A unique experience was born in Italy, and precisely in Emilia, thirteen years ago and one of the few that are active in the world. The network involves twenty-one regional socio-health entities, almost two million citizens and manages an aggregate turnover of 344 million euros. Giampaolo Colletti interviews Averardo Orta, founder and CEO of the consorzio Colibrì (Hummingbird consortium) for FARE Insieme.
di Giampaolo Colletti
@gpcolletti
There is an ancient African fairy
tale, today a collective heritage, which best summarises the story we are about
to tell. During a forest fire, while all the animals were fleeing, a
hummingbird flew in the opposite direction with a drop of water in its beak.
"What do you think you are doing?" asked the lion. "I'm going to
put out the fire", replied the hummingbird. With a drop of water?",
the lion retorted. And the hummingbird, continuing its flight, replied. “I do
my part.”
How much contemporaneity in these
words. Just like those choices taken at the beginning of 2021, after a year of
pandemic, by the World Economic Forum. "Nobody is saved on his/her
own": this is the subtext to describe the fragile time we are presently
living in. «The pandemic has shown that no institution or individual alone can
address the economic, environmental, social and technological challenges of our
complex and interdependent world. This is why in recent years the creation of
impact and the definition of partnership policies are necessary», reads the
Davos manifesto. Play as a team to better face the challenges and win them.
This is what the consorzio Colibrì (Hummingbird consortium), which
involves twenty-one structures in the health and social services sector, has
been doing every day for the past thirteen years. Unity is strength because
together we can really count more. And this applies to the optimisation of
purchases, to the efficient management of services, to the training of
operators. The structures belonging to the consorzio Colibrì (Hummingbird
consortium) operate within integrated services, linked by the desire to take
better care of people. But each reality has its own history and experience, a
specific organisational and management capacity, a mission to be carried out
based on one's skills. Even before that, these companies share a common vision
of doing business, focused on the ethics of behaviour and on social
responsibility towards the territory and stakeholders. «This is an experience
that has no equal in our sector. We deal with social and health services for
the individual, a very complex activity with a very high technological
component and with an enormous amount of human resources employed. Technology
is not enough. You need empathy, and this is why we are hi-tech and hi-touch», says
Averardo Orta, founder and CEO of the consorzio Colibrì (Hummingbird
consortium).
Network services. The network involves more than eight thousand
operators assisting nearly two million citizens and for an aggregate turnover
of 344 million euros. Goal: to offer all users the highest quality standards. «There are new needs, not just new
drugs and new machinery. That is why the only way is to imagine solutions that
are themselves innovative. Today the citizen needs answers that are transversal,
adapted to his/her new needs. We collected the subjects capable of providing
diagnostic, surgical, rehabilitative services, linked to the outpatient and
home setting. Our consortium contains all the elements to accompany the patient
in his/her care path», says Orta, who represents the fifth generation of
the family in overseeing these activities that intersect health, volunteering
and community. In this idea of circular health, the patient is at the centre of
focus, but what makes the difference is this intuition of getting everyone to
work together, by optimising resources and creating value. «We can say that we
represent the main buyer in our region. We bought personal protective equipment
when no one could find it because we were placing large orders. We have
networked the research activities by dividing the fixed costs on 21 different
subjects: this is the only way to support the weight of a shared apparatus,
which is absolutely indispensable and correlated to the quality of the service
that is provided», Orta specifies.
The new stakeholdership. Sadly, there continues to be a huge difference between words and deeds.
That in this case implies listening to all the stakeholders involved to find
shared lines. To be different but with common goals. A story that begins on the
other side of the world, during a trip to the United States. «My wife and I
reflected on the problems and opportunities of being entrepreneurs. And there
we understood that the current structure we had in place was not able to
satisfy the transversal needs of the citizen in his/her health path, which was
a sort of labyrinth. Thus, we were struck by this idea: to take the best of the
various entrepreneurial experiences from all the main characters of the private
socio-health sector of the Emilia Romagna region. At the time, we were parked
at a petrol station when we noticed several birds, which were hummingbirds.
They immediately gave us the idea of something fast and light. In essence, each
one was free and independent, but moving like a swarm they managed to do great
things»,
says Orta. This is the strength to join forces: in a dizzyingly accelerating scenario,
a swarm allows you to implement more complex strategies. And all this generates
value because the pieces together make up a winning mosaic. The future goes in
the direction of new paths for citizens and of an opening of the consortium
towards other entities that do not only provide health services, such as
insurances. «As soon as we will emerge from the pandemic our intention is to
address the consumer and the patient, while until now we have been involved in
building the internal structure and B2B relations, dealing with innovation,
technology, drugs and processes», concludes Orta. Here is thus the future, which must
necessarily be declined as a first person plural.
https://podcast.confindustriaemilia.it/
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