Maurizio Luongo - Ask the Leaders Anything Series

Now in October it's going to be one year. As you know, I've been coming to Singapore for a few years on a regular basis, basically almost every month. But truly now being stable in Singapore for one year is helping me to understand much more than before. I am fortunate enough to be surrounded by women: my wife, two daughters, and a little dog which is a female dog as well. My wife I met there since the very early times when I was still in university. I met her because she was my trainer, and then we ended up getting married. It's now more than 22 years we've been together between being fiancée and then married. And then we have two daughters: one is going on 15 and the second is going on 11. Curious, determined, fast, and fair. If I were an animal, I think I could probably be a monkey because monkeys are curious, they are also determined when they want to eat something and they go and try. They're smart and fast to find a way to maybe steal something or eat it. So I believe it's probably the animal that could represent me a bit better than the others. The best way for me to keep motivated is really to see the results. I'm the kind of person who always thinks that there is something more to do, so that motivates me every time to continue to be curious, look for alternatives, look for new ways to do things. And third, the motivation I get is with the team. There could be no way I could work properly without the right team and without enthusiastic people around me. Sports and music are the two best ways. When I was in Florence, I still have the piano there. Sometimes I play piano even though I'm not as good as I was many years ago, but still I'm trying to be happy playing some piano, which also distracts me sometimes, especially when I'm alone. Normally when I see people curious enough or able to come proactively with proposals, that's a very good sign. Maybe something which is that they're not comfortable with but they say 'let's try.' I start to appreciate this kind of people because that's what we need. Talent development for me passes through the share of information first of all. If you consider a personal talent, you have to share all the information with them. So when I want the people to participate in the discussions, because that's the way to learn, to share, and to involve, it's the right way. For me, the first way to develop talents is training. I believe the training should be oriented both on reinforcing the strengths and on working on the improvement area. Sometimes we only focus on the improvement area, but it's not fair because if one has some clear strengths, he has to cultivate his strengths over time, not forget about the strengths because this is what makes him already strong. So we have to feed this part but also work on the improvement area. So in three words: involvement and information sharing, learning by doing. You have to do things and make things happen, to make mistakes and learn or to understand where you're good and go ahead. And training, but training not only to improve the weaknesses, also to reinforce the strengths. Integrity goes without saying. It is the basis. You have to always understand that if you are not working on the basis of integrity, you will never go far. For sure, especially in this world but I would say everywhere and even in private life, integrity is helping you to build the same way to make a career development. So integrity for sure is the most important value. I would say the second is sense of urgency. When I talk about sense of urgency, I refer to a way not to fast-track things for the sake of being quick, but the sense of urgency means to understand, to try every time to understand what can I do differently or better in order to achieve this or that. The sense of urgency is not only related to the time, it's also related to the way you approach things. Maybe what we need to cultivate together now is a new way to interpret this concept. I've always thought that you can be really satisfied of what you've done when you will tell your experience to someone and this someone is keeping listening to you with interest. Ultimately, when I see people around me developing, I think I'm doing a very good job and I'm extremely satisfied. Of course, there are results that have to demonstrate that on a daily basis, but looking at the future, this probably will be a good sign of success. Same concepts would apply also on the job. A team is a team whatever the activity they do. So I would make sure that the team is made of all members actively involved even in deciding how to coach better tomorrow every day because they are the ones who are making things, they are the ones who are going into the swimming pool and exercising, and they can feel whether the kind of training we're doing is enough or not, is the right one or not. There are some basic rules but anyone can feel free to give new ideas on how to improve the training. And I believe the other point is to do a lot of activities to make a strong integration between the team members and respect each other. I do enjoy the direct conversation with people. And now my room is my house, but even my house is open every time. If someone has to come and knock at the door, unless I'm with external people that I have to manage, but I will always answer. Maybe I will say just give me one minute, but I'm always there. There's no need to take an appointment to talk to me at all. I mean, people who work with me know I'm very easy and direct in this. Liverpool, no doubts. I have to say sorry for those who support Man U, but Liverpool has proven to be a very proud club throughout the years, a very proud club, but also a club which is able to revitalize every time. It's a way to approach football from the past where they were very classical but they were winning. Then they understood that it was not the style they had to keep for the future and they started to review their way even with their coach, which is a very strong coach and visionary. Without big names in the team, they were able to win everything. So yes, I definitely support Liverpool for the history that they bring. And it's a kind of Menarini has a strong history, a very important tradition, a successful history right here. Whatever Menarini has been playing in the market, but also the ability to evolve and to look at diverse angles. You can see also the evolution of the leadership of the group at very top level, which is a sign that it's a never stop, never ending story. There is a continuous development. And Liverpool is a little bit reflecting this story.