Attention
The most contested resource of the digital age. Without attention, information and opportunities lose their value and their impact.
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Sparking Thoughts 3
The Age of Scarcity
Next event22–23 October 2026Hotel Villa e Palazzo Aminta, Stresa
Write to us to attendThe context
Abundance and scarcity
We do not live in a world of scarcity, but in a world where abundance and scarcity coexist. We may have more capital, data and technology than ever, and still be limited by what is rare: attention, trust, time, courage. That is where the future of organisations is decided.
Trust
It accelerates decisions, collaboration and change. When it is missing, every process becomes slower and more expensive.
Judgement
The ability to build meaning, form independent interpretations and choose what genuinely deserves attention.
Patience
The willingness to wait for results, learn in depth and build value over time.
The format
Two moments. One continuous thread.
A session that opens the right questions. A lab that turns them into scenarios and decisions.
22 October — Evening
The perspective
A talk that shifts the point of view. Not a lecture, but an opening: the starting point for the conversation that follows.
23 October — Morning
Scarcity Map 2035 — Strategic Foresight Lab
In 2035 there will be no shortage of data or tools. Everything else will be short. That is what the workshop works on: which resources — attention, trust, judgement, patience — risk becoming the real constraint for your organisation?
Speakers
The names for the third edition will be announced shortly.
The first two editions
Two conversations. New questions.
Sparking Thoughts — first edition · Lefay, October 2025
Marco Bentivogli, Faculty Lecturer at Polimi and former general secretary of CISL, opened by recalling that the further automation advances, the more human skills matter. Samira Rafaela, co-rapporteur of the EU Pay Transparency Directive, explained what changes for companies, and why: it is not a compliance question, it is the ground on which trust between a company and its people is built. Then the data: Gianfranco Chimirri presented a Gartner report on an organisation that chose to govern the time freed up by AI rather than let urgency absorb it — because waiting is already a choice.
Sparking Thoughts — second edition · Brescia, May 2026
Three voices, one question: how is work really changing? With Carlo Alberto Carnevale-Maffè (SDA Bocconi), Giuseppe Torre (founder of DataHubs and lecturer at the Pontifical University Antonianum) and Monia Cusini (Head of HR Advisory, Sparq). Three signals that keep coming back: skills move faster than professions; HR’s problem is not AI, it is continuing to manage work with categories designed for a world that no longer exists; the more powerful technology becomes, the more valuable the things that cannot be automated.
Read the Sparking Thoughts II reportThe setting
Hotel Villa e Palazzo Aminta
A five-star hotel overlooking Lake Maggiore, facing the Borromean Islands. The right distance from everyday noise to think clearly.
aminta.it
Getting there
Stresa, Lake Maggiore
- Address
- Via Sempione Nord 123, Stresa (VB)
- By train
- Stresa station, Milan–Domodossola line
- By car
- About an hour from Milan, A26 exit Carpugnino
- Airport
- Milan Malpensa, about 40 minutes
Would you like to join?
Places are limited. Write to us and we will tell you how to take part.
events@sparq.biz