PALERMO (ITALPRESS) – Exploring how the business world and institutions can work together to promote a corporate culture based on principles of legality, ethics and social responsibility. These were the objectives of the conference “Legality and Business Culture,” organized by Irfis, Aidda Ets and Falcone Foundation, which was held in the Blue Library of the Museum of the Present at Palazzo Jung in Palermo. Also at the center of the debate was the role of women entrepreneurs and what can be the tools to increase the percentage of them who occupy top roles within public and private companies. “The idea is to combine the dignity of women as much as possible, which must be enhanced with the idea of work,” explained Iolanda Riolo, president of Irfis. “Irfis is made up of 40 percent women and many hold top roles within the Institute.
A work that also begins with an educational path especially financial “a woman who knows her bank account, who knows how to manage her autonomy also financial, who knows how to find a place in society, is definitely a more aware woman,” she added.
During the meeting, several testimonies of women entrepreneurs emerged who told their own experiences: from Marinella Avellino, owner of a plastics manufacturing company in Gela, to Grazia Locascio “wife, doctor and manager” of health facilities dedicated to nephrology in Palermo and in the province of Messina. But also the testimony of Maria Grazia Vagliasindi, former head of the Caltanissetta Court of Appeal from 2017 until 2024, the first woman in Sicily to reach this level in her judicial career. “Let’s remember,” she said, “that women in the judiciary entered with the first competition in 1965 and that even today there are many more women who pass the competition but far fewer colleagues who reach top figures.
The meeting was also a way to combine the theme of legality with that of business. “We are looking for an antidote to ignorance, an antidote to unlawfulness. The only way is to study, we want to transfer is the virus of legality,” added Irfis President. The numbers say that in companies, especially in Italy, the percentage of women is not very high and should increase. While female employment in Italy remains a knot for all statistics. “Not only the authorities can help, but I think women themselves can make a great contribution: that is, to bring ethical values to their businesses and therefore automatically and consequently a legality,” reported Antonella Giachetti, national president of Aidda, who also called for a paradigm shift more focused on the social economy “it should not only be profit what should guide those at the top of a company but sustainability in every field.”
“We women are naturally inclined to transparency, naturally inclined to try to resolve conflicts not through confrontation but through inclusion. They play a very important role with their values that contaminate the organization of the company. Just get access and they will contaminate the system.” And speaking of contamination from the discussion emerged the idea of a “time bank” to accompany and support young female college students who want to open a business to Aidda entrepreneurs.
– photo xd6/Italpress –
(ITALPRESS).
