“This is a man's world… But it wouldn't be nothing, nothing without a woman or a girl”. “This is a man's world but it would be nothing without a woman or a girl”. James Brown sang it and made it one of his greatest, most unforgettable hits. Vodafone remembered it and, precisely on Tuesday 8 March, chose it as the soundtrack - in the many variations interpreted over time also by female voices - to present in Milan "HeforShe" the United Nations campaign that Vodafone has made its own by putting its face on it : that of Aldo Bisio, Ad Italia, and that of Vittorio Colao, CEO of the group that is its "champion", or champion and active promoter, together with 9 other Chief Executive Officers of as many multinationals including PriceWaterhouse Cooper, Unilever, Twitter for to name just a few. There are also ten head of state and government champions (Japan, Finland, Rwanda, Malawi and others), ten rectors of major universities (Georgetown, Oxford, Sciences Po, Nagoy, among others).
He For She
The concrete objective, to get out of the celebration of 8 March as an end in itself, is to give a strong boost to gender equality. Specifically: for Vodafone, to reach 2020% of women among the group's 30 managers in 7.500; collect 100 supporters, outside the group, to spread a different mentality towards women and their inclusion in work, politics and university. Where do we start from? “Today in our company we are already 39% female managers – explained Aldo Bisio, number one of Vodafone Italia – and 50% female employees out of a total of 7.000. However, it is not enough - she continued - if we think that in Italy the law on women's quotas has led to a doubling from about 12 to 25 percent of women on boards of directors, a percentage that drops to about 8% among senior executives and almost zero among CEOs”. And this despite all the statistics show that, in Italy even more than elsewhere, the percentage of graduates leaving universities is higher among women and with better grades even in faculties such as engineering where 40% of graduates are women.
Women, men and the 30% target
Bisio recalls that in Vodafone "the lever of flexibility has been accelerated, smart working has been implemented with 1 day of work from home a week, the possibility of extending post-maternity paid leave has been offered" but also announces that to raise to 30% the presence at all levels is about to launch an internal roadshow to flush out prejudices and obstacles. Obstacles which, Vittorio Colao agrees, exist even if the intention is to overcome them. “Vodafone is a group – she recalls – with 100 employees in about thirty countries and not everywhere there is the same gender ratio: in Italy we are 40% female managers, in Ireland 50% in ten countries under 30 with 25% women on the board. We have risen by 6-7 percentage points in recent years but reaching 30% is the minimum goal that every company must set itself". How to move forward? “Flexibility, hiring 50% of graduates, adopting a worldwide policy for mothers who return to work, we are doing all this. And it is not obvious: for example, in the United States, offering 4 extra weeks of paid maternity leave has generated more articles in the newspapers than the merger with Mannesmann. For example, in Qatar or India, equal pay is not always accepted. However we will go ahead to achieve the goal with very defined protocols, we may not be able to reach the 30% that we have set ourselves everywhere but we will push to succeed".
Banks, Railways and Diversity
Renato Mazzoncini, number one of FS, and Federico Ghizzoni of Unicredit will also take part in the Vodafone Theater in Milan. “In Fs – admits Mazzoncini – the greatest difficulty is overcoming a certain gender bias in an activity hitherto considered a male reserve such as the railway. On the other hand, however, it must be said that 95% of the railway companies controlled by us are led by women: I am thinking of the CEO of Trenitalia Barbara Morgante and the CEO of TreNord who is a woman”. Francesco Starace of Enel in a teleconference from Rome highlights one of the great problems still revealed by statistics today: wage diversity for equal jobs. “Our effort – he says – will be to push for equal pay”. A diversity that, on the other hand, is sometimes less explicit and more indirect. In fact, Ghizzoni explains: "Our remuneration policy is identical but while we have an equal presence and remuneration between men and women in private banking and in retail banking, the presence of women in investment banking is minimal and that is where the highest salaries are concentrated ”. Francesco Caio, CEO of Poste, thinks "the time to accelerate" has arrived to reset gender diversity. Ghizzoni concludes: “The lever is that the presence of women makes it possible to improve the income statement”. It is true but it is not enough and the protocols that Colao undertakes to disseminate will perhaps give more guarantees. First check: next March 8th.
