On 4 October I took what’s been called an “intellectual vacation day” and attended TedX Zurich. Eclectic and sometimes electric, the event drew about 450 to the SRF television studios and hundreds more to the virtual conference streamed online.

I wouldn’t say the live event drew together people from all walks of life as the audience didn’t appear to be too diverse – most seemed to be young, creative types, or at least folks who were interested enough in creativity and the world of ideas to spend their day at a TedX event.

The diversity of presenters, however, was carefully planned by the legendary Swiss “ideas man” Peter Hogenkamp and his team. A magician, a musician, an experimental particle physicist, a neuroscientist, an asset manager, an anthropologist – oh, and a business consultant – were among the featured speakers.

In typical Swiss fashion, the event started precisely on time – on the hundredth of a second, in fact, someone pointed out. During the 20 sessions, audience-fed Twitter streams (#tedxzh) provided live commentary. Most of that instant feedback was positive but sometimes the Tweets were just clever, like the one sent following a too-brief introduction of one of the presenters: Worst intro you can get ever anywhere—“Our next speaker is a consultant.”

Over the next few days, I’ll write about some other quotable quotes and intellectually stimulating ideas from the thought leaders on stage that, I believe, loosely apply to the business world, too. I’ll ask some rhetorical questions for you to think about and then encourage you to assess the necessary actions based on your answers. The thought-leadership model introduced here is “Ask, assess, then act.” Contact us – we’re here to help.