AuthorMartin Hladík

Inauguration of the new Mexican Ambassador

Accomplishing the protocol diplomatic process world-renowned, on the 8th of August 2017, H. E. Rosaura Leonora Rueda G. presented her Letter of Credence to the Honorable President Miloš Zeman by which President Enrique Peña Nieto had accredited her as Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotenciary of Mexico to the Czech Republic. At the same time, she presented the Letter of Recall of her predecessor Ambassador Pablo Macedo.

Ambassador Leonora Rueda is a career member of the Mexican Foreign Service since 1990 and has served as Consul of Mexico to New Orleans, La., USA; Charge d’A airs in Vietnam; Ambassador to Jamaica concurrent to the Bahamas; Ambassador to New Zealand concurrent to Samoa, Tonga and Tuvalu. In the Ministry of Foreign A airs she worked with the Latin American Department as Director for Border Issues Mexico-USA and Advisor to the Under Secretaries of International Cooperation and Deputy Secretary for Multilateral Issues and Human Rights respectively.

Throne Day of Morocco

H. E. Souriya Otmani, Ambassador of the Kingdom of Morocco hosted a wonderful reception during an evening of July 31st, in Hilton Hotel to celebrate the Glorious Throne Day of Morocco and the 18th anniversary of the access of HM Mohammed VI, the King of Morocco  to the throne of his illoustrious ancestors. H.E.Milan Stěch, President of the Senate of the Parliament of the Czech Republic honored with his presence the reception and made a speech to pay a tribute to Morocco and to the Ambassador Souriya Otmani, for the work she has performed as she is preparing herself to leave the country in oder to fullfill another diplomatic assignment as Ambassador of Morocco to Canada. Some 300 personalities, VIPs and friends attended the amazing ceremony with fantastic entertainment , such as the music virtuoso Felix Slováček playing tromphet and Shar group from Hradec Králové performing beautiful Moroccan folklore dances.

Personal Branding: Empower Yourself, Empower Your Business

 

I, the Brand

www.cristinamuntean.com

In my strategic communications consulting and coaching practice, I am often confronted with the question: if I start boosting my personal brand, does it mean that I am betraying my current company? This question, which reflects the high degree of loyalty, ethics and integrity of the people asking it, many of them corporate leaders like you, led me to a series of considerations that I’d like to share with you in the column below.

Today’s world of work is inevitably changing. We are experiencing massive transformation driven by several factors.

  1. Accelerated technological innovations. With the rise of artificial intelligence, Internet of Things and automation – collaborative robots, electrical, flying or self-driving cars being just a few symptoms of this phenomenon – the world as we know it is ending every day. We must start admitting that it is quite impossible to grasp the features of our future business, economic and socio-political models as carved by today’s accelerated technological transformation.
  2. Demographic changes. For the first time in history we are confronted with a mix of at least five generations at the workplace, each one specific in its own way. There is nothing new about people with different ages working together – this occurred in the past as well. However, as the global market is becoming more and more employee-driven, companies find themselves compelled to deal with the different age-driven specifics and integrate age diversity as opposed to applying a more comfortable and easily manageable one-fits-all employment model as in the past.
  3. Diversity challenges. Time will come when we will smile nostalgically at when dealing with gender diversity was our main headache. The real challenge ahead of us is embracing the entire mix of diversity in terms of multitude of nationalities, cultures, religions, local and regional attachments, language endowments and levels of overall cultural maturity unleashed by globalization.

These are only a few of the challenges that are making today’s leadership models a constant quest for the North Star – that firm guide above that will show us how to navigate the unclear and unknown waters ahead of us. One of the most important moments in a leader’s personal growth occurs when, unable to see the North Star, there is nothing left but to look our challenge in the eyes and admit that we don’t know. In today’s massive, overwhelmingly complex world, quick solutions drafted in septic management school rooms simply don’t work anymore. What we need to do is to learn to embrace our own limitedness and vulnerability – our own “smallness.” We need to learn to become comfortable with not knowing. This way we become humble and we open ourselves to viable solutions that might come from places impossible to see before. In today’s world, this is the first step towards genuine individual empowerment.

When you’re aware of your value, you cannot not communicate it

What comes next is even more interesting. Individuals who know they don’t know and are able to humbly open themselves to new solutions and collaboration become somehow stronger on the inside. This inner force doesn’t allow such individuals not to act – in terms of leadership and communications alike. When you know that the value of what you can offer to the world, of your unique gift that is needed and relevant, you cannot hold it for yourself. You cannot not communicate it.

The question is: what will companies do with such individuals? Will the company – the group, the whole – accept, allow and encourage an environment in which such conscious individualities become engines of innovation? Or will they continue to bet on scale-driven, time-tested structures and processes that will allow them to make a bit more money through size and scope, yet at the expense of innovation, talent motivation, people engagement and genuine service?

This takes me back to my initial question: do people betray their companies when they want to start building their personal brands? The answer is: not at all. Yet before moving forward allow me to make one more essential distinction – between personal branding and self-promotion.

In my understanding self-promotion is the vainglorious attempt of boosting one’s visibility for narrow, individual-only benefits. In today’s social-network-instant-chat-app-driven communication world self-promotion has become dangerously available and scarily potent – as the recent elections in the United States have showed. But can self-promotion stand the test of time in terms of genuine competencies, respect and people trust? No. My experience shows that self-promotion can only take an individual that far. On the other hand, personal branding is the complex process of finding the best in yourself and communicating it with the world consciously, compassionately and consistently for the benefit of everyone involved. This is the major difference between personal branding and self-promotion: self-promotion is for one’s self only, personal branding is putting the best in one’s self to the service of others. A genuine strategic communications process from the inside-out, personal branding cannot resist the test of time unless it is grounded in the deepest layers of one’s personality, competencies, experiences and individual wisdom. Being able to channel all those individual qualities for the benefit of others is a major sign of personal maturity – a sign of leadership. Now you tell me: which company, dealing with individuals who are aware of the best in themselves and willing to put their unique life force and gifts to the service of others, would refuse such an offer?

That’s why I strongly believe that striving to develop your personal brand is not a betrayal to your company: it is, in fact, a gift to your company. In the new world of work, which requires new models of leadership driven by mindfulness and an ability to walk the world open, vulnerable and curious, personal branding becomes the strategic empowerment tool for leadership. All it needs is a commitment to authentic, inside-out communications – for the sake of ourselves, our companies and our world.

By Cristina Muntean

Cristina Muntean specializes in strategic communications and personal development. She has more than 12 years’ experience in the Czech, Romanian and international media. In 2010 Cristina founded Media Education CEE, a Prague-based PR advisory and training agency. Her clients are entrepreneurs and managers with Top100 companies in the Czech Republic and Central and Eastern Europe. Cristina is also the former president of the Czech PR Klub and former chairwoman of the Marketing Committee of the American Chamber of Commerce in the Czech Republic. She is an internationally certified trainer and coach with the Enneagram, a complex system of personal development. Cristina provides corporate and individual advisory, training, coaching and mentoring on topics such as Media Training, Crisis Communications, Writing for the Media, Presentation Skills, Personal Branding and Emotional Intelligence in Communications in English, Czech, French and Romanian, her mother tongue. She can be reached at +420 776 574 925 or at cm@mediaed.cz.

Your Body = Your Story

 

“How To Get Real Buy-in For Your Idea”

Alena Huberova, Communications strategist, speaker and trainer

Have you ever finished a presentation with a bad taste in your mouth, asking yourself “What on earth happened? Why did my audience look so indifferent? Why didn’t they ask more questions? Don’t they understand just how important this idea is to the future of this company?!”

Not your fault, or is it?

Blank stares from a tuned-out audience, that’s probably the worst thing that can happen to us when delivering our message. We spend endless hours preparing for our presentation, we’re excited about our idea and convinced it can change the world, yet the response is disheartening. ‘They’ don’t seem to care! But why? And the blame cycle starts…

Is it fair to criticize others for not supporting our ideas? Or does this have something to do with us? My friend, I’ve been there. I’ve been the one pointing the finger at others, blaming them for not paying enough attention to my message. It hit me one day when I looked at my own hand and realized that there were three fingers pointing back at me…

It’s hard to admit it, but in most cases we are the culprits. We either fail to explain our idea in a way that is understandable and relevant to our audience. Or, we fail to excite our audience, build rapport and credibility. Today we’ll talk about the latter.

Your body = Your story

Puzzled? Think about it. Each and every time you walk into a room your body speaks. It tells a story about you to others. You don‘t even need to say a word yet everyone in the room hears your story. Your story is so powerful that it influences how people think of you, how they treat you and how they react to you and your message. Your story determines whether people will like you, trust you and whether they will be willing to support your ideas.

Do you know your story? Does your story grab people’s attention or quite the contrary? If you want to have more impact, you need to understand your story and own it!

We constantly judge each other…

It sounds dreadful but it’s true. It’s not our fault! It’s our reptilian brain in action. When we meet someone for the first time, we perform an instantaneous scan looking for information about them. Our brain captures small cues from the way the person looks, speaks and behaves and in a matter of seconds we make a snap judgment, labeling someone a friend, an enemy, a potential sexual partner or indifferent. When trying to convince a group of investors to invest in your business, being labeled an enemy won’t get you too far.

Yes, first impressions count. Make a great one and the door of opportunity will swing open to you. But that’s only the beginning…

People interacting with you are watching your every move and are continuously evaluating you and making their decisions about how they want to relate to you.

There are three questions on their mind:

1. Do you care about me?
2. Can I trust you?
3. Can you help me?

I want to believe that you do! And that you are competent, have the skills and the knowledge, and that you care! But the question is. Do they know it too? Are you sending the right signals, making people want to work with you? Are you telling the right story?

Key principles to positive influence, on and off-stage

Remember, everything about you – the way you look, speak and behave – transmits powerful signals that are captured by others. If you want to get people interested in your message, you need to make sure that a) they like you and b) they believe in you and your abilities. How? By transmitting signals of strength and warmth.

Professors Amy J.C. Cuddy, Matthew Kohut and John Neffinger studied the signals of strength and warmth and published numerous articles on the topic in the Harvard Business Review. Their studies show that all great leaders transmit both signals and they do so at the same time. Though this may sound easy, it’s not, due to the hydraulic effect between strength and warmth.

If your signals of strength are too intense, people will perceive you as powerful and influential but they may not particularly like you because they will regard you as cold and unkind. If, on the other hand you’re perceived as overly nice and kind, people may see you as someone with no power or influence. Balancing your signals of strength and warmth is the answer. This is especially crucial for women. A lot of strength with little warmth from a man is deemed passable whereas a lot of strength with little warmth from a woman is seen as being too cold and aggressive. You’ll see a concrete example in the section to follow.

You do not know what you do not know…

We tend to be blind to our own signals and that’s a big problem. Awareness is key. Only then you can purposely adjust your signals and own your story!

How do people perceive us?

I remember working with a client, a female finance director of a large corporate firm. She was preparing for her presentation at the company’s annual staff briefing and she was nervous. The rumor in the air said that she wasn’t particularly liked; she was accused of being cold, rigid and unapproachable. I was surprised, that is, until after I saw her in action. I captured her performance on camera. When we looked at it together she broke down in tears. She never realized just how overpowering her signals of strength were. Our mission was clear; to balance her strength with warmth signals. We worked on everything from body posture and gestures, getting rid of her characteristic ‘karate-chops’ and finger pointing; on her emotions to bring a smile to her face, gentle eye contact; we even chose an outfit and accessories that would make her look and feel more relaxed, open and amiable. In terms of content of her presentation, we used storytelling to create an emotional bond with her audience; we also paid extra attention to her use of words and expressions to make sure ‘warmth’ prevailed. The result was spectacular. She enjoyed her performance enormously and even more so the reactions of her peers and team members. Something profound had shifted in their relationship.

This is just an example. Everyone is different. You have to identify your own signals and then adjust the signals accordingly.

You deserve to be heard, go and shine!

I have no doubt that you have great talent, skills and experience. But your talent and uniqueness are worth nothing unless you know how to show them and sell them! You are extraordinary and deserve to be heard!

Go and shine!

By Alena Huberova

Elisabeth Lobkowicz

 

“I Use My Talent for Others”

Elisabeth Lobkowicz, Princess

The life and memories of Elisabeth Lobkowicz could easily make up several volumes of a book. However, she does not consider herself to be someone special and she prefers to stay away from media attention. In the Czech Republic, she is known as the wife of Jaroslav Lobkowicz, from the Křimic branch of the family, as well as for her work as a representative of the Christie’s Auction House. Her personal story is much more complex. She is from the de Vienne family, who is related to the French royal family of Bourbon. When we met, she proudly showed me around the Middle Ages house at Sněmovní, close to the Czech Parliament and just below the Prague Castle gardens. We sat outside, the garden furniture was simple however the table was covered by a tablecloth from Provence. On the table, there were German newspapers. The European spirit of past and present was felt everywhere, underscored by the paintings of Italian and Dutch masters. We discussed not only her upbringing, the French-German reconciliation or her taste in art, but also many current issues, including united Europe and immigration as an opportunity rather than a threat.

You were raised in France, then you lived and worked in Germany and after the Velvet Revolution you and Jaroslav moved to Czechoslovakia. Where are your roots?

I grew up in France, in a noble family. Both of my parents came from the nobility, father from the North and my mother from the West. As both families had properties in Paris, I grew up in a private family house in the middle of Paris. In terms of the furniture of the apartment, it should be mentioned that it had not been bought but inherited. After the French Revolution and the Napoleonic wars, many families who left the country eventually came back and started collecting old furniture at the beginning of the 19th century. Meanwhile, our furniture and paintings came mainly from 16th -18th century, before the French Revolution. This is what I saw when I was a baby, a little girl, when one does not particularly appreciate what he sees. Because of this, I feel a connection with any piece of furniture and can immediately tell if it is an original or replica. I have difficulties understanding modern art. I stopped with the impressionists. I am happy to look at the impressionist paintings, but more contemporary pieces of art do not give me the same feeling. Had I been able to afford buying some Modern or Contemporary pieces, I would not like to have them in my home. On Sundays, we went to the mass to the Notre Dame Cathedral and then we continued to the Louvre museum. I consider these impressions from my early childhood very important. I still remember the first time I saw the Egyptian antiquities in Louvre, I was ten years old.

Your upbringing was quite unique, one would not guess that it happened in early fifties of the last century.

We were a very close family, I was the eldest of four children. We went to Catholic private schools. On my way to school, I had to pass the Soviet embassy. I remember that we had a young Polish girl as a servant. She woke me up one day and she said, “Stalin is dead.” I asked her who Stalin was and she explained the Polish experience with Stalin. So, besides art, I started to be confronted with high politics. Whenever we were passing the Embassy together, she being Polish and afraid of the Soviets, would cross the road and walk on the other side. My mother remembered that after the Germans occupied Paris during World War II, they came to the Soviet Embassy and searched the garden, finding many corpses there. Another World War II story was linked to the place where my family had a castle, about 100 kilometres south of Paris. In a neighboring village, the French resistance killed two German soldiers. The next day, the Germans marched into the village and demanded 20 people. They took them and shot them immediately. A similar thing also happened at another property in Normandy. Of course, we did not have a complete overview of the occupation, but from all the incidents I knew, it was awful and it influenced the atmosphere I grew up in. Such stories were an integral part of my upbringing.

How did the French-German reconciliation, which today serves as an example in history textbooks, happen?

In 1954, my parents made the decision to take a German au-pair, as a way to reconcile with the Germans. The first German girl came to our house when I was seven years old. Prior to the German au-pair coming, I was warned by my mother not to talk with her about World War II. She said, “we want to forget it and we want to reconcile with young people.” I grew up with the idea that Europe had to be built on reconciliation and forgiveness. My parents also started to speak German to me but at that time it had little success, as I admit to being quite lazy. When I was 16 years old, I myself was sent as an au-pair to the woman who previously came to our house. She tried to be as nice to me as my parents had been to her. To me, it was a dream. I fell in love with Germany and German culture at that time.

You support both Germany and united Europe. Such attitude has become rather rare.

Based on my upbringing, I believe in Europe from a Christian perspective, based on values of reconciliation and pardon. I follow the latest developments in Europe and I am afraid that is has become a question of interests, economy, and I am missing these Christian values. If you do not know who you are and where you are, it is becoming problematic particularly in regard to growing Muslim communities. Xenophobia is the worst thing I can imagine. We must find ways to counter that. We must make others happy in our society as it is with our values. Again, my experience of being an adolescent in 1960s can serve as an example. At that time, I saw the birth of pop-culture. Growing up in the 1960s, coming from a strong family, I did not like it. I did not consider it Christian culture anymore. I only liked the music of that period. Coming back to your question about roots, the young terrorists have no roots these days. On one hand, they want to be a part of a new culture, on the other hand they hate it. They are in the middle and thus very easy to manipulate. I am not despairing, I am very curious about the current situation. Immigration can be a huge opportunity. Currently, it is going the wrong way, but we are still in the middle of a journey. We see that terrorism is growing and so far, we lack the means to counter it. Have we looked at the perspectives we are offering to these young people?

What exactly went wrong in the development of Europe?

I believe that Europe made the wrong turn in the sixties. As nobility is closely related all over Europe, I remember being invited to Switzerland and there meeting some German second cousins who invited me to Bavaria. I went there in 1967 for the first time and the church was full. The religion was the religion of the people. I went to a very famous pilgrimage and we could not fit into the chapel as it was so full. I visited the place 15 years ago and since then I have been coming every year and it is empty. Do you know who and what replaced the place of pilgrimage? Russians who brought their money and built their villas in the middle of nowhere.

They even placed a statue of the Bull of Wall Street in one little square. It reminds me of the famous story from the Bible when people were dancing around the golden calf. Isn’t it frightening? The place that served as a place for pilgrimage until 1960s? Instead, there is a huge casino. These people believe only in money, not eternal life. The cult of the Virgin Mary was replaced by a cult of money.

It was in Bavaria, where you met your husband, Jaroslav Lobkowicz.

Yes, it was in 1968. I was invited to a ball and I noticed a young man standing in a corner who did not know anybody. I approached him to find out that he was from Czechoslovakia.
He was the first Czechoslovakian that I saw in my life and I am still seeing him today. The only thing I knew about Czechoslovakia was that it was behind the Iron Curtain.

Let me again refer to the history textbooks, as we were taught about the special Czechoslovak-French relationship during the First Czechoslovak Republic, the Little Entente agreement or the close ties of the Czech and French artists…Nothing lasted until 1960s?

None of these things were on my mind. However, I told you that I am extremely curious. I interviewed him to find out more about him and his fate and at the end he fell in love with me. Well, you know, it might be quite dangerous to give an interview. (laugh)

You two met in July 1968…The spring of that year was special not only for Czechoslovakia, but also for France.

Jaroslav mentioned at that time that he made his living repairing TV sets and that he had to return back to his country, as his clients were waiting for him. Of course, we discussed the events of Prague spring and we compared it to Paris spring. That year, many people in Paris were literally prepared to die, as we did not know whether the Americans would stick to their military engagement as the French president de Gaulle left NATO. The revolution in Paris broke out and at that time the French communist party was very strong, they got 30% of the vote in the election. There was a huge demonstration at the Place de la Concorde, close to our home and we felt it was our duty to go to the demonstration. Everybody was watching us. So we went. The whole family. As de Gaulle left the country, we thought the demonstration was the last chance and we participated knowing that we could be shot, if the Soviets decided to intervene. The French communists still had weapons, so it was truly dangerous. The surprise was that one million Parisians thought the same. Place de la Concorde full, Champs Elyséés full…Luckily, the tanks were secured by the government. Eventually, de Gaulle came back and we held a new election where de Gaulle got 80% of vote.

Jaroslav was in love, but what about you?

He returned to Czechoslovakia in July and then he left the country two days after the invasion. At that time it was still easy to cross the boarders. Even though Jaroslav was invited to live with his nobleman uncle, he did not want to just sit at the castle. So his uncle opened newspapers and found my future husband a job– he started to work in a factory next to Turks and other immigrants. He never asked for political asylum. He said that he did not want to get money from Germany and he did not want to be dependent on the decision of a civil servant. After three months, he earned enough money to attend the German language course which eventually enabled him to get a scholarship and start studying at the university. In Czechoslovakia, as a member of Lobkowicz family, he could not stud. He went to school Monday to Friday and on Saturdays he kept repairing televisions. After university, he started his great career at Siemens, working at the research and development department. We had three children, we spoke German at home and we had many friends. We felt truly at home in Germany.

Let us fast forward more than twenty years, when you returned to Czechoslovakia in 1993.

I must say that I visited Czechoslovakia during communist times to visit my husband’s parents. Since 1971, I was visiting Czechoslovakia regularly. I remember how dark driving to Plzen was, it felt like entering a military zone. My father in law had been subjected to many difficult and painful interrogations by the secret police, but it didn’t change him, he was very nice and kind. My impression at that time was that if the Iron Curtain did fall down, everything was so devastated that it would be almost impossible to repair it. I am so glad to have been wrong about that and I am so happy to see how well the Czech Republic is doing. The Czechs made it. Compared to East Germany, they did not have billions of Euros from outside but they have made it.

 

By Linda Štucbartová

 

 

The Křimice castle in Plzeň is currently undergoing restoration under the management of Vladimír Lobkowicz, the eldest son of Jaroslav Lobkowicz.  Visit it to learn not only about baroque history, but also about contemporary events, when the castles were ruined and turned into boarding schools, agricultural cooperatives or warehouses.  When the castle was returned to the Lobkowicz family, almost all of its 130 windows were broken,  and it’s a structural integrity damaged.  The park had turned into a jungle.  Now, the entire complex is open  for the public and being used for cultural events, serving various age groups from children to seniors.