shared by many other Italian firms. Today, CM manufactures fork lifts and similar machinery, exports to 35 countries, and owns three patents. Dal Pane begins his story with simple clarity: “It is 20 March 1974. Two young men, Domenico Calonaci (24) and Gabriele Calini (26), go to a notary public to establish CM.” He then continues in this same vein as he seeks to answer a series of questions: “Who is an entrepreneur? What drives a man or a woman to invest their talents and make sacrifices in order to build something good for themselves and for others, a journey made of both happiness and pain, hope and the daily dramas of life? What factors enable a business to grow and to thrive over time?”

CM’s story serves to find the right sort of answers. It starts from the foundation of the company in the offices of that notary public before moving on to the innovations that they came up with in the workshop and their early explorations at industry trade shows, with their first employees hired as something of a surprise (and told as if in a novel: “A sixteen-year-old girl passed by that narrow workshop door on her bicycle taking her nephews to preschool, unaware of what destiny had in store for her.”), and on to their first patent. Dal Pane then tells – or rather has those who were actually involved tell us – the story of how they got their ideas for new products, how they organized the production and sales, what happens when life comes crashing down upon the business, and where that resilience that drives an entrepreneur ever forward, despite it all, comes from. He also describes the milestones that are common to all businesses, the maturing of the business, conquests and defeat, the definition of company values (such as “professionalism”), the use of new tools of production and knowledge management, the value of employees, and the true meaning of teamwork.

Dal Pane’s book can be read right through in a morning. It is packed with just what is needed and flows just as it should. It also includes a nice afterword by Paol Preti (who teaches the Organisation of Small and Medium Enterprise at Bocconi), who writes something about entrepreneurs that may, on the surface, appear obvious: “Not heroes or modern-day legends, but men and women for whom our society has a particular need and to whom we should be grateful for the role that they play, even if they are already well rewarded for their efforts – at least when things are going well.”

Il lampo. Storia di genti meccaniche

Eugenio Dal Pane

Itaca, 2014 

Local, multinational, global. How has the culture of enterprise changed?

Globalisation changes the culture of enterprise, and this, in turn, changes strategies, organisations, and social relations within the company, even in cases in which an enterprise can already, to some extent, claim to be “multinational”, because “multinational” is one thing and “global” is quite another. So it is that globalisation, innovation, competition, and imitation create a sort of accumulation of drivers of change that give rise to something we didn’t have before: global enterprises with roots in a given territory and which draw their lifeblood from their cultures of origin, relying on extremely local partners, but looking out to the rest of the world because they are a part of much broader networks.

This is the subject of a recent work by Silvio M. Brondoni and Margherita Corniani (both with ISTEI-DEMS, University of Milan-Bicocca) entitled “Network globali e partner locali. I processi di imitazione e di innovazione nello sviluppo delle imprese globali di USA, Cina, Giappone e Sud Corea” (Global networks and local partners. Processes of imitation and innovation in the development of global enterprises in the U.S., China, Japan and South Korea), which was published a few weeks ago in a collection of papers about networks, new industries, and regional outlooks for development.

This paper by the two Milan research fellows is based on a study that looks into the relationship between innovation, competition and innovation in global enterprises in four different countries: the U.S., China, Japan and South Korea.

Thus, their study looks at the culture of enterprise in these four countries starting from the point of view of their leadership in innovation before, and imitation after, and looks at relationships and change in these quite different countries. What happened when globalisation had a profound impact on the culture of enterprise in a given country? As Brondoni and Corniani explain, global networks have significantly altered the competitive boundaries of innovation and imitation and have also transformed the competitive positions of a number of nation states and the relationship between global enterprises and local businesses. But that’s not all, because the culture of enterprise also had to come to terms with the drastic reduction in the innovation leadership of the leading European nations. In other words, the corporate cultures, the economies, and the very manner in which the role of the entrepreneur is interpreted in countries such as the United Kingdom, Germany, Italy and, of course, the U.S. had to make room for other cultures of enterprise that the authors refer to as having great “propensity for innovation”, but which are also able to take advantage of favourable market conditions and have a great capacity for imitation, such as in South Korea, India and Taiwan.

This article by Brondoni and Corniani is a good account of what has happened in the past and should be read in order to better understand what is still taking place today.

Network globali e partner locali. I processi di imitazione e di innovazione nello sviluppo delle imprese globali di USA, Cina, Giappone e Sud Corea

Silvio M. Brondoni, Margherita Corniani

in Reti, nuovi settori e sostenibilità. Prospettive per l’analisi e le politiche regionali

edited by F. Mazzola, D. Musolino, V. Provenzano

Franco Angeli, 2014

Globalisation changes the culture of enterprise, and this, in turn, changes strategies, organisations, and social relations within the company, even in cases in which an enterprise can already, to some extent, claim to be “multinational”, because “multinational” is one thing and “global” is quite another. So it is that globalisation, innovation, competition, and imitation create a sort of accumulation of drivers of change that give rise to something we didn’t have before: global enterprises with roots in a given territory and which draw their lifeblood from their cultures of origin, relying on extremely local partners, but looking out to the rest of the world because they are a part of much broader networks.

This is the subject of a recent work by Silvio M. Brondoni and Margherita Corniani (both with ISTEI-DEMS, University of Milan-Bicocca) entitled “Network globali e partner locali. I processi di imitazione e di innovazione nello sviluppo delle imprese globali di USA, Cina, Giappone e Sud Corea” (Global networks and local partners. Processes of imitation and innovation in the development of global enterprises in the U.S., China, Japan and South Korea), which was published a few weeks ago in a collection of papers about networks, new industries, and regional outlooks for development.

This paper by the two Milan research fellows is based on a study that looks into the relationship between innovation, competition and innovation in global enterprises in four different countries: the U.S., China, Japan and South Korea.

Thus, their study looks at the culture of enterprise in these four countries starting from the point of view of their leadership in innovation before, and imitation after, and looks at relationships and change in these quite different countries. What happened when globalisation had a profound impact on the culture of enterprise in a given country? As Brondoni and Corniani explain, global networks have significantly altered the competitive boundaries of innovation and imitation and have also transformed the competitive positions of a number of nation states and the relationship between global enterprises and local businesses. But that’s not all, because the culture of enterprise also had to come to terms with the drastic reduction in the innovation leadership of the leading European nations. In other words, the corporate cultures, the economies, and the very manner in which the role of the entrepreneur is interpreted in countries such as the United Kingdom, Germany, Italy and, of course, the U.S. had to make room for other cultures of enterprise that the authors refer to as having great “propensity for innovation”, but which are also able to take advantage of favourable market conditions and have a great capacity for imitation, such as in South Korea, India and Taiwan.

This article by Brondoni and Corniani is a good account of what has happened in the past and should be read in order to better understand what is still taking place today.

Network globali e partner locali. I processi di imitazione e di innovazione nello sviluppo delle imprese globali di USA, Cina, Giappone e Sud Corea

Silvio M. Brondoni, Margherita Corniani

in Reti, nuovi settori e sostenibilità. Prospettive per l’analisi e le politiche regionali

edited by F. Mazzola, D. Musolino, V. Provenzano

Franco Angeli, 2014

Complexity that simplifies business management

Coming to the realisation that managing a business is a complex affair can help us in actually doing just that. This awareness of complexity does not complicate the lives of business leaders; it actually simplifies it. It provides them with a starting point and helps to clarify what needs to be done, especially today, when businesses are increasingly called upon to resolve complexity found both within the enterprise and outside of it.

It was with this in mind that Gianluca Colombo (professor of Business Administration at the University of Insubria, Varese) wrote “Dialogo sulla complessità, sul management ed altro” (Dialog on complexity, management and more), recently published online at Economia Aziendale. He begins by noting that an organisation and its management would be more efficient if they saw complexity as a way of interactively determining the meaning of the context both inside and outside of the enterprise.

This was what led to his study, the goal of which was to show a number of ways to manage a business by applying the “complexity approach”, underscoring the underlying assumptions, implications and any potential for contamination.

But another interesting aspect of Colombo’s article is that his views on complexity are presented in the form of a dialog between (imaginary) characters, each with their own points of view and backgrounds, which lead to a variety of ways of managing a business. The first of these characters is Melanius, who claims that it is possible to achieve objective rationality, although it is often influenced by the particular circumstances. The second is Salviatus, who offers us a systemic view of enterprise. The third is Valerius, who sees the enterprise as a complex system in which there is a “dialectic” between the local nodes of the system.

It is a dialog, therefore, that helps us to understand the complexity of the enterprise, of business management, and of the world in which the organisation operates. Colombo provides us with a text that is to be read with care, but it will be worth the effort.

Dialogo sulla complessità, sul management ed altro

Gianluca Colombo

Economia Aziendale Online, Vol. 5 1/2014

Coming to the realisation that managing a business is a complex affair can help us in actually doing just that. This awareness of complexity does not complicate the lives of business leaders; it actually simplifies it. It provides them with a starting point and helps to clarify what needs to be done, especially today, when businesses are increasingly called upon to resolve complexity found both within the enterprise and outside of it.

It was with this in mind that Gianluca Colombo (professor of Business Administration at the University of Insubria, Varese) wrote “Dialogo sulla complessità, sul management ed altro” (Dialog on complexity, management and more), recently published online at Economia Aziendale. He begins by noting that an organisation and its management would be more efficient if they saw complexity as a way of interactively determining the meaning of the context both inside and outside of the enterprise.

This was what led to his study, the goal of which was to show a number of ways to manage a business by applying the “complexity approach”, underscoring the underlying assumptions, implications and any potential for contamination.

But another interesting aspect of Colombo’s article is that his views on complexity are presented in the form of a dialog between (imaginary) characters, each with their own points of view and backgrounds, which lead to a variety of ways of managing a business. The first of these characters is Melanius, who claims that it is possible to achieve objective rationality, although it is often influenced by the particular circumstances. The second is Salviatus, who offers us a systemic view of enterprise. The third is Valerius, who sees the enterprise as a complex system in which there is a “dialectic” between the local nodes of the system.

It is a dialog, therefore, that helps us to understand the complexity of the enterprise, of business management, and of the world in which the organisation operates. Colombo provides us with a text that is to be read with care, but it will be worth the effort.

Dialogo sulla complessità, sul management ed altro

Gianluca Colombo

Economia Aziendale Online, Vol. 5 1/2014

Manage like Mozart? All genius and charisma? Or more methodical like Salieri? Best to focus on teamwork

What brand of manager do we need in these times of such intense change? Summarizing a study by the Harvard Business Review, which claims that the figure of the innovative genius – the great leader backed by an enormous “emotional intelligence” (think Steve Jobs) – has had its day and that now is the time for those who are able to manage complex processes, engineers able to guide business systems with determination and a keen focus on linear development, Ettore Livini wrote, in La Repubblica (5 November), that Wall Street prefers a leader like Salieri over one like Mozart. It is a sort of “Salieri’s Revenge”, as Herminia Barra, a professor at INSEAD in Paris, noted as part of a reassessment of the role of the cold, methodical, and yet reassuring composer that was cast in the shadows in 19th century Vienna by the overwhelming genius of Mozart. In other words, we now need less charisma and more method. The Harvard Business Review study, in fact, has found that 24 of the 100 best-performing CEOs in America are engineers. They may be less charismatic than their predecessors who created the business, but they do bring a practical, pragmatic approach that results in great profitability and pleases shareholders as well.

Jack Welch, once the leader of the US multinational General Electric and long respected as a point of reference for any good manager, liked to say that leaders manage power, while managers manage the organisation. James Citrin, a senior executive at Spencer & Stuart, a leading recruiting firm, has also said that the time for revolutionary rhetoric is finished and that now it is engineers able to solve problems with logic and an architectural way of thinking – i.e. with an orderly approach to processes, relationships and responsibilities – that are proving to be the most successful today.

Is that truly the case, even here in Italy? In Europe, the culture of management has always been heavily influenced by the U.S., where it has been possible, thanks in part to a sort of “public company” capitalism, to build a sophisticated, rich theory of business management and general rhetoric over time. In Italy, however, for better or for worse, capitalism is still very heavily family oriented, with a unique blend of shareholders and business leaders who are heirs of the companies’ founders (and who have strong, unabashedly innovative, “Mozart-esque” personalities) and managers backed by that all-too-Italian culture of beauty, complexity and resilience (i.e. intelligent adaptability).

So perhaps it would be best to avoid these typically American formulas and remember that, even in business, we can still see a typically Euro-Mediterranean fascination with Napoleon. (As Ernesto Ferrero noted in La Lettura for Corriere della Sera on 2 March 2014, Napoleon, too, was a manager, combining planning and speed of action with an ability to understand and motivate people and take advantage of culture, thereby underscoring his dual role as innovator and legislator – a builder of new processes and regulator of their growth, a creative and an engineer of institutions.)

Perhaps we should pay closer attention to a new sort of lesson that also came out of the US, that of Walter Isaacson (editor of Time, the former chairman and CEO of CNN and now president of the Aspen Institute), who wrote the internationally best selling biography of Steve Jobs. He is also the author of The Innovators: How a Group of Hackers, Geniuses and Geeks Created the Digital Revolution, published in October by Simon & Schuster, in which he claims that innovation in technology does not depend on individual genius, but is rather the result of teamwork.

Serena Danna, also writing in La Lettura for Corriere della Sera (12 October 2014), summarised the situation by saying that the next Steve Jobs will come in the form of a team, that the idea of the single individual who drives innovation is an illusion, and that genius arises through collaboration. Keith Sawyer, professor of innovation and creativity at the University of North Carolina seems to agree when he said, “When we collaborate, creativity unfolds across people; the sparks fly faster, and the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.”

What brand of manager do we need in these times of such intense change? Summarizing a study by the Harvard Business Review, which claims that the figure of the innovative genius – the great leader backed by an enormous “emotional intelligence” (think Steve Jobs) – has had its day and that now is the time for those who are able to manage complex processes, engineers able to guide business systems with determination and a keen focus on linear development, Ettore Livini wrote, in La Repubblica (5 November), that Wall Street prefers a leader like Salieri over one like Mozart. It is a sort of “Salieri’s Revenge”, as Herminia Barra, a professor at INSEAD in Paris, noted as part of a reassessment of the role of the cold, methodical, and yet reassuring composer that was cast in the shadows in 19th century Vienna by the overwhelming genius of Mozart. In other words, we now need less charisma and more method. The Harvard Business Review study, in fact, has found that 24 of the 100 best-performing CEOs in America are engineers. They may be less charismatic than their predecessors who created the business, but they do bring a practical, pragmatic approach that results in great profitability and pleases shareholders as well.

Jack Welch, once the leader of the US multinational General Electric and long respected as a point of reference for any good manager, liked to say that leaders manage power, while managers manage the organisation. James Citrin, a senior executive at Spencer & Stuart, a leading recruiting firm, has also said that the time for revolutionary rhetoric is finished and that now it is engineers able to solve problems with logic and an architectural way of thinking – i.e. with an orderly approach to processes, relationships and responsibilities – that are proving to be the most successful today.

Is that truly the case, even here in Italy? In Europe, the culture of management has always been heavily influenced by the U.S., where it has been possible, thanks in part to a sort of “public company” capitalism, to build a sophisticated, rich theory of business management and general rhetoric over time. In Italy, however, for better or for worse, capitalism is still very heavily family oriented, with a unique blend of shareholders and business leaders who are heirs of the companies’ founders (and who have strong, unabashedly innovative, “Mozart-esque” personalities) and managers backed by that all-too-Italian culture of beauty, complexity and resilience (i.e. intelligent adaptability).

So perhaps it would be best to avoid these typically American formulas and remember that, even in business, we can still see a typically Euro-Mediterranean fascination with Napoleon. (As Ernesto Ferrero noted in La Lettura for Corriere della Sera on 2 March 2014, Napoleon, too, was a manager, combining planning and speed of action with an ability to understand and motivate people and take advantage of culture, thereby underscoring his dual role as innovator and legislator – a builder of new processes and regulator of their growth, a creative and an engineer of institutions.)

Perhaps we should pay closer attention to a new sort of lesson that also came out of the US, that of Walter Isaacson (editor of Time, the former chairman and CEO of CNN and now president of the Aspen Institute), who wrote the internationally best selling biography of Steve Jobs. He is also the author of The Innovators: How a Group of Hackers, Geniuses and Geeks Created the Digital Revolution, published in October by Simon & Schuster, in which he claims that innovation in technology does not depend on individual genius, but is rather the result of teamwork.

Serena Danna, also writing in La Lettura for Corriere della Sera (12 October 2014), summarised the situation by saying that the next Steve Jobs will come in the form of a team, that the idea of the single individual who drives innovation is an illusion, and that genius arises through collaboration. Keith Sawyer, professor of innovation and creativity at the University of North Carolina seems to agree when he said, “When we collaborate, creativity unfolds across people; the sparks fly faster, and the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.”

The right guides for growing an enterprise

Managing a business is fascinating, but difficult. It takes more than just technical and financial knowledge. It also takes imagination, creativity and an entrepreneurial spirit that separates the true leaders from the imposters. In any event, it also requires the right plans of attack, reliable guides, and roadmaps for complex processes. This is why we need guidebooks that are able to provide the knowledge and business leaders can use to govern a business well – effective “instruction books” that leave room for creativity, but which provide reliable, practical guidelines.

Pietro Genco (Professore Emeritus at the University of Genoa) has written a manual that is a good step in this direction.  Entitled “Corporate governance. Sistemi e strutture di governo dell’impresa” (recently published in Italian), it provides an organic presentation of a series of business disciplines and areas of management that are often disjointed one from the other and can be of help in developing a model of the business landscape we are currently facing.

Written in a clear, linear style, the book looks at the various aspects of corporate governance and describes the various approaches that depend on the specific culture in which the business operates (e.g. Anglo Saxon, Germanic, Japanese, Latin, etc.). The author also emphasises the cultural dimension of business along side the technical and economic aspects. 

The governance of an enterprise is seen not only from within the organisation, but also with a focus on external aspects, looking at the business not as a closed system, but as an entity that is most definitely open to all external forces. 

The book is essentially divided into three parts. First of all, it provides the theoretical framework for corporate governance before taking a closer look at the models that come out of various economic cultures. The concluding section is an up-close analysis of the ownership and control structures of Italian enterprises and the structure of their governance and control models. 

In short, culture of enterprise is fed by inspiration and intuition, but must also be backed by the proper technical supports. 

Corporate governance. Sistemi e strutture di governo dell’impresa

Pietro Genco

G. Giappichelli Editore, 2014

Managing a business is fascinating, but difficult. It takes more than just technical and financial knowledge. It also takes imagination, creativity and an entrepreneurial spirit that separates the true leaders from the imposters. In any event, it also requires the right plans of attack, reliable guides, and roadmaps for complex processes. This is why we need guidebooks that are able to provide the knowledge and business leaders can use to govern a business well – effective “instruction books” that leave room for creativity, but which provide reliable, practical guidelines.

Pietro Genco (Professore Emeritus at the University of Genoa) has written a manual that is a good step in this direction.  Entitled “Corporate governance. Sistemi e strutture di governo dell’impresa” (recently published in Italian), it provides an organic presentation of a series of business disciplines and areas of management that are often disjointed one from the other and can be of help in developing a model of the business landscape we are currently facing.

Written in a clear, linear style, the book looks at the various aspects of corporate governance and describes the various approaches that depend on the specific culture in which the business operates (e.g. Anglo Saxon, Germanic, Japanese, Latin, etc.). The author also emphasises the cultural dimension of business along side the technical and economic aspects. 

The governance of an enterprise is seen not only from within the organisation, but also with a focus on external aspects, looking at the business not as a closed system, but as an entity that is most definitely open to all external forces. 

The book is essentially divided into three parts. First of all, it provides the theoretical framework for corporate governance before taking a closer look at the models that come out of various economic cultures. The concluding section is an up-close analysis of the ownership and control structures of Italian enterprises and the structure of their governance and control models. 

In short, culture of enterprise is fed by inspiration and intuition, but must also be backed by the proper technical supports. 

Corporate governance. Sistemi e strutture di governo dell’impresa

Pietro Genco

G. Giappichelli Editore, 2014

How jobs are changing: Goodbye low-quality positions. Welcome to the era of “STEAM” (science, technology, engineering, arts, math)

There will be no more postmen. No more stenographers, or switchboard operators, or farm workers. It will be the era of biotechnologies, of doctors armed with nanotechnology and, above all, of experts in social networking and digital marketing, specialists in cloud technology, app developers, and other hyper-technological computer experts to help boost growth in manufacturing, in the service industry, and even in agriculture. But there will also be greater opportunities for experts in wellness and recreation, like zumba (dance for fitness) instructors, beach gymnastics instructors (one of the fastest growing professions since 2008, ballooning by a factor of 3,360, right behind experts in big data and a triumph for beach resorts).

This is what comes out of a recent study carried out by Deloitte, a leading international advisory firm, and Oxford University (as reported in La Stampa on 12 November) confirming the extent of the radical changes currently under way. “The End of Work” was the title of a book by Jeremy Rifkin, a keen analyst of economic change, written back in 1995. It turned out to be prophetic. Then came analyses of the end of Fordism, of “individualist mutations” in jobs and professions, and of the “age of jobs” (on which the Renzi government’s Job Act is based). In short, goodbye “work”. Hello “jobs”.

We are going through a period of transition in which old-fashioned production systems still have their weight – though suffering (and giving rise to union protests as people lose their jobs) – but a new equilibrium is already being established, and the keenest observers of these transformations are noting that the digital revolution continues unimpeded, impacting on the economy in unpredictable ways. “Today, students are working towards professions yet to be created, based on technologies yet to be invented for problems of which we are still unaware,” were the paradoxical words of Andrea Cammelli, director of Almalaurea, the largest database of university graduates in Italy (La Repubblica, 10 November).

A figure out of the United Kingdom is also the topic of much debate: over the next ten years, ten million jobs – those that are the most repetitive, low quality and poorly paid – will be lost to robotics (La Stampa, 12 November). That’s the bad news, but the good news is that it will free up resources for more highly skilled, better paid, more satisfying jobs, so long as there are extensive programmes of high-tech training for those who have been pushed out of their jobs in old-fashioned production processes. In the era of the “knowledge economy”, digital capabilities are what has value, as well as more general skills, so that people are not “information technology workers”, but rather self-aware, responsible experts.

In other words, we are witnessing what experts say is based on the “STEM” (science, technology, engineering, math) model and which is now being extended (such as, in Italy, by Gianfelice Rocca, president of Assolombarda and for many years head of education for Confindustria) to “STEAM” (powering the engine of development), where the “A” stands for “arts” and refers more broadly to the humanities – art, literary knowledge, and so on – a specialisation in which Italy has led the way for generations and which is now, naturally enough, to be defended in a more technological manner (e.g. by investing in education and related information technologies in order to close the digital divide that still weighs heavily on the nation, an outlier in Europe with just 6 computers for every 100 students, as compared to the EU average of 16).

Intelligence and knowledge are being seen as the keys to growth, as well as an openness to changes in the job market, but we must also keep in mind a calculation by Enrico Moretti, a brilliant economist at the University of California, Berkeley, found in his book The New Geography of Jobs: for every new high-tech job – such as a highly specialised computer engineer, Google software designer, or physicist specialised in nanotechnologies – five more jobs are created, both in highly skilled professions (lawyers, doctors, teachers, nurses) and in less skilled jobs related to services for businesses and individuals. It is a driver of economic growth, a sort of “social escalator” (where what counts is what you know, learn and can do, not who you are or who you know) to give a greater boost to development.

There will be no more postmen. No more stenographers, or switchboard operators, or farm workers. It will be the era of biotechnologies, of doctors armed with nanotechnology and, above all, of experts in social networking and digital marketing, specialists in cloud technology, app developers, and other hyper-technological computer experts to help boost growth in manufacturing, in the service industry, and even in agriculture. But there will also be greater opportunities for experts in wellness and recreation, like zumba (dance for fitness) instructors, beach gymnastics instructors (one of the fastest growing professions since 2008, ballooning by a factor of 3,360, right behind experts in big data and a triumph for beach resorts).

This is what comes out of a recent study carried out by Deloitte, a leading international advisory firm, and Oxford University (as reported in La Stampa on 12 November) confirming the extent of the radical changes currently under way. “The End of Work” was the title of a book by Jeremy Rifkin, a keen analyst of economic change, written back in 1995. It turned out to be prophetic. Then came analyses of the end of Fordism, of “individualist mutations” in jobs and professions, and of the “age of jobs” (on which the Renzi government’s Job Act is based). In short, goodbye “work”. Hello “jobs”.

We are going through a period of transition in which old-fashioned production systems still have their weight – though suffering (and giving rise to union protests as people lose their jobs) – but a new equilibrium is already being established, and the keenest observers of these transformations are noting that the digital revolution continues unimpeded, impacting on the economy in unpredictable ways. “Today, students are working towards professions yet to be created, based on technologies yet to be invented for problems of which we are still unaware,” were the paradoxical words of Andrea Cammelli, director of Almalaurea, the largest database of university graduates in Italy (La Repubblica, 10 November).

A figure out of the United Kingdom is also the topic of much debate: over the next ten years, ten million jobs – those that are the most repetitive, low quality and poorly paid – will be lost to robotics (La Stampa, 12 November). That’s the bad news, but the good news is that it will free up resources for more highly skilled, better paid, more satisfying jobs, so long as there are extensive programmes of high-tech training for those who have been pushed out of their jobs in old-fashioned production processes. In the era of the “knowledge economy”, digital capabilities are what has value, as well as more general skills, so that people are not “information technology workers”, but rather self-aware, responsible experts.

In other words, we are witnessing what experts say is based on the “STEM” (science, technology, engineering, math) model and which is now being extended (such as, in Italy, by Gianfelice Rocca, president of Assolombarda and for many years head of education for Confindustria) to “STEAM” (powering the engine of development), where the “A” stands for “arts” and refers more broadly to the humanities – art, literary knowledge, and so on – a specialisation in which Italy has led the way for generations and which is now, naturally enough, to be defended in a more technological manner (e.g. by investing in education and related information technologies in order to close the digital divide that still weighs heavily on the nation, an outlier in Europe with just 6 computers for every 100 students, as compared to the EU average of 16).

Intelligence and knowledge are being seen as the keys to growth, as well as an openness to changes in the job market, but we must also keep in mind a calculation by Enrico Moretti, a brilliant economist at the University of California, Berkeley, found in his book The New Geography of Jobs: for every new high-tech job – such as a highly specialised computer engineer, Google software designer, or physicist specialised in nanotechnologies – five more jobs are created, both in highly skilled professions (lawyers, doctors, teachers, nurses) and in less skilled jobs related to services for businesses and individuals. It is a driver of economic growth, a sort of “social escalator” (where what counts is what you know, learn and can do, not who you are or who you know) to give a greater boost to development.

What can be done for Italian industry?

Italy does have a manufacturing industry, but it often languishes. The reasons are as familiar to us as is the awareness of the importance of actually having a modern, competitive manufacturing industry, but the best strategy for overcoming the current difficulties is much less clear. Indeed, in order to have a full understanding of what needs to be done, we must first have a good understanding of the present, and, in that respect, a statement by Luigi Einaudi remains valid to this day: “Conoscere per deliberare” (loosely translated: “deliberate based on knowledge”). 

A recently published book by Dario Di Vico (a reporter for Corriere della Sera) and Gianfranco Viesti (an economist) can help to better understand the present in order to give focus to plans of attack that seek to provide (in one way or another) economic policies that could, according to the two authors, give Italian manufacturing the push it so greatly needs. Entitled Cacciavite, robot e tablet. Come far ripartire le imprese (Screwdrivers, robots and tablets. How to revitalise enterprise), their book is divided into two parts: two analyses of the same situation (as seen from the points of view of each of the authors) and two outlines of industrial strategy designed to breathe new life into Italian manufacturing, all in about 130 pages.

Viesti (who teaches international economics and the University of Bari) starts from the assumption that manufacturing is, and must remain, the driver of Italy’s economy. In order to see how to achieve this goal, Viesti follows a path that takes us through issues such as the need for a different sort of industrial model, the awareness of the change taking place in the world around us, the need for the nation to be “attractive”, and the need for capital and for great minds in order to grow. The conclusion Viesti reaches is based on stimulating public action built on the needs of globalisation in order to help enterprises to grow in size and to promote innovation and internationalisation. 

Di Vico (who mainly covered economics in his work for Corriere della Sera), on the other hand, takes a different route, one that looks at the role of banks and of multinationals, the role and complexity of Italy’s industrial districts and, finally, the importance of labour and the changes taking place in employment. He then identifies other pillars of Italian industrial policy that should see government seeking to reduce the burden of taxes, to give more leeway to banks to fuel growth, and to be more open to investment funds and multinationals. 

The sum of these two parts is a book that can be read in a day and which has a number of goals: to describe the current situation; to outline strategies for growth in manufacturing; and to create a new culture of enterprise. 

Cacciavite, robot e tablet. Come far ripartire le imprese

Dario Di Vico, Gianfranco Viesti

Il Mulino, October 2014 

Italy does have a manufacturing industry, but it often languishes. The reasons are as familiar to us as is the awareness of the importance of actually having a modern, competitive manufacturing industry, but the best strategy for overcoming the current difficulties is much less clear. Indeed, in order to have a full understanding of what needs to be done, we must first have a good understanding of the present, and, in that respect, a statement by Luigi Einaudi remains valid to this day: “Conoscere per deliberare” (loosely translated: “deliberate based on knowledge”). 

A recently published book by Dario Di Vico (a reporter for Corriere della Sera) and Gianfranco Viesti (an economist) can help to better understand the present in order to give focus to plans of attack that seek to provide (in one way or another) economic policies that could, according to the two authors, give Italian manufacturing the push it so greatly needs. Entitled Cacciavite, robot e tablet. Come far ripartire le imprese (Screwdrivers, robots and tablets. How to revitalise enterprise), their book is divided into two parts: two analyses of the same situation (as seen from the points of view of each of the authors) and two outlines of industrial strategy designed to breathe new life into Italian manufacturing, all in about 130 pages.

Viesti (who teaches international economics and the University of Bari) starts from the assumption that manufacturing is, and must remain, the driver of Italy’s economy. In order to see how to achieve this goal, Viesti follows a path that takes us through issues such as the need for a different sort of industrial model, the awareness of the change taking place in the world around us, the need for the nation to be “attractive”, and the need for capital and for great minds in order to grow. The conclusion Viesti reaches is based on stimulating public action built on the needs of globalisation in order to help enterprises to grow in size and to promote innovation and internationalisation. 

Di Vico (who mainly covered economics in his work for Corriere della Sera), on the other hand, takes a different route, one that looks at the role of banks and of multinationals, the role and complexity of Italy’s industrial districts and, finally, the importance of labour and the changes taking place in employment. He then identifies other pillars of Italian industrial policy that should see government seeking to reduce the burden of taxes, to give more leeway to banks to fuel growth, and to be more open to investment funds and multinationals. 

The sum of these two parts is a book that can be read in a day and which has a number of goals: to describe the current situation; to outline strategies for growth in manufacturing; and to create a new culture of enterprise. 

Cacciavite, robot e tablet. Come far ripartire le imprese

Dario Di Vico, Gianfranco Viesti

Il Mulino, October 2014 

Online culture of enterprise

The culture of a business – i.e. the meaning of its existence, the essence of everything it does – can be understood in many ways, including by looking at the way in which the business approaches the Internet and manages its presence there. What is also needed to reach this objective are the right tools and an appropriate model of analysis. This is what is provided in a recent work by Cai-shun Zhong (out of the Foreign Languages College, Jiangxi Normal University, Jiangxi, China) published in the August edition of the International Journal of E-Business Development.

Entitled “Modeling the Socio-Cognitive Process of Cultural Recontextualization in E-business Web Design”, the paper gives us a good example of how to study business culture by starting from the actual operations of the business itself and how that business presents itself to the consumer. The author emphasises the “cultural representation” of the business and of the society in which in originated, beginning with an analysis of the e-business web designs of Amazon and Taobao, two e-business platforms based in America and China, respectively.

After a theoretical overview of the method of analysis of web design, the article then looks at a comparison of various aspects of the two sites: product presentation, the purchase process, and the listing of search categories. The author then looks at the two sites in greater detail, assessing the image conveyed by each page and the graphical approach to each aspect. In this way, Amazon and Taobao, which obviously represent two different cultures of enterprise and underlying societies, are compared based on their web design, which is assumed to be an indicator of the cultural context within which each business acts.

This passage from the conclusions is particularly interesting. The author states that an analysis of the two web sites reveals that “e-business web design needs not only to address the difference between business and general cultural orientations, but also to construe how the cultural information is reified in the web page components”, i.e. how cultural information is received by those who view the site.

Thus, the culture of enterprise and the culture of consumption are compared and go hand in hand with a constant exchange of information and feedback.

This work by Cai-shun Zhong (a paper of roughly ten pages, dense with explanatory illustrations) is written in a manner that is easy for the reader to follow and can provide an example of how the culture of enterprise can be seen even in unusual and unexpected places.

Modeling the Socio-Cognitive Process of Cultural Recontextualization in E-business Web Design 

Cai-shun Zhong

International Journal of E-Business Development Aug. 2014, Vol. 4 Iss. 3, pp. 75-84

The culture of a business – i.e. the meaning of its existence, the essence of everything it does – can be understood in many ways, including by looking at the way in which the business approaches the Internet and manages its presence there. What is also needed to reach this objective are the right tools and an appropriate model of analysis. This is what is provided in a recent work by Cai-shun Zhong (out of the Foreign Languages College, Jiangxi Normal University, Jiangxi, China) published in the August edition of the International Journal of E-Business Development.

Entitled “Modeling the Socio-Cognitive Process of Cultural Recontextualization in E-business Web Design”, the paper gives us a good example of how to study business culture by starting from the actual operations of the business itself and how that business presents itself to the consumer. The author emphasises the “cultural representation” of the business and of the society in which in originated, beginning with an analysis of the e-business web designs of Amazon and Taobao, two e-business platforms based in America and China, respectively.

After a theoretical overview of the method of analysis of web design, the article then looks at a comparison of various aspects of the two sites: product presentation, the purchase process, and the listing of search categories. The author then looks at the two sites in greater detail, assessing the image conveyed by each page and the graphical approach to each aspect. In this way, Amazon and Taobao, which obviously represent two different cultures of enterprise and underlying societies, are compared based on their web design, which is assumed to be an indicator of the cultural context within which each business acts.

This passage from the conclusions is particularly interesting. The author states that an analysis of the two web sites reveals that “e-business web design needs not only to address the difference between business and general cultural orientations, but also to construe how the cultural information is reified in the web page components”, i.e. how cultural information is received by those who view the site.

Thus, the culture of enterprise and the culture of consumption are compared and go hand in hand with a constant exchange of information and feedback.

This work by Cai-shun Zhong (a paper of roughly ten pages, dense with explanatory illustrations) is written in a manner that is easy for the reader to follow and can provide an example of how the culture of enterprise can be seen even in unusual and unexpected places.

Modeling the Socio-Cognitive Process of Cultural Recontextualization in E-business Web Design 

Cai-shun Zhong

International Journal of E-Business Development Aug. 2014, Vol. 4 Iss. 3, pp. 75-84

The enterprise to come

To thrive, a business must change. It’s easy to say that change is a necessary part of doing business, of being an entrepreneur, but it is, in fact, one of the most complicated things to manage, with its uncertain conclusions and an evolution fraught with danger. In these times of change, many historical businesses have closed their doors. Faced with an uncertain future, even more businesses have started up only to be tossed against the rocky crags of aggressive competition, complex markets, and the sheer speed of today’s economy. Therefore, as is often the case, what is needed is a sort of guidebook to show us the way forward.

This is what Renato Fiocca, a professor at Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore since 2002, has managed to do with his recently published “Impresa futura. Nuove prospettive per l’impresa e il management del domani” (The Future Enterprise. A new outlook for the enterprise and the management of tomorrow), the goal of which is to provide a series of reflections on the role of enterprise and management in the years to come. 

As Fiocca writes in this book, the crisis and other challenges that have afflicted the markets and business in recent years have left their mark on the way in which businesses can now be run. Going back to old models and systems of management is no longer thinkable. Too much has changed. New technologies, new customer needs, and increasingly aggressive international competition leave no room for a blind return to what are now out-dated management strategies.

So what must we do? Fiocca provides his answer in these 13 chapters through a series of observations, suggestions and provocations for the business leaders and managers of both today and tomorrow. 

Beginning with the observation that any enterprise has a “world” of (often invisible) resources at its disposal, Fiocca goes on to discuss the issue of human resources, the quality of relationships, altruism and selfishness in relationships, and the node of communication in relationships and in networks. The author then moves on to discuss the issue of the relationship between the business and the market (respect for the business and respect for the market) and cooperation and competition between businesses.  In just over 250 pages, the book concludes with a series of reflections on the philosophical meaning of business decisions and ethics in general, of aesthetics, and of mathematics in relationships. But Fiocca goes further and looks even deeper into the future to analyse enterprise as it slips lower and lower and the need to “hate waste”. 

It’s all about good management with particular emphasis on the intangibles of doing business today while looking to the future. This work by Fiocca is well written using a fresh, modern style and an uncommon depth of reasoning. 

Impresa futura. Nuove prospettive per l’impresa e il management del domani

Renato Fiocca

Franco Angeli, 2014

To thrive, a business must change. It’s easy to say that change is a necessary part of doing business, of being an entrepreneur, but it is, in fact, one of the most complicated things to manage, with its uncertain conclusions and an evolution fraught with danger. In these times of change, many historical businesses have closed their doors. Faced with an uncertain future, even more businesses have started up only to be tossed against the rocky crags of aggressive competition, complex markets, and the sheer speed of today’s economy. Therefore, as is often the case, what is needed is a sort of guidebook to show us the way forward.

This is what Renato Fiocca, a professor at Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore since 2002, has managed to do with his recently published “Impresa futura. Nuove prospettive per l’impresa e il management del domani” (The Future Enterprise. A new outlook for the enterprise and the management of tomorrow), the goal of which is to provide a series of reflections on the role of enterprise and management in the years to come. 

As Fiocca writes in this book, the crisis and other challenges that have afflicted the markets and business in recent years have left their mark on the way in which businesses can now be run. Going back to old models and systems of management is no longer thinkable. Too much has changed. New technologies, new customer needs, and increasingly aggressive international competition leave no room for a blind return to what are now out-dated management strategies.

So what must we do? Fiocca provides his answer in these 13 chapters through a series of observations, suggestions and provocations for the business leaders and managers of both today and tomorrow. 

Beginning with the observation that any enterprise has a “world” of (often invisible) resources at its disposal, Fiocca goes on to discuss the issue of human resources, the quality of relationships, altruism and selfishness in relationships, and the node of communication in relationships and in networks. The author then moves on to discuss the issue of the relationship between the business and the market (respect for the business and respect for the market) and cooperation and competition between businesses.  In just over 250 pages, the book concludes with a series of reflections on the philosophical meaning of business decisions and ethics in general, of aesthetics, and of mathematics in relationships. But Fiocca goes further and looks even deeper into the future to analyse enterprise as it slips lower and lower and the need to “hate waste”. 

It’s all about good management with particular emphasis on the intangibles of doing business today while looking to the future. This work by Fiocca is well written using a fresh, modern style and an uncommon depth of reasoning. 

Impresa futura. Nuove prospettive per l’impresa e il management del domani

Renato Fiocca

Franco Angeli, 2014

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