Bruno Casella, When You Need a Little Creativity

The World Investment Report (WIR) is one of the most important documents released by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD). It's issued every Summer, it focuses on trends in foreign direct investment, it features recommendations to international organizations and national policymakers. One of the economists that work on the report is Bruno Casella, a DES graduate with a PhD in Statistics at the Bocconi University. In the 2016 report, he has analyzed the ownership structure and the governance of multinational corporations, and the implications for investment policies in an era of global economy and Panama Papers. "One of the biggest challenges of the economic research within the framework of an international organization" he says "is the need to keep a broad perspective in order to take into account the interdependence of issues. The academic research requires specialization and in-depth analysis instead. Another exciting yet controversial side is the need to deal with the feasibility at the political level".

Nine years ago Casella took a break from research. After a two-year contract in England offered by Professor Gareth Roberts, an authority of the Monte Carlo method to which he had devoted his doctoral thesis, Casella had felt the need – to use his words – to see how things work in reality. He worked for five years at McKinsey, then he was employed by the Investment and Enterprise Division of UNCTAD where he devoted himself to applied research on economic development. "Theoretical research taught me accuracy and the ability to handle mathematical and statistical tools. And a third thing, perhaps the most exciting and least known: creativity, which is what defines a truly great researcher. Talking to Gareth was like talking to an artist".