Pelliconi and the value of people: the company visit of the Professional Master in HR & Organization
2 February 2026Founded in Bologna in 1939, Pelliconi is today one of the global leaders in the production of metal and plastic closures for the food & beverage industry, with manufacturing plants across four continents and billions of caps produced every year.
At the heart of its growth model lie technological innovation, a strong focus on quality, sustainability and great care for human capital, regarded as the company’s main asset.
Students from the Professional Master in HR & Organization had the opportunity to visit the headquarters and production facilities, entering an industrial environment where advanced automation and interconnected processes coexist with a solid culture of responsibility and belonging. For Thibaut Mahieu, participant in the Master, the most striking element was “being inside the production environment and seeing how advanced and interconnected the machines and processes truly are.” What is often discussed as operational excellence in the classroom became, at Pelliconi, a tangible reality, made possible by specialist skills, coordination and a widespread sense of ownership among people.
In the discussion with Pierluigi Garuti and the management team, a clear vision emerged of HR as a strategic function, closely connected to the business. Not just administrative support, but a key lever to sustain the company’s long-term capabilities: investments in technical and professional development, pathways to preserve and transfer knowledge and experience, and strong attention to organizational stability and shared culture. In a global and highly competitive context, the HR department thus becomes a crucial player in holding together growth, innovation and the transmission of know-how.
The visit was also an opportunity to reflect on the future role of HR professionals. Thibaut highlights how the experience reinforced the idea that those working in human resources need to deeply understand what happens on the operational side of the business: processes, constraints, technologies and the language of people on the shop floor. Being present in the plant and closely reading the connection between people, processes and technology becomes a prerequisite for contributing credibly to strategy, while at the same time supporting people development and organizational performance.
For the Professional Master in HR & Organization community, the company visit to Pelliconi represented a real-life laboratory in which many of the topics addressed in the classroom came to life: HR as a business partner, talent management in complex industrial settings, and the centrality of human capital in highly automated production chains. An experience that confirms how education and practice reinforce one another when the classrooms of Bologna Business School open up to direct dialogue with companies that have made innovation and people the core of their identity.
