Her name means “melody” in Turkish. Although not as passionate about music as she is about aviation, Ezgi Kirman is an engineer who has made the harmonisation of melody a way of life, both personally and professionally. Although, by her own admission, her work in the Leonardo site in Cascina Costa is so fascinating to her that very often the two dimensions intertwine. Since 2020, Ezgi has been an Integrated Project Team Leader in the programme for the development and supply of AW169 helicopters to the Italian Army.
Born in Ankara and moving to Istanbul at the age of eighteen for university studies in mechatronic engineering, Ezgi first came to Italy in 2006, for a summer internship at Ferrari's Gestione Sportiva in Maranello. “The love for this wonderful country was born there. Today, I live in Italy on a stable basis and have had my citizenship for a year.” With an excellent French-speaking background and an English that improved during her university studies, but with no knowledge of Italian, the path was not exactly smooth: “I had to take a year-long Italian course to make myself understood in the best possible way, but above all to be able to attend university lectures in Italian.” Arriving in Italy in 2008, she attended the Milan Polytechnic and in 2011 realised her lifelong dream: to become an aeronautical engineer. “My father, a law professor and manager, dreamed of being a pilot: the passion I shared with him for planes and modelling has undoubtedly had an impact on my life choices.”
Ezgi graduated in aeronautical engineering with a thesis at the Leonardo site in Cascina Costa on the structural optimisation of a helicopter component using genetic algorithms. “My career path, which began in a purely technical field as a structural analyst,” she says, smiling, “took an increasingly transversal and managerial direction thanks to the internal job rotation opportunities offered by Leonardo.”
“I am very passionate about my job,” Ezgi explains, “Since becoming Project Manager, I have been assigned the responsibility of managing the AW169 programme for the Italian Army. I feel the responsibility and at the same time live this experience as a professional but also a personal challenge.” In this role, she interacts with many functions that revolve around the product, such as engineering, experimental, production, procurement, customer support, training & simulation, contract management, finance, risk management, and more. In addition to internal contacts, she also interfaces with contacts from the Defence Administration, the Army General Staff and the Army Aviation Command. “From each of them I learn something. I am a perfectionist and always try to live up to my stakeholders’ standards.” In this perpetual challenge with herself, Ezgi is committed to playing life's best tune, professionally and personally. Ezgi in name and in fact.