Voice of Experience: Lia Turri, Partner, PwC Italy

With a 20-year track record of success at PwC, including 10 years as partner, Lia Turri has always specialized in the financial services sector, developing a strong client services background. She has focused on engagements with leaders of Italian companies and helped oversee IPOs and a variety of special projects. This longevity has helped her guide clients as the industry ushers in changes brought by the effect of new technologies. “It will be a completely different environment in five to 10 years and my goal is to help my clients adapt,” she says.

Heading Up Diversity Efforts Region Wide

In addition to her client services roles, Turri was asked in 2016 to coordinate diversity strategy across PwC offices in the Middle East, Europe and Africa after a successful stint as the diversity leader for Italy.

She has embarked on a listening tour, as she works with the diversity leaders across the region to hear their key priorities and understand the successful actions they are already implementing, thus enabling teams to share best practices with one another.

The first step in any change management process, she says, is to determine current priorities and then adopt a scale of measurement so you can track progress and make sure the actions you’re putting in place achieve the desired results.

Diversity can be measured in many ways, such as gender, culture and age, but the team has found that gender is something that can be most effectively monitored. Currently, 18% of partners across the footprint are female, so that is an easy metric to focus on for improving. “We are losing competencies if we don’t keep women at higher levels,” Turri points out, so it’s vital to share successful best practices.

Turri has found that initiatives across Italy have already brought positive results, as the team has received feedback from clients that the increased diversity has been noticed. She appreciates the opportunity she has been given to head this initiative and is eager to get everyone on board.

“It’s gratifying to be able to work across the boundaries and be in touch with people from other offices and areas. It has truly helped me recognize how many amazing people are working within PwC,” she says.

Growing the Pipeline

Turri has been active in a mentoring program called Sharing the Future, which is designed to help increase the pipeline for the partners of tomorrow by pairing senior managers with mentor partners. The pilot was such a success that they decided to continue the program with a new group of mentees, and all the partners who participated the first time elected to continue with the program — a success from both sides.

One of the messages that Turri shares with younger associates she works with is that you have to make sure that you are in the driver’s seat of your career, rather than letting others decide for you. For example, she says it is a common occurrence that a young woman will have a baby and others will start counting her out. “They might decide that her family has taken precedence, so they don’t invite her to participate in interesting projects because they think she won’t have the capacity, yet they haven’t even asked her what she wants.” Turri cautions against letting other project on you and your career.

“Blind spots are the the measure of the other person, not you,” she says, and yet they can affect the opportunities you are offered. In that way they can influence whether you can achieve a goal and will allow others to impact your career trajectory if you let them.

She also finds that in a male-dominated industry, many women assume they need to act like a man to progress in their career, but eventually they realize they are submerging the qualities that set them apart.

Finally, women need to support each other, she says. “Women have a great power, and if they are working together, they can great results.”

Along the way she has learned the importance of getting that support, even at home, through her two kids, ages 20 and 16. “They keep me energized in whatever I’m doing at work or at home,” she says. “They are very supportive of me in my passions and interest. Because I put a lot of time into my work, they encourage me to remember to always seek balance.”