I went in for a day at a school in a pretty tough area and as always got feedback. One week later I got this email from a 17 year old:

I just been waiting for this opportunity to thank you for the lesson you gave us for about a week ago. It was amazing. Every word you say makes me more inspired, and my self-confidence isn’t so good, not at all actually, but when you speak and tell us all these things, it all feels so much better.

I guess I just want to thank you, because you give me such an inspiration and you make me feel that studying is really fun, it’s fun to learn. I really do hope that you come back soon I really do.

And that’s why I do what I do: if it makes a difference, and can help one teenager see life as possible instead of impossible, as hopeful instead of hopelesss, as having a future that might actually lead somewhere. It’s always fun to work with those who already understand how life works and just need better tools, but to make a real difference you need to work with those who see it as gray, boring, and crushing…

I look forward to return visit in February very much…

It’s always good to see the future of work - and going to schools and doing the Way of Intelegance for schools is always rewarding.

I had a fantastic day at Bladins.

Bladins is one of the best International Baccalaureate schools in the Nordic region. The pupils are bright and have every chance of success. We had a great time together - and they were kind enough to give me a huge cheer and a standing ovation at the end - some of them even came up at the end to say how they enjoyed it - never easy for teenagers! I look forward to more visits - thanks to all involved!

Going to speak to Toastmaster is like being a lion, who made a good living out of Saturday afternoon’s in the Colisseum, suddenly confronted by the Lamb Himself!

Toastmasters are the world’s largest speakers’ organization. Anyone can join - all you need is a curiosity, and a desire to try speaking. If you’re already a great speaker then go - they hold competitions - you could become known for being the best speaker in the world! For the good they’re tough: one could perhaps say more Roastmasters than Toastmasters? But for the beginners they are instructive and kind: and above all for everyone it’s fun, and supportive.

I was invited for the second time by Chapter 58 - Section G, which covers among other areas Gothenburg. Gothenburg is the second largest city in Sweden and is the center for some of Sweden’s largest companies such as Volvo, both Volvo Cars and Volvo Truck, Astra Zeneca, and SKV, one of the world’s largest producers of ball bearings and tyres.

I was asked to speak on effective / inspirational leadership.I offered some maxims of leadership for clubs, which are different from the norm for business, though they share much in common:

In ambition: Want others greatness, not their own.

In goals: Make Leaders, not just followers.

In attitude: Treat others wonderfully and with deep respect.

In temperament: Don’t annoy or get annoyed: they coach.

In criticism: Are brief, and loving.

In their hearts: Value Truth.

In vision: Make a difference.

While exploring values and talking about simply getting the job done, there were some good laughs and a lot of interested faces. It wasn’t all roses, a couple felt there were was too much IT. I am at fault on this: I guess I work too much with youth who love the slideshows and yes I do like my Mac toy - but overall the thank you’s after were generous and genuine.

I would like to thank especially Alexandra Ohlsson for sponsoring the event, Elisabeth Nostedt, and Susanne Stensson, and Paul van der Vliet for their lovely praise.It was good to come home, as always, and I hope to be more involved with Toastmasters: it is a wonderful way to have my speaking evaluated!

Amazon are now offering the “next generation” gizmo a lightweight electronic reading device called Kindle. Apart from the fact that the screen flashes black on every page turn, and takes two seconds to load each page, and has some DRM issues, as the reviews by users at amazon.com themselves forlornly admit; does no-one else think that this is kind of souless?

The immense pleasure in paper, opening the book, smelling the book even(!), carefully preserving the spine and dust covers and building a library over the years that tells a life story?

That can now be replaced by a push button.
[I do think this is useful installed at airports and at Starbucks for newspapers and magazines, but as a way of owning books, no thanks.]

I love real books, and so do my children. I used to spend wonderful mornings as a geeky teenager in the book shops on the Charing Cross in London loving every minute. They have all gone, beaten out by huge conglomerates. As a business thinker I admire the strategic efficiency and clout, but as a human being I mourn the lovely sensation of serendipity of finding an old 19th century leather-bound edition of Tennyson, or a wine list from the 1940s, or old Hotspurs, and Beanos (The heyday of British comics), or just that good novel that I never got round to reading in the 5p pile.

What’s next for publishers? Is this a symptom? Is it really good-bye books? I don’t think so, but I think it is a trend. Already libraries are buying e-books rather than books. Now publishers would make lots of money - no print or distribution costs - and libraries will become a thing of the past. They’ll say they won’t of course, but eventually…

The more paranoid will see a conspiracy. I see an attempt by Amazon to reduce logistics and stock - but when and why do we accept the social cost? I like paper, it’s organic, cellulose, and beautiful. I also live in Sweden where paper matters to companies like Södra.

I would also argue the neurological event of reading and the memory process are curtailed. Further, I can’t give the book to a friend, I can’t take out from the shelf a vloume a once baby chewed on (!) and I’d never hold a wonderful oversized colour atlas again, and that’s a thing of immense beauty.

And beauty will be gone, for on Kindle all books will become the same size. No special bindings, or bookmarks, no dog-eared interruptions, or books with watermarks, and flyleafs, tracing paper, and watercolours, and jammy fingers that bring smiles of memories of midnight snacks, torches, and childhood. More than that, I fear that books, the absolute pinnacle of human learning and the repository of thought and ideas, laughter, sorrow, and wisdom will become just another commercial commodity. I wouldn’t even want a Kindle for the train or the beach, and yes, I get that I can get thousands of books that I can’t get in a bookstore - but for me that’s hardly the point.

My suggestion to Amazon would be to emphasize that printed books will continue to be the number one way of enjoying reading; and to bundle the book and electronic version together for a dollar more (As in buy two get one free) for those who want that. Me, no thanks. You, maybe both? Maybe just Kindle?

Just think this though, every purchase or read of an electronic book, somewhere a printed book dies. The logic of the strategic model might be that we really are meant to lose most printed books to an electronic e-book format over the next 50 years…So kindle or kindling? You judge.

For me every real book is a wonderful testament to human freedom - I run my hand across my bookshelf from Beatrix Potter to Essays On Exchange Rates: Deterministic Chaos and Technical Analysis on my bookshelf and feel a lifetime of memories…The loss of that seems to my way of thinking as bad as losing childhood itself…Or am I wrong?

I had a great meeting today with Collette Logan-Anderssen, the publisher and editor of the South of Sweden Magazine. Published in English it is an excellent forum for information about, not wholly surpisinngly the south of Sweden. They are looking to redesign and launch again - and fast. In January 2008. Helping to ensure that process goes smoothly, is creative, fun, and new is part of it, but there is also the issue of practical deadlines, stress, and cash flows. Intelegance helps - Collette is lovely and driven and smart, and I look forward to collaborating and working and developing with her and her teams more and more.