“I’m not THE BOSS, i’M
just THE FIRST EMPLOYEE!”

by Paolo Perego

Giuseppe Ranalli has a company to manage: 280 employees and important international potreis. Where does he get the positive energy for what he does?
Giuseppe Ranalli, President of Tecnomatic, a firm in the Abruzzo Region of Italy, specializing in the mechatronics sector (a combination of mechanical engineering, electronic engineering, and software engineering), with over 280 employees, doesn’t agree with the simplistic demonization of the world of finance. “The stock market is an instrument. The true problem is with people and their education.” His firm is doing well with important international partners (like General Motors, Ferrari, and Tata) but it, too, is feeling the effects of the crisis. “The key to everything is the widespread mentality that nothing truly seems to have value. If I get up in the morning and don’t believe in anything, how am I going to relate to reality? I’ll squeeze it for all it’s worth, to get the most profit possible.” The new pirates who’re exploiting the situation are the packs of managers who leap onto firms and wring them dry, with the idea that “the less you invest, the better.”
These ideas are expressed by a fellow who hasn’t distributed dividends for ten years, choosing to reinvest everything in projects and research. He is one who risks, and it works! “The aspect of faith is fundamental in this choice: recognizing that it’s the little reality in which I achieve the task entrusted to me. This is my work. And in this, I realize that I’m the first employee.” Task and reality? “Yes, work is the point where the nexus between me and reality is realized. In the beginning, I wanted to make money and had big plans to do something useful for the world. But without that consciousness, it’s impossible, because you have before you people who work, and their children. Nothing can pass before you without your asking its meaning.”
Certainly, there’s the demand for profit, but it’s an instrument, and can’t be an end in itself. “Today, work is reduced to performance–that is, money. And career. It can happen that you conduct interviews of even three hours, and realize that the person before you is out of touch with reality, entirely absorbed in his mental projections: ambition, career, salary. I ask, “Yes, but for your career, you have to do something. What would you like?” Nobody answers this question. At best they say, “Anything, as long as I make money.” Then, he explains, when the person starts, work becomes a millstone. “Instead, in working, one can discover who he truly is, in the relationship with what he does.”
This doesn’t come easily or automatically. For Ranalli, help came eight years ago, with training courses held by Bernhard Scholz, now President of the Companionship of Works Association. “The classes were necessary for me to come to understand the value of things, from attention to the workplace environment to discovering what it means to have a career through participation in the creation of value.” What about incentives for workers? “No. The incentive system is based on the assumption that you’ve got a bunch of loafers, people who want to cheat you. The question is, do we create value? Yes. Good, then, it’s right that we all participate in the attainment of our objectives. The award system is better. The labor unions still travel with the idea of the award for showing up at work. But if the workers don’t come to work, how will we build the result?”
Ranalli says the relationship with the employees is vital. He dedicates two afternoons a week to receiving them in his office. “But not because I’m magnanimous. It’s of interest for me. They, too, have been given to me, but what if I never look at them?” What does it mean to look at them? “When you give someone a raise, the way you do it is important. If the only thing that satisfies me is Christ, it’s presumptuous of me to expect that I can make someone happy by giving him a raise. This doesn’t mean that I don’t give him his raise, but I have to say, ‘Your worth isn’t limited to this raise. How long will you be satisfied with a few dollars more?’”