The first picture in my head was not the training room. It was the flight. That sounds simple, maybe a little strange, but it is true. When The Mayor asked me what I saw first when I thought about the training in Belgium, I did not see the trainer, the schedule, the people, or the…
Money is a strange thing. I like money. I can say this very directly. I like money because when you have money, life feels more relaxed. You can buy things. You can do things. You do not always have to think, “Is this possible?” or “Can we afford this?” Money is not everything, of course….
The Mayor started with a difficult question. He asked me if I am someone people ask for help because they know I normally say yes. And immediately I thought, no, this is not the point. I do not think people come to me because I am a yes-sayer. Nobody wants to be seen like that….
I knew before we started that this would be difficult. Some topics are easy for me. When we speak about customers, meetings, football, discipline, trust, preparation, I can find my way. These are things from my daily life. I know them. I live them. I can explain them with stories. But playful thinking? That was…
I had reservations about this topic before we started. Creative play in daily life. For some people, maybe this sounds easy. For me, not really. I can talk about customers. I can talk about football. I can talk about family, driving, meetings, distributors, sales numbers, and how to build a relationship step by step. These…
I found this conversation more difficult than I expected. Part of it was the language, of course. When I speak English, I can say what I mean, but sometimes I need time. I search for the right word. I start a sentence, then I stop, then I try again. Some topics are easy because they…
The sun was shining that morning, but it was not warm. That is how the conversation began. The Mayor asked me if the birds were singing in my world, and I said yes, they were singing, but it was windy, and we only had five degrees. He told me he had ten. It was a…
I remember someone once telling me that work should be fun. At first, I agreed almost automatically. It sounds right, doesn’t it? If you spend most of your life working, then it should at least feel good. Otherwise, what are you doing? But when I think about it more carefully, I realize that “fun” is…
I remember standing next to a machine for eight hours, doing nothing but watching. At the time, it didn’t feel dramatic. It wasn’t a bad day. It wasn’t even a hard day. It was just… quiet. Repetitive. Predictable. A piece of metal in front of me, a process to follow, and the feeling that tomorrow…
I still remember how quiet it felt on that first day. Not quiet in the sense of silence—there were machines, people, movement—but inside me, it was quiet. I didn’t know what to think yet. Everything was new, and at the same time, nothing felt special. It wasn’t a big moment like you imagine when you’re…
