What does the synderesis of medieval mystics have to do with a young startupper hungry for success? What remains of an entrepreneur’s work after his “animal spitit” has subsided, leaving room for the balance of memories? Why does artificial intelligence make the reflections of Socrates and Plato very current? At SIOS24 Sardinia Mario Rosso will share answers, reflections and open up scenarios through intellectual provocation capable of fertilizing the minds of entrepreneurs and startuppers. He will offer a different point of view on the challenges of those who want to do business, sharing a long professional experience mixed between theoretical philosophy and industrial management.
Rosso is a philosopher devoted to economics: 73 years old, born in Rome to Sardinian parents, he moved to Turin where he graduated in Theoretical Philosophy. He joined the Fiat Group as a manager, then the La Rinascente Group, then became senior vice president of New Holland based in London, with international experience from China to Mexico, from Turkey to India. Having returned to Italy, he returned to Fiat and then to Telecom Italia, Ansa, Tiscali, Almaviva. He has written several books, including recently “The cathedrals of industry. An unusual management story between Olivetti, Fiat and Telecom”.
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Doctor Rosso, let’s start from the past and your professional history: can we talk about decline when referring to the Italian industrial system?
I have experienced all the industrial phases of the country up close to today’s digitalisation, observing an epochal transition and a clear decline. When I joined Fiat there were 82 thousand workers, today there are 12 thousand, half of whom are on redundancy pay.
What are the reasons?
This decline was determined by various factors, from industrial automation to the bankruptcy of large capitals. In the 60s and 70s there were exceptional management schools in Italy, just think of Fiat and Montedison. Then with the arrival of the various crises, funding for training was cut. Thus globalization and the hyper-competitive world scenario have caught us unprepared, without capital and great managers. From then on, a long agony until the end of the last century.
Mario Rosso, philosopher and manager
Is there also a problem of governance and interlocution?
During the economic boom, the systems of government of collective behavior were supported by very solid ideologies that allowed consensus to be conveyed from below, guaranteeing a certain governability. Today we have a problem of interlocution, at all levels. We even have difficulty understanding who runs a large company. Foreign funds? Management who knows where abroad?
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What advice would you give to a young startupper?
Being an entrepreneur is beautiful and is a complete existential experience, but don’t forget the importance of the physicality of life, the sense of reality where satisfactions and sufferings are concentrated. The world we are living in is extraordinarily complex and an entrepreneur must decide whether to produce happiness or suffering, progress or regression. To make the right choice, I suggest relying on the synderesis described by medieval mystics, that is, the innate faculty of spontaneously understanding what is right and what is wrong, the immediate knowledge of moral principles.”
You also draw a distinction between human and managerial factors…
I would tell a young startupper to remember that before being a manager, he is a man. In a few years the products you designed will be obsolete, the people you worked with will no longer be there and then what will be left of your transit?
The profound meaning concerns human value and the choices you will have made following your ethics of action. Contrary to prevailing thought, ethics is not an impalpable abstract concept, but must be translated concretely into daily choices. Ethics is the coordinate that determines the direction of action.”
What do you think about Artificial Intelligence? Do you belong to the party of techno enthusiasts or dystopian pessimists?
The most honest answer leads me to say: it depends. Artificial intelligence is the second great innovation that can radically change the world, after the atomic bomb. An innovation that no one can stop, despite the proliferation of regulations that legislators are deliberating in recent months. Artificial intelligence is not perfect, it is not abstract and it is not incorporeal, but it is inside the people who designed it: it brings with it the same cognitive biases of those who select the data and those who design the algorithms. But artificial intelligence is like a new utopia that responds to an unsolved problem, deriving from the reflections of Socrates, Plato up to the perfect city of Saint Augustine and the great utopias.
Or?
The awareness that the real world is profoundly imperfect and must be amended, corrected. There is the belief that artificial intelligence can amend reality, fix things rationally thanks to the perfection of numbers. In reality, the facts say that artificial intelligence is like the genie that came out of the lamp but we still don’t know if it will make all our wishes come true or if it can instead become hostile towards us.
Is there a solution, from your point of view?
Let’s start from the problems of reality that are tangible to everyone: social injustices, demography, quality of life, pollution. Will AI remedy this? Probably not. So what’s left? Once the cost/benefit analysis has been clarified, everyone must carry out their own daily guerrilla warfare, following their own individual ethics and verifying demystification. We are all called to our daily commitment, within the limits of what can be done.”
