Change is inevitable

There is a more powerful, diffused and dangerous fear than failure in our society, and it's the fear of change. It's a very human habit, because change is perceived as something that can “steal” what we have, what we achieved. Moreover, our brain, especially the left hemisphere, encourage routines to save energy. Just pay attention, for example, on the rituals that everyone has in the bathroom in the morning, or what we buy every week at the supermarket, or the route to the office that very often we drive automatically while we are thinking to something else.

Well, there is nothing bad in that. That's true, but habits are dangerous because they make lazy the rest of our brain. And we start to fear for every kind of changes, from the smallest to the biggest one.

There are some students that if they don't find free their usual seat in their classroom become nervous. There are workers that get angry if a new machinery (or a new software to elaborate data) is introduced to produce differently a good or a service, breaking previous rules. There is people that take to the streets to shout against gay marriage or the “sinful Western lifestyle”. What they have in common is fear of change, they feel threatened by innovations, by something unknown, sometimes they also refuse to watch the evidence because change requests an act of commitment, responsabilities, energy to understand and to learn.

But change is inevitable. British artist Charlie Jeffery designed it clearly in his artwork that lays on the external wall of a wool mill in Biella, in Italy, showing three eras of the continental drift with the claim “Change is inevitable”. And it's really significant that this work is on that wall. Because economy is the place where innovations are more rapid and they affect us all.

 We think that is better to accept changes (if they are really improving, of course), instead of fighting them.We know that it's not easy to do that. The only tip we have is to try to change starting from the most little things. For example, move from your usual seat at your kitchen table where you have dinner every day. Or change your furniture arrangement. It is not difficult and it will also help you to see your room from a different perspective. Think about how many problems could be solved adopting a different perception len, in your kitchen and, maybe, in the world.

Good change to everyone!

JK Rowling and the benefits of failure

Famous author JK Rowling, creator of Harry Potter, the wizard grew up with a whole generation, in 2008 gave a magnificent speech to the graduates of Harvard, a speech that all young people should hear.

She focused on a special theme: the benefits of failure. The richest author in the world wanted to speak to young people, that faced the so-called real life, about what she learned from her failure.

This is an incredibly formative approach, because instead of talking about dreams realized, goals achieved, the meaning of being a famous writer and what she can feel about selling 11 million copies of her book within 24 hours of release, she told how the poor failure of his life when she was in her early twenties led her to strip off everything that was not essential for her to understand what she really wanted to do in life and focusing on  it.

Describing with ruthless honesty the feelings of that time, "I found myself to be the biggest failure that I had known, it was a dark period in which I had no idea that there would be what the press now calls a happy ending. I had no idea how much the darkness would last for a long time and the light at the end of the tunnel was a hope rather than a reality".

JK Rowling explained, however, that it was precisely in that period that she succeeded in channeling her energies on what she truly loved: writing. The failure became the basis from which she started with determination to do what she had always wanted to do, without fear of losing anything because she had yet lost everything.

She started again from there, "I had an old typewriter and a big idea."

This is the reason why, she said to the graduates, "each of us, in different forms, should experiment with his/her own idea of ​​failure." And from it, to start again.

At the centre of entrepreneurship there is always a human person

Last week we had a great afternoon in Fiesole, near Florence, talking with José Manuel Leceta, the outgoing Director of European Institute of Innovation & Tecnology that since last August is a visiting fellow at the European University Institute (EUI) Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies, whose headquarters are exactly in the wonderful hills surrounding Florence.

The first time we met José Manuel was in November 2013, in Budapest, during the EIT Awards, where a number of successful entrepreneurial start-ups came out of the different EIT’s Knowledge and Innovation Communities were highlighted. During his speech, he underlined the importance of nurturing not just the usual entrepreneurial skills (business plan, idea development, marketing, etc.) in the young people that attended the KICs, but also their entrepreneurial attitudes, paying attention on training also motivation, vision, resilience, uncertainty management, and others.

Carla and I were really excited when we heard those words, because it was exactly what we tought (and we still think) about entrepreneurship and about what is the current way of teaching to aspiring entrepreneurs. There is a psychologycal, behavioural aspect that, at the moment, is completely ignored.

So, during the networking lunch we approached José Manuel to talk with him about our book and to analyze our common vision about entrepreneurship training. And less than a year after, we had the opportunity to meet him again. He read our book and appreciated it and he is still convinced that there is still a lot to do to put in contact ecomics and psychology. One of his central ideas (and he said it during the Madrid TedxTalk, last March) is that at the very centre of everything - innovation, economics, technology - there is still the human person. This is also the thesis of our essay, what a stunning sensation to have such an intense and so similar feeling!

Thank you so much, José Manuel, for your welcome, for your kindness and openness! And many thanks again for discussing with us about several arguments, projects and visions! For Carla and I that has been a great moment of exchange and learning! We hope to see you very soon, and all our best wishes for your job in Florence to maximize the co-operation opportunities between the EIT and the EUI!

Can entrepreneurship be learned? An intriguing question

This week the prestigious Italian university “Luigi Bocconi” presented a new Chair in Entrepreneurship, created thanks a philantrophic gift of Carlo Debenedetti in memory of his father Rodolfo, one of the most brilliant 20^th century entrepreneurs in Italy.

The “lectio inauguralis” of the Chair had an intriguing title: can entrepreneurship be learned? The chair holder, Fabiano Schivardi, as the following speech hold by Josh Lerner of Harvard Business School, focused mainly on the macro-economical factors that can facilitate or be an obstacle to entrepreneurship. So their final reply to the above question is: yes, it is possible to learn to be entrepreneurs, it depends by external factors as, for example, the place you live, the number of companies and entrepreneurs in that place and many others.

Carla and I think that this approach to entrepreneurship is correct, because also the cognitive psychologists that study the entrepreneur mindset arrived (at the moment) at this end: actions are driven by intentions, intensions are influenced by attitudes, and the latters are shaped by external factors. But the main important external factors are the family and the school; the birthplace, the companies concentration in that area, the number of entrepreneurs and so on are secondary factors.

That's why we think that the capital aim of every nation should be to introduce entrepreneurship into the education systems not just as a new subject to teach but changing the way subjects are teached. Teachers should become learning facilitators that go along with their students explaining them that is more important to learn from everything, at every age, that just to memorize data. Showing them how to see opportunities instead of problems. Training them to be motivated, resilient, focused on their aims, to take decisions and assume responsabilities.

It is not a simple change, but it is necessary. Some countries, like the USA, are really advanced by this point of view. But others have a lot of work to do. We need to find and improve new methodologies to teach and train an entrepreneurial mindset in everyone.

Our suggestion? Mixing psychology and economics, we think that the new Bocconi Chair could be much better in “building” the future entrepreneurs.

In our past lay the seeds of our future

I always loved historic places. Or places with some interesting histories behind. Yesterday evening I visited one of the most ancient ones in Biella, an industrial city in the Nort West of Italy nearby I actually live, that really fascinated me and let me think about past and future.

The place I visited has lived different changes during the centuries. On the left side of Cervo river, in 1550 settled a paper mill; then, a century later, a silk spinning plant has been builded. In the 18^th century the real estate had been enlarged to make room for a wool weaving factory, that developed its activity thanks to the Industrial Revolution. The site still have the name and is a property of Sella dynasty, that started with the textile mill and go on during the time with other activities, including the foundation of a bank in Biella, Banca Sella. In the 1990s they moved here the data processing center of the bank. In the huge complex, located in a wonderful environment, there are also the Sella Foundation, the bank training center and, since 2013, the SellaLab, a start-up incubator and accelerator full of passionate, young people that are co-working on new ideas and new ventures.

What struck me during the explanation of the past and present life of this incredible group of buildings is that here history and future blend together to create inspiration and new visions. In the old, massive halls, in the restored rooms, it is really perceivable a sense of  identity, what Latins called “genius loci” or the spirit of a place, where generations of entrepreneurs and workers faced their challenges, pursued their dreams and lived their bad or good luck.

I think that good ideas can come out everywhere, but in my opinion they can born better in a place like the Maurizio Sella wool mill. Here you can breathe that sense of “I can do it!”. That gave me a great hope, because we have roots and they could give us the seeds for our future. Let them grow now!

www.sellalab.net (sorry, just in Italian!)

Change starts with everyone of us

“You must be yourselves promoters of the change you wish to see in the society.

The idea of being able to change things will remain an utopia until each of us decide to do their part. We have to get up every day and decide to do something in a different way from what we've done so far, in our work as in life. Do not wait for someone to tell you, that a directive arrives on the desk or an email on your pc. Do it by yourself.

Rather than fighting the existing reality, with inefficiency and bureaucracy, think of a new and more modern model, which makes that reality obsolete. Do not let someone else define your way. Make it your own.

Build yourself a path, follow it, draw it entirely again whenever you want. But start today, right now. Accept the challenge of the unknown and risk. You will make mistakes, you will fall, but you will have acquired the strength and courage to stand up and change again. You will have the experience to start over. Above all, you will have broken the spell of inaction.

The hopes for the future are in the hands of people who do. To all those who, from any layer of the society they come from, they decide to fight back, to engage and get into play.”

The author of these words is Sergio Marchionne, the CEO of FIAT SpA and President and CEO of Chrysler Group LLC, in an article published few days ago by La Stampa, one of the most important Italian daily newspaper. His aim was to stimulate a reaction in Italian society, that seems generally defeated by the economic but also social and cultural crisis. His advice is, in other words, a push to adopt an entrepreneurial mindset to face all the life challenges, not just the work ones. Being reactive, creative, motivated, are all part of the entrepreneurs attitudes that Carla and me are trying to share in Italy and all around the world. Because we strongly think that this is the only way to improve people's lives. So let's start the change, all together!

Are you still able to dream?

There is a very pleasant aspect in teaching in schools: Carla and I come into contact to one of the most powerful of the human aspect, that is the capacity to dream. The younger the students are, the less obstacles they impose themselves in dreaming. While boys and girls grow, they seem to loose the power of imagining something of incredible, different, exciting for their life. We have a strong perception of this change among secondary schools and colleges, thanks to a simple exercise that we make during our lessons. We give each student a white leaf with a simple question at the top: what is your dream?

Results among pupils of secondary schools are full of fantasy, flamboyant desires of what they would like to become, to do and to have in their lives. Their older “colleagues”, instead, are only focused on what job they will try to obtain, what studies they will have to carry on to arrive there. And a lot of fear to not have a future at all.

Are we sure that this is just one of the results of the economic crisis? And of the continuous media coverage of 'bad' news?

The ability to dream, to have aspirations, to grow self ambition is something very important at every age. The human history is studded of downturns but what pools them is that they have been solved by the enterprising attitude of lots of people that did everything was possible (and, sometimes, also the impossible!) to pursue and achieve their dreams.

So, if we want that things change, the first step is to take a white leaf and write down what are our dreams. What we can do to let them come true. How many and what kind of obstacles we will have to overcome. What we would do if we would fail. It takes courage, honesty and responsability. But this is the only way to become “entrepreneurs of ourselves” and living a life that worth.