Welcome back. For many of us the suitcases are still sitting there, half unpacked in a corner, and our heads are struggling to settle back into emails and deadlines. That’s only natural. It was a good summer and, even though the heat gave us little respite, I think most of us can say we had a genuine break. Some by the sea, some in the mountains, some discovering new places: each of us, in our own way, had the chance to unplug and recharge. And that is often worth more than we imagine.
Then comes the moment to start again. Is that a sigh I hear? Understandable. After all, who wouldn’t enjoy a life on permanent vacation? And yet I am sure of one thing: anyone who takes real pleasure and pride in their work, and is fortunate enough to be in a company where the atmosphere is right, doesn’t start again by dragging their feet. They start on the right foot. And right now, that matters more than ever, because ahead of us lie the last four months of the year, and they will be decisive.
Four months that are really three
Let’s start by taking an honest look at the facts, without kidding ourselves. These four months, when you do the math, are not four. The first two weeks of September are almost always slow, the time it for everything to get properly moving again, and we know December well: operational for half the month, then the holidays. Take those margins away and you realize that the bulk of the work is concentrated into just three months.
Three months in which we need to close as many orders as possible, to finish the year well and, above all, to start the next one well. Three months that will bring urgent requests, materials to prepare on tight deadlines, staff to organize, surprises around every corner, a few heated discussions, a certain amount of stress and inboxes filling up with dozens of messages a day. That is the real picture, made more complicated by a difficulty we all know: the shortage of staff. I have no intention of sugarcoating it.
Opportunity hides in adversity
So the real question is a different one: what do I do when the context becomes more complex? How do I respond when conditions turn out to be less favorable than I had imagined? Because there is always an opportunity hidden inside adversity, but you have to go looking for it; it doesn’t turn up on its own.
An old saying comes to mind: “If I know where I’m going, then I can prepare accordingly.” Let’s not dance around it. Resources are stretched thin, whichever way you pull them. That we cannot change. What we can change is how we choose to live through it. And I don’t just mean the choice, important as it is, to face things with a positive attitude. I mean something more concrete: stopping for a moment to work out which parts of my day are really slowing me down. Asking myself how best to handle that critical moment I already know is coming in two weeks. Asking myself, honestly, whether I am using every resource available to me.
Am I delegating properly, or do I tend to keep everything on my own desk, slowing down my work and everyone else’s along with it? And above all: am I able to tackle one thing at a time and tell the real priorities apart, or do I only ever see the enormous pile of work bearing down on me? These are uncomfortable questions, I know. But that is exactly where the difference lies between enduring a period like this and getting through it with a clear head.
Because if we each built that habit of mind, and built it together, we would handle the unexpected differently and we would be laying the foundations of a real team. And in the difficult months, a team is worth more than any individual talent left to fend for itself.
The choices we are making
This isn’t theory. It is exactly what every department at Mozzanica is preparing for, so that we can make the most of this period and go on, I am certain of it, to celebrate new milestones and new successes. Some of those choices are covered in this issue: from training, now made even more pressing by the qualification requirements that the Decreto Controlli sets for fire maintenance technicians, to strategic spare parts management, through to the hands-on exercises that allow us to work with ever greater precision at our customers’ sites.
They are different pieces of the same picture: prepare in advance so we don’t have to react later.
There is also a new development I am especially pleased to announce. We will soon be launching a new column dedicated to a series of case studies: we will present real problems and setbacks faced by our directors and managers, along with the decisions that turned those difficult moments into an improvement for all of us. A way of giving concrete form, through real stories, to what here remains a principle: opportunity hides in adversity.
Let’s bring the best of ourselves
Let me close by wishing everyone a sincere welcome back once again. And I do so with a simple invitation: let’s bring the best we have to give, those talents that have always set us apart, and then reap together the good results that follow. Because in the end this is what makes the difference: knowing that every day, every order, every effort isn’t going toward some abstract result, but is building something real, and building it together.