“We need trust. We need trust to compete in the world arena. We have to foster trust in our organization because the market place is too complex, and even more so in the future, and nobody has all the skills to provide effective answers to all the questions…so we have to act as a team”. This is what Massimo Getto, Vice President and CFO of Viasat Group, has chosen to communicate in front of the entire Viasat Group Sales Team, during a very special occasion at Ronchi Verdi in Turin last July 2, 2015: the announcement of the latest acquisition in Romania that opens the doors to Eastern Europe to the most important satellite telematics company of our country and one of the world’s leading players.
“We are in such a restful and relaxing place so I prefer not to bore you with a formal speech… and I would like to tell you just two short stories:
I have a little kid, Giacomo, he is 3 years old. Last week we were in his kindergarten to attend the annual end year play. I suppose a great part of you have attended such a demanding event. Haven’t you? A nice mother of a Giacomo’s friend came over to me and said after some pleasantries, I have an other kid, 17 year old, what kind of school do you suggest as best to help my son find a job? My reply was let him choose what he likes. Nobody has a clue what the world will look like in five years’ time. No idea how this will play out. If you think of it, kids starting school this year will be retiring in 2065! In such a fast moving scenario the unpredictability is going to be the habit. So everyone has to be curious, smart, ready, flexible. I like to quote Darwin “it is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent but It is the one that is most adaptable to change”…but to be adaptable to change we have to study, to stay updated every single day and have the culture and knowledge to read market signals in advance. Coming to grips with such a habit requires to be engaged just in what we like, what helps us grow as human beings, what helps us enjoying our life. Once we went to school in the very first part of our life and then we used what we learnt to work in the second part of our life. These times are over….so we have to enjoy our activity and stay curious to learn every single day…it is also the best way to stay free.
The second story…. During my university period I used to go to the US for summer holidays. One day driving along the Ocean drive, in LA, I saw a homeless with a corrugated paper board which said: “if you are what you are is because once somebody trusted in you” It is true. It is true for me, but if you searched inside your mind probably you could find such a key person. Absolutely. I have been thinking of that thought in these years. There were such men in my life…but most of all what really thrilled me about that board, thinking of it in these years, is that in English trust is not only a noun, it is a verb as well. Trust as a verb means a precise flow of actions: seeking first to understand and then to be understood, making and keeping promises, honesty and integrity, kindness and courtesies, thinking win win or no deal, clarifying expectations, being loyal to those not present, apologizing. Trust becomes a verb when you communicate to others their worth and potential so clearly that they are inspired to see it in themselves. Goethe once said: “treat a man as he is and he will remain as he is, treat a man as he can be and should be and he will become as he can and should be”.
We need trust. We need trust to compete in the world arena. We have to foster trust in our organization because the market place is too complex, and even more so in the future, and nobody has all the skills to provide effective answers to all the questions…so we have to act as a team. We have to develop customer trust with our solutions, services, paying serious attention to their needs. We have to encourage trust with our suppliers, our banks, more in general with our stakeholders to let them walk with us so we may instill trust to all of these stakeholders using our transparent communication.
In a nutshell my message to every one of us, first of all to myself is: love your job, be flexible and embrace change as an opportunity and promote trust. Try to be a person who is like a guiding light, not a judge, who is a model, not a critic.
And let’s remember: we can’t change all things, we can’t change people, we can only change ourselves”.