AuthorMartin Hladík

“We’re setting up an international start-up corporation”

Jiri Sven Sverak, Regional Director Germany & Austria, left, and Vladimír Kvaš, CEO and co-founder of G2 server CZ s.r.o.

The energy and enthusiasm shown by Vladimír Kvaš and Jiří Svěrák during this interview in which they shared G2 server’s vision were like a wave of refreshment in a repressively hot Prague. Although they are different in terms of age, professional experience and education, they are as one in terms of company expansion and cloud services provision.

Vladimír Kvaš jointly founded the company at the age of 20 after lasting exactly one semester at university. Jiří Svěrák obtained an MBA at LIGS University and is an experienced corporate player. After a career in corporations such as Aliatel, Hewlett-Packard and DellEMC, he transferred this June to G2 in order to boost the company within Western markets.

G2 server was founded in 2004 and is today one of the largest cloud services providers. A turnover of around 400 million CZK is predicted in 2017, with employee numbers of 40.

The company has a subsidiary in the United Kingdom, and in autumn 2017 it is planning to expand into the Western Europe region. In September, Ondřej Vlach will boost the company’s position with his experience within VEEAM, and his task will be to expand the company within Poland and the Baltic region. But G2’s regional growth is far from ending there. Other key markets being looked at include Spain, Portugal and Russia of course. The new G2 team is breezing its way to meeting its vision of, “Becoming the Number One cloud services provider in Europe”, and for those who fly you might say at jet stream level.

Our interview did not focus just on expansion, but also the importance of building up a solid company culture, learning from your mistakes and debunking the myth that the perspectives and position of a corporation and a medium-sized enterprise are necessarily fundamentally different.

Jiří, you’ve come to G2 server after a successful career in a number of multinational corporations, and your job is to build up a new one. So as Director for Germany and Austria you’re launching the big expansion.

We want to be a large business provider based on strong distribution and work with our partner network. It is our partners for whom we want to help build their business, and we then aim to replicate this successful model in other countries. My role is to build up company headquarters in Germany, Austria and Switzerland. We realised during planning that the logical next step is to carry out a similar step in the Benelux countries and in Liechtenstein. And then at a stroke we’ve created the Western Europe region, common within corporations. Ondřej Vlach, who is a specialist in back up, a key field for our customers, has Poland and the Baltics under his management. 2017 really is a landmark year for G2, transforming from a company mainly operating within the Czecho-Slovak and British markets into one operating Europe-wide and present within key markets.

It is said of corporations and SMEs that they operate in very different worlds, often almost impenetrable. You two, however, have known each other for some time and you have already worked together successfully on many projects.

Jiří: We met seven years ago when I was working for HP. Vladimír was our customer. I’m glad that G2’s successful cloud history began on HP technologies.

Vladimír: I’m going back to 2004 when the company began. After its first year and the first million made, I had a great feeling. We’d become ‘millionaires’! At that time we were focused on low-volume services in the IT field. Over time, we began to focus on the enterprise segment, which also required the use of appropriate technologies and it was HP which supported us.

It sounds almost like a fairytale. Jiří Svěrák is known for his business and networking skills and human approach to business, but was the meeting between an enthusiastic young man and the corporate world really so smooth, dare I say idyllic?

Jiří: It was for me. I was trying to find new customer segments with my team, and the cloud was new, even for us in corporations. From today’s perspective, you might think this field is well-known; we even back up our telephones in the cloud, but at that time it really was a new approach and we had no prior experience. At HP, we had dealt with the problem in terms of hardware, and it seemed to us that companies involved in hosting could be suitable customers. The fact that we are sitting at the same table today shows that we weren’t wrong. I got a list of 200 companies; 190 were really small, and of the 10 potential customers G2 proved to be the most interesting.

Vladimír: I can remember that Jiří’s colleague brought our first enterprise server by taxi; he was carrying it in his arms and it was a demo. He assured the worried salesman that we really would pay for it.

Jiří: Yes; I taught all salespeople that sales mean nothing when only invoiced and you have to wait for the money in your account. Young flexible teams can be found even in large corporations.

Vladimír, when you went to HP as a customer for G2, did you notice the difference of the corporate world, or did you tell yourself that even HP began as a company in a garage?

I’ve even been personally to look at that garage. You’re right, it was a meeting with a different world. I admit that there was a period when we despised HP as a company. We had been buying cheap Chinese servers and we couldn’t understand how someone could sell the same technology for two to three times the price. A number of previous meetings where HP had tried to acquire us as a customer had broken down over the price. In the end, we came to realise that although they were a little more expensive, their quality was in a different league, and that offset the price of many Chinese servers. HP employees who came to G2 regularly heard a talk on how “that corporation doesn’t know how to make sales effectively” and is too expensive.

Younger people giving their experience to older people, or David to Goliath, is a trend of today. What did G2 realise about itself through collaborating with HP?

Vladimír: I’d describe it as literally a meeting of two worlds. After five years of doing business, I was 25 already and I thought I’d experienced it all… (laughs) I was convinced that we were brilliant. I looked at everything from the perspective of a small enterprise, which can equal the world at an enterprise level. But growth and revenues in this segment were limited; customers were unwilling to pay for the quality provided yet expected 110% guarantees. In 2010, we said that we no longer wanted to work for customers who want cheap Chinese servers. I wanted to work for customers who appreciated quality and were also willing to pay for it. In 2010, we undertook a kind of company restart and we cancelled contracts with almost half our customers. Targeting the enterprise segment brought us year-on-year growth of almost a hundred percent, a figure which had previously been ten percent. From a turnover of fifteen million CZK, we have reached an expected four hundred million in 2017.

Let’s go back to the beginnings of doing business. Vladimír, you started doing business right after secondary school at a time which wasn’t as favourable to young entrepreneurs as it is today. In 2004, corporations offered not just premium salaries, but also security, benefits, career growth…

Both my parents were entrepreneurs; they worked hard and from childhood I had had the opportunity to watch them. From secondary school, I wanted to be an entrepreneur, to found and manage a company. I endured just one semester at university. With hindsight, I have realised that this wasn’t entirely a great idea. I don’t mean you can’t do business at twenty, but a young age can put you at a disadvantage in negotiations with senior colleagues from the corporate world. At twenty, you basically look like a child. I spent a lot of time thinking about how to look older.

Jiří, were you never attracted to running your own business?

I did try it. Following a brief experience as an entrepreneur in the educational books field, I came to the opinion that my opportunity to grow and meet with large customers and do big deals was limited. I joined Aliatel, where I was responsible for large customers including the Czech National Bank. Suddenly, my partners were two generations older than me. I also began thinking about how to look older at that time. Eventually, I acquired not just business, but also management experience and I subsequently joined HP, which at that time was one of the largest corporations in the Czech Republic. To begin with, I wasn’t sure whether they would succeed and I hoped I could last there at least a year. I was responsible for small customers, so the shock from moving to a corporation wasn’t so large for me. Within the small customers segment, we managed to grow from nothing to 20 million dollars, so acquiring great renown. After eight years, I left HP, having been offered the opportunity to work as EMC Country Manager for the Czech Republic and Slovakia. Three years passed and following the merger with Dell I decided to move outside of the current corporation world and help to build up a new corporation.

Doubts in a corporation are a bit different to those in a small or medium-sized company. Vladimír; can the owner of a medium-sized company afford to have doubts?

Definitely. I can’t say everything I have done has been absolutely the right thing. I still learn from my mistakes, but after 13 years in business their percentage is smaller. You have to learn from every mistake you make, even if that does sound like a cliché. I made a lot of mistakes at the beginning in regards to recruitment or my little experience managing people. Suddenly I had to become an expert in managing people instead of an expert in IT, and I had to focus on managing them, motivating them, and also shaping the work environment so that they were satisfied and had reasons to remain in the company for the long-term.

Jiří, what made you decide in the end to move to G2?

I was enthused by the opportunity for expansion, to build something from scratch and to establish completely new relations within an international environment. I’m really looking forward to the opportunities and new encounters in Austria, Switzerland, Belgium… and I’m looking forward to building G2 into a corporation.

The word corporation, however, does not have positive connotations for many people today.

Vladimír: We want to build up a start-up corporation.

Jiří: Let’s define what that word actually means. For me personally, corporation doesn’t have a negative meaning. We’re going to build a company which will operate Europe-wide, and in future globally. If we’re going to have many times more people, then we’re also going to need certain processes to manage them. If we’re going to have tools, then these need to be described. Almost nobody in any role can avoid Excel and making tables these days. So it’s about the corporation’s company culture. And I trust that we will preserve our company culture, which is creative, enjoyable and in a certain sense homely. The environment will be more corporate in terms of the nature of communication with various nationalities, customers, employees, partners and distributors and that will require certain rules. But we do still want to build a corporation with a human face.

Let’s look specifically at people; we are always hearing in the Czech Republic about the lack of IT specialists. How can you acquire them, and how can you keep them?

Vladimír: I’d like to say that I think this frequent discourse on the labour market is not a good idea. The fact that there are no people available on the market gives the impression that there might be qualified people sitting somewhere at a job centre, waiting for the right position. And today really is not the right time for recruiting people through internet advertising as many incorrectly believe. Today it is important to focus on HR marketing and show using specific examples in practice that despite rapid growth, the company is able to maintain its start-up spirit and keep up its distinct company culture and company spirit. And rapid growth also attracts many talented people.

What makes your company spirit different?

Vladimír: Even choosing your environment is key; we don’t want to be in a greenhouse like many other companies. We have a large terrace where we hold parties. On hot summer days ice-cream is available, while during flu epidemics in winter we have tea with honey and lemon available, along with throat pastilles and cold medicines. We endeavour to ensure people are truly happy here. Every day they can enjoy pre-sliced fruit. It is our experience that if you only keep fruit stored away then it goes bad. We also offer healthy breakfasts. These might seem to be trifles; the cost of one ice-cream is negligible, but employees appreciate that the company tries more than is common in other companies where the first coffee is free of charge and any more have to be paid for.

I’m really surprised that neither of you are complaining about the young generation and their volatility or poor loyalty.

Vladimír: I think our particular company culture means we have a very low staff turnover. Our first colleague is leaving after five years, and only to grow their professional profile. It’s not just about salaries; people here don’t feel like they’re at work, but rather in a team of clever and friendly people. It all begins with recruitment, when you ensure nobody comes into your team who would spoil that culture. We recruit people on a similar wavelength with the same values. And then they are happy to remain with us and apply to us directly. We can choose.

Jiří: I think talent management is key here. And I’m really looking forward to building this agenda and developing it in different countries. And we really watch out for well poisoners. We will be very careful in our new countries to ensure the managers of each of our subsidiaries are right for the company. Recruitment under pressure won’t pay dividends. I am convinced that you can always find suitable people; we just have to reach them. And we have something to offer.

Vladimír: The fact that a strong and specific company culture can attract the right people was confirmed during our expansion to Slovakia.

G2 started with the cloud, so can you tell me what is beyond the clouds?

Jiří: The cloud is a major topic, but there are many types of cloud… You can have photographs or the basic operations of a company in the cloud; you can also develop your start-up in the cloud. At the moment, we are focusing on traditional infrastructure, but other new platforms are coming. Applications are developing quickly, and as such businesses won’t keep a single environment along with expensive experts on operation and maintenance, but will instead want to have a simple functional environment for their further business.

Vladimír: In the American market, the cloud is divided into infrastructure, platform and software. Today we are focusing on infrastructure, but there is a lot of space for growth. As yet, the markets in Eastern Europe are not ready for the next phase. The Czech Republic is ready for platforms. Customers are different too, and that’s a great challenge for us. As Jiří implied, growth is far from being just limited geographically.

Guys, here’s to your further excellent cloud navigation!

Good luck on behalf of Czech and Slovak Leaders editors from Linda Štucbartová.

Vladimir Kvaš, Chief Executive Office of G2 server has co-founded the entire company in 2004. Vladimir is responsible for company’s vision, mission and strategy leadership as well for legal offices and datacenter expansion across regions. G2 server has been already marked as fastest growing cloud provider on Czech and Slovak market. Vladimir has built up a functional executive structure of directors to enable company’s business boom in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Belgium, Netherlands, Poland, Hungary and Baltics.

Jiri Sven Svěrák, Regional Director of G2 server for Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Belgium, Luxembourg and Lichtenstein has joined the company in June 2017. His mission is to execute the business expansion to above mentioned countries  and establish functional operations and business. Jiri has more than 15 years of corporate experiences from service providers segment and IT vendors as well. Jiri joined from General Manager role form Dell EMC and he worked on several managing roles at Hewlett-Packard before.

“We can overtake even Estonia in digitalisation”

Zdeněk Zajíček, President of ICT UNIE

My interview with Zdeněk Zajíček ran a little late. He is known to the public mainly as the father of “Czech Point”, a member of parliament and Deputy Interior Minister. A detailed overview of his career, however, can serve as an excursion into history and an illustrative example of how the transformation of the Czech Republic turned out. He claims himself that opportunity has always found him. I think in his case “Fortune favours the prepared” is a better description. See for yourself: over four years at the beginning of the 1990s, he gained experience at the city prosecutor’s office, the National Property Management Ministry, and the Land Fund. He also took his Law examinations, so during his career he smoothly transferred three times between work in politics, in the civil service and in the private sector. He was elected to the Czech Parliament’s Chamber of Deputies for the Civic Democratic Party (Občanská demokratická strana – ODS) in 1996. At the turn of the millennium, he moved to the City of Prague Council, where he began to create the foundations for Czech Point with his team. He was working in Prague Council during the flood and the period following it, which was exactly 15 years before our interview. Then from 2003 he worked for the Central Bohemian Region as a healthcare and hospital transformation advisor. Since 2006 he has successively held the roles of Deputy Interior Minister, Deputy Justice Minister, and Deputy Finance Minister.

In 2013, he left politics for the bar and to work in education. His wife owns and runs the private International and Public Relations Grammar School in Prague. Zdeněk Zajíček spoke of his wife with admiration and appreciation, and has helped her in running the school, and this personally lefta good impression on me. He didn’t stay away from public affairs for long, having headed ICT UNIE since 2016.I don’t know whether you believe in synchronicity, but before my interview with the main proponent of civil service computerisation, I had the opportunity to see how digitalisation and data sharing is getting on in the country. The day before the interview, I had forgotten to move my public transport season ticket from one handbag to the other. I was rather annoyed at having to submit the original to the transport company’s headquarters during its inconvenient opening hours, despite the factI have a year’s season ticket with a number issued to my name and the ticket inspector saw my ID. On the day of the interview, I went to the doctor where I had to show my health insurance card and state ID card. It might seema tri e. But why should I when the state already has all this information? Zdeněk Zajíček and his team have calculated that the public can hold up to 260 various ID cards issued by various institutions. It is unfortunate that although the Czech Republic has one of the best registries, it is unable to use it effectively. On the day of the interview, Estonia announced its plan to implement its own, state-sanctioned cryptocurrency, the Estcoin. Zdeněk Zajíček came to the interview with a 202020 badge on his lapel, and he proudly declared that as far as digitalisation is concerned, the Czech Republic has a number of projects running which could even overtake Estonia’s proverbial digitalisation.

Mr President, during your career you’ve been in politics, the civil service and the private sector. What moments in your career have influenced you most?

I graduated in Law in 1991, and I linked my career path with the state and its reform. My first position at the city prosecutor’s office where I learnt about criminal law influenced me a lot. I considered a career as a prosecutor then. I still have great respect for criminal law, especially its clarity, structure and intelligibility. As a fresh young legal graduate, I was then invited to the Ministry for Privatisation where I looked after agricultural privatisation, so I learnt not just about the transformation laws, but also the issue of restitution. This was shortly followed by a role within Land Fund management, where I was in charge of legal matters. After four years, I felt tired, left the civil service, did my bar examinations and became a professional lawyer from January 1996. I wanted to exploit my knowledge of criminal law and now transformation law at the bar. However, I got the offer of running for parliament’s Chamber of Deputies. From an unelectable 11th position, I was eventually voted in. The next focus and challenge in my career involved the opportunity to create legislation. I became a member of the Constitutional and Legal Affairs Committee for the civil service and the environment. As such, I was building on my prior positions and I learnt about the creation and preparation of laws and how fundamentally their creation affects their application in practice. I endeavoured to promote my opinions, but I was just one voice in 200. I left in 1998 and returned to the bar. Following the snap election and the “Sarajevo Assassination”, the political situation was in turbulence. For me, it was a disappointment, I felt somewhat disillusioned and I went back to the bar. That lasted just under two years.

It wasn’t long before you got another offer. You worked for Prague Council from 1999, where you also experienced the flood, whose 15th anniversary we are now commemorating. Looking back, the fact that nobody lost their lives in a flood of such size in Prague seems little appreciated. How do you look back on that time?

I was born in Prague, so working for the council was a great challenge for me to take on. At that time, the council had almost 2000 employees, so in terms of size it was comparable to the largest ministries. Personally, I think my time at the council was one of the most enjoyable for me. I really enjoyed working with people. It was at that time that I had the opportunity to reconstruct the council, give it a different structure, and create clear barriers between political and official representatives. In local administration, you are much closer to the people; every decision made is seen by the people within just weeks or months. That’s a big difference compared to my previous legislative role, where the period between adoption of a law, its acceptance by the public and its actual impact is measured in years. The period of the flood was also almost the culmination of my work in the council. I was part of the crisis team and I was able to learn more about myself and test out my stamina, while also getting to know my colleagues better. I didn’t sleep for three days; we set out to protect first peoples’ lives and then property. For the general public, public servants may seem indecisive, operating within a certain civil service elite and using worn out methods. But this crisis period showed these people were absolutely exceptional, they took on responsibility, made risks and sacrificed their everyday need for sleep and food to protect the city. I realised how important it was not to cave in to first impressions when someone at a counter or office may appear unapproachable. Many of these people are of much greater value than we are capable of recognising.

You are known for claiming that the state can provide certain services online like private entities. It was during your time at the council that the foundations for Czech Point were being set up. What led you to implement it?

Our team was already working on computerisation, but you should take into account it was 1999 and the internet and its accessibility was nowhere near as widespread as it is today. I always looked at my projects from a user perspective. It seemed perverse that if I lived in Stodůlky and worked in Letňany then I would have to take a day off to arrange planning permission, applying at my place of residence. At that time, and still to this day, there are vehicles which travel between different authorities carrying internal post. So why couldn’t they take post to the public too? So the idea of a single point for submitting and receiving documents came at the council. The next project we implemented was the first register of contracts in electronic form, which allowed an overview of contracts the city had concluded to be viewed. Although this is something which crops up before every election, the option for such checks was already there in 2000.

Czech Point was implemented when you were Deputy Interior Minister. I was surprised that the whole project was launched in just seven months; in the civil service most projects take years, or even whole parliamentary terms.

It’s about the desire, the will, to change something and the energy invested in the project. Find allies and guarantee security. We managed to implement this ground-breaking idea and unique service, including system delivery, legislative changes and the training of public servants beginning 4 September 2006 when I took up the role until 28 March 2007, when the first document was issued on Teachers’ Day in Prague 13. Over subsequent years, the service has expanded not just to almost all authorities, but also to Czech Post and bank branches, and notarial and law offices. We managed to achieve something which had until then been unthinkable. Forget long queues, special forms and the stamps you needed to get the original Criminal Record Check in Pankrác, Prague. Now, you can also get Property Register extracts or the popular extract from a driver’s points register. It was fascinating to see how different authorities were afraid to share their previously exclusive powers, afraid of an abuse of the system which never occurred. And today we have moved from a physical Czech Point to a virtual Czech Point, and you can now apply for an extract using “Czech Point at home”, and it will arrive in your data mailbox.

Your next project was data mailboxes, although these have not achieved the same popularity as Czech Point did.

Unfortunately, this system was the subject of political dispute and initially had a bad name, and users were frightened off . The system doesn’t deserve that; it is one of the most accomplished systems for state- guaranteed delivery not just in Europe, but in the world. Many countries are jealous of us. Data mailboxes have great potential for an expanded use between companies, but there is no will to support the system. It is the same story for the Basic Registers system, based on the principle that the state provides its data just once and the institution shares it. The system is fully functional again, but it isn’t used. As such, the state and its institutions continue to annoy citizens unnecessarily. The state could share this data further with commercial institutions, naturally with the citizen’s consent.

In 2013, you left for the private sector and you abandoned continuing digitalisation. After an almost three-year break in the education system, you were again persuaded to return to the world of ICT at the head of ICT UNIE. Now you are working on a revolutionary project again.

It is to our own detriment when we look at IT negatively and we don’t exploit the opportunities this sector offers. Nine out of ten ICT projects have succeeded. In 2008, the Czech Republic was assessed as in 25th place in the world in e-government, but in 2016 we were in 50th place. Originally, our ambition was to be in the top five. Since joining ICT UNIE, I’ve come up with the 202020 in national colours project. My objective was to return to the top twenty. Not by evolution, but by revolution. Let’s forget about petty disputes, criminal complaints and political division. We’ve begun to bring various entities together under the 202020 brand. We’re endeavouring to provide positive information about e-government; we’ve had enough of critics and frustration. We’ve got support in the Chamber of Deputies and in the Senate, and we’ve even found it in the government. We’re also endeavouring to prepare new projects for the future government. ICT UNIE is a collective member of the Chamber of Commerce. My colleague Tomáš Vrbík, whom I know from my previous work, and I have put together the PES “Právní elektronický systém pro podnikatele” (Legal Electronic System for Entrepreneurs) project. I came to realise that today nobody really knows what their obligations are. Over the last 25 years, law has expanded hugely and not even lawyers, civil servants, judges or MPs have a comprehensive knowledge of it, never mind entrepreneurs themselves. That is perverse. Entrepreneurs should be doing business, not studying law in the evenings so they know what their obligations are in carrying out their business. We want to create an accessible overview of obligations on the internet, based either on individual laws or fields of business, according to your current situation in life. You could enter road transport and you’d get an overview of all laws and standards. And it’ll work the same way if you want to run a fast food stand. The appropriate law is ready now. And not even Estonia has this kind of law. We have the opportunity to be the first in the world.

By Linda Štucbartová

The Information Technology and Telecommunication Association (ICT UNIE – ICTU) is a professional association of companies in the information technology and electronic communication fields, as well as other business and educational entities whose objective is to increase the awareness of the importance of adopting and making use of modern information technology in our society, including creating the optimal conditions for developing public electronic communication networks in the Czech Republic as an essential condition for establishing an information society. ICTU has over 70 members. ICT UNIE’s mission is to be a respected professional organisation in the ICT industry which removes barriers which slow down the development of information and communication technologies in order to benefit consumers. We want to be a partner and opponent to the Czech Republic government in projects promoting a movement towards a European information society and a government and civil service working effectively for its citizens and the business sector.

“I have fulfilled my mission at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs; I look forward to my next career challenge“

JUDr. Petr Gajdušek, LL.M. (Cam), M.St. (Oxon)

There are a lot of widespread stereotypes and myths amongst the general public about the Czech civil service. From my own experience, however, I know that there are many talented, educated and hard-working individuals working there. JUDr. Petr Gajdušek, LL.M. (Cam), M.St. (Oxon), who currently holds the role of State Secretary at the MFA stands as proof. He studied at Charles University’s Faculty of Law, and he studied Political Science and International Relations at Charles University’s Faculty of Social Sciences. He then obtained a Master of Laws (LL.M.) at the University of Cambridge, and also studied at the University of Oxford (M.St.), focusing on international law and human rights. Along with his studies at these two prestigious UK universities, he has undertaken study visits to no less prestigious universities in the USA (Georgetown) and in Bologna, Italy. He holds the Bolzano Prize for best thesis. Petr Gajdušek speaks fluent English and French.

Before joining the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Petr worked as director of the International and Legislative Department at the Office for the Protection of Competition, and he has experience of the private sector from working in an international law office, where he focused on the energy sector.

And if you think everything always takes a long time anywhere in the civil service, Petr is your proof that there are exceptions. After two and a half years, in which he has fulfilled his mission to ratify the Foreign Service Act, he has asked to be released from his role, and as of 1 October he has been named government representative for international organisations.

Despite a busy schedule, I managed to meet Petr Gajdušek in Tuscany Palace where I myself began my work at the Diplomatic Academy 15 years ago. I was reminded that there is no quiet summer period for diplomacy, whether because of the number of consular cases, or because of the number of strategic meetings which take place during the summer. We met shortly after his departure from his role was announced, and when new ambassadors were being approved, always a subject of much debate and speculation.

Since relations with journalists and the press have recently been very tense, to break the ice I congratulated him on his studies and invited him to a meeting of Cambridge and Oxford alumni which is being organised by OCAS (Oxford and Cambridge Alumni Society) in Prague. I myself am an Oxford alumni, so the first question was easy. His response to the question of which university he preferred was the first and last which I didn’t find entirely persuasive. Cambridge is just much more romantic being located at the river.

Mr Gajdušek, your study successes can serve as an example to the young generation, which in my opinion does not always value and utilise all the opportunities on offer today. You have said that graduating from both universities was a dream come true for you… Where did you get your motivation, and what recommendations do you have for today’s young university students?

I’m from Mosty u Jablunkova, a small village right in the east of the Czech Republic. I knew I wanted to spend my life doing something I enjoyed; international law and philosophy: and the only way to do so was high quality education. International law and philosophy are taught together to a high quality at Anglo Saxon universities in particular. Since I wasn’t good at technical subjects and I’m not great manually, Třinec heavy industry wouldn’t have got me far. As such, I decided to leave my region. And as for recommendations for others, if I could give any advice, then I think humility and courage are essential. Universities abroad taught me humility; respect for people who truly know something. I met a lot of exceptionally talented colleagues who perhaps weren’t as lucky as me and didn’t get a grant or were simply born at a different time. So that made me appreciate the chance I had got even more. And courage because if you decide to take a certain path, you have to stay on it, even if it is a leap into the dark.

After work in a law office, your career up to now has been in the civil service. Were you not deterred by the many stereotypes of the rigid and slow environment?

They didn’t deter me. I think there are a lot of prejudices about the civil service. But I was lucky I was able to do what I enjoyed in my last job at the Office for the Protection of Competition; an agenda which included collaboration with international organisations such as the OECD and the World Bank, and work on new laws. In the civil service, a lot of it is about who you work with. If you’re part of a good team you have the opportunity to change a lot even within a rigid environment. A rigid environment is the result of rigid people. If you’ve got a dynamic team, rigidity won’t affect you. At the MFA, I’ve been able to surround myself with personnel staff and lawyers who have moved the department forward, in no small part due to the fact we have had many successes. I’m glad to be able to be a part of such changes.

You’re leaving the Ministry of Foreign Affairs after two and a half years having fulfilled your mission, which mainly involved securing the independence of the civil service and adoption of the Foreign Service Act. Using sports terminology, you’re leaving at half- time; you were nominated for five years. I’d like all state projects (especially the repair of the D1 motorway) to be similarly fast. How did your mission play out, and what specific successes did you have (from the perspective of the public)…

I joined at a time when the MFA was standing before a key fork in the road. On the one hand, the Civil Service Act did not reflect the MFA’s peculiarities, portending big problems. On the other hand, we had received a real mandate to begin to change things, so there were massive opportunities. In essence, the window of opportunity had opened – it was now or never. I knew that if we wanted to succeed we would have to take a path which no-one before us had completed. Thanks to the team I had the honour to be a part of, we managed in a short time to get a so-called technical amendment to the Civil Service Act adopted, which amongst other things saves a few hundred million crowns from the state budget each year and allows for the basic working of the MFA. But this still didn’t solve a number of other problems which the MFA had been suffering from for a number of decades, such as the lack of health insurance, damages and little legal protection for returning employees. For this reason, following the technical amendment we immediately set to work on the Foreign Service Act. If I compare it to similar foreign amendments, the Czech act goes much further in terms of employee rights and a stress on system transparency. Now, the act needs to be interpreted to ensure actual conditions at the MFA change for the better. And that’s a human factor which no law can affect. In any case, it is a huge satisfaction for me after almost three years of work and night shifts, to have been a part of this change. And also that we have fulfilled the promises which we gave to MFA employees a few years ago.

The politicisation and depoliticisation of the civil service is a constant issue. How do you see it? Not only in your role as State Secretary, but also as a civil servant…

The quality of every person must be the decisive factor. Their professional knowledge and also their personality. I think that just as important as expertise are empathy, an ability to reach agreement, and to be able to listen. If a civil servant has these traits, it is irrelevant what party they vote for, what church they are in or with whom they spend their private life. The problem occurs when people in key positions only get the role because of who they know without having the expertise required. That is one reason that I am glad that there are absolutely strict language, security and other conditions required at the MFA to be able to hold a particular role. They are essentially stricter than in the civil service, although this is also due to the peculiarities of diplomacy work.

In your new position, you’ll be responsible for the Czech Republic’s representation in international organisations. From my own experience, I know that Poland is far more successful in filling positions in international institutions. Where are we, and what can be done to ensure Czechs are better represented?

In the middle of the last year, we were asked by the Office of the Government to begin working on a strategy to increase the number of Czechs in international organisations. This was also conditional upon the strategy not leading to an increase in the number of civil servants or an increase in the budget. Thus we first had to undertake a thorough analysis of the situation, and the figures we came up with are not positive ones. Compared to our neighbouring countries, the Czech Republic is not in a good position, despite membership in almost 500 international organisations and the high sums we pay towards their budgets. This leads to a simple correlation: there is supply from international organisations, and there is also demand from the Czech side. So we need to create a system in which supply and demand meet each other in some intelligent form. As such, we want to create a database of suitable candidates, a list of international organisation priorities, assistance with preparing for tenders, communication across resorts, etc. But it’s a long game and we are a number of years behind some of our neighbours. We won’t be able to catch up in all the statistics in a year or even two.

What are you most proud of in your career so far? Looking at your next position, what are your career ambitions and plans in the medium-term?

In terms of the MFA, I am most proud that I was a part of the big changes to take place there, and part of an extraordinary team of people, deputies, lawyers and personnel workers. I’m glad we managed to implement all the changes within a short timeframe, something we didn’t have a choice over in any case. In terms of my further plans, first of all I’ve got to hand over my role properly, and then my superior will put me in a suitable role at MFA headquarters. The role of government representative is an honorary one, as the whole strategy is designed without any funding from the state budget. In the short- term, I need to take the rest of my holidays, and in the medium-term I would like to focus on international law at a transnational level.

By Linda Štucbartová

“I Use My Talent for Others”

Elisabeth Lobkowicz, Princess

The life and memories of Elisabeth Lobkowicz could easily make up several volumes of a book. However, she does not consider herself to be someone special and she prefers to stay away from media attention. In the Czech Republic, she is known as the wife of Jaroslav Lobkowicz, from the Křimic branch of the family, as well as for her work as a representative of the Christie’s Auction House. Her personal story is much more complex. She is from the de Vienne family, who is related to the French royal family of Bourbon. When we met, she proudly showed me around the Middle Ages house at Sněmovní, close to the Czech Parliament and just below the Prague Castle gardens. We sat outside, the garden furniture was simple however the table was covered by a tablecloth from Provence. On the table, there were German newspapers. The European spirit of past and present was felt everywhere, underscored by the paintings of Italian and Dutch masters. We discussed not only her upbringing, the French-German reconciliation or her taste in art, but also many current issues, including united Europe and immigration as an opportunity rather than a threat.

You were raised in France, then you lived and worked in Germany and after the Velvet Revolution you and Jaroslav moved to Czechoslovakia. Where are your roots?

I grew up in France, in a noble family. Both of my parents came from the nobility, father from the North and my mother from the West. As both families had properties in Paris, I grew up in a private family house in the middle of Paris. In terms of the furniture of the apartment, it should be mentioned that it had not been bought but inherited. After the French Revolution and the Napoleonic wars, many families who left the country eventually came back and started collecting old furniture at the beginning of the 19th century. Meanwhile, our furniture and paintings came mainly from 16th -18th century, before the French Revolution. This is what I saw when I was a baby, a little girl, when one does not particularly appreciate what he sees. Because of this, I feel a connection with any piece of furniture and can immediately tell if it is an original or replica. I have difficulties understanding modern art. I stopped with the impressionists. I am happy to look at the impressionist paintings, but more contemporary pieces of art do not give me the same feeling. Had I been able to afford buying some Modern or Contemporary pieces, I would not like to have them in my home. On Sundays, we went to the mass to the Notre Dame Cathedral and then we continued to the Louvre museum. I consider these impressions from my early childhood very important. I still remember the first time I saw the Egyptian antiquities in Louvre, I was ten years old.

Your upbringing was quite unique, one would not guess that it happened in early fifties of the last century.

We were a very close family, I was the eldest of four children. We went to Catholic private schools. On my way to school, I had to pass the Soviet embassy. I remember that we had a young Polish girl as a servant. She woke me up one day and she said, “Stalin is dead.” I asked her who Stalin was and she explained the Polish experience with Stalin. So, besides art, I started to be confronted with high politics. Whenever we were passing the Embassy together, she being Polish and afraid of the Soviets, would cross the road and walk on the other side. My mother remembered that after the Germans occupied Paris during World War II, they came to the Soviet Embassy and searched the garden, finding many corpses there. Another World War II story was linked to the place where my family had a castle, about 100 kilometres south of Paris. In a neighboring village, the French resistance killed two German soldiers. The next day, the Germans marched into the village and demanded 20 people. They took them and shot them immediately. A similar thing also happened at another property in Normandy. Of course, we did not have a complete overview of the occupation, but from all the incidents I knew, it was awful and it influenced the atmosphere I grew up in. Such stories were an integral part of my upbringing.

How did the French-German reconciliation, which today serves as an example in history textbooks, happen?

In 1954, my parents made the decision to take a German au-pair, as a way to reconcile with the Germans. The first German girl came to our house when I was seven years old. Prior to the German au-pair coming, I was warned by my mother not to talk with her about World War II. She said, “we want to forget it and we want to reconcile with young people.” I grew up with the idea that Europe had to be built on reconciliation and forgiveness. My parents also started to speak German to me but at that time it had little success, as I admit to being quite lazy. When I was 16 years old, I myself was sent as an au-pair to the woman who previously came to our house. She tried to be as nice to me as my parents had been to her. To me, it was a dream. I fell in love with Germany and German culture at that time.

You support both Germany and united Europe. Such attitude has become rather rare.

Based on my upbringing, I believe in Europe from a Christian perspective, based on values of reconciliation and pardon. I follow the latest developments in Europe and I am afraid that is has become a question of interests, economy, and I am missing these Christian values. If you do not know who you are and where you are, it is becoming problematic particularly in regard to growing Muslim communities. Xenophobia is the worst thing I can imagine. We must find ways to counter that. We must make others happy in our society as it is with our values. Again, my experience of being an adolescent in 1960s can serve as an example. At that time, I saw the birth of pop-culture. Growing up in the 1960s, coming from a strong family, I did not like it. I did not consider it Christian culture anymore. I only liked the music of that period. Coming back to your question about roots, the young terrorists have no roots these days. On one hand, they want to be a part of a new culture, on the other hand they hate it. They are in the middle and thus very easy to manipulate. I am not despairing, I am very curious about the current situation. Immigration can be a huge opportunity. Currently, it is going the wrong way, but we are still in the middle of a journey. We see that terrorism is growing and so far, we lack the means to counter it. Have we looked at the perspectives we are offering to these young people?

What exactly went wrong in the development of Europe?

I believe that Europe made the wrong turn in the sixties. As nobility is closely related all over Europe, I remember being invited to Switzerland and there meeting some German second cousins who invited me to Bavaria. I went there in 1967 for the first time and the church was full. The religion was the religion of the people. I went to a very famous pilgrimage and we could not fit into the chapel as it was so full. I visited the place 15 years ago and since then I have been coming every year and it is empty. Do you know who and what replaced the place of pilgrimage? Russians who brought their money and built their villas in the middle of nowhere.

They even placed a statue of the Bull of Wall Street in one little square. It reminds me of the famous story from the Bible when people were dancing around the golden calf. Isn’t it frightening? The place that served as a place for pilgrimage until 1960s? Instead, there is a huge casino. These people believe only in money, not eternal life. The cult of the Virgin Mary was replaced by a cult of money.

It was in Bavaria, where you met your husband, Jaroslav Lobkowicz.

Yes, it was in 1968. I was invited to a ball and I noticed a young man standing in a corner who did not know anybody. I approached him to find out that he was from Czechoslovakia.
He was the first Czechoslovakian that I saw in my life and I am still seeing him today. The only thing I knew about Czechoslovakia was that it was behind the Iron Curtain.

Let me again refer to the history textbooks, as we were taught about the special Czechoslovak-French relationship during the First Czechoslovak Republic, the Little Entente agreement or the close ties of the Czech and French artists…Nothing lasted until 1960s?

None of these things were on my mind. However, I told you that I am extremely curious. I interviewed him to find out more about him and his fate and at the end he fell in love with me. Well, you know, it might be quite dangerous to give an interview. (laugh)

You two met in July 1968…The spring of that year was special not only for Czechoslovakia, but also for France.

Jaroslav mentioned at that time that he made his living repairing TV sets and that he had to return back to his country, as his clients were waiting for him. Of course, we discussed the events of Prague spring and we compared it to Paris spring. That year, many people in Paris were literally prepared to die, as we did not know whether the Americans would stick to their military engagement as the French president de Gaulle left NATO. The revolution in Paris broke out and at that time the French communist party was very strong, they got 30% of the vote in the election. There was a huge demonstration at the Place de la Concorde, close to our home and we felt it was our duty to go to the demonstration. Everybody was watching us. So we went. The whole family. As de Gaulle left the country, we thought the demonstration was the last chance and we participated knowing that we could be shot, if the Soviets decided to intervene. The French communists still had weapons, so it was truly dangerous. The surprise was that one million Parisians thought the same. Place de la Concorde full, Champs Elyséés full…Luckily, the tanks were secured by the government. Eventually, de Gaulle came back and we held a new election where de Gaulle got 80% of vote.

Jaroslav was in love, but what about you?

He returned to Czechoslovakia in July and then he left the country two days after the invasion. At that time it was still easy to cross the boarders. Even though Jaroslav was invited to live with his nobleman uncle, he did not want to just sit at the castle. So his uncle opened newspapers and found my future husband a job– he started to work in a factory next to Turks and other immigrants. He never asked for political asylum. He said that he did not want to get money from Germany and he did not want to be dependent on the decision of a civil servant. After three months, he earned enough money to attend the German language course which eventually enabled him to get a scholarship and start studying at the university. In Czechoslovakia, as a member of Lobkowicz family, he could not stud. He went to school Monday to Friday and on Saturdays he kept repairing televisions. After university, he started his great career at Siemens, working at the research and development department. We had three children, we spoke German at home and we had many friends. We felt truly at home in Germany.

Let us fast forward more than twenty years, when you returned to Czechoslovakia in 1993.

I must say that I visited Czechoslovakia during communist times to visit my husband’s parents. Since 1971, I was visiting Czechoslovakia regularly. I remember how dark driving to Plzen was, it felt like entering a military zone. My father in law had been subjected to many difficult and painful interrogations by the secret police, but it didn’t change him, he was very nice and kind. My impression at that time was that if the Iron Curtain did fall down, everything was so devastated that it would be almost impossible to repair it. I am so glad to have been wrong about that and I am so happy to see how well the Czech Republic is doing. The Czechs made it. Compared to East Germany, they did not have billions of Euros from outside but they have made it.

By Linda Štucbartová

The Křimice castle in Plzeň is currently undergoing restoration under the management of Vladimír Lobkowicz, the eldest son of Jaroslav Lobkowicz.  Visit it to learn not only about baroque history, but also about contemporary events, when the castles were ruined and turned into boarding schools, agricultural cooperatives or warehouses.  When the castle was returned to the Lobkowicz family, almost all of its 130 windows were broken,  and it’s a structural integrity damaged.  The park had turned into a jungle.  Now, the entire complex is open  for the public and being used for cultural events, serving various age groups from children to seniors.