Interview with Gianmario Verona, Rector of Bocconi University.

Opportunity can emerge from difficulty. A year and a half after the spread of Covid turned our lives upside down, what will we carry with us for ever, and what have we learned?

We talked about it with the Rector of Bocconi University in Milan, Gianmario Verona, who is certain of one thing: “ Together we win, alone we lose ”.

What does Italy have to invest in right now, what are the priorities for the restart?

“We are living through a unique historical moment that is emphatically called the ‘fourth industrial revolution’, which is overturning the economy and society as a whole. This process has been going on since the end of the 1990s, when a convergence of technologies exploded: first telecommunications and the web, today the cloud, in future what we call artificial intelligence.

This fourth industrial revolution has been heavily underestimated in Italy. Put simply, Italy has none of the big digital players and we have let this issue drift as if it were something to deal with in the future. Digital has to be joined by a second investment that this pandemic has highlighted. The priorities are starting to be tied to the needs that the new globalisation brings into play.

When we talk about sustainability, climate change, clean energy, we are referring to the new needs that these kinds of problems specifically highlight.”

Are we behind on sustainability too?

“Although we are the second European power in manufacturing exports, we need strong innovation that lets us align with these great changes we are living through, above all with regard to the small and medium-sized enterprises that form the backbone of this country.

Fortunately, the National Recovery and Resilience Plan (PNRR) helps us to have the resources to bring about a profound change.

First of all, every industry has to be heavily digitalised, and we also have to invest in an approach to production, distribution and consumption tied to sustainability. So we have to invest in these big areas, bearing in mind that they require not only resources but above all a cultural change.

Digitalising doesn't mean buying the latest phone, but reorganising all industrial activity around data, and doing that also takes a lot of will.

If we think about it in relation to certain sectors such as public administration or universities, with their tendency not to change the status quo, this cultural change cannot be taken for granted. Cultural change is what leads you to make reforms.

We can make big investments in SPID digital identity or in Covid tracing, but if I then don't simplify implementation and don't motivate people, because I don't change their mindset, I am wasting money.”

What do companies need in this respect, to achieve these goals?

“Companies certainly need financial incentives, but a change of pace in the context is also needed. We need reforms that help implement new rules, for example on simplification. This PNRR could potentially be a Marshall Plan that brings Italy back to life.”

With the PNRR funds, is Italy staking all its credibility?

“Absolutely. In the global world, we are always under scrutiny. At this moment we are lucky to be represented by someone of the calibre of Mario Draghi, who is technically expert and credible in Europe. Nevertheless, Italy's situation is not straightforward.

Let me give you an example from a sector in which we are usually considered world leaders, luxury and design. When we think about the design and luxury of the future, it is all tied to digital processes that unfortunately many small and medium-sized companies have not yet designed. Our competitiveness risks being compromised by this fourth industrial revolution.

In part the pandemic created a global crisis, but now we have the opportunity to restart and we have to find the right key.”

How have the challenges of Covid affected teaching?

“For about 20 years in our sector there has been debate about distance learning as opposed to in-person teaching, and many professors internationally have even written articles saying that universities somehow had to change their skin. Retail was the first big sector to undergo the digital revolution, then it was the turn of newspapers and the whole world of entertainment.

Universities, however, have a range of services based on extremely important social and human interactions; learning requires sharing.

The pandemic forced us to make a leap towards distance learning. The new ‘normal’ will be a model in which digital is increasingly integrated with presence.

So digital is not a substitute, but helps to strengthen presence itself.

What we are doing at Bocconi is increasing the opportunities to engage students more and more outside the classroom too, which will remain central in terms of interaction. Let me give an extreme example, the ‘flipped classroom’.

In this model the student is encouraged to learn things before going to class, through a series of videos and links for further reading, and the classroom is then used for even more applied teaching.

This could be a way of imagining the classroom of the future: move outside the classroom everything that doesn't need to be done inside it, and use the classroom to interact in an even more segmented and personalised way with individual students.

The lesson can be developed with digital tools and can be segmented more and more according to the learning path, so that everyone keeps growing.

It's a bit like the personalisation of consumption: think of teaching in which the professor becomes a sort of personal coach and the class is divided into four or five ‘clusters’ for even richer applied lessons.

Presence therefore remains fundamental; Bocconi offers opportunities for international exchanges between students and that is a great asset, but we have to make the most of what we have learned.

What have we learned from the pandemic, what will we carry with us for ever?

“Many of us thought the globalisation of the last hundred years was irreversible; we would never have imagined living through a situation like those apocalyptic films in which everything changes overnight.

Planes weren't flying, we were all in lockdown. This made us reflect on the weakness of human beings; in the end nature, as always, is stronger than we are, and it is always worth remembering. More pragmatically, we have to prepare ourselves to face new challenges. On a philosophical level, one thing we must carry with us is the importance of unity. Together we win and alone we lose. From an economic point of view too, the Europe that until yesterday was contested is today giving us the resources to be reborn.

Individual weakness gives way to the importance of the whole.

We will also take with us new skills, such as a much more widespread use of technology; we have partly caught up with our digital-native children, and many people have shown a capacity for innovation.”

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