Luxottica and women

Together with ten other large enterprises, Luxottica decided to launch an important and innovative project promoted by McKinsey in support of professional development for women in Italy.

Together with ten other large enterprises, Luxottica decided to launch an important and innovative project promoted by McKinsey in support of professional development for women in Italy: Valore D, Donne al Vertice per l’Azienda di Domani (Value D, Women at the top for the company of tomorrow).
“Valore D” aims to build on women’s talent to manage change in our country’s economic and industrial system; increase the number of women in top management positions; and pool the experiences of the participating companies to develop new projects in support of leadership by women.
The initiative was officially presented to the public on May 7 and will be implemented throughout 2009.

McKinsey decided to approach companies which, like Luxottica, show a high degree of sensitivity on the theme of professional development of women in Italy, and which, like Luxottica, are leaders: AstraZeneca, Enel, General Electric, Ikea, Johnson & Johnson, Microsoft, Standard & Poors, Unicredit and Vodafone, as well as McKinsey & Company itself. Together, they constitute a critical mass capable of raising public awareness of these issues and promoting real change.

Being a founder of Valore D is a further step in a strategy Luxottica embarked on some years ago and which is based on four key factors:

• 65% of our customers are women: having an increasingly high number of women in management positions means Luxottica understands and wants to reflect this female-male customer ratio;
• 60% of our people are women: the organization’s top management must reflect this percentage; the female manufacturing force, which is highly specialized , is one of Luxottica’s competitive advantages;
• innovation is rooted in diversity: recent studies have shown there is a link between the growth in value of an organization and the proportion of women in its top management team and that women are better at managing change;
• to have the right people in the right places it’s necessary to ensure a well-stocked pool of talent to draw on; companies that believe diversity is a key value have a competitive advantage because they’re considered more appealing as employers.
• In practical terms, Valore D will involve eight Luxottica women in Italy. As co-founders of the initiative, we will be represented on the Association’s management committee by Tullia Panconi, project leader for Luxottica.