“To succeed, you have to continue the effort where others have already given up …”

What professional achievement has brought you the most satisfaction?

Having had the opportunity to be part of a team launching media. The happiness of reading a project, of accompanying it, seeing it grow to its material existence “From scratch”. The concept of project is crucial. It’s a goal, a course that shapes our course, even with its apparent road trips … The famous connecting “connecting the dots” by Steve Jobs.

What is the fundamental quality that someone in your position should demonstrate?

Resilience. An entrepreneur (founder of the online micro-media “Draussen” whose launch is imminent) and a consulting professional (who also teaches) must abandon the idea of certainty in his actions and reasoning.
Avoiding Murphy’s Law should dictate every move and action. He must know how to deal with adversity and reversals of situations, both positive and negative, in order to provide them, not the “best” solution, but the most adequate.
Although success is often a common and shared adventure, the journey is often done alone and in the open.
The hardest part is getting rid of the biases and perceptions that interfere with judgment and obliterate the most unsuspected opportunities.

What is the essential quality you are looking for in an employee?

Loyalty. An employee does not work FOR you but WITH YOU, with a common concern of achieving a shared result.
How to get a collaborator’s “blood, sweat and tears” if a set of common values is not shared from the first moments of the collaboration? A challenge.
This is what Simon Sinek calls the “Why” in the concept of the “golden circle”. The “why” representing our convictions, the reasons why we do what we do. The deep meaning of our actions and the relationship we have with the world.
Without the legitimate existence of the “why”, it is impossible to gain the loyalty and support of an employee.
The employee will only participate in the objective and subjective merits of the adventure to which you invite him.
Loyalty is crucial, much more than skills, which they acquire.

What do your colleagues appreciate most about you?

Active listening. This ability left the door open, even to the deepest disagreements, in order to grow and ultimately achieve collective satisfaction.
Listening attentively allows for a more flexible, flexible management adapted to the individuals making up the organization. Active listening transforms management into leadership.
Authority becomes implicit and not imposed.
It helps defuse issues upstream that could have swelled as time goes by.
Active listening gives pride of place to dialogue and transparency. The goal is to come up with the most “fair” decision or solution possible.

What other profession would you have liked to practice?

Composer (I tried it for a few years) or professional tennis player when I was a child.
I left my social position and my professional situation in Paris (at the time, a manager in a large French media group) to run my adventure in Berlin and have nothing to regret.
It was a great experience that allowed me to make exciting and instructive meetings.
As for tennis, it was one of my pre-adolescent passions during the great era of tennis in the 80s (Noah, Lendl, McEnroe, Connors, etc.). What beautiful memories to dream of before the finals of Roland-Garros and the other Grand Slam tournaments!

What motto (quote, leitmotif, formula…) does it guide you in life?

“Do not suffer” motto of “Do not suffer” motto of General de Lattre de Tassigny. It indicates the will to take charge of one’s life. Besides, I could also have chosen General Leclerc’s “Order yourself” in the same spirit. Because basically, it only happens to us…General de Lattre de Tassigny.

What is your favorite mobile, software, application?

Twitter. A wealth of discoveries from inspiring personalities, a source of information (however, conditional), a window (sometimes biased) on the pulse of the world.
Even if the best and the worst coexist there, it is a crystallization of our societies of which I prefer to keep only the positive … In a few signs.

What social media do you actually use?

Twitter daily, Instagram sparingly and Facebook as little as possible … I’m very passive, I’m just responding.

I admit that I am not very fond of Facebook because of posts such as “the 1st tooth of the youngest” or the socio-cultural-political-economic rantings that want to be “analyzes” … The war of attention is raging, even among “friends”!
Not to mention the scandal “Cambridge Analytica” which would have been right for any start-up but does not seem to have frightened its frequent users!

What’s your favorite book ?

“The unbearable lightness of being” by Milan Kundera. A founding shock when I read it during my teenage years.

This book was remarkable in my learning of the complexity of human relationships and its philosophical dimension. Like all the great stories, the context of the action says less than the universalism of the themes addressed.

What recommendation will you give to a young person to follow in your footsteps

It seems to be a commonplace, but don’t give up. I will paraphrase a word my mother sent me for my birthday a long time ago: “To succeed, you have to continue the effort where others have already given up …”.

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Marc, thank you again for the time you have given us and good luck.