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John Elkann

American-Italian businessman

John Philip Jacob Elkann (born 1 April 1976) is an Italian-American industrialist. In 1997, he became the chosen heir of his grandfather Gianni Agnelli, following the death of Gianni's nephew Giovanni Alberto Agnelli and in 2008 became the head of IFIL, an Agnelli family investment company now part of Exor. He chairs the automaker Stellantis and is the chairman and CEO of Exor, the holding company controlled by the Agnelli family, which also owns PartnerRe and holds a controlling stake in Ferrari, CNH Industrial and Juventus F.C.

John Elkann in 2014

Quotes

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  • Juventus is a great love, and this is its secret. A love from everyone, and obviously from my family, which is passed down from generation to generation; these colors are part of my children's lives too.
  • We have been reflecting on the journey we have taken since the foundation of FIAT back in 1899 because, though we are proud of our past achievements, we are most interested in what we can learn from them, and also what we can learn from our mistakes.
  • Today Gianni would be disappointed as all we Ferrari fans are. But I am optimistic because we have two young drivers: they are not 'used to winning' but they have a great desire to 'train to win' with their humility and determination, they are infecting the whole team with this.
  • LaStampa has always been a free newspaper because of its economical sustainability, and we're proud of it. It's the only way for a newspaper to be independent.
  • Many things are linked to being able to live with uncertainty, ...with paradoxes. But this can be a strength of an organisation and a situation.
  • I was born in New York, then I went to the UK, then I went to Brazil, then I went to France, then I studied in Italy. My life was always about being confronted with an environment where you had to adapt.
  • (talking about his children) I'm interested in avoiding two types of behaviour: one is the sense of guilt and the other is a sense of entitlement. If these two are avoided, then the rest is up to them.
  • I am a big believer of what Darwin discovered in the Galapagos, proving that the species most responsive to change will survive over apparently stronger or more intelligent competitors.
  • As an entrepreneur you have responsibilities in trying to operate well in what you have to do. There is a positive effect if you end up doing that. That’s where I try to spend most of my efforts.
  • The lesson I have learnt is that when a family and a business function, they function together. You have to have a family that works and a business that works and the two will end up working well alongside.
  • I learnt not to be desperate in bad times, and I am learning not to be bullish when times are good.
  • Artists have a sensibility that others don't have. They have a way of reading into the future.
  • Responsibility is something that you have. And I've, I've personally always felt responsible, felt responsible since a very, very early age as we were growing up in many different countries and we had divorced parents and were very much very close to my siblings. And always trying to be responsible in school settings, sport settings and taking on responsibility was definitely something that I always was drawn to. Difficulties are the moments in which you can show courage and you can show responsibility for others. And over the course of more than 20, so getting close to 30 years, that I've been involved as a director of Fiat back in 1997, there have been many moments of time where that responsibility was acted on.
  • A great CEO is someone who's really interested in the job, not the title. And who's really interested in competing in the pure sense of what it means, and really likes not only the company, but likes the people with whom he works. A great CEO is also someone who has the ability of thinking long term, but also acting now. Being strategic, but yet being operational.
  • The advice to young people is, first of all, they need to be optimistic about the future because the future is theirs and they have the responsibility of building that future. And that's not daunting, it's exciting. On a more practical, I think the advice that my grandfather gave me remains true. To listen and ask questions, and in some ways curiosity and learning are really what you need to start young at.

About

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  • He is extremely intelligent and has a great sense of responsibility. I've seen, in the past few years, he has managed several crises with extreme dignity and wisdom.
  • John was in exactly the right place at the right time to understand manufacturing at its deepest level — at a cellular level. His apprenticeship culminated in an insight that was critical to Fiat’s survival. He noticed a persistent gap between what happens on the factory floor of, say, a headlight plant in Birmingham, and what information filters up to headquarters.
  • Re-structuring and modernizing a media business in the current environment is a challenge; if anybody can make it work in Italy, that is John. He has vision with no illusion, a great passion for Italy, a set of principles rooted in tradition, which helps him being an innovator, and has a great business sense about opportunities.” Robert Thomson La Dolce Vita dei Media, Air Mail, October 2020.
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