“I’m Offering Italy Two Years of Work to Bring It into the Modern Era and Make You All Forget About Certificates”

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La Repubblica

“I’m Offering Italy Two Years of Work to Bring It into the Modern Era and Make You All Forget About Certificates”

Diego Piacentini. Amazon’s super executive has become special Commissioner for Digitalization: “A startup at Palazzo Chigi”

By Mario Calabresi
Here is the interview on Repubblica.it

His father had arrived in Milan from the lower Brescia region to be a construction worker: he was proud of his 17 year-old son who, thanks to a scholarship offered by the Intercultura program, had taken a plane for the first time to go halfway around the world, to a rural town 50 kilometers from Seattle.

He was proud of this son who, after graduating from Bocconi – he was the first in the family to go to university - went to work at Apple in Europe before returning to the Pacific Coast and reaching the top brass of the world’s leading digital commerce company. But he really couldn’t understand the latest decision taken by his boy, who is now grown and has gray hair: to return to Italy - to Rome, of all places, to work in the public administration. Diego Piacentini, 55 years old - 13 of which he spent at Apple and 16 at Amazon, was appointed yesterday by the Government as special Commissioner for Digitalization. Piacentini’s choice is revolutionary, if we think of Italy’s brain drain issues. One of the world’s leading experts on digital architectures has decided to embark on a mission focusing on maximum simplification: “Making public services accessible to citizens in the easiest way possible through mobile devices.” But this is also a choice that has raised doubts and discontent on the left, for those who think that this assignment involves a conflict of interest and ask themselves what could have prompted one of the world’s top executives to accept a government post in Rome and take a two-year leave from Amazon.

Let’s start from the nays: those who disapprove argue that you can’t take on a public position because you’re Amazon’s second largest shareholder, after founder Jeff Bezos.
“First of all let’s immediately clarify that I’m not the second largest shareholder: I am the second employee who owns the most shares. I’m an Amazon executive who over time has accumulated 84.000 shares. Which means 0,000017 percent.”
How have you accumulated these shares?
“Amazon’s philosophy is to provide a basic salary of up to $170.000 a year, and then depending on your role and performance, you’ll periodically receive a certain amount of shares.”
Two days before going on leave from Amazon you exercised a right you had gained by buying and selling a block of shares: will you continue to do so as you fulfill your Italian position?
“Every quarter we implement a sales plan that is predetermined and regulated by the SEC, during which the date of sale of the shares is specified, to prevent insider trading. In the next two years I’ll be on leave and so the shares that I should receive are also suspended. Similarly, I’ve suspended every sales plan.”
Your appointment entails that you’ll work for free.
“Yes, without any kind of salary, pro bono, zero. I’ve also renounced to the reimbursement of costs, no room and board, I pay for everything with my personal credit card.”
Why?
“During my 16 years in the United States I was struck by an impressive concept: the idea of giving something back to one’s own country, school, university. When I’d just arrived in Seattle in 2000, I was invited to a charity dinner organized by the public elementary school where we had enrolled our eldest son. My wife, who the previous year had collected 800.000 lira for our son’s kindergarten in Milan, was very curious. We were shocked when we witnessed with our own eyes that $170.000 had been collected to fund school activities. One of the guests told us that it’s almost a moral obligation: if you’re successful you should give something back to those who educated you.”
It’s certainly hard to believe that someone should leave Amazon to come here and, on top of everything else, do it for free.
“I understand, because when I told my parents they too were perplexed, I expected them to be excited and instead they started asking: ‘Really? But what are you getting yourself into? Into a lot of trouble, no one can change anything anyway...’ And when I told them that I wasn’t going to earn anything their perplexity became almost turned into annoyance and skepticism. They shook their heads and muttered: ‘Surely they’ll give you something else.’”
If your own mother is perplexed, then also the parliamentarians who are questioning your appointment have a right to be so.
“In fact I no longer get irritated by this tendency to be suspicious, because I’ve seen my parents’ reaction... I’ve realized that the idea of ​​giving something back doesn’t belong to our DNA, but perhaps my situation can help to change the Italian mentality.”
Another doubt: Bezos has let you go because it will help Amazon’s business in Italy.
“With all due respect for our country and for the skill of those who work here, Amazon has only existed in Italy for six years and this country represent a very small share of the company’s global turnover, my presence is in no way relevant.”
But we’re still dealing with possible conflicts of interest.
“My role has nothing to do with legislation and policies, and not even with central purchasing groups, I’m not involved in supplier contracts. I don’t see where there can be any conflict of interest.”
So what have you came to do here?
“My goal is to make life easier for citizens, by simplifying their relationship with the institutions, and to ensure that the State is able to use technology, as it does in Great Britain or the United States. A simple relationship between the State and citizens is necessary for economic development, because it stimulates investments rather than restraining them.”
How did you come up with the idea of coming to Rome?
“During a meeting with Matteo Renzi in September 2014. He came to visit Silicon Valley and told me: ‘I would like to help the country catch the innovation and digitalization train, would you be willing to return to Italy for a certain amount of time?’ I thanked him and declined, and for me that was the end of it. A few months later he called me and returned to the attack; in the meantime the thought had crept into my mind. So I started talking about it with my wife and with Bezos – my relationship with him is not only based on work but also on loyalty and friendship. Then I asked myself one question: ‘What will I regret not having done in 10 years?’ I realized that I would have regretted not trying to do this.
How much time have you decided to dedicate to this project?
“Two years. Which will be dedicated not to finishing a project but rather to creating a long-lasting system that will allow things to change, and to trying to create a new mindset.”
And what would happen if Renzi fell before?
“It would complicate the situation a little, but the system that we must create is independent of who the prime minister is: it’s for the country, not for the prime minister, even if Renzi is the one who convinced me to do this.”
What are the first steps you’ll take?
“A process started two or three years ago: I’m talking of the Digital Administration Code, the European digital agenda and, above all, of a new awareness. The digital identity of citizens, through which they can access hundreds of state services, is under development. It needs to be improved, to be made available: all the services through which it can be used still have to be developed and the majority of the population still doesn’t know about it, but it’s a fundamental step.”
What is it about?
“Each one of us will have an identity that will always be up to date. You won’t need to prove that you exist, that you were born, that you’re married or that you live somewhere. Today we still have to certify or self-certify too many things, but if the civil registry is built with technologies that all the public authorities share, then we’ll no longer need to certify that we exist and everything will be accessible and clear.”
How did you find the Italian public administration?
“I’ll read the tender notice I wrote to find the software experts who we’re planning to hire: ’You must know that we’ll be dealing with bureaucratic processes, complicated rules, obsolete technologies and a lack of coordination, but also with excellently performing units that are capable of achieving a lot with few resources.”
Where are these excellently performing units?
“For me it was a pleasant surprise to find highly technological groups in the Italian public administration – I’m thinking of SOGEI (an information and communication technology company of the Ministry of Economy and Finances, TN) or the Poligrafico dello Stato (the Italian State Printing Works and Mint, TN), just to mention two examples. I’ve met young people who would easily find a place in Silicon Valley and would rise to success in a jiffy.”
What kind of team are you planning to build?
“A group of about 20 people offering the highest technological expertise, a kind of startup inside a machine that is as ancient as the state administration. Our office will be in Palazzo Chigi.”
How much will you pay these digital experts to convince them to come to Rome?
“We have a budget of 150.000 euros a year for the most experienced technical positions but most of the team members will be paid between 40 and 120.000 euros.”
Why did you write in the tender notice that “occasionally you’ll have to be dress up but normally you can dress casually?”
“Because developers won’t even come near here if they think they’ll have to work in a suit and tie, so they have to know that they can wear sneakers, though not flip-flops, like they to in California... We’re still in Palazzo Chigi.”
And how is Palazzo Chigi?
“It's the first place that needs a technological transformation. Like in many other Italian offices and public places, there are Wi-Fi issues: I’ve realized during these first few weeks just how detrimental it is for those who work in Italy not to have access to broadband, on a regular and daily basis.”
You’ve worked with Steve Jobs, what did you learn from him?
“The ability to pinpoint the things that matter, to focus on the key issues in a complex system.”
And from Amazon’s founder, Jeff Bezos?
“That there is nothing that you can’t change. To be able to do this you must create the right conditions: find the most highly skilled, make the right investments, always focus on the future, spread a new culture also through small daily actions and don’t waste time with too many conferences.”
Do Jobs and Bezos have anything in common?
“Yes, I learned from both of them the importance of being direct with people, of saying what I really think, without pretending. But Bezos is kinder. Sometimes Steve was really tough and, I’d say, impolite. But he was a genius.”
You mentioned that this budding digital team resembles a startup: what success rate do you expect?
“The success rates of a startup hover between one and five percent: hope I have more of a chance, because if we’re successful, the change for Italy will be truly remarkable.”
Have you had any second thoughts in these early Roman weeks?
Piacentini takes off his glasses and squints myopically, then he thinks for a bit and sighs: “In Seattle I would definitely had fun inventing new things, but one day I would have look in the mirror and would have asked myself: ‘But why didn’t I give it a try?’ Better to run the risk of not making it than to regret not having had the courage to do it.” His father is gone now, but he probably would have agreed again.

Caricato il 03/10/2016

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Team per la Trasformazione Digitale - Presidenza Consiglio dei Ministri

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