As a company that is an important part of the country and its social and economic-productive fabric, we contribute to the development of Italy's economy and the competitiveness of businesses, the efficiency of the public administration and, more generally, the well-being of the people.
This is why we believe that it is essential to have an ongoing relationship with our stakeholders, that is all the people and organisations involved in our operations in various ways.
Through consultation, dialogue, information and partnership with us, each of our stakeholders has the opportunity to express which topics are relevant to them.
In order to make stakeholder engagement effective, with a view to continuous improvement, we constantly review the process, and we also use a collaborative platform to encourage solid and continuous involvement.

It is through these stakeholder engagement activities that the materiality matrix is defined and updated annually, allowing us to focus our attention, in the strategic planning and reporting phases, on the relevant issues that have emerged from discussions with our stakeholders.

Having benchmarked comparable companies and consulted internally, we have grouped our stakeholders into these 7 macro-categories:

customers
suppliers
institutions and regulatory bodies
business community
civil society
people
financial community

The standard we have adopted for effective stakeholder engagement (AA1000SES) includes a circular process, with a view to continuous improvement.

Therefore, we begin by defining the engagement objectives that are consistent with the strategic plan to achieve actions that are in line with what emerges from the discussion with the stakeholders and taking it into consideration. In order to do this, we have adopted a model that relies on two enabling factors: digital potential and the crucial role of corporate representatives, who at TIM supervise and manage stakeholder engagement activities internationally, nationally and locally, at various levels.

To engage our stakeholders, we use a collaborative platform (Re2N⁽¹⁾) which uses sustainability applications and semantic and big data analysis techniques.

The collaborative platform we use allows us to keep an open dialogue with our stakeholders, have a shared view of the complex system of relationships and businesses we manage and monitor the evidence in order to update topics of interest in a more timely and consistent manner, thus facilitating the analysis of emerging risks.
We have a different way of engaging with each stakeholder, depending on the purpose of the engagement:

consultation (surveys and observatories) in which we ask our stakeholders for their opinion on certain initiatives
dialogue such as panels on topics of common interest
information, one-way communications from TIM to its stakeholders, including training initiatives
partnerships, the specific projects we manage together with our stakeholders

Through the collaborative platform, TIM company representatives manage important information to map and monitor stakeholders relevant to their business. In addition to indicating which are the stakeholder categories with which they interface, they enter the data for the most important stakeholders and information about their contact persons and thus create actual maps in which the positioning of each category of TIM stakeholder can be seen for the various corporate components. Positioning on the map is the result of an assessment made by the contacts themselves which, according to the international standard AA1000SES, expresses the relationship with the stakeholders on the basis of "dependence", "influence" and "tension" through a score from 0 to 5 (page 3 of the presentation "Monitoring local stakeholders").
In addition, the contacts take note of stakeholder engagement events and initiatives, specifying elements of common interest with stakeholders, such as relevant issues on which to collaborate (on page 5 of the presentation "Monitoring local stakeholders" the Lucca case study is presented).

After a number of refresher webinars held in the second half of 2021 with all corporate functions involved in stakeholder engagement, the reference stakeholder map was updated (following the criteria of the AA1000SES standard) in order to identify the most relevant stakeholders for the company.

During 2022, TIM intends to make stakeholder engagement more continuous and solid, keeping relationship channels open, and to plan together with the stakeholders in order to create shared value.

(1) For this project, TIM is working with Re2N, a company that develops innovative tools for sustainability and shared value

Local stakeholders monitoring

Consult the presentation

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"Materiality is determining the relevance and significance of an issue to an organisation and its stakeholders."

AA1000 AccountAbility Principles Standard

The materiality matrix is a way of representing the topics that have an economic, social and environmental impact on our company, cross-referencing them with the level of importance attributed to those topics by our stakeholders.
It is defined through an analytical process based on highly evolved methodologies which allow us to consider a greater number of information sources and data in order to have a more complete and defined vision of the environment in which we operate and the positions of our stakeholders.
The analytical process, which is reviewed and updated annually, thus reveals the matrix of priority topics, those on which to focus the company's utmost attention in its commitment to sustainability.

Starting with the priority topics, through further analysis, we have identified the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to which we want to contribute through our people, technologies and services, adopting business practices that promote and protect human rights and the environment.
The analysis of the material topics for 2021, in addition to confirming what had already emerged in 2020, led to changes in some names and descriptions to capture new aspects and emerging differences or sub-themes.

The process for creating the 2021 materiality matrix

Here are the steps used to define the Group's 2021 materiality matrix:

1 - Updating the taxonomy for the semantic search engine

We have updated the taxonomy to be used in the semantic search engine. In addition to considering the most recent versions of the 'sustainability' and 'digital' references previously used, we have included new sources of particular importance, such as:

the EU Taxonomy
the TCFD - Task Force on Climate-Related Financial Disclosures.

In addition, for the first time, a university technical committee was set up to support the whole process of structuring the taxonomy.

2 – Definition of the new TIM relevant topic tree

In order to identify and collect documents related to the Group's core business, we have selected a number of public and private, domestic and international sources internal and external to TIM.

Through the iterations and on the basis of the occurrences in the more than 200 documents analysed, the new TIM relevant topic tree was identified.

3 – Assessment of relevant issues by stakeholders and managers

The topics as reported in the matrix were submitted for evaluation by TIM's stakeholders and management in order to define their level of priority in the 2021 matrix. In fact, in order to measure the relevance of the aforementioned topics for the company and for external stakeholders, two parallel consultations were launched. Internally, a significant sample of top managers from all company departments were involved in order to express their opinion by filling in an online questionnaire, expressing their opinion on the relevance of each topic for TIM's strategy.

Collecting external points of view, on the other hand, was facilitated thanks to innovative tools, such as big data analysis, through the TIM Data Room and our collaborative platform, on which the area dedicated to TIM has been set up for consultation and engagement initiatives with its stakeholders.
At the end of the analysis, TIM assigned a relevance score based on the occurrences of the topics and the votes expressed by stakeholders in the survey.

4 – Creating the matrix of priority issues for 2021

The materiality matrix is the result of this analysis and assessment process and represents the topics that have an economic, social and environmental impact on our company and the level of importance attributed to those topics by our stakeholders.

These topics, which are priorities for TIM and its stakeholders, reflect the Sustainable Development Goals that we believe can be achieved by making a greater contribution through our people, our suppliers, our technologies and the services we offer, focusing our corporate culture on the new generations, the green transition and human rights, in particular fighting inequality.

5 – Validation and approval of the matrix

The validation of the topics and of the entire materiality analysis process was carried out with the contribution of the Investor Relations Function dedicated to Sustainability Planning & Performance Index Analysis, the TIM Data Room and the external consultant, RE2N.
The TIM Data Room is the Group structure that analyses digital data coming from the network through listening, reporting and benchmarking.
Subsequently, the Audit and Risk Committee approved the 2021 materiality matrix in December 2021.

Analysis of priority topics, a circular process

Once approved, the materiality matrix — updated in accordance with GRI Standards — forms the basis for building the Group's Strategic Plan from an ESG perspective.
It is also planned that the review phase will be carried out to prepare for the next reporting cycle, with a view to submitting the results of the analyses conducted, updated in the following year, to specific consultation and stakeholder engagement activities.