Inside leadership with Alfredo Altavilla at ESCP Turin

The global industrial leader joined Tiziana Pregliasco for a Leadership Masterclass exploring the experiences, decisions and convictions behind a career at the top of international business

What does leadership look like when decisions carry consequences for people, organisations and entire industries?

On 30 September, students and members of the ESCP community had the opportunity to hear one perspective first-hand during Mediocrity Isn’t Worth the Trip, a Leadership Masterclass with Alfredo Altavilla at ESCP in Turin.

Organised by Blue Factory and opened by Professor Alberta Di Giuli, the event featured a conversation between Altavilla and Tiziana Pregliasco, executive coach, entrepreneur and author. Drawing on Altavilla’s extensive international career, their exchange explored leadership, ambition, accountability and change through the experiences and decisions that have shaped his professional journey.

A career shaped by transformation

Altavilla has spent much of his career in industries undergoing profound change. Former Chief Operating Officer for EMEA at Fiat Chrysler Automobiles, CEO of Iveco and Executive Chairman of ITA Airways, he is currently Special Advisor to BYD Europe and Senior Advisor at CVC Capital Partners.

Rather than offering a textbook account of leadership, his conversation with Pregliasco brought the audience closer to the realities behind senior executive roles: making difficult decisions, managing different perspectives, setting ambitious objectives and taking responsibility for results.

For ESCP students, it was an opportunity to encounter a distinctive management philosophy developed over decades at the highest levels of international industry, and to question and reflect on it through the lens of their own education and ambitions.

Mediocrity is not worth the trip

The title of the masterclass comes from an episode that Altavilla still considers a reference point in his professional life. It dates back to the Fiat-Chrysler integration, when a member of the new leadership team argued that pursuing the most ambitious scenario would require much the same commitment and energy as settling for a more conservative one: “Mediocrity is not worth the trip.”

The phrase stayed with Altavilla. The masterclass provided a starting point for a wider conversation about the temptation to accept established ways of working and the role that ambition, perseverance and constructive disagreement can play in organisations.

Different perspectives

The exchange between Altavilla and Pregliasco also explored the human side of leadership.

Among the questions raised during the evening were how senior teams handle disagreement, where individual accountability meets collective responsibility, and how leaders reconcile demanding objectives with the people expected to deliver them.

Altavilla brought to these questions a strong and highly personal point of view, grounded in his executive experience. Pregliasco’s role as interviewer created room to examine those convictions from different angles, including performance, professional growth and well-being.

The conversation extended to the audience, as students and other participants put their questions directly to the speakers and continued the discussion during the networking aperitif.

A conversation that started with ESCP students

The masterclass also marked another chapter in a collaboration that began at ESCP. Pregliasco previously worked with Bachelor in Management students through an ESCP Collective Projects, an initiative that enables students to address real challenges alongside companies and professionals.

The project, supported by Compagnia di San Paolo, initially focused on welfare before developing into a series of conversations with CEOs and senior professionals. This work contributed to Pregliasco’s book Vincere al Quadrato, published by Il Sole 24 Ore, which includes an interview with Altavilla.

Bringing their conversation to the ESCP Turin Campus, therefore, connected the evening back to an initiative in which ESCP students had participated from an early stage.

Discover the new call for ESCP Collective Projects 

Learning from experience, questioning perspectives

Welcoming business leaders to campus gives students access to experiences that cannot be reproduced through theory alone. It also gives them the opportunity to question those experiences, compare different approaches and develop their own understanding of leadership.

The masterclass with Alfredo Altavilla offered precisely that space: an encounter with a senior international leader and the choices, convictions and experiences that have shaped his career.

Leadership education also happens through exposure to different perspectives. By bringing experienced decision-makers into conversation with students, ESCP creates opportunities to listen, question and form an independent point of view.