From a multi-license to the leader of an architecture firm capable of growing 40% in a year of a pandemic

She was fired from the professional firms, and had to open one of her own as they kept getting fired, and was considered an irreducible pain in the butt. Edith Forte, 53, Roman, Graduated in Architecture Distinction in Sapienza, opened it and has done so much more. He founded Fortebis, a company of architects and engineers, fifty interior designers including 42 women, young men, and talented professionals. Consulting company operating in Italy and abroad. Specialization in strategic and urban planning, architecture, interior design and engineering has led Fortebis to develop integrated projects all over the world: Europe, North America, the Middle East, South Africa, China, and Asia Pacific.

Edith Forte is a pioneer in the innovative category. “At the age of thirty-three, I went to the bank to buy money, and I came from a family that was experiencing financial fluctuations, and gave birth to Fortebis, four partners, three women and a man, average age from 40 to 60. Opening with my sister Josepina, the youngest of five years, graduated Just today she is in Berkeley, California, she speaks five languages ​​and studies architectural criticism. I was in charge of development and management, and she was creative with the group. He chose to come up with his replacement, he works like this for us: Simona Franci, a wonderful architect who has nothing to envy Renzo Piano, but in line with the company’s logic. “

Luck prefers the bold. Fortebis is a company of expert architects and engineers in office design for major fashion designers, and important banking groups, in the hotel, residential, corporate and retail sectors, generating significant added value for the client. Retail is the industrial category in which he operates the most. “We design the spaces in which products are sold. Also, offices and buildings.” Simone Spoletini, the only man in Booker Partners, the architect and chief technician, is a former construction worker, Giuseppina Zippo is the general manager. “In the new organizational chart, we will be six, the company formula is open, all of them are operating partners, and they are not capital. When one of them leaves, he returns the shares to the value he got with them.”

Many different professional personalities. “I take care of the strategic plan for three years, align planning with new trends, prepare the budget with Giuseppina Zibo, and oversee the financial aspects.” At the forefront are project managers who dictate quality and timing, and people with two to ten years of experience work as tutors and the responsibility for consulting the client rests on them. Then there’s the creative designer who takes on project costs and tracks engineering. An overseas network with the long experience of local architects and professionals in the region. A lawyer joins the team for tendering contracts and a Senior Project Manager, who will become the Country Manager for Europe. “Usually the site manager is a man, but from the head office we also send construction managers. They are hungry for knowledge. They are there, and they are fluent in the language. It’s a huge job. And because they are all natural talents and full of challenges, like a purebred horse paw.”

Daughter of Art, her mother Luigina, who passed away five years earlier, was an architect. She taught me perfection in the profession, she was never happy with me, I suffered a lot but today I thank her. She said to me: Never fall in love with the project because you think it is over.

The pandemic has not dampened the Fortebis team’s work, but it has boosted its performance, so much so that in its growth forecast for 2021, the company aims to generate € 4 million in revenue, up 40 percent from the previous year. The company grows and in Rome it is changing its headquarters to a new and bigger headquarters. “Even in the crisis, we stayed ahead. I didn’t let myself be afraid, and I couldn’t stand it. For a year, we were only financing ourselves. Our clients helped us develop. We took the step abroad. This was done with Italians who crossed the line to open their operational bases and sales networks. We are helping them in our global services, and we start with the design and premise of the solution. ” Fortebis is the European partner of Gensler, a professional firm with four thousand architects worldwide. “For me, the client’s need comes first. Architecture has a very important educational function, which translates into beauty, into joyful spaces. You spend a third of your useful life at work, you should feel satisfied. It makes it better. Scampia in Naples and Corviale in Rome: How to envision Such spaces?

The outcome of the pandemic has highlighted the positive aspects of the fast and distant action imposed by the lockdown. Proof of this is that Edith Forte, the sole director and strategic director, specializes in design and management at Politecnico di Milano and holds a PhD in Architectural Technology in Florence, does not lead the company from the capital, the physical and legal headquarters of the company. But he lives in Sardinia. In its outdoor location, it created a kind of clever job. “After twenty years in the company, I am starting to feel upset. When you are in charge of payroll, you cannot give up. Our company operates on a global scale, and the sun never sets on our work, when China sleeps, the United States wakes up. United. I spent my vacation on San Pietro Island. I moved there, which is a wonderful fact that has brought me back a dimension of peace, tranquility and security. Asparagus and chard grow automatically. CasediCarloforte was born in San Pietro. ”, A widespread hotel that houses vacation homes and landlords and is today a subsidiary of the group. We have reached 100 beds. It also allowed me to “ground” my family, to create a nest. Three years ago, at the age of 50, she, a single mother, Matteo Carlo Forte, gave birth to “the name in honor of the island that hosted me.”

Today the businessman lives in Cagliari. “Five years on the island would have been enough. In the midst of an epidemic, my son is without a school, the nanny who never came, saw the chaos. On March 8th I came, booked the hotel and stayed there for two years and half a month before going home. Like all.” Innovators, I tend to continually improve, by moving I started developing an industrial plan, to think in terms of the value of the process. From here I manage a dense network of correspondents who follow projects, and I manage construction sites that ensure punctuality and efficiency. For a knowledge company like ours, that means work. Towards goals without time restrictions. This immediately led to the exercise of delegation. Two exceptional conditions to grow for. Great employment. When you see that the basic risks are controlled, you can let them go. ” Conscription is reminiscent of an old school Marines. “They give me three years, I get them to do such a mess, I am not very democratic: Either that is the case or you are out, they know that with me they either have a profession or wear them out. Whoever stands in the way of the vision does little to nothing.” A lot falls. But those that remain are specially designed and help us guide the boat in terrible moments. “

In Sardinia, once a year the businessman invites to build a team. Sometimes it calls for excellent characters. “We are having fun, we play, we do tests together, I subject them to those family towers. The island is a beautiful scenario, in October, off-season, four stimulating days during which I look at them all, smell them, know them. I put the team logic before individuality. For us. They are in the center, one thing is their vision in the company, and the other is framing the right mix of personality values. ” Fabrizio Peresi, who was CFO, Comptroller, condensed everything in the first five minutes of meetings because he said that innovators like this, attention collapses very quickly because they’re thinking of something else. “He reconciled me with my nature. He explained to me that in companies as in life, people are divided between innovators, early adapters, followers and skeptics; enthusiasts who welcome impossible challenges, and analysts who follow you who always say they don’t, but in companies they keep tillage straight.” Three “Components if they are well balanced will make the company grow. Inside offices, we always change places. Even the way you bring people together can change the overall energy of the system.”

Customers who go to visit her take her to the sea to talk about work in front of a plate of fish. “I learn from everything, even from them. Business logic was born from entrepreneurs like Roberto Spingardi, Gerardo Solaro del Borgo, Ugo Diburnardi. With this epidemic, the bureaucracy disappeared, and everything became simpler. Large private companies, even corporate firms, banks. They had to tighten measures. ” Safety and Well-Being in Post-Covid Places. “We are redesigning offices, because smart work has changed habits, people no longer want to gather, and everything changes and opens up a great opportunity for us. International vision is our added value. We very much want Italy to be aware of his talent and make the most of it as others do.” Why should you sell everything to the highest bidder? The Biennial has now asked us to renovate the “Cinema Azzurro Scipioni” in Rome.Ferrari, one of our best clients, has two hundred points of sale all over the world, each of its two thousand and three dealers. Thousands of square meters, they never closed the R&D center and sold more cars than before.As part of a framework agreement, they entrusted through a tender “ Purchase of supplies, we administered tenders for millions and millions of euros in respect of our charter of values ​​and twenty years of integrated experience. Our dignity is at stake. In Italy, entire regions have been banned and thousands of companies are turned upside down. There are architects that lick their wounds and we don’t know how to handle the tasks. ”

She does not like to travel, “I am a resident, perhaps because I changed fifteen houses. The time to do everything in life is not there, and when I communicate with an area I want to attract. Who knows if my son will travel or not, Aunt Bena is from the states he invites us to.” So much. Now we’re going to organize some team building and lobbying. We want to do more, more and better. They ask us to design hotels, there will be an explosion of tourism in Italy as well. If that is the case. Teaching Covid I’m there, it’s a call to action. It’s always been a company. Edith Forte is active in women’s empowerment and sustainability. “I will award a prize to women in the Year of Epidemic for unifying the values ​​of solidarity. If someone comes and tells me I want the kids, I will hire her. And when you get back to work, you become more effective. Here the real way is right. Realized after motherhood. So we tell our daughters: Have children. We’ll cover the social cost. I choose people like me, positive, youthful enthusiasm, and Italy is only the country that crushes them instead of rewarding them. ”

From team building to academy. “The idea for the future is to create the Fortebis Academy at Carloforte to incubate and train the talent in our services, making those who are good at it teachers.”