Barbara Martin Coppola
speaker
72 appearances
1 recordings
1 series
first heard Jun 2025
last heard Jun 2025
Barbara Martin Coppola’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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Appearances
If within the culture, you know, everything that is empowerment and entrepreneurship is present, then that means that, you know, and people feel it. That means they can actually use it. That's a very good sign already for somehow the environment being conducive to that.
The second thing is purely the budget in a very rational way is making sure that no matter what and agreed with the board, that investment will be put aside. And put aside, which doesn't mean to not have accountability on the budget. So the follow up actually on this big thinking and definition of success and the metrics are really important too.
And so defining that together with the board and seeing how things are coming back and it gives at the end, I believe when success comes, a lot of pride to the rest of the company. is disruptive innovations that redefined sport or something incredible in terms of services in circularity that is really growing and having benefits for the planet and for society.
All of those examples are shining stars of the possibilities and energy for people to actually want to create more.
So I'll start with both Decathlon and IKEA, which have an advantage somehow because both companies are the first experience. For instance, when you start living on your own, many people go to IKEA. Yeah. And when people start doing sport, especially in Europe and Asia and other places, they actually start with decathlon. There is an emotional connection associated to that.
The issue of these companies is to actually move and evolve with people through their lives. When I was single and setting up my apartment with IKEA, right? Then later in life, I'm a mother of two. The needs are different. And then one day I'll have different needs with my husband because we want to do different things. IKEA needs to adapt to my life, to the stages of my life. Same for Decathlon.
I'm starting with a sport. Now I've got my kids. We need something else. So it's about personalizing, but over a lifetime, There is an important element, of course, in this relationship with the customer, which is what the company makes you feel. When you go and interact with these brands, every single touch point needs to be seamless and needs to make you feel something.
The values of the company, the brand, the ethos, but also rational aspects such as I'm getting what I need at the price that I need it. And I'm getting it delivered, you know, in a flawless way. So it demands quite a bit, you know, if you think about an iceberg from the company, the customers are going to see the tip.
But there is a whole thing in the company of orchestration, of excellency, digitalization, but also creative and aspects that are a lot more intangible that need to be put into place in order to have this excellent customer experience. The final thing that I would say is brands are part of people's lives today. And they can give hope or not.
And so I'm a deep believer of what a company does, not only rationally, but emotionally too. And going with, you know, people's lives and being actors, you know, in the society through the way they behave and the way they provide service to people around the world.
Yes. The North Star produced a whole evolution of the brand for Decathlon, and then that was implemented into an evolved customer experience, not only through the stores online, but also innovating different business models. And one thing that we really put in place was renting equipment secondhand and a lot of different forms of, you know, creating business, but in a different way.
And we've been astonished to see how successful those businesses are. The repairing equipment, the renting bikes instead of purchasing new. It's an incredible phenomenon. And when you think about it, there is a positive aspect on the deglobalization of the circular business unit. But there is also a good aspect for the planet. So I'm a deep believer on circularity overall.
So there's been a huge movement, putting into place this new brand, this new experience, and actually seeing how positive of an effect it has been with people in different places, India, UK, Spain, and France. Really great reaction to what we have implemented.
It's a good question. I believe enough people around the world are concerned about what is happening in the planet. So beyond the governments, I think there is the movement on people, consumption, you know, parents and their kids and wanting to build a better world actually for the generations to come.
I believe there are many businesses that are doing the right thing, decarbonizing, investing in materials that are the right ones. I see different business models. I see innovation that is going in the right direction.
Both in IKEA, at Google, at Decathlon, I found many, many people wanting to do the hard work to reinvent the business models and actually decarbonizing, but going even beyond decarbonizing into reinventing business models. So I'm leaning in the side of hope and I'm leaning in the side of having the responsibility as a leader to carry light, carry hope, not just through words, but through actions.
And so what has happened recently within Decathlon, for three years, we've been building the business in a positive growth trajectory while at the same time, having minus 13% on CO2 emissions over the last years. It is possible. The question is, how are we going to be scaling this? And especially, how are we not going to fall into cynicism and negativity? Because this is not the moment to do that.
On the contrary, It's the moment to actually bring light, hope, and actions because many people around the world want this. And so I believe in the power of many people moving.
I deeply believe in the role of education more than ever. The way we educate might be changing, but the role of education continues to be as important as ever. We can learn the skills or the theory, if you will, as well, in different ways. But I think it's really important to put it into action as soon as we can. So learning a new concept, we can learn in different ways. But how do we apply it?
How do we apply it through case studies, through group work, through internships? And so getting actually this hands-on experience, I think, is really important. And that's what I see in institutions such as INSEAD. There is also another role of education, which is to learn to manage, lead people through difference.
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