Serving as the springboard for discussions at this Meeting for the Aspen Junior Fellows was the observation that Italy’s fortunes will pick up again, and that it is armed with this knowledge, along with a strong drive, high ideals, and continuous training, that younger generations in the country must face the future and do business. The large number of small and medium-sized businesses that typify Italy’s entrepreneurial landscape were characterized as facing the major competitive challenges of internationalization, growth in a more globalized market, and exercising managerial skill in a more complex world.
Being Italian – it was submitted – is not a handicap, but rather continues to be a boon as it encompasses both tradition and modernity, and can thus draw on the fruitful interplay of craftsmanship and technology, with numerous success stories demonstrating that, based on its manufacturing tradition, the “Bel Paese” has much potential. The recipe for success is to believe in the values of Italian culture, raise the profile of Italy’s industrial identity, face the future with courage, and invest in innovation. It was stressed that the time has come for decisions to be taken, and that it is no accident that the Greek word for crisis (κρίση) also means decision. To have substance, it is necessary to be able to change, to want to change, and to feel an obligation to change.
One crucial factor singled out as decisive for the success of Italian businesses was that of tapping into the local context in which they operate, which entails looking beyond the district they belong to with confidence and interest to a broader ecosystem made up of skills, supply chains, networks, connections, and entrepreneurship. A business does not operate in isolation, but in collaboration with other entities within a network capable of creating value and economies of scale. Indeed, it was noted that over 70% of innovations are generated outside a businesses, by suppliers, customers, and research institutes.
People and the most importantly leaders are always at the heart of success, as it is men and women who forge a firm’s culture and values. In this regard, it was suggested that it is those in leadership roles who transform individual dreams into a common vision and define horizons. The best leaders were seen as those who know how to build an environment that fosters the sharing of ideas with a view to integration, change, and improvement. Factors such as curiosity, discipline, respect for people and their diversity, continuous learning, and international experience were also considered to be the foundation on which to build a winning venture. The core values of leadership must be distinguished by ethics, meritocracy, and healthy competition, bearing in mind, however, that leaders must always be themselves, showing consistency of values in everything they do. It was precisely this kind of business culture that was held up as engendering managerial aptitude and the courage to take risks in pursuit of one’s ideals and dreams, for as Mahler once observed: ”Tradition is not the worship of ashes, but the preservation of fire”.