Milan is fast, Milan is frenetic, Milan hurries too much, Milan never stops. These are stereotypes, clichés. In all fairness, they do harbour some truth, but they are limited, as they reduce complex realities to banal, threadbare sketches. It’s therefore important to keep on working on one particular trait of the city, among others: the willingness to learn, reflect, try to properly understand the meaning of what needs doing. And then, of course, actually do it – with determination, efficiency, a certain level of effectiveness, and, yes, nowadays with some speed, too. Always bearing in mind, of course, what Alessandro Manzoni (Don Lisander to his friends) taught us through the words of Grand Chancellor Antonio Ferrer, as he addressed his coachman in a well-known section of I promessi sposi (The betrothed): “Adelante, Pedro, con juicio” (“On, Pedro, with care”). And indeed, it’s probably no coincidence that the most successful slogan of the Pirelli Foundation, Milanese to the core, is “la potenza è nulla senza controllo” (“power is nothing without control”). Just another way to say “juicio”.

The COVID-19 pandemic has reshuffled trends and habits. It has radically changed economic and social strategies, highlighted vulnerabilities, imposed new criteria on the relationships between work, health and social coexistence. Hence, new maps are needed to chart new ways of thinking, consuming and producing – to create new job opportunities, and thus promote a better growth.

Yet, the speed at which technology is challenging space and time boundaries, this “immediate immediacy” of the “everything now”, should not be fuelling the digital obsession for constant “real time”: an obsession that, to be honest, characterises part of Milan’s citizens. On the contrary, we need to be able to stop, think, try to understand, in order to build our recovery in responsible fashion – or, rather, to boost “regeneration”, to use a term favoured by Assolombarda in its most recent considerations.

The “culture of making” that deeply distinguishes Milan goes hand in hand with widespread knowledge, strong relationships between companies and universities (whose quality and authoritativeness are rising on the international stage) and the cultural world (such as publishing houses, theatres, art spaces).

In a nutshell: the speed of Milan is contemplative.

And what is Milan so quickly contemplating? This was the topic of a debate held in mid-September as part of the “Amare Milano” (“Love Milan”) project; a long afternoon of discussions conducted under the shade of the magnolia of the Palazzo delle Stelline’s courtyard, organised by the Centro Studi Grande Milano association. An event chaired by its president Daniela Mainini and dedicated to the memory of Carlo Tognoli, one of the best and most loved mayors of Milan. The discussions centred on one of the metropolis’s key characteristics: to have a vision and translate it into practice, to think big yet keep the feet on the ground – the project’s ambition and a pragmatic approach to accomplish reforms. Reforms in politics and authorities, as well as in business. Applying those good practices that were acquired over time in order to build a solid network of relations between public and private.

Milan, today, is a dense web that comprises different attitudes, tensions, visions – often contradictory ones, which need to be harnessed to a development plan mindful of the wealth diversity can bring, but also aware that excessive disparities in income, relations and possibilities can hinder environmental and social growth. Then again, this is Milan’s underlying nature: to be both competitive and inclusive, profit-oriented yet caring.

The campaign for the election of the new mayor of Milan and city council is almost at its end (and all polls indicate that Beppe Sala, incumbent mayor, is the favourite candidate for re-election). However, those who know Milan will also know that, over the years, Palazzo Marino, the seat of the city council, has developed a strong culture of continuity, even when mayors belonging to different political parties are elected – yet another underlying trend, among others, driving the metropolis.

A trend that needs to be stressed and that sees Milan as the central hub within a system of economic relationships that comprises the whole productive area extending from the north-west of Turin and Genoa to the north-east, where we find globalised medium-sized companies and districts accelerating productivity, and further expands towards the dynamic Emilia-Romagna region, nicknamed the “Motor Valley”, with its hi-tech industries and know-how spanning from the machine tools industry to the robotics and automotive sectors. An economy spread out along the A1-A4 motorway axes (from east to west, from north to south) and deeply integrated with Europe, its strengths including manufacturing, finance, services, universities, culture, all within a network encompassing metropolises, medium-sized towns and socially dynamic territories. A unique phenomenon in Europe, and a very “glocal” one, to use the clever portmanteau of ‘global’ and ‘local’. A geo-economic dimension whose flows (of ideas, people, projects, works, goods, exchanges) are strongly tied to local identity. And Milan is at the heart of all this, with its culture and spirit, its opportunities and plans – a genuine “middle ground”, as its original Latin name, Mediolanum, suggests.

An enterprise such as “Milano & Partners”, whose strong collaboration with the public sector (especially with the council), social stakeholders and private companies, is a great boon when it comes to attracting financial and intellectual resources, and as such can play a major role: a role that’s broad-minded, open to dialogue and innovation, open to new projects.

Hence, we’re back to that much needed conflation between contemplation and speed, plans and implementation, and we recall a Latin adage, apt for such a productive city: “Festìna lente”, “make haste, slowly” – move swiftly but with caution.

Latin historian Suetonius attributed the phrase to Emperor Augustus, and it became the motto of Aldo Manuzio, a printer and publisher who lived in Venice during the Renaissance period, when the city’s trade was at its zenith. Words also beloved by mayor Beppe Sala and by archbishop Mario Delpini, who criticised the hectic pace of a greedy cupidity that widens social gaps (“inequalities are increasing, there’s a part of Milan that’s moving too fast and is making far too much profit”). But also beloved by some companies, especially those related to industry and services, those tied to the real economy and that fully grasp the need for the coming of a new season bringing an environmental and social sustainability based on (mainly international) investments, employment, quality of life.

From this perspective, the future is crystal clear: a future marked by the circular and civic economy, that is, where sustainability becomes the pivot on which competitiveness rests.

In this fast and contemplative metropolis, brimming with enterprise and “polytechnic culture”, open to reform and ensuring that development remains well rooted in social responsibility, two essential hues transpire: green and blue. The former symbolising the environment and environmental and social values, the latter the emblem of innovation and well-managed digital technologies “designed for human beings”. Two colours entwined around Milan, a city whose roots are deep in historical self-awareness while it looks to the future, and that could indeed become the best illustration of “Festìna lente”.

Ignazio Visco’s reading of Dante Alighieri enhances corporate culture for all

Classics and the economy, or, rather, companies and classics. Not two separate worlds disconnected from each other, but two strictly interrelated ways of living in society, illustrating how ephemeral any boundary meant to rigidly compartmentalise human activity is. An aspect that is often missed through a quicker, more superficial reading, but fully grasped by Ignazio Visco, Governor of the Bank of Italy, in his speech “Note sull’economia di Dante e su vicende dei nostri tempi” (“Notes on Dantean economy and vicissitudes of our times”), delivered at the Dante2021 Festival in Ravenna.

Dante, therefore, and economy, production, exchange, finance, exploitation, doing business. Visco offers an unusual take on the poet’s brilliance, based on observing what Dante Alighieri might have lived through in his time. The Governor’s way of reading classics is nonetheless a cautious one (we should never read history purely through our modern eyes), and as such takes the cue from Dante’s life and civic commitment.

Taking The Divine Comedy and Convivio (as well as other texts) as his starting point, Visco runs through some of the major themes concerning the economy (both past and current), such as finance, profits, production, exploitation, imbalances, economics and ethics. Dante, therefore, is seen as a figure foreseeing many of the issues that, still today, are central to our economy and politics. “The innovative power in Dante’s analysis,” writes, for instance, Visco, “lies in identifying the global nature of instability, which he directly observed and masterly described in The Divine Comedy, and as such the need for institutions to change in order to handle it. Nowadays, the financial crisis that occurred in the first decade of this century, the sovereign debt crisis linked to the euro in the second decade, the crisis due to the COVID-19 pandemic that we are still dealing with, all share the same characteristic: the need for a supranational response.”

“Dante,” adds Visco, “reminds us that ‘the individual’s need for human society … is established for a single end: namely, a life of happiness, which no one is able to attain by themselves without the aid of someone else, since one has need of many things which no single individual is able to provide. Therefore the Philosopher says that human being is by nature a social animal.’ (Convivio, IV, 1). How happiness can be reached is not really apparent, but the imperfections and limits deriving from greed threaten to compromise, as we would say today, an efficient allocation of resources and the stability of the monetary balance, with undeserved effects on equitable distribution, too. Hence, there is a need for an external intervention that could re-establish and preserve balance, and whose scope extends beyond national boundaries.”

Be mindful of efficiency, we would say nowadays, but also of humankind, and of the environment.

Ignazio Visco’s reading of Dante Alighieri is certainly very different from all others. And it is a good reading for those, too, who wish to enhance a careful corporate culture, nourished by calculations and logic but also by knowledge refined by history and human actions that go well beyond today’s balance sheets and digitalisation.

Note sull’economia di Dante e su vicende dei nostri tempi (Notes on Dantean economy and vicissitudes of our times)

Intervention of Ignazio Visco, Governor of the Bank of Italy

Dante2021 Festival, Ravenna, 11 September 2021

A collection of 26 stories about start-ups that can teach everyone a great deal

The beginning of an adventure is perhaps the best part of it. The idea of exploring something new, exchanging views with others, thinking about the next steps, planning them, getting the tools (whether physical or mental) ready, focusing on the goal, dreaming about it. This is also true for the world of production and economy, as, on close examination, every enterprise is an adventure (encompassing women, men and things) and as such must be carefully planned and managed. A departure and a journey, then, and knowledge. This is why one should keep informed, study, learn. And this is why Storie di startup dalla A alla Z. Case study, esempi pratici e insight raccontati direttamente dai protagonisti dell’ecosistema startup (Start-up stories from A to Z. Case studies, practical examples and insights directly narrated by protagonists in the start-up ecosystem), a recently published collection of 26 stories about start-ups gathered by Vincenzo E.M. Giardino, makes for useful reading.

The book has a simple purpose: to gather, through the voice of authoritative stakeholders within the start-up system – that of up-and-coming, fledgling companies with (or at least aspiring to) a great future – the narratives of those visions that lead to the creation of an innovative, unconventional, offbeat enterprise.

The stories in Giardino’s book are varied, and they are all accompanied by a drawing on the first page that summarises the company’s strength points, the dreams of the narrator. Stories that are indeed placed in alphabetical order (from A to Z), according to a key concept. Hence, there are chapters dedicated to, for example, ambition, business plans, the ecosystem, market orientation, the “mission statement”, open innovation, technological transfer, and much more. Chapters can be consulted randomly and are addressed to a wider number of people, to anyone who might have something to do with start-ups.

Vincenzo Giardino’s book, then, should be read with care (and perhaps re-read after having witnessed other start-ups embarking on their own adventure), though at times, even in some introductory sections, clarity of language gives perhaps too much way to jargon terms that can become irksome while reading.

Storie di startup dalla A alla Z. Case study, esempi pratici e insight raccontati direttamente dai protagonisti dell’ecosistema startup (Start-up stories from A to Z. Case studies, practical examples and insights directly narrated by protagonists in the start-up ecosystem)

Vincenzo E.M. Giardino

Egea, 2021

Figures come in handy when discussing significant reforms and a socially sustainable future. The first figure we’re looking at is 400,000 – the number of job vacancies that companies fear might not be able to fill this autumn – a season that will be driven by fierce recovery, with an expected GDP growth of about 6% – due to the lack of specialised workers, especially in the high tech sectors, those that drive development (the data comes from an investigation undertaken by “Affari&Finanza”, supplement of la Repubblica, 13 September).

The second figure to consider consists of a series of numbers: 3.5 million people are in receipt of “citizenship income” (welfare allowance dependant on income and citizenship); out of these, 1.3 million people are employable, yet only 152,000 of them have succeeded in finding a job (though it’s not known how many found it through job centres), and only 400 people were hired by entrepreneurs who decided to take advantage of legal incentives (thought of by many as too restrictive and involving too much bureaucracy). Considering the big gap between 1.3 million and 400, this decision that claimed to “abolish poverty” through employment seems to have miserably failed.

A further significant figure is provided by the replacement rate of the “quota 100” pension scheme (taking retirement at 62 years old, after 38 years’ worth of contributions): 0.4 for each one of the three years the scheme has been in operation. This means that, on average, only 40 new workers have been hired to replace 100 retired ones. Another failure, considering that the plan was to replace an elderly workforce with a younger one.

Yet, it came at a significant cost to the public purse: 30 billion in three years for both measures – 11.6 for “quota 100” and almost 20 in “citizenship income”.

These two projects were waved about like propaganda flags, the former by the Lega Nord party led by Matteo Salvini and the latter by the Five Star Movement, in the days of Giuseppe Conte’s “yellow-green” government, when the two parties formed a coalition. Two populist plans useful for attracting votes, but that in reality lacked effectiveness and came at a very high cost. And that now have to be abolished or, at least, drastically reformed, as per the figures in hand.

The current government led by Mario Draghi rightly points towards reform (as also urged by recent well-documented analyses by the OECD). The Five Star exponents defend their choice, while Salvini, speaking for the Lega Nord, threatens to make a stand to safeguard “quota 100” and renew it for another two years, finding some support in Maurizio Landini’s CGIL (Italian General Confederation of Labour) party. Yet, just on the eve of the administrative election due at the beginning of October, both political parties have adopted propagandistic tactics. And faced with the noise made by identity politics, the government shows, once more, a clear willingness for reforms and for moving forward.

No one, of course, doubts that some measures are needed to tackle the actual poverty experienced by a few millions of Italian people (something that basic income does too little to address, and does so badly, in skewed fashion and with too many opportunities for “crafty” people to benefit from it eluding legal requirements). Hence, adequate welfare measures will need to be perfected.

Tackling the issues of those finding their first jobs, those who lost theirs and need help to find new ones, of young people and women who can’t find employment because they’re not sufficiently qualified, of middle-aged individuals who find themselves off the market due to a reorganisation aimed at spreading digital technologies, is a different matter.

The paths that could be chosen concern above all education and training, long-term programmes ending with a qualification; a deep transformation of the policies and workings of job centres; a greater and better welfare system, with the government fine-tuning strategies and tangible choices that are closely linked with those who represent our social forces.

The challenge lies in linking education, training and employment in order to deal with the economy’s deep transformation, in decreasing the tax wedge to improve workers’ income and ease companies’ costs, in stimulating investments to create new qualified professional roles. In fact, these are precisely the issues that the indications included in the PNRR (Piano nazionale di resilienza e ripresa), the Italian recovery and resilience plan, together with funding from the EU, aim to address. And, looking forward, and in relation to the knowledge economy, it’s worth remembering that “every euro invested in education is also invested in the whole country”, as Francesco Profumo – former rector at the Politecnico di Torino and former Italian Minister of Education, now president of the Compagnia di San Paolo foundation – loves to repeat.

While with regard to pensions, we need to take responsibility in acknowledging the disastrous effects of “quota 100”: it has deeply decreased the number of active workers, depriving companies and the public authorities of top-quality skills, without adequately creating new jobs and, for instance, forcing Luca Zaia, the governor of Veneto, to put a great number of recently retired doctors back on duty due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Goodbye, then, “quota 100”. The government is researching “balanced solutions” to avoid a transition from the current situation to a sharp increase of the retirement age to 67 years. The debate is open, and it needs to move forward with competence and a sense of responsibility, knowing full well that Italy, just now, is in need of development, employment, and welfare – and not of the old unproductive kind. And that public expenditure should be devolved to investments in the growth of quality and sustainability, not gimmicks designed to grab voters’ attention.

“This prize rewards those who write

living stories, and who, through writing

that is never demeaned by sermonising

entrusts to beauty all that has value,

responding to the vision of children,

to their exacting and timid curiosity,

to their silent,

at times cantankerous

need and desire for words.”

This previously unpublished poem by Roberto Piumini opens the events devoted to the first edition of the Premio Campiello Junior, which came about through the partnership between the Pirelli Libraries and the Premio Campiello.

The real protagonists will be young readers from all over Italy, who will be called upon to choose the winner: a popular jury consisting of 160 children aged 10 to 14, who will have the task of selecting the best book of fiction or poetry from the three finalists chosen by a technical jury.

Primary and lower-secondary school educators and teachers are invited to the presentation of the programme of events involving young people in the jury of readers. The event will take place online on Thursday 23 September 2021 at 5.30 p.m. During the meeting you will be able to see how to propose young people as candidates and learn about the educational initiatives – put on by the Pirelli Foundation in collaboration with the Campiello – that will accompany young readers on this adventure, also in the first months of 2022.

Speakers:

Antonio Calabrò, director of the Pirelli Foundation

Michela Possamai, IUSVE teacher and member of the Premio Campiello Junior Jury

Stefania Zuccolotto, member of the Management Committee of the Premio Campiello with responsibility for Campiello Junior

The booking system is available on this page. A link will be subsequently sent for connection on the Microsoft Teams platform.

To keep up to date on the initiatives of the Premio Campiello Junior, you can find more information on www.fondazionepirelli.org and www.premiocampiello.org.

We look forward to seeing you

On Sunday 12 September, Formula 1 drivers and teams will battle it out for the podium at Monza. The Brianza circuit has always been the scene of epic contests with great champions of the present, such as Fernando Alonso, Lewis Hamilton, Charles Leclerc and Max Verstappen, but also of the past, such as the unforgettable Juan Manuel Fangio, Gigi Villoresi, and Piero Taruffi. These are just some of the driving aces who have bound the history of Pirelli to that of the Italian Grand Prix, becoming the faces of a promotional project like no other.

The year was 1965. After studying the outcome of a market survey, Pirelli planned a new advertising campaign to capture and keep the multitude of new motorists, with cars registered between 1962 and 1963, who would inevitably need to change their tyres that year. This led to a new communication strategy – one that was destined to impose one of the company’s flagship products on the Italian market, after it had taken the world by storm: the Pirelli Cinturato. Patented in 1951, it immediately became synonymous with safety, durability, flexibility and comfort. Across the world, the judgment was unanimous: the Cinturato, in all its forms – from standard to summer to winter – was the most prestigious tyre on the market. It was produced under a Pirelli patent in 19 countries and each nation fell in love with it for a different reason: in Spain it was “the tyre your car was waiting for”, in Brazil they adored the beauty of the tread, and in Switzerland its safety, while in England it was chosen for its road handling.

From January to December 1965, all Italy was plastered with a promotional campaign with great ideas that came in the form of advertisements on paper, billboards, television and film. Pirelli was launching a campaign, now online on our website, with exceptional endorsers: Fangio, Maglioli, Villoresi, Bracco, Gonzales, Taruffi and Chiron. The return of these record-breakers and their sensational feats, as drivers in everyday attire, introduced a new style of highly emotional advertising that went on to affect sales in the following years.

“I used to race with your Stelvios. Now I have the Cinturato on my car. Extraordinario! It is a tyre that’s really different from the others. What is so amazing is the absolute precision if gives you”, crowed Manuel Fangio.

“Embroiders the road!”, screamed the poster of Gigi Villoresi.

“Ahora, velocidad y seguridad”, cheered José Froilan Gonzales with a wink.

“Sensationnel”, promised Chiron, who had been testing the tyre for years in the Monte Carlo Rally.

“Safer than ever!”, said Giovanni Bracco.

The end user was contacted all the time, every day: when he opened his newspaper and rode on public transport in the morning all the way until the evening, when he turned on the TV or spent a few hours at the cinema or reading a motoring magazine. All year long, these “travelling messages” flashed past the Italians. There was talk of the Cinturato everywhere. The smiling faces of driving champions appeared all over the place, telling of their experience of driving a Pirelli-fitted car. Thanks to their skills, their long lines of extraordinary victories and the key role they played in the history of motoring, these drivers were the perfect voice with which to talk of the power, innovation and safety of a tyre that not only changed the history of Pirelli, but the very way in which driving was viewed.

Ever since it was first opened in 1922, the Monza race track has been synonymous with speed. The first lap of honour was given to the heroes of the moment, Pietro Bordino and Felice Nazzaro, aboard a Fiat 750. The greatest drivers, such as Antonio Ascari, winner of the 1924 Italian Grand Prix, and Gastone Brilli-Peri, the first World Champion in 1925, have all fought it out on the Monza circuit since then. In 1933, Monza proved fatal for Giuseppe Campari, Ascari’s teammate, at the entrance to the famous banking that is one of the wonders of modern motor racing.

In 1950, the race track witnessed the victory of Nino Farina, the first Formula 1 World Champion, in his Alfa Romeo, and in 1955 it sealed the fate of Alberto Ascari, who went off the track during a test lap in a Ferrari. The history of the race track is closely intertwined with the long career of Juan Manuel Fangio, who also used it as a set for a film with Amedeo Nazzari and, many years later, to celebrate both himself and the Pirelli Cinturato in a series of Caroselli commercials for Italian television. Monza also starred in a splendid photo shoot by Federico Patellani in 1950, with the mechanics-tyre fitters wearing their Pirelli overalls and caps in the pits. The history of Monza is also one of broken records on two wheels: one photograph that remains in the annals shows Gianni Leoni in November 1948, down on his “Guzzino”, “after almost fifteen hours of racing in weather conditions that were by no means favourable”, and pointing at the Pirelli advertising billboard, as he strives to conquer another record.

When Pirelli abandoned racing in 1956, it did not sever its historical links with the Monza race track. The experimental return to Formula 1 in the 1980s and, especially, the great years in the various Touring championships often took Pirelli radials back to the “world’s most famous asphalt”. And racing continues to this day, with record-breaking tyres on a circuit that is the stuff of legend.

A recently published book provides a useful synthesis of organisational methods’ goals and tools

The ability to organise and get organised – a theme essential to all companies, as well as to their employees. A theme that might sound trite, and yet still leaves much room for exploration. Reading the recently published Sapersi organizzare. Piani, obiettivi, traguardi e altre sfide quotidiane (How to get organised. Plans, objectives, achievements and other daily challenges) really helps to understand when and how to introduce some level of organisation (to production or other areas).

Fraccaroli teaches Work and Organisational Psychology at the University of Trento and in his book he very adroitly explains that, above all, when “looking at the current world of production (…),” one can draw attention to “how ways of working are becoming increasingly virtual, mobile, self-managed. As a result of this trend, in future we’ll see fewer ‘people in organisations’ and more ‘organisation in people’. This means that the level of individual responsibility in managing one’s own work has dramatically increased and will keep on increasing.” Hence, organisation is a crucial skill for everyone.

But how to tackle it? Fraccaroli writes that solutions “to keep an acceptable balance between ourselves, what we do and our future” are achievable, and that “self-organisation means to make plans, implement them and try to shape the events of today and what might happen tomorrow in a manner that is acceptable to us.”

Hence, the book starts by analysing the concept of “managing the future”, which turns into a need to “set objectives for oneself” and thus adopt proper solutions in order to achieve them, thanks to expedients such as “learning from mistakes” or involving one’s community when planning, rather than doing it alone, as well as succeeding in managing one’s own time.

In his conclusion, Fraccaroli states that “The ability to get organised means knowing how to build strong mental foundations, using common sense, giving them a well-defined shape, and develop them according to certain priorities (how I would like to be; how I would like my future to be), from which secondary processes will then naturally ensue, such as empowering, collecting feedback, planning, evaluating, taking the initiative, adapting.” He adds, “To us, the ability to get organised is an articulated psychological process that cannot be traced back to a fragmented series of operational tasks.” Therefore, the path towards individual and collective organisation is a rather tortuous one. And a long one, too, along which good corporate culture also grows, and which is much easier to embark on after reading Franco Fraccaroli’s book.

Sapersi organizzare. Piani, obiettivi, traguardi e altre sfide quotidiane (How to get organised. Plans, objectives, achievements and other daily challenges)

Franco Fraccaroli

Il Mulino, 2021

Research undertaken by the University of Calabria provides a snapshot of this complex issue

 Innovation: always and without a question, though some caution and consideration is required. It’s an important, crucial issue for any business and it continues to be a priority.

We need, however, to understand what it means and how it can be implemented. We also need some outlines, in order to steer its execution, and here is the value of Emanuela Logozzo’s thesis Open Innovation. La globalizzazione dell’innovazione (Open Innovation. The globalisation of innovation), recently defended as part of the Business Economics and Management Master’s degree course, Department of Business and Legal Studies, University of Calabria.

Logozzo explains, “Innovation has been perceived as the central factor for the long-term survival of organisations. The most evolved international companies were able to put in place effective open innovation strategies. Open innovation is a matter of relationships and networking, within a company but also with all actors within an entire ecosystem, from suppliers to customers.” Open innovation is seen as the answer to the growing needs for competitive change in companies that have to contend with increasingly higher financial and organisational costs.

Hence, the author of this investigation looks at the crucial aspects of open innovation, starting from its definitions and characteristics, and going on to explore in depth its obstacles and key drivers in Europe. She reaches a number of conclusions but, above all, highlights the need to evaluate with care what should be adopted as part of an innovation path. “At times,” writes Logozzo, “open innovation represents a convenient, accurate tool for the externalisation of thoughts, even during difficult periods; at other times, however, it can become a sunk cost for organisations that have adopted this kind of business model. Indeed, one of the biggest mistakes one could make with OI is that of squandering resources when there is no need to do so – that is, try to achieve goals methodically while not really understanding the reason why. Closed and open innovations both exist for a reason, and knowing this reason can help organisations to balance them in a consistent manner, getting the best of both worlds.”

Emanuela Logozzo’s research provides an honest and useful overview of the current state of play of a topic still in evolution.

Open Innovation. La globalizzazione dell’innovazione (Open Innovation. The globalisation of innovation)

Emanuela Logozzo

Thesis, University of Calabria, Department of Business and Legal Studies, Master’s Degree Business Economics and Management course, 2020

“Why did air encroach upon space? What led us to the eternal? Where, where did the stars run to? When I entered the class and sat down, the questions pressed down on us, seized the air, flitted about the students’ heads. The professor came in, said hello, quickly counted us. He paused when he saw me and smiled. I was the only woman.”

Faculty of Mathematics, Sapienza University of Rome. Autumn 1915. This woman was Anna Maria Ciccone – curious, enterprising, determined not to share the same fate of other girls from wealthy Sicilian families (she was born in Noto in 1891): a good marriage, children, housekeeping, the wealthy and tedious passing of time in an ancient province. She had a passion for science, the light, the stars. She wanted to study, understand, research, teach. So, against her parents’ will, she left Sicily, started studying mathematics in Rome and soon after won a public competition to gain admittance to the Scuola Normale Superiore university in Pisa. Fascinated by the then revolutionary ideas of Einstein, she caught the eye of a few supporters. And then, from Pisa to Germany, and back to Pisa, always in search of “a small glimpse of knowledge…”.

Simona Lo Iacono, a writer of indisputable and captivating talent, told her story in La tigre di Noto (The tiger of Noto), published by Neri Pozza. Ciccone had a strong inclination for scientific research, as well as a civic passion combining a mighty sense of responsibility, which led her to defy Nazi’s anti-Semitic raids and save 5,000 valuable Jewish books. She enjoyed the latest ideas on relativity and quantum physics that were changing the world, and showed an eager yet austere vocation for teaching. Indeed, she taught experimental physics in Pisa, did research in atomic and nuclear physics at the Collège de France, and qualified for two full professorship posts, to which “she was never appointed, because she was a woman.”

Re-reading her story, remained unknown for so long, is worthwhile, especially now that Italy, too, is increasingly becoming aware that more women are needed in science and, more in general, in STEM – which stands for Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics. Anna Maria Ciccone, Marianna to her friends and colleagues, was in fact a pioneering STEM woman, a leading figure who exemplified the significant role played by high-level women scholars in science and research, and how significant an original and inquisitive attitude, the ability to wonder and ask questions, the combination of emotional intelligence and rational investigation, can be.

“Role models. 50 successful women in tech and science: become one of us”, reads the title of an article in CorrierEconomia (6 September) on the results of a study undertaken by Inspiring Fifty, an initiative launched in 2015 by two Dutch digital entrepreneurs, Janneke Niessen and Joelle Frijters, aimed at enhancing the role of women in high tech companies and science, and at encouraging girls and young women to choose a career in science.

“Promoting the debate on the value of STEM education and the role of women in technological innovation is the duty of society,” states Marilù Capparelli, managing director of Google Legal Department, one of the Italian women included in the Inspiring Fifty. Other Italian role models include Anna Grassellino (director of the National Quantum Information Science Research Center of Chicago); Barbara Mazzolini (associate director at the Istituto italiano di Tecnologia of Genoa); Diana Bracco (president and CEO of the eponymous pharmaceutical group); Nunzia Ciardi (director of the Italian Postal Police); Luisa Lavagnini (director of Research and Development and Technological Innovation at Eni); Nicoletta Mastropietro (Chief Information Officer for the high-tech company Leonardo); and many more women from Italy, other European countries and the US. All keeping a watchful eye on the relationships between science, technology and environmental and social questions. “To address the environmental issues of our century we need engineers, chemists, physicists. But we also need more women, because the solution to a global problem requires diversity, in ideas and attitudes, as well as the experience of both women and men,” says Giovanna Laudisio, co-founder and CEO of Naturbeads, a start-up focused on trying to solve the problem of microplastic pollution.

A STEM future where women will be the protagonists, then.

A thought comes to mind, however: the acronym could be enhanced, from STEM to STEAM. By adding the “A” from Arts to these vital scientific skills, we’d also include that totality of humanistic knowledge necessary to conceive original concepts, a sign of a more heterogeneous “polytechnic culture” (a recurring term in our blog).

Indeed, new technological challenges, from sustainability to the recent types of Artificial Intelligence, always necessitate synergy between different sets of knowledge (an attitude that, by the by, is associated with Italy and – according to some – to women). And our efforts to “learn to learn” should include precisely that emotional intelligence we talked about.

It’s worth, then, reiterating a remark included in last week’s blog, made in reference to industrial humanism and – especially – digital humanism by Christian Greco, director of the Egyptian Museum of Turin: “It’s time to introduce what can only be defined as digital humanism, in which archaeologists, anthropologists, architects, historians, philosophers, neuroscientists, psychologists work side by side with chemists, physicists, computer specialists, in order to attain the definition of new semantics that will allow us to understand and process the complexity of our reality.”