Ten interviews with ten CEOs reveal a hidden yet important side of good corporate culture

Managing a company also means feeling frightened – very frightened – or having doubts, spending sleepless nights, getting angry, feeling touched. Understandably so as, after all, managing a company means being in charge of a community and responsible for all its members, as well as having the ability to inspire courage and enthusiasm when needed, and being strict, above all with oneself, when required. This is what Certo che ho paura. Storie di vita vissuta di dieci Ceo (Of course I’m frightened. Ten real-life stories by ten CEOs) is about, a book by Marco Rosetti that should be ready by anyone involved with a company, not just CEOs.

The premise of these ten interviews with ten CEOs, carried out by the author, lies on the fact that a  Chief Executive Officer is expected to lead a company through bad and good times, without ever losing sight of the goal. Yet, CEOs are, above all, human beings, with all that this entails. As such, from time to time, all CEOs feel the need to “hide away in a safe place” yet are obliged to keep on betting on the future and risk losing everything. Rosetti further asks the ten interviewees when and why they had some doubts, if they ever experienced moments of weakness or were touched by certain circumstances. Thus, through these ten conversations, the author explores a world that is pretty much unknown to us, or of which we only see a small part (and, perhaps, not even the most important one). The figures interviewed do not appear weak but rather emerge as well-rounded individuals capable of steering what actually are rather complex systems – as all respectable businesses are – in the right direction. Individuals who are able to lead and listen, and as such take command of a production organisation during difficult situations. The CEOs featured in the book include those of La Marzocco, F1consulting, Gnutti Group, WeSchool, Hera Comm, Flowe, Diagonal, Gellify, Unicalce, Clear Channel. Each story is different, yet all ten are united by a sense of professionalism accompanied by a great human touch.

The book, of about 250 very readable pages, ends with 25 ‘rules’ given by the author, and the last of these provides us with the best advice: “Examine your ego and then forget about it.”

Certo che ho paura. Storie di vita vissuta di dieci Ceo (Of course I’m frightened. Ten real-life stories by ten CEOs)

Marco Rosetti

GueriniNEXT, 2022

A thesis discussed at the Marche Polytechnic University attempts to explore the relationships between managerial control and corporate goals

 Working together for real, also in factories and the most competitive companies – a sentiment that applies to all businesses and that is implemented in several different ways that, if shared, could contribute to the improvement of the whole production system, even when it is a matter of reconciling collaboration with control. This is the topic of Erica Calosci’s research study, which became her thesis: “Il sistema di controllo manageriale: il caso Elica S.p.A.” (“Managerial control systems: the case of Elica S.p.A.”).

The research work, discussed at the Marche Polytechnic University, is based on one observation: “Considering the dynamism of today’s market, the high level of competition between companies and the scarcity of resources, enterprises increasingly require effective control systems that allow to reach their set goals. These new needs have led companies to understand the importance of investments in motivating and valuing human resources, that is, resources that are the classic components of a so-called managerial control system.”

Organisation and collaboration, then, can go hand-in-hand, especially when, as Calosci explains, we can “steer individual behaviour towards the pursuit of company goals” by “controlling staff and internal culture”. This in order to achieve some of the objectives that are common to all production organisations, such as strengthening the image, withstanding financial pressures, increasing and spreading motivation and innovation among staff.

To analyse all this, Erica Calosci first looks at the theoretical basis of managerial control and then focuses on the case of Elica S.p.A., a company that manufactures kitchen hoods and operates in the Marche region. Thus, the study aims to make us understand the importance and the constraints involved in controlling staff and internal culture, which paired with controlling results and activities constitute the wider managerial control system. The outcome is pertinent to virtually all businesses: the need to find a (delicate and fragile) balance between control tools and motivation, constraints and opportunities. This is the only way, tells us Erica Calosci’s research study, in which a “corporate climate” leading to growth and an all-comprehensive production culture can be created.

“Il sistema di controllo manageriale: il caso Elica S.p.A. (“Managerial control systems: the case of Elica S.p.A.”).

Erica Calosci, Thesis, Marche Polytechnic University, “Giorgio Fuà”, Faculty of Economics, three-year degree course in Economics and Management, 2021-2022

The latest book by the Cavalieri del Lavoro Federation tells about a production culture that should not be lost

Families and enterprises, or, actually, family enterprises. Countless, different, yet all showing the same core features and an entrepreneurial culture that, though in different guises, still perpetuates today. This is the feeling – the message – one gets when reading Famiglia e impresa. Storie di Cavalieri del Lavoro (Family and enterprise. Stories of Cavalieri del Lavoro), which narrates 75 family stories, each one about a ‘Cavaliere del Lavoro’, i.e. a person awarded the Italian Order of Merit for labour. The particular feature of the book is that it collects the stories of entrepreneurial families that were awarded at least two Cavalieri del Lavoro titles. A different yet not restrictive approach, as the 75 stories encompass the whole Italian economic history, from the 19th century to now.

Each one of the 75 family stories included comes with a summary of the entrepreneurial adventure spanning across various generations, from founder to current owner, and this is accompanied by biographical details for all the members of the family who were awarded the merit. Completing the historical picture, and adding a future-oriented perspective, is a contribution by the Cavaliere del Lavoro currently in charge.

Thus, readers can enjoy different stories ranging through virtually all Italian manufacturing sectors. Some are about companies that most people will not be familiar with, while others tell of big businesses and more – naming these brands might create the wrong impression, while reading the introductory essay is a good idea, as it tells how these stories allow us to discover the “true collective identity that has kept together a country that reached unification rather late, torn apart by two world wars and then by terrorism and several economic crises. A country that, without underground resources but only counting on its great enterprising spirit and attitude towards quality work – a real national feature and, certainly not the only one, but one of the longest-lived.” And, further, “Even when all seemed to fall apart, shattered by ruptures and downfalls, its productive heart kept on beating, innovating, transforming, manufacturing. The steel, chemical, food, textile, pharmaceutical, mechanic, banking, shipbuilding, construction, winemaking, liquor industries – the sectors in which these families operate are countless and in constant evolution, adapting to the transforming economy, yet what never changes is their solid and productive nature.”

Thus, these are stories that express Italian corporate culture at its highest level and this is why is worth reading (and even rereading, perhaps) about it, going beyond its merits and rhetoric, reaching the heart of Italian enterprise. The introduction by Maurizio Sella, the current president of the Cavalieri del Lavoro National Federation, includes a beautiful sentiment: “Those who have a story feel a strong duty to ensure it continues.”

Famiglia e impresa. Storie di Cavalieri del Lavoro (Family and business. Stories of Cavalieri del Lavoro)

Various authors.

Marsilio, 2022

“Weigh your words” with a passion for exactitude, as if a speech or a written page were a chemical compound; “Do not trust inaccurate words”, just as you wouldn’t randomly mix acids and bases, to avoid disaster; and finally, write about “technical things as seen through the eye of an author while tracing the letters as a technician would.” Quotes by Primo Levi, which the great linguist Gian Luigi Beccaria revived for an event scheduled as part of the Festival del Classico in Turin (as mentioned in la Repubblica, 26 November), and their message is really rather similar to the one preached by refined author Italo Calvino, likewise captivated by the exact nature of scientific culture: “Focus only on difficult things that have been perfectly accomplished; be wary of easy ways, laziness, slapdash attitudes. Focus on accuracy, both in language and in the things you do” (as also mentioned in our blog post from 18 October).

Chemistry and literature. The desire to accomplish things to perfection. The rigour and the beauty that searching for the right word and the correct chemical or mathematical formula entails – indeed, to Levi, “loving one’s work is what most fully and concretely constitutes happiness on earth”, as shown by the passion conveyed by his Il sistema periodico (The periodic table) and his fascination with Mendeleev’s periodic table of elements, and the same with his La chiave a stella (The wrench) and the eagerness he felt in building mechanical installations such as metal towers and cranes. Moreover, it’s further evidence of a focus on a “polytechnic culture” – typically Italian, fervently technological and poetically unique – blending humanities and sciences.

This is what we should reflect on when discussing culture, and so, by extension, also education, training, know-how (or “tell-how”, from a writer’s viewpoint): the relationship that exists between culture and enterprise, memory and innovation, history and future, techne and aesthetics, under the powerful banner of an “industrial humanism” that binds together competitiveness and environmental and social sustainability, productivity and solidarity.

These are strong values, which need to be learned at school, experienced not as ancillary to education, as inferior to productive work skills and processes, but as part of a concurrent and organised relationship between work skills and civil duties that also include initiative, freedom and responsibility. Rereading Primo Levi is useful, indeed, along with Sinisgalli, Vittorini, Sereni, Natta and all those scientists and authors who held an ample and inclusive notion of culture: poets-cum-engineers, engineers-cum-philosophers, writers with a passion for technology and science.

Hence, in order to discuss “merit” in education while also “entering into its merits”, ITS (higher technical institutes, also called ITS Academies, highlighting the high educational value they offer to upper secondary school graduates) must be part of the conversation, and we should seriously think about the possible content offered by their programmes. In fact, we should borrow from Levi and Calvino, in order to highlight how educational processes – even those most tailored to the world of work – need to integrate a multidisciplinary, a “polytechnic” dimension, blending humanities and sciences and paying particular attention not merely to skills but also to the complexity of knowledge systems and the invaluable nature of a “know-how” attitude, as well as to a special focus on the whys and hows of things, up to a concept of “learning to learn” in its deepest sense.

In Italy, only 21,000 students are enrolled in ITS, as compared to 800,000 in equivalent institutions in Germany – this is also due to the fact that fewer than two students out of ten are aware of them, according to a survey launched by Talents Venture Observatory among high-school students (Il Sole24Ore, 28 November), while a little over four (42%) students have only heard of them and the other four don’t even know that they exist. Yet, these institutes guarantee good employment opportunities at the end of their two-year programme (80% of graduates find work within 12 months, as compared to the average 70% of university graduates).

As such, to have them grow, we need extraordinary commitment from the public and private spheres, fast and targeted public investments (the PNRR, the Italian recovery and resilience plan, can provide €1.5 billion but 18 out of the 19 decrees required to authorise a first expense of €500 million have not yet been approved) and fiscal stimulus supporting those foundations that launch them in close cooperation with productive areas and enterprises based in industrial territories. According to Giovanni Brugnoli, vice president for Human Capital at territorial entrepreneurial institution Confindustria, we are also very much in need of “extensive training and guidance activities for families, students and teachers”. Human capital looking for value. Young generations more attentive than ever to anything that might rebuild a climate of hope and confidence in a better future.

Training, communication, guidance for companies. “New skills for new careers within the environmental and digital twin transition”, declares UniCredit Lombardia, refining initiatives aimed at tackling this mismatch, this discrepant gap between labour supply and demand (companies can’t find professionals, yet Italy has the highest unemployment rate among young people in Europe). And, especially in the most industrialised regions of the north of the country, companies’ productivity and competitiveness, as compared to international competitors, is not growing due to the lack of graduates (from ITS Academies, but also from standard technical institutes) and technologically advanced skills.

This, then, is the issue we need to urgently address: that of STEM education (the acronym stands for science, technology, engineering and mathematics), which should be reclassified and enhanced into STEAM by adding an ‘a’ for arts – the humanities, the sense of beauty – to attain a refined culture based on individuality and quality, just like the values of design, to mention a more illustrative example, which Italian enterprises with international ambitions have been nurturing for a long time now. A taste for exactitude and perfection – which the teachings of Primo Levi must continue to inspire in us.

The Selection Ceremony for the finalists of the Premio Campiello Junior award will be held on Friday 16 December 2022 at 11 a.m., and live-streamed on the Pirelli Foundation‘s Facebook page and on the social media channels of the Premio Campiello.

During the ceremony, the finalist books will be announced, three for each of the two categories of the award: 7-10 years and 11-14 years. The selection will be made by a Jury of Writers chaired by Roberto Piumini with Chiara Lagani, actress  and playwright, Martino Negri , lecturer of didactics of literature and of literature for children at the University of Milano-Bicocca, Michela Possamai, lecturer at the IUSVE University of Venice, and former member of the Campiello Giovani jury, and David Tolin, bookseller and president of ALIR.

The speakers at the meeting, which will be moderated by Giancarlo Leone, will include Antonio Calabrò, director of the Pirelli Foundation and Enrico Carraro, president of the Fondazione Il Campiello.

After the selection of the finalists, it will be the turn of the Readers’ Jury: 240 young people from across Italy and from abroad will have the task of reading the finalists’ books and saying which one they like best, in order to decide the two winners, who will be proclaimed in May 2023, with the prize awarded in September 2023.

To follow the live stream, please click here.

For further information on Premio Campiello Junior events, please go to www.fondazionepirelli.org  and www.premiocampiello.org.

21 EoF stories, among thousands, now collected in a book

A different economy, yet an all-comprehensive one, encompassing enterprises, markets, development and growth, but with no exploitation or self-profit. This is what The Economy of Francesco (EoF) movement is all about, whose now regular events involve thousands of young people directly invited by Pope Francis to revamp the way in which we conceive and live the economy, through the wonderful means of narration. And these stories – some of them, at least – have now been collected in a book entitled The economy of Francesco. Il racconto dei protagonisti per una nuova economia (The economy of Francesco. The story of the protagonists for a new economy), collaboratively curated by Maria Giaglione and Marco Girardo with a precise goal: to render a sense of adventure made of ideals, experiences, tangible proposals and no ideologies.

Thus, the protagonists of this book are EoF young people and, above all, their individual stories, unfolding over the past two years, in view of a global summit in Assisi. The works includes 21 chapters (better described as stories) representing 3,000 young people from 115 countries across the world, and in just under 100 gripping pages, it really encompasses a bit of everything. Stories of economists, entrepreneurs and change-makers, as Luigino Bruni writes in his foreword, pointing out that, “It really feels like reading One thousand and one nights, as here, too, each story ends at the beginning of the next one.”

Subdivided in the book as “stories from the first year” and “stories from the second year” (some of the latter penned by writers from the Avvenire newspaper), these are individual narrations that perfectly describe a different economy than the traditional one and thus outline, too, an unexpected corporate culture in which closing the ledgers is not purely a question of arithmetic. Hence, to give some examples, we read about plantations mindful of workers and the environment, the challenge of microcredit in Africa, start-ups supporting the homeless, the importance of training and education as a response to growing inequality, the inclusion of ethics in American industry, how much diplomatic and financial relations could (if one wanted to) impact the energy transition, and much more.

Commenting on this collection, Maria Giaglione writes that EoF is an “eco-system of people and relationships, born of our times to alert us that there is still hope.” While, taking a different viewpoint, Marco Girardo tells us that EoF “interweaves stories from different places, concrete accounts and converging visions (…) in order to narrate itself and also how we can devise a more comprehensive way to conceive the economy and thus human development.” All this driven by the power of narrative, and though we might end up disagreeing with or even doubting some of these stories, we should nonetheless read them all – that’s the significance of this slim volume curated by Gaglione and Girardo.

The economy of Francesco. Il racconto dei protagonisti per una nuova economia (The economy of Francesco. The story of the protagonists for a new economy)

Maria Gaglione, Marco Girardo (curated by)

Avvenire/Vita e Pensiero, 2022

Globalisation and the pandemic have led to widespread intercultural and virtual working groups that need, however, to be properly understood and “governed”

‘Cross-cultural virtual teams’, or, the virtual (and virtuous) intersection of different cultures within a group. Different experiences creating positive contamination. Sowing new seeds for a better, improved and higher-quality crop. These are also themes around which a corporate culture aiming to remain up-to-date, topical and more competitive revolves around and, therefore, reading “The management of cross-cultural virtual teams” intervention by Nuno Baptista (researcher at the School of Social Communication in Lisbon) and recently published on European Journal of Human Resource Management Studies, will prove very useful.

The author’s aim is to explore “the contingencies of intercultural virtual teams, discussing the main challenges they entail and exploring a number of practices to manage them in a virtual environment.” Thus, Baptista wants to reach a better understanding of the reality arisen after the pandemic, starting with an observation: “The accelerated development of information technologies and communication, the transformation of entrepreneurial activities that are now more global and competitive, and the prevalence of services based on knowledge and information have led to the emergence of new models of virtual work teams, more flexible and adaptable, which go beyond typical departmental functions and require the collaboration of employees with different skills, opinions and abilities.” The whole phenomenon was then further accelerated by the outbreak of COVID-19.

In order to achieve his aim, Baptista first focuses on the main possible virtual and intercultural working groups, then goes on to outline these groups’ potential organisation and “governance” strategies, and finally describes the shape and meaning that their leaders take. Thus, in his conclusions the author points out the working difficulties that, however, these groups may encounter (from different perspectives to work habits), while nonetheless emphasising their value. In the end, “governance” skills, culture and ethics remain the most effective tools to make the most of these experiences.

The management of cross-cultural virtual teams

Nuno Baptista, European Journal of Human Resource Management Studies, 6/2022

“Shaping the future” – this is the motto that defines the new 2022/23 academic year at the University of Milano-Bicocca, which counts 37,000 students, 1,200 professors, 73 programmes and a swift climb in international ranking concerning quality of teaching and research. A future that needs to be built on the awareness of the past, comments rector Giovanna Iannantuoni; or, as Ursula von der Leyen, president of the European Commission, strategically put it, “The history of Europe is a history of Renaissance.”

Thus, the Renaissance as identity marker and foundation for development, and memory as an asset for growth. A grand scheme “to future memory”, as the latest work by Leonardo Sciascia – one of the best literary and civic minds of 20^th-century Europe – is concisely and intriguingly entitled. Retaining some doubts (…“if memory had a future”), however, while remaining acutely sensitive to the power of reason. Relying, in other words, on a newly found enlightened spirit – an essential feature in an era when science and critical knowledge are looked at with distrust, replaced by “magical thinking” as well as, even more regrettably, the wiles of fake news and trends inspired by so-called “utopias of escape” where a too hard reality and too cumbersome responsibilities – “utopias of reconstruction”, as per Lewis Mumford’s rigorous definition – are replaced by “idols”.

A critical Renaissance, then, celebrating enlightened thinking and, further, unafraid of confronting its darker sides (as the extraordinary Hieronymus Bosch exhibition at Palazzo Reale in Milan clearly shows).

The University of Milano-Bicocca has been in operation for 25 years now. It was built, and later expanded, in the Bicocca neighbourhood, north of Milan, an area where great industrial developments took place in the 20^th-century – first the Pirelli plant, followed, moving towards Sesto San Giovanni, by the Breda metalworks and the Falck steelworks. Assembly lines and workshops, foundries and rolling mills, the whistles of sirens marking the beginning and end of work shifts, train tracks entering the plants to load goods and tram stops crowded with workers. Rigorous, difficult, active and proud work – productive work, rife with technical skills and political, unionist and civic-minded notions.

Only memories are left of all this (also thanks to the documents and images preserved in the historical archives of the Pirelli Foundation and the ISEC (the Institute for contemporary history), as well as a heritage built on culture and passions. At the end of the 20^th century, Vittorio Gregotti deftly designed a neighbourhood that would accommodate both universities and enterprises, cultural sites and sports spaces, homes and services: an urban dimension able to develop the blend of beauty and functionality embodied by Gio Ponti’s Pirelli Skyscraper and anticipate the trends of a future Milan, now home to the Porta Nuova and City Life skyscrapers, a transformed Bovisa district and the MIND (the “Milan Innovation District”) area.

Nowadays, the phrase “industrial humanism” is often heard in meetings about the relevance of corporate culture – a phrase that also recalls company magazines (such as the Rivista Pirelli, the Civiltà delle Macchine by Finmeccanica/Iri, the Comunità by Olivetti and the Il Gatto Selvatico by Eni) and the role they played in stimulating a better culture in the 1950s and 1960s.  And to this we can also add “polytechnic culture”, to indicate that blend of humanities and sciences – rigorous techne and a sophisticated sense of beauty, engineering and philosophy – distinguishing those periods, which have evolved into a “manufacturing Renaissance”, the phrase that the international press has adopted to denote the Italian industry of the year 2000, ruled by mechatronics and the digital economy.

Here we are again, then, to a term that’s so dear to universities, encapsulating the dynamism of factories that have transformed into “factories of ideas and knowledge”, of industry that has become a cultural space where skills for a better future are born. Indeed, industry always showed a multidisciplinary spirit and that’s especially relevant today, in an era when widespread Artificial Intelligence calls for engineers-cum-philosophers and mathematicians able to design algorithms that are both socially and morally ethical as well as technically innovative, chemists and sociologists, data scientists and jurists, architects and digital economy experts, psychologists and cyber-security technicians. All working together in hybrid neo-factories generating production and research and in high-tech services and state-of-the-art centres where criteria of environmental and social sustainability steeped in a “do, do well and do good” attitude are formulated.

Universities are the key cornerstones within this process and this loudly resounds in the speeches opening the new academic year at the Bicocca-Milano, Polytechnic, Bocconi and Cattolica universities, as well as at the State and IULM universities, and all other academic institutions that make the Great Milan a special site of knowledge and change.

Smart cities are the future (as Carlo Ratti, director of MIT’s Senseable City Lab in Boston, highlighted in his keynote address) and in order to exist and grow, in line with new and improved economic and social balances, need smart lands – territory where the quality of life, competitiveness and social inclusion go hand in hand. Yet, above all, they need smart citizens, social actors able to lead an active, aware, critical and responsible civic life. Here we are again, then, looking to the future – a confidence gambit for the new generations, supported by a good university education.

(photo Getty images)

 Our publishing project Thinking Ahead. Pirelli: 150 Years of Industry, Innovation and Culture, published this year by Marsilio, has received two important honours for its promotion of corporate heritage.

This morning, at the Confindustria congress centre in Rome, we received the first prize in the “Storytelling through words, images and sounds” category of the 2022 Corporate Heritage Awards. The award is promoted by Leaving Footprints, an academic spinoff of the University of Naples Parthenope with the University of Sannio, specialised in consulting in the field of heritage marketing. The aim of the award is to showcase and tell the stories of the companies that have played a role in the development of Italy, to help promote and develop corporate culture.

The book also obtained the Montegrappa Special Mention for the promotion of Company Heritage at the 2022 OMI Awards, which will be given on 19 November in the Assembly Hall of the Polo Zanotto at the University of Verona. Now in its sixth edition, the primary aim of the Osservatorio Monografie d’Impresa award is to promote institutional monographs as a means for enhancing corporate communication and reputation.

Corporate storytelling is essential for making known the values of a large company like Pirelli, which has reached a century and a half in business by constantly focusing on innovation in all disciplines.

A recently published research study focuses on enterprising communities

Communities that develop with an aim – communities that “achieve”. Existing social systems with something extra, which also have a lot to say in terms of organisation, embodying a weighty culture of being and accomplishment. Communities, then, that should certainly be analysed and better understood, which is what a Euricse research group did with “Le comunità intraprendenti in Italia” (“Enterprising communities in Italy”), a recently published report that attempts to shed some light on a facet of the economy and of society that many claim to know and be a part of, but whose key features still need to be fully explored.

The study, coordinated by Jacopo Sforzi, revolves around a particular observation: “Since the end of this century’s first decade, when the heavy consequences of the financial crisis on income levels and employment were felt, reliance on the term ‘community’ and on community resources has progressively increased. The pandemic, and now the energy crisis, have further contributed to this evolution.” And, additionally, there is the realisation that it is “finally clear how initiatives promoted by communities are able to bring forth and capitalise on economic resources that our model, purely based on a private goods/public goods dyad, has been neglecting and thus ignored, because unable to situate them within its own system.”

Starting from here, the paper first highlights the distinctive features and widespread nature of Italian enterprising communities, before further exploring the main types of community in existence: community hubs, community enterprises, complex collaboration agreements, neighbourhood caretaker groups, social markets and food banks, communities supporting agriculture, food cooperatives, energy communities and FabLabs. Each enterprising community is described in qualitative and quantitative terms, and for each some concrete examples are given. What emerges is a complex and varied picture of a world that, as we mentioned above, is substantial yet not fully understood.

“Virtuous examples of social innovation” – this is how the study defines them in its conclusions – such communities acquire a new aspect and a new role as drivers of a different social and production culture.

Indeed, such conclusions also add that, “It becomes obvious, then, how the different experiences encompass several intervention areas, which vary depending on the needs and resources of each single community, and succeed in joining together cultural, social, economic and also political activities. In addition, it is also possible to identify the enterprising communities described in this report as efficient tools for the activation and consolidation of territories’ social capital.” In other words, this is a promising world that has just been discovered and, as such, needs to be further investigated.

Le comunità intraprendenti in Italia (“Enterprising communities in Italy”)

Various authors.

Euricse Research Report, 023/22