Activities
Pro bono
Since its foundation Telos has offered pro bono professional consultancy services to both individuals and the community.
This spirit is behind Telos’ commitment to dedicate part of its time and human resources to work, free of charge, for pubic interest initiatives that involve the company’s fields of expertise.
Telos assesses these initiatives on a case-by-case basis by evaluating the soundness and quality of the intended project. Telos also establishes how much time and resources to dedicate to these activities and every year determines the parameters required to decide whether or not to accept the project.
Thanks to our expertise and work with Italian Institutions we have helped either organisations or individuals to elaborate and manage several projects which have provided tangible benefits for the community.
Here are two examples:
Network of HIV+ people (NPS)
The work performed by Telos and the Network of HIV+ people goes back many years. It all began in 2008 when we worked together to present with the Resolution on HIV/AIDS: early diagnosis and early care to the European Parliament for adoption. The Resolution was duly approved in November of that same year. Then Rosaria Iardino asked us: “How can we ensure that Member States will not dillydally before implementing it?”. So we began to work together to sensitise the Ministry of Health and the Italian Parliament on this issue. The first tangible result?
Several motions were submitted, one in the Senate and several in the Chamber of Deputies; the motions were approved and positively sanctioned by the Ministry of Health. Amongst other things the motions asked “to confer official and binding mandate to the Commission for the Fight against HIV/AIDS, the technical body of the Ministry of Labour, Health and Welfare, to draft National Guidelines to ensure, promote and facilitate access to testing”. The guidelines were indeed drafted. In October 2009 the Committee was appointed the task by the Minster and began to draft the required documents. Nevertheless work progressed slowly given the delicate topic and the sometimes divergent if not conflicting positions of different groups in the Committee. “So, what shall we do?”, Iardino asked. Our answer? “Let’s engage the Regions!”.
And so we developed the project entitled “From definition to application”; its primary objective was to make Regions aware of the HIV issue and its prevention thanks to testing; this was achieved by continuing the work already performed with the central authorities - the Parliament - and Ministry of Health.
The road show with the Regions, which began in July 2010, was intended to inform them about the contents of the Consensus Document and how the HIV test was meant to be offered and what it entailed. Another objective was to obtain initial approval of the Document by the Conference of the Regions (technical committee) and then joint approval by the State-Regions Conference.
The Document was the only one on HIV issued by the Ministry of Health which was approved by the State-Regions Conference during its session on 27 July 2011. This was the first tangible result of the Project. Of the 27 EU Member States, Italy was the first to react positively to the request by the European Commission, the European Council and the European Parliament to implement policies ensuring early diagnosis thanks to access to testing.
Telos continues to work with the NPS on all their projects or activities, or simply by providing any advice requested by the Association.
Electronic register for commercial activities involving used valuables
Armando Arcovito is a well known gemmologist and expert in precious metals who has worked in the jewellery sector for over twenty years.
Thanks to his extensive expertise he has been part of many important collaboration projects. A member of the National Scientific Committee for the Study of the Treasure of San Gennaro in Naples, he is also the gemmology consultant for the Vatican Museums. In 2013, in accordance with the ruling of the Court of Messina, he worked as part of the non-government watchdog body (ex lege n. 231/2001) on behalf of a company with several authorisations to trade in used valuables. His job allowed him to not only assess the critical points of the norms regulating this market but also to develop a local electronic communication protocol for data identifying both the seller/buyer and the product. The protocol can be used by operators to send said data to the local law enforcement bodies.
How can an individual, an excellent professional but completely unaware of the meanders of the Institutions, manage to get his input acknowledged by the central authorities. Whom should he contact and how? Telos bought into this initiative and worked with Arcovito. We implemented a classic Public Affairs project: identification of the decision-makers, drafting of the ad hoc supporting documents, and organisation, management and follow-up of the accreditation meetings. The topic? A request to establish an Electronic Register to communicate data about trading of used valuables to the local law enforcement bodies. In short, a stringent regulation for “Cash for Gold Shops”.
The fact that Arcovito was able to meet, and above all, talk to the highest technical experts in the Ministry of the Interior, including Deputy Minister Filippo Bubbico proves that “if you have something to say institutions will listen to you”. Furthermore, during the institutional monitoring performed by Telos we identified a possible ‘action area’ where we could intervene in Parliament: the ongoing debate about provisions regarding the gold market and gemmological materials (Decree Law n. 237 and similar legislation) being examined by the 10th Standing Committee (Industry, Trade, Tourism) of the Senate of the Republic. Telos immediately sent a request that Arcovito be allowed to address the Committee (request approved by the Select Committee). The documentation supplied by Arcovito was published on the Senate website together with additional in-depth material requested by the Senators regarding certain specific issues.
Today Telos continues to work with Armando Arcovito on this project which is still ongoing.
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