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From Milan, 33 years old, Ms Galgano shapes
the managers and salesmen of the future
Adriana the German sells you success
"This is how I defeat
'time thieves'"
"My name is
Adriana Galgano, I am 33 years old and I come from Milan, the name of my company, which deals with the commercialization of
the products and services of my family’s company,
OTTANTAVENTI, is Medea. The name of the company Ottantaventi comes from Pareto’s law. He was a 19th century Swiss economist– who stated that 80% of results comes from just 20% of the effort. We sell planning methods, training courses for managers and salesmen, we explain how to speak in public, how to communicate and sell over the telephone and how to manage time". “Stop” – I said. The beautiful and determined young-lady I had invited to have a cup of tea in a tearoom
on Piazza di Spagna could have continued talking for a long time. She feels my disorientation and gracefully gives me some papers. I look at her and understand why her friends call her “the German”.
Last summer - "instead of relaxing at the beach" – she went to Heidelberg to study German. She has no time to waste, she had intuitively understood that I did not follow what she was explaining to me.
She has prepared tables and documents, she also gives me a book written by her father
Vittorio Galgano for Sperling & Kupfer, "How to become a great
salesman", techniques, tactics and strategies to acquire new customers and gain their loyalty forever. I do not really know if I am interviewing her or if I have been hypnotized by the “apparent persuasion” method this strange family
has invented.
Let’s try to understand. Here is how the “ottantaventi" man should
be and which are his commandments (please be patient, it’s really a hard thing to understand...). The ideal person - according to Adriana Galgano - "attributes the same importance to family life and to professional life because they are aware that the two enrich one another and contribute to their balance and to the fullness of their existence. They
pride themselves on persuasion and avoid aggressive and dictatorial behavior; they move only if strictly necessary and before doing this ask whether it is possible to achieve the same result by using telephone, fax or land mail; they prefer public transport because it provides
an opportunity to read or write; they arrange
several meetings every time they move; they do not try to solve a situation if they are not convinced that they want to solve it; they have
daily meetings with themselves to review their goals and to verify whether their actions are connected to them; they know their faults and weaknesses and are used to creatively playing on them to overcome them; they write down a large part of their reflective work; they
do one thing at a time and aim to do it well without unnecessary perfectionism; they don’t allow frequent
or unjustified interruptions; when an inconvenience occurs they don’t ask whose fault it is but ask themselves what they can do and if it is possible to go on.”.
Adriana is slim, a sporty type, with long, sleek hair and green eyes that see
right through you.
She is from Milan but works in Perugia, where the family company is based, she is
engaged. She drives alone all over Italy, "fifty thousand kilometers a year” to teach tricks, secrets and tactics to dozens of companies, among which are some of the most famous
companies in the world;
Ip Petroli, Aprilia, Samsonite, Bang & Olufsen.
I’m Exhausted at the thought of it but she is full of energy. She has also patented a special agenda (she shows it to me,
I understand just a little, everyday is divided into goals
and priorities, it would be useful) based
upon "Time
management", which means a rational organization of time to protect against those who she calls
"time thieves", always ready to ambush. The Galgano world
is a strange place, (Adriana’s uncle, Alberto, is the guru of total quality and discovered and successfully applied new systems to revolutionize production organization and Adriana’s father, Vittorio specializes in sales
techniques). In the early Seventies, the two brothers imported and adapted
organization and persuasion techniques, already famous in the United
States, for the Italian market. The system must work because customer
numbers are increasing.
Her father Vittorio is writing another book "How to speak in
public", based on lessons and seminars he has been giving in Milan for more than ten years. His daughter Adriana helps him
with the final version of his books, his wife Gabriella is the organizational secretary of the group. After graduating in Political Science, Adriana did everything, baby sitting in England, selling English courses door to door, working in regional research centers, teaching at university
until finally she followed in her father’s footsteps. However, in order to be independent she founded her own company in 1992, Medea, which provides services to her family’s company. At Confindustria
Ms Galgano works in the “economic reports commission” of the association of young businessmen ”this is
" she says "my way of doing politics, we also submitted a proposal for electoral reforms ... We trust the opinion of the electorate, that part which
acts and chooses the best proposal every time. We, the businessmen do not have
an ideological approach, we get angry when you, the journalists, brand us.
I also don't like when business is referred to using the concept of masters and workers, this makes you think of yuppies driving Rolls
Royces, not of people that work twelve hours a day, travelling up and down in a country where it is still an adventure to take an airplane on time.
Last year for six weeks I travelled on the Roma-Catanzaro route and there was never less than half an hour
delay.
Adriana Galgano relaxes playing "Trivial Pursuit", she spent New Year’s holidays in Prague with a group of young businessmen she met at the Confindustria meetings in Rome, she admits “maybe we are a little wealthier than other young people of our age but we don't have time to spend our money. In our opinion the company is a social value, a place to concentrate energies, resources and investments". This is the philosophy of thirty year old Adriana, who is convinced that businessmen should change and improve image
with the cooperation of the press. As for children, at the present there is no time to build a family. At midnight when I am still at the office I think “
Thank God I do not have a husband and a son waiting for me at home!”.
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