Author: bbr

Hello, I am Beate Brinkman, the bbr.harlekin. I am editor and author for Harlekin.Blog e.V. and my “main job” is support coordinator in an international IT company. So far I have worked in German, Dutch, American and Indian companies and have acquired a great deal of experience of multicultural cooperation. I have been living in the Netherlands as a German for many years and have discovered that the cultural differences between Germans and Dutch alone could fill entire books. For professional and private reasons, I am particularly interested in multicultural (mis)understanding. Whether it’s about food, language, official conference calls or the organisation of funerals – when the cultures of several countries collide, things get lively. And that leads to sometimes unpleasant, often very funny, but always instructive situations.

Fortunate people…

…often have very favourable beginnings and very tragic endings. What matters isn’t being applauded when you arrive – for that is common – but being missed when you leave. – Baltasar Gracian

Dear friends of the harlekin.blog,

After 5 years of Harlekin, we have decided to stop publishing our blog. Why? There are many reasons, because the seven of us have new and very different professional or private projects ahead of us to which we want or need to devote more time.

It’s a good time to look back on. We have learned a lot, discussed a lot and laughed a lot while preparing our contributions. But this is the end, beautiful friends, the end. We would like to thank you for your loyalty. We are proud that so many Harlequin “fans” have taken the time to read our articles every week.

Some Harlequins will be saying goodbye with a personal contribution in the next few weeks, so it is still worth looking out for new articles.

Best wishes,

The Harlequin Team

Let your forehead go all soft…

Since “indoor” group sports are not possible at the moment ⁽¹⁾, I have been obliged to look around for yoga courses on YouTube – and without much enthusiasm at first. I found what I was looking for from a young woman from Berlin who explains really well and clearly indicates what matters in individual exercises. A real happy ending for me – in the meantime, “yoga with tablet” has become an enjoyable (and beneficial) part of my everyday life.

However, after the first few classes, I found that the blocks I had to overcome were less physical than linguistic. I had certain difficulties with prompts like “Let your forehead go all soft”, because whatever I had hoped for from yoga – a soggy noodle it was not.

Harlekin.blog presents the “Contributions of the Year“

Dear readers, this year, too, the Harlekin.blog team is saying goodbye for the summer holidays. Last summer we bridged this time with “our favourites” – this year we would like to present the Harlekin “contributions of the year” to you once again.

Retiree Reveries

Just to get things clear from the beginning: The title does not refer to the daydreams of any old pensioners, but it is about the preconceptions that people between 60 and 67 have about their own retirement period, which is ahead of them but has not yet begun. The topic comes up again and again during enjoyable evenings with friends, and the “fantasies” in this regard not only say a lot about the nature of the people involved in the conversation, but also about the challenges of their particular everyday professional lives.

Can you hear me? I can’t hear you!

International Conference Calls

In international companies, the Conference Call is the easiest way to hold meetings with participants from different countries. Depending on the company’s policy, this is done as a video call (with web cams) or audio only. Both have pros and cons.

Fly to my love, oh my pretty flamingo

Birds in music (part 2)

When my harlequin colleague HFI told me about the post she was writing about birds in music, I said, “I know lots of songs with birds in them too” – and started right over with “La Paloma, ohe” and “Wenn die Kraniche ziehen (When cranes migrate)”. My Harlekin colleagues struggled to hide their horror, but at the risk of lowering the intellectual level of the Harlekin.blog somewhat, I thought the topic “birds in music” would not be complete without Schlager¹.

Product placement with influencers – how does it work?

Due to the current debate about TikTok and its potential misuse for spying purposes, countless TikTok fans are expressing their concern on TV. And my generation should not make fun of young people’s despair at the thought of a possible TikTok ban. Many of my peers would have felt similarly in the past if they had been deprived of Bravo magazine.

Home Alone

… until retirement

In recent years, we at Harlequin have dedicated a few articles to the topic of “home office in Covid times”. At the time, this was “the new normal” and admittedly – it didn’t just have downsides. However, most of the working population for whom home office was an option had the prospect in the background of being allowed / able / obliged to return to the office at some point.

The “right” hobbies

Yesterday I read an article on XING with the title “Golf, sailing, horseback riding – these hobbies will get you a job interview”. As I read on, I was relieved to discover that the author, Sandra Zemke – a recruiter, by no means recommended that you should list one of these three hobbies on all your future job applications. On the contrary, she advised “that for a fair, diverse and high-quality applicant selection, these characteristics – which are not relevant for job success – should be eliminated as far as possible.”

Nevertheless, my imagination immediately ran away with me. I pictured claiming misleadingly in my application that one of my hobbies was playing golf, sailing or horseback riding. At the subsequent job interview, an enthusiastic golfing, sailing or riding manager would actually be sitting opposite me.

Fitness in the office

The trend toward exercise and wellness continues unabated – and I think it’s highly commendable. The saying “Sitting is the new smoking” fits this trend well – and is leading more and more companies to encourage their staff to do fitness and wellness exercises during working hours. There are numerous instructional videos on LinkedIn and YouTube, and at my company, one colleague took it upon herself to regularly provide us with new exercises “for in between.”