In recent days, the topic of balancing layoffs and dividend distribution has sparked extensive discussions on social media, particularly regarding a prominent Italian industrial group. Reports of billions distributed to shareholders alongside thousands of layoffs raise legitimate questions about business ethics. However, to address these dynamics constructively, we need to look beyond the surface and analyze the broader context.

The Role of Entrepreneurs and Managers

The primary goal of an entrepreneur or manager is to make their company competitive in the long term, meeting customer needs with products and services of quality, value, and fair pricing. Achieving this requires a strategic vision across multiple timeframes:

• Long term (20-30 years)
• Medium term (5-10 years)
• Short term (3-5 years)
• Very short term (the current and following year).

To reach these goals, adopting innovative technologies—such as robotics and artificial intelligence—is essential, not only to enhance business efficiency but also, ideally, to improve people’s lives.

However, innovation inevitably brings change. Job cuts, for example, are not new: they occurred during the mechanization of agriculture, they are happening now with automation, and they will happen again tomorrow with technologies like autonomous driving, replacing traditional jobs.

Who Is Responsible for the Future of Work?

And here lies the critical question: entrepreneurs or managers cannot replace institutions and politics.
While their responsibility is to ensure their company’s sustainability and competitiveness, it is up to institutions and politics to ensure that citizens are equipped to face the future by providing them with the necessary skills.

When politics focuses only on the short term, it is inevitable that the educational and labor systems fail to keep pace with technological and economic transformations. This results in unemployment, precarious work, and entire professional categories being left without a future.

A Lesson for the Present

The social media debate raises an important question: are we truly addressing the root problem, or merely observing the consequences? The reality is that economic and technological change requires collaboration between businesses, institutions, and politics, with a shared vision that goes beyond emergencies and conflicts.

Today, unfortunately, we live in a “everyone against everyone” climate, where workers and managers, professional categories, and sectors clash with each other, while the real issue remains unresolved: a system unable to adapt and prepare for the future.

An Ethical and Sustainable Future

Running a business today demands ethics and responsibility, but also an understanding of the structural challenges that our system must address. It’s not just about distributing profits; it’s about building a society where everyone can play a meaningful role.

Innovation can and must serve humanity. But for this to happen, we must work together to ensure a balance between technological progress and social justice. The future is not a threat: it is an opportunity—if we prepare to seize it.

What are your thoughts? Do you agree that now is the time to act with a long-term vision to create a fairer and more sustainable future for all?