Olivier Torrès: From PMU to PMist

Olivier Torrès has a way with words. This management professor at the University of Montpellier often describes himself asa “bistro owner and École Normale Supérieure graduate”—meaning that he grew up in his family’s Tabary’s bar-tobacco shop-betting parlor in Sète and went on to attend the École Normale Supérieure (ENS) in Cachan. These two roots continue to shape his career today: from the first, he retained a deep attachment to artisans, shopkeepers, farmers, and other small business owners; from the second, he took his first steps into academic research, which still drives him today.

“At the ENS, SMEs were practically nonexistent. We only talked about large corporations. A blind spot that unfortunately characterizes all major economic theories,” notes the professor, who points out that nearly 99.9% of companies in France are SMEs. “They’re everywhere except in the textbooks!” The man who describes himself as an SME specialist found his calling in Montpellier, under the guidance of economist Michel Marchesnay, with whom he wrote his thesis on SME globalization strategies.

“The Unspoken and Unacknowledged Suffering of Employers”

Through this work, he has come to believe that what defines small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) is a sense of closeness, in contrast to the remote management style found in large corporations. His affection for small business owners grows as he becomes more aware of the hardships they face at work.“I was taken aback by a series of suicides among SME executives,” he says, pulling a relic from his wallet—a small newspaper clipping from the “News in Brief” section headlined“Driven to Desperation, an Entrepreneur Takes His Own Life.” On the same day, Midi Libre devoted an entire page in its “Society” section to the suicide of an employee at a large corporation.“This difference in treatment prompted me to write an op-ed in 2009 an op-ed in Le Monde on ‘the unspoken and unacknowledged suffering of employers,’” says Olivier Torres. His op-ed struck a chord in the media and sparked a debate on the subject.

An alert system

“To fill a gap,” the researcher founded the Amarok Observatory in 2008 to monitor the health of small business owners:“One of my major findings from the many studies I’ve conducted over nearly 20 years has been to show that entrepreneurship, despite its challenges, is actually good for your health!”Pathogenic factors (stress, workload, loneliness, uncertainty, etc.) are largely offset by salutogenic factors—those that are good for health—such as resilience, control over one’s destiny, and adaptability.

“Starting a business always adds a new dimension to the entrepreneur’s spirit; it is a vocation of commitment, like all professions that leave a mark: artists, authors, researchers… After all, the word ‘firm’ literally means ‘signature.’” Quoting Jean-Paul Sartre, he declares himself an existentialist: everyone is the master of their own destiny, and the entrepreneur above all. In German, the entrepreneur is an existenzgründer —which literally means a founder of existence—says the author, who is currently working on a book on the subject.  

His empathy for small business owners also drives him to take action on their behalf. His research has shown that 6.5% of them are at risk of severe burnout (Screening for Burnout and Preventing Burnout Among Small Business Owners, 2019). Through Amarok, he is implementing a system to detect workplace distress. The association, which operates on its own funds, works in partnership with about a hundred occupational health services and professional federations such as the French Building Federation (FFB) and the National Federation of Road Transporters (FNTR).

^864th conference

Through these tools, entrepreneurs are asked to rate their stress and satisfaction levels on a scale—the “entrepreneur’s stressometer and satisfaction meter.” If the distress exceeds a certain threshold,“a psychologist receives the alert and can speak with the individual to refer them to support services offered by Amarok’s partner organizations ,” explains Olivier Torrès. These organizations (60 000 Rebonds, Second Souffle, and Re-Créer) are brought together under the Rebond portal, which won the European Grand Prize for Business Promotion in 2020–2021.

More recently, Olivier Torrès has also shared his research with farmers and local elected officials (At UM Science, The Health of France’s Mayors, October 10, 2024). A true champion of the cause of self-employed workers, he has just delivered his^864th lecture on the subject. While he has received several awards, the Julien Marchesnay Prize, which he received in 2024, is particularly meaningful to him:“a lifetime achievement award that marks my place in the Montpellier school of SMEs.” This year, he will also receive the insignia of Knight of the National Order of Merit. A title befitting someone who never stops traveling far and wide to promote his cause.