Living for Today

It was all planned that Sergio Marchionne would retire in April 2019, and then become Vice Chairman of Ferrari. What a cushy way to retire.

Who is Sergio? He’s the guy that saved thousands of jobs in Italy and North America as the CEO of Fiat Chrysler Automobiles (FCA) and saved both companies from going bankrupt. Sergio was brought in to fix Fiat in 2004 and turned it around and made it profitable. Then he decided to work his magic on Detroit based Chrysler, which was on the verge of bankruptcy during the financial crisis of 2008. He bought Chrysler in 2009 and by 2014 he merged the profitable Chrysler with Fiat and renamed the company Fiat Chrysler Automobiles (FCA).

Along the way, he also became the Chairman and CEO of Ferrari since Fiat owned a stake in the legendary sports car company. Ferrari makes under 10,000 cars a year so the idea was to oversee this “small car company” during his retirement. That never happened. Unexpectedly, he died from complications due to a should surgery over the weekend, he was 66 years old.

When I heard the news, I was stunned. Not because I personally knew Sergio but I had been watching and reading about him in the press as he turned around Chrysler. Then taking the reins at Ferrari which led to an IPO on the NYSE for Ferrari, their ticker symbol is RACE (haha, nice touch). It makes you pause and realize it’s good to plan for the future, but you absolutely have to live for today.