Courage, the key lever of family capitalism, the value of governance and timing. These are some of the key issues addressed at the Trento Festival of Economics, organized by Sole 24 Ore, in the panel “Post pandemic, generational change and governance: what future for family-owned companies” during which Ornella Barra, chief operating officer International of Walgreens Boots Alliance, Gian Maria Gros-Pietro, president of Intesa Sanpaolo and Dario Tosetti, founder of Tosetti Value.
Governance
Gros-Pietro himself, in dialogue with the deputy director of Sole 24 Ore, Alberto Orioli, framed one of the crucial aspects of the country’s economic context: “There is much more management in French companies but there is much more entrepreneurship in companies Italians and entrepreneurship is one of the most difficult things to activate if it is not there. In Italy we don’t have this problem, what disadvantages us is the whole structure ». But in what terms? “When I was at IRI with the sale of the shareholdings, I experienced firsthand the difference between the financial structure of Italy and that of Europe,” he added, underlining that there was a lack of capital to acquire key stakes in the giants abandoned by the state.
Barra, for his part, has made it clear that the entrepreneur’s ability to get involved and change skin during his “entrepreneurial” life can make up for this lack of money. She, she assured, has done so on several occasions and this has allowed her to create an international giant of pharmaceutical distribution starting from a pharmacy. You need intuition, but you also need “courage and a sense of time”, that is, doing the right things at the right time. The empire was built by passing from one phase to another having as its sole engine “the desire to grow”. So first there was the search for a partner who made it possible to make the first leap, Stefano Pessina, and then from there the choice to get involved: the Paris Stock Exchange, the first merger with Unichem, then Boots, then just on the eve of the crisis Lehman Brothers, Kkr and the maxi operation of leverege buy out, and finally the merger with Walgreens. All this having three priorities very clear: «Time, price and partner». Because “there is never a point of arrival and we must always look at what can happen in advance; it takes luck and courage ».
But all this cannot be separated from a central theme: governance. Barra has always acted according to her “own system of governance”, a personal model made up of the principles that have guided her in her ascent: the company’s interest first and foremost.
Concept reaffirmed also by Gros-Pietro according to which the tasks must be very clear: “The ability to gain market confidence lies in the board, while the management of the group is the responsibility of the management and the board must defend the interests of the shareholders from those of the management “.