Memoirs of a child of the past century - 9. Chapter 9: How to find a place in the ‘high society’

I did not know Lausanne and above all I was not known. Switzerland is a small country which presents the peculiarity of being divided into 22 small 'cantons', similar to U.S. states. The inhabitants of each canton have the bad habit of despising the inhabitants of the neighboring cantons.

As a citizen of the canton of Geneva, close to the west of the Canton of Vaud (of which Lausanne is the capital) and coming from the canton of Valais, close to the east, I was doubly 'disregarded'. So I had to fight to making myself accepted and to overcome the indifference Lausanne’s ‘good society’ showed to me.

I had two trumps, however, in my sleeve:

The first was my membership in the SIA, the Swiss Society of Engineers and Architects. This society included only university graduates and the accession procedure was very strict. Because of my 'trade union's activities in Zurich, I entered into contact with influential members of the SIA and their support allowed me to be accepted more easily. My automatic transfer from the local chapter of Zurich to that in Lausanne had opened its doors and my reputation as anactive and
dynamic member, which had followed me, allowed me to become soon well known and regarded as an interesting figure in the development of the local chapter.

The second was my membership of the Junior Chamber International (JCI), a worldwide non-political and non-sectarian youth service organization. I guess you've heard of it. It’s an international community of citizens between the ages of 18 to 40 (yes, people around 40 are undeed still young !), with the purpose of creating positive changes in the world. The first section of JCI Switzerland was founded in Geneva in 1959. With some friends from Geneva, I took an important part in the creation of the Junior Chamber of Commerce in Lausanne. I was from the beginning an enthusiastic member and I found very quickly numerous contacts to the 'economic powers' of the city.

One aim of the Junior Chamber was to promote activities for the entire community. I very quickly became positively noted by the authorities by organizing, with the blood transfusion service of the Red Cross, a collection of new volunteer donors.

I myself was a donor and the service manager had told me his concerns about the lack of donors. This action of a single day was a real success. In response to the organization that I had put in place, members of the Junior Chamber launched appeals on local radio to recruit donors, set up about 30 stations to answer telephone calls from people willing to announce themselves as donors and filled fact sheets to be transmitted to the blood transfusion service of the Red Cross.

This action encountered a very favorable response from the local press and from the authorities of the city. As for me, I gained immediately known as the instigator and organizer of it, and I retired a great benefit for my reputation both in the city and in relation to the authorities.

When I look back at this time, I feel like a rocket on its launch pad. In Lausanne, I was a man without a past. Born into a modest family, myself without traditions (except those of Judaism, which I had abandoned), without family assets on which to sit my fortune, I could only count on myself to make my place in society.

I was what the Romans called a 'homo novus', Latin for 'new man'. It was the term in ancient Rome for a man who was the first in his family to serve in the Roman Senate or to be elected as consul: how the lowly born but inherently worthy man could properly rise to eminence in the world.

I really wanted to become 'someone', to climb the social ladder, and show my father that the financial sacrifices he had made to pay for my education had not been made for nothing. Unconsciously, I needed to get my revenge for anything the Jews had endured over the centuries. I only became aware of this attitude much later, when my too fast ascension was also the cause of my fall.

Today, when I read over my text, I am trying to understand why I really had such a thirst for power. In fact, this was not the power I wanted. I needed to be recognized, to be accepted. At the bottom of myself, having always had to obey an authoritarian father, whose authority came from the fact that he himself had felt and suffered in his childhood the unstable nature of his own father, I was always the child obedient and submissive to paternal authority. Throughout the first part of my life, I looked around me people who might be for me a protective father

At the same time, I had the will to assert myself and free myself from this constraint. This dual approach has marked me almost all my life. It was only later that I became aware of it.

In psychoanalysis, a Freudian slip is, among others a failure in an action (I greatly simplifies the definition !). The subject is asking how he could have come to such a failure in carrying out his work. Throughout my career I have accumulated a certain number of such bungled actions. After almost every professional success, I acted in its follow-up by trusting my partners, in whom I thought I had found an image of the father "protector".

Nearly all abused the trust I put in them. I do not say that to relieve me of my responsibility. My failure was always my doing, I have taken some time to understand it. At least I had enough courage and will to get me out (more or less) of the difficult situations in which I had set myself ! (I will come back to that point in a later chapter).

After working for five years (1958 -1963) exclusively for the USNC, I decided it was time to prepare myself to become an independent consultant in all areas of management and engineering. I developed a global strategy including three points:

1. Develop my professional knowledge by correspondence courses and seminars,

2. Use the levers of JCES and SIA to make myself known,

3. Search for 'private' mandate, while continuing to work part time for the USNC.

The implementation of this strategy soon occupied one or two days a week and often my evenings, and all this to the detriment of my family life. Our three children (soon to be four with the birth of Nicolas in 1964) suffered from my absence. In addition, my wife also took on the care of a little niece disabled by thalidomide (This medication was routinely given to pregnant women to stop sickness. In the late 1950s and early 1960s, more than 10,000 children in 46 countries were born with deformities as a consequence of thalidomide use).

Because of my professional work, my wife had to take care of household management and the education of children almost alone. I tried to help as best as possible but as I was often absent and the weight of family life rested on her. I remember a remark by Gilles (he was 10) on a Sunday morning at breakfast, "Mom, who is that the man who eats with us this morning? ". My wife's response was 'classic': "Stop laughing, it's your father. Shut up and eat! ".

Some memories about the implementation of my 'strategy':

Developing my professional knowledge:

My studies in electrical engineering were rather deficient in the areas I wanted to 'attack': project management, industrial psychology and construction engineering . So I had to find something to train me by mail or by personal study of the literature corresponding to those areas.

For those interested, I can’t resist the pleasure of introducing them to areas of my complementary training:

Project managers have the responsibility to planning, organizing, securing, and managing resources to achieve a project. . A project engineer performs work that crosses the boundaries between engineering and project management.

Industrial and organizational psychologists contribute to an organization's success by improving the performance and well-being of its people.

Construction engineers deal with the designing, planning, construction, and management of infrastructures such as highways, bridges, airports, railroads, buildings, dams, and utilities.

I added to these areas a special training that was also useful for my personal development:

Transactional analysis, an integrative approach to the theory of psychology and psychotherapy. It is described as integrative because it has elements of psychoanalytic, humanist and cognitive approaches. Transactional Analysis is a powerful tool in the hands of organizational development specialists. Through presenting the basic concepts of transactional analysis and using it as the basic theory to undergird the objectives of their clients, organizational development specialists build a common strategy with which to address the particular needs of organizations and to build a functional relationship, as well as eliminate dysfunctional organizational behaviors.

While developing my theoretical training, I took advantage of my consulting work to test all these methods and adapt them to my current needs, while incorporating my experiences in my training.

Using the levers of JCES and SIA to make myself known :

Just a few words to remind you of these two organisations :

The SIA (Swiss Society of Architects and Engineers) includes within it the best trained representatives of both professions, those whose work and benefits are to pursue only the interests of the Owner.

The JCI is a membership-based nonprofit organization of 200,000 young people ages 18 to 40 (yes, people around 40 are undeed still young !) in 5,000 communities and more than 100 countries around the world. Each JCI Member shares the belief that in order to create lasting positive change, we must improve ourselves and the world around us. We seek targeted solutions to the unique problems in our communities to build a better world, creating global impact. In Switzerland, the JCI is called JCES (Jeune Chambre Economique Suisse).

The contribution of the SIA:

The local society was divided into two clearly separated groups: architects and engineers, civil engineers for most. These two groups were jealous of each other because of their mode of work. For the construction of a building or a house, the architect was appointed first. Then he chose the civil engineer, often based on criteria other than technical,for example friendship, personal relationships etc. Exchange of favors (ie "send back the elevator," that is saying render a service in
exchange for another), was widely practiced in this rather closed community.

For industrial buildings and structures such as bridges, the project owner did not need an architect and could work directly with an engineer.

As an electrical engineer and specialist trained in management, I did not belong to any of these groups but I felt 'at home' in both. I had friends and even distant relatives (through my wife's family) in both groups. The organization of the society became a passion for me and I quickly became the president of the Groupe of Engineers, responsible among other things for arbitrating disputes between members of both groups, architects and engineers. I showed qualities that were appreciated by many people and I soon became an influential member, which constituted an excellent springboard for future mandates as project coordinator.

The contribution of the JCI :

We were in the early 60's. Junior Chamber Switzerland was just born and our goal was to expand as quickly as possible to other cities. As I was almost bilingual in French and German, I was charged with creating two local chambers in German speaking towns : Bern, the capital, and Zurich, the largest city where I had contacts through my past.

I arrived in each city with the title of Officer of the JCES. I quickly met a galaxy of yuppies and representatives of associations like the Rotary or Lyons (who sponsored the international development of the JCI). Needless to say, these contacts were also very useful for my career!

Much later, I realized that the JCES, and probably the entire JCI, included indeed members concerned about the public welfare, but that most members, like me for that matter, could be defined by the words of 'pushy' and 'snobs'. The Junior Chamber is the perfect way to climb the social ladder, to create business relationships and achieve a power position.

To further expand my influence in the Junior Chamber, I began looking for an activity corresponding to my capabilities and at the same time meeting a need felt by a majority of the JCI members: personal formation. In all areas of management training and the organization of 'social' activities (conferences, seminars), the central secretariat of the JCI could make available a detailed and extensive documentation, unfortunately only in English.

During the difficult years in Zurich, I had supplemented our meagre income by doing translations from English into French and I had become a 'specialist' in this area; so I could use all this documentation, translated by me into French, to promote the personal development of the members in all chambers of the French-speaking part of the country.

I appreciated very much this activity as Junior Chamber’s 'trainer' and I spent much time organizing one-day seminars dedicated to a particular training of the JCI, for example ‘the technique of conducting discussions’ or ‘how conduct a project to support humanitarian organizations’.

In 1963, a national conference (a gathering for a weekend of all members from all over Switzerland, dedicated to the exchange of experiences, debates and discussion of problems of national importance) was held in Lausanne. I was particularly interested in the conference themes (regional planning and urban development).

I was instructed to present the technical aspects of these themes, taking care in particular to adress the problems of implementation of industrial areas and electrical energy supply. My professional experiences in the USNC were particularly useful. Not only did I achieve some success but more importantly I met the head of the Office of Spatial Planning of the canton and his two deputies, with whom I became acquainted. It was through them that I got my first consultancy contracts outside the USNC.

And so I made my way in Lausanne. At that time, the Internet and social networks (Facebook, Yahoo) did not yet exist. The only means of contact were primarily personal encounters, often preceded by telephone contact or correspondence. I devoted a significant portion of my free time to this quest for contacts and support. It was only later that I understood the difference between strictly professional relationship, often uncertain, and real friends, those who do not let you 'fall' when in
difficulty.

In summary, experience and contacts gained through the SIA and JCES were the springboard for my career advancement as consultant, culminating in 1968 with the creation of my own consultancy firm.

The third point : 'Search for "private" mandate, while continuing to work part time for the USNC' will come in one of the next chapters.