A83222 Heritage and Competition

The student will be able to recognize how companies rely on their historical heritage referring to communication, strategy and identity.

By the end of the course, he or she will learn to analyze critically different modality of use of the heritage and to apply a theoretical model of evaluation to actual situations.

The course will present the evolution on the long run of the Italian economy, underlying the path of development of the Made in Italy model.

The student will consider the complexity underlying the relation between this model and its historical roots, analyzing – from a critical perspective, and using some specific research tools – how companies understand and manage their heritage.

The student will be required to understand how heritage could be relevant for present and future strategies and how it would be possible to approach this topic from many different perspectives.

Some basic notions of international business history and good knowledge of the Italian case will be required as essential at the end of the course.

The course in intended for students at a MS level (if interested, international undergraduates should inquire the instructor before the beginning of the lessons).

The course develops 3 different interrelated modules:

1) Corporate heritage: theory and application

The module will explain how the knowledge of the past is useful to understand the firm and how heritage is a component of corporate identity with peculiar features (unique, not imitable, time-related). This part will show also some cases of companies which encompass heritage in their strategies.

2) Italy: from Industrial revolution to Made in Italy

Italy is a good case study to understand how production models differ among countries and over the time. The module will show the evolution of Italian economy presenting different paradigms of industrialization and their application in the country: First Industrial revolution model, Fordism, SMEs...

3) Made in Italy debucked

Very often the relationship between made in Italy and Italian productive tradition is presented in a very simplistic way: aim of the third module is to underly the complexity behind the bond – very relevant – between Made in Italy and heritage. Students will consider the history of some relevant industries and how some companies in them increase the value of their heritage assets.

The course asks to the student a serious commitment toward active learning. Participation to the lessons is mandatory and students who would miss some class are required to catch up autonomously with the topics presented (the instructor is always available for suggestions).

During the lessons, lecturing is kept to a minimum and students are invited to participate to group activities and debates. At the beginning of the course, readings used in each lesson will be scheduled.

A very important feature of the course is the direct contact with corporate heritage: original documents (written, video, pictures) will be therefore presented during the activities, guest speakers will be invited and one field trips will be part of the course.

Due to the need of a direct contact with original documents, part of the material used during the activities will be in Italian only: to overcome linguistic problems, student will work in groups composed by both native Italian speakers and international students (multi-cultural experience is encouraged also for a better understanding of the topic).

Students are invited to consider assessment as a tool to check their learning all along the course rather than as a system to assign grades. The final result will be the sum of individual and group assessments:

• Individual

  • Written test, from 0 to 10 points. The exam will be a multiple choice test, aiming to check the comprehension of the basis of the course (Module 1-2, theory and Italian business history). Due by October, the 23rd.

  • During the whole duration of the course, some short unexpected individual flash-quizzes (1 written open question each one) will reward attendance and will check key points about reading or previous lessons. They will account from 0 to 5 points.

• Group

  • Outdoor activity, from 0 to 5 points: the group will recognize material evidences associated to the industrial past or material elements showing the historical change in the proximity of the university, using the method explained in lesson 15/10/2014.

  • Final assignment, from 0 to 10 points: the group will analyses the cases presented during Module 3, applying the scheme presented by Urde et al. 2007. A short comparison among the cases (500-800 words) will be required.

Points awarded for the elective Laboratory (-3 to +5) will be sum up to in the final grade. See Laboratory web-page for further information.

Points exceeding 30 will be considered for “distinction” (30 e lode)

Students who will fail to reach the minimum of 18 on 30 in the assessments during the course, will be allow to present an individual research paper to recover the result (it is required to plan topic and deadline with the instructor, the grade awarded for the paper – from 0 to 30 – will substitute EVERY previous score).