Italydership
At the roots of the cultural identity of Italian entrepreneurship
by Carlo S. Romanelli
Italianpreneurs is an entrepreneurial project which wants to explore, affirm and disseminate the best of Italian entrepreneurship, allowing promising young people to draw inspiration and to give continuity, innovating, to this great tradition always admired in the world, and in many ways irreproducible in some of its distinctive elements.
The years of the crisis that we all know have profoundly shaken the world of Italian entrepreneurship, yet, struggling through innumerable hypocrisies, opportunistic behavior and evident sterile digressions on “Italian” business models, have also generated a widespread movement of research and of thought, almost never organized, inspired by a sincere intent to understand if there are peculiar characteristics, I would say almost anthropological, of Italian entrepreneurship (and I would not exclude, of the Italian management), able to re-bring Italy into positioning that it competes in the world by generating a “new renaissance”, innovating starting from these peculiarities.
In short, Italian entrepreneurship, does it have something different that characterizes it in the global competitive scenario, and can it rethink to the continuity of the prestige gained over the centuries?
Almost everyone focuses on the theme of “Made in Italy” – nothing wrong with this – but maybe not enough to regain strength: perhaps there is need, at the same time, to reflect on a STRONG THOUGHT, which identifies our way of understanding the management, the way of staying in the company and doing business, and that leads decision makers to dialogue with us on our ground, about what, in some way, makes us unique in the world.
Because Italian entrepreneurship needs a specific cultural proposition that identifies it in the world, of a strong temperament and an adaptable nature.
Because it is a STRONG IDEA that can attract many people towards the way we do business and represent a benchmark for management (Italian and international) and Italian entrepreneurship.
Basically, by forcing our hand a little, we need to re-born affirming the peculiarities of a cultural model that has deep roots, starting from the Renaissance, which was able to change the world precisely because it was based on unique characteristics in their overall expression (no characteristic is in itself unique, all together yes).
Because we need a model of “native” entrepreneurial leadership in which people identify themselves by exalting their characteristics, and at the same time open and able to speak with the world.
In 2014 I was involved as a Project Leader in a project that aimed precisely at the search for this peculiar identity. The enthusiasm of the involved researchers and of the Italian and international companies, entrepreneurs and managers involved in that first phase, allowed us to identify a first idea of some of the distinctive elements of Italian entrepreneurial temperament, of its irreproducible DNA elsewhere in its entirety.
On the basis of those initial research hypotheses, is there therefore a “primary and original leadership” of Italian entrepreneurship?
Yes, it exists. What is the basis of our corporate cultural identity, what are its particular elements, what characteristics identify it?
Cultural identity: we are children of our cultural heritage. It must be declined in a series of peculiar dimensions, and for each of them it is necessary to highlight both the VIRTUES AND VICES. No hagiographic approach therefore, but a thorough and continuous research of the roots, activities and perspectives of our specific way of thinking, building, deciding, relating, managing and doing business: the roots of our ATTRACTIVITY.
The main emerged descriptions of the Italian Entrepreneurial Leadership would be:
1. Professional Leadership;
2. Entrepreneurial Leadership.
3. Humanistic Leadership;
4. Seductive and Aesthetic Leadership;
5. Territorial Leadership;
6. Family Leadership.
Let’s see then the main insights of these anthropological characteristics:
Professional Leadership
We are descendants of an excellent craft and commercial culture based on “know-how”, on experimentation and research in laboratories and “botteghe”.
We possess a tradition and a cultural vocation to the exaltation of the “trades”, to the improvement of the abilities connected to these and to the creation of exceptional business in thought and manufacturing.
More than to the “big numbers”, we are committed to “great things”.
Business Leadership
The affirmation of the individual personality inspires every action, also in the ability to form a group and to be a team when needed.
We give the best of ourselves when there is a possibility of subjective affirmation translated into collective experience.
We are small entrepreneurs, even in managerial skills.
Humanistic Leadership
The centrality of the person is one of our innate peculiarities.
Italydership wants/search relationships, the “piazza” is the place where we express ourselves even better.
The inclination to the respect for the person in his subjectivity, individuality, more than in any other culture (if we exclude the Scandinavian one in some of his traits) is a characteristic that belongs to us more than to other approaches to entrepreneurial leadership.
In every idea of product, service and management approach there is an idea of relationship.
The reception for subjective characteristics and tolerance in this sense, if it is one of our main vices, is also one of our primary virtues.
Territorial Leadership
Italydership is founded and is almost always expressed in the ability to start from the peculiar characteristics of a territory, turn them into ideas/products, and bring them to the world.
The characteristics can be cultural, of experience, of tradition, geophysical, social, etc.: more often than not every successful Italian experience comes from a mix of these things.
We are a people of intellectual travelers able, like no other, to start from the small to arrive in the world.
Aesthetic and Seductive Leadership
Italydership is based on beauty and the ability to attract.
We have an inimitable and irreproducible drive for beauty, for the well done and for the well presented.
We have always been one of the most desirable places in the world, where there is a sweet life and where life itself is more long-lived.
We have an irresistible and permanent ability to attract thanks to our lifestyle and some aspects of thought.
We are perhaps not among the most esteemed in this historical era, but among the most admired and “envied” certainly yes.
Family Leadership
Italydership is often a “family matter”.
Although this trait also belongs to many other countries, we assume a different dimension: two thirds of companies have a “family” management and do not like an “independent” and professional management.
It is a matter of discovering to the full why, and how, this trait truly represents a distinctive element.
Nothing definitive of course, only a series of suggestions supported by countless comparisons, interviews, experiences and explorations.
Probably there are other unexplored dimensions, this blog will certainly accommodate them.
IP Crew
