Intervista a Jessica Spina

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Jessica Spina, who graduated with honours in Economics and Business Studies from the Bocconi University in Milan, is the Head of Group Investor Relations and Strategic Corporate Development of Mediobanca. As the Head of the Group Strategic Corporate Development, she is responsible for supporting the CEO and senior management in identifying directions for the Mediobanca Group to grow.

As IRO she is responsible to create effective, two-way dialogue between the company itself and the financial community.

She is also qualified as an auditor and accountant. Back in 1992, Jessica started her career as a financial analyst covering Italian listed banks. Later in 1998, she joined Mediobanca, working first in Corporate Finance, in the Financial Institutions Group. In 2004 she founded the Investor Relations unit, initiating a dialogue with the financial community. As IRO she has received several awards: in the Institutional Investors survey (AllExecutive Team – Mid-Cap European Banks) she was ranked in the Top 3 in the Best IR professional category in 2017, 2018 and 2019.

An Ever-Evolving Role Jessica has been in her role since 2004. In these past fifteen years she has seen the role change and develop significantly, both in terms of scope and complexity.

As IRO, she says that the core of her job was equity: analysts and portfolio managers. However, in the years following the Lehman crisis and the sovereign debt crisis that hit Italy (and the spread on Italian bonds), credit, in the shape of agencies, analysts and portfolio managers, gained traction, asking for separate road-shows, presentations, meetings, and sections in institutional websites. Recently ESG has become increasingly relevant. So in other words, Jessica’s job has basically trebled. She also believes that an indepth understanding of different audiences’ needs and tailoring communications accordingly is crucial to the effectiveness of her role.

Jessica Spina

The Experienced Leader

In term of corporate development the strategic goal has been how to evolve Mediobanca’s business model turning the challenging scenario and

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The 20 Most Successful Businesswomen to Watch, 2020

regulatory framework into opportunities. In the last fifteen years Mediobanca has trebled in size (in terms of revenues, volumes and shareholders’ funds), moving from a holding company to a diversified financial player, with effective diversification in investment banking, wealth management and consumer banking. Mediobanca Group enjoys a distinctive profile in European financial sector, due to the effectiveness and sustainability of its integrated business model, having shown it is able to grow and deliver while outperforming the sector by financial results and market performance due to distinctive its DNA, culture and positioning.

Creating a Two-Way Synergic Dialogue Jessica sees Investor Relations as a responsibility for the company in both ethical and strategic terms, the purpose of which is to create effective, two-way dialogue between the company itself and the financial community.

Mediobanca’s mission follows three main guidelines: to create an investor base, institutional and retail, for our shares and bonds in the medium/long term; to facilitate stock liquidity and price stabilization; to promote ongoing dialogue between investors and senior management regarding results, options, and strategic choices, This two-way synergic dialogue between investors and senior management and between investor relations and corporate development is vital to the effectiveness of her job, Jessica says.

According to Jessica, working in finance, looking at banks first as sell-side then buy-side analyst for M&A, and then from the corporate side, for strategic planning and investor relations, has helped her understand better each different audience needs and points of view Challenges

“Self-awareness and lightness: vital qualities for succeeding in business as a woman.”

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For Jessica, the first challenge was to find a successful balance between a highly demanding job and family life as the mother of three children. This has meant having and needing to adapt the whole time, being ready to challenge, push, and drive herself consistently, which requires a huge effort in terms of self-awareness.

Another major factor has been simply accepting the hard work involved in trying to hold everything together, as has the next step of accepting that if she is happy and

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fulfilled, everyone else is more likely to be so too. She firmly believes it’s no good to anyone making a martyr out of yourself, either at work or at home.

Jessica added, “One last lesson, or achievement, has been learning to be assertive in the workplace, which, as a woman – there’s no point in denying it – is simply harder”.

Advice for Emerging Women Entrepreneurs When asked for some advice for young emerging entrepreneurs, Jessica said; Be aware: know your value, be assertive, and understand that imperfection is part of life: you don’t have to be perfect, but “good enough”, as Winnicot would say Ÿ Play by the same rules the men play by: present yourself and your results without waiting for someone to discover you; ask for money and role based on your results; networking. Why shouldn’t you? Ÿ Share your work-family project. Your partner has to be proud of you and of your successes, sharing in the pleasures and duties as part of the same household and family. Your company has to be focused on your performance, not just on where you are and when you’re there. You are a human being, not WonderWoman. Ÿ Stop trying to control everything – Be brave and “light”. Work, commitment, organization, all these things are indispensable ingredients for success and a happy work-family balance. But luck is also vital, and fortune favours the brave as they say. A touch of “lightness” is needed if you want to transform a problem into an opportunity, loneliness into time for yourself, absence into a different way of sharing. Ÿ

She also added, “Strong hard and soft skills, along with resilience, self-control, passion are vital attributes that every leader, male or female, has to have. Women must also have full awareness of their own skills, play the same rules that men have always played by in business, avoid to pretend to be perfect and control everything; share, be brave and light, get fun.”

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