Loom bands, those colourful American fripperies much beloved by young people around the world have been identified as a serious potential health risk. Birmingham Assay Office, an independent laboratory in the UK, has tested Loom bands and found them to contain over 500 times the recommended safe level of phthalates, a known hormone inhibitor. The […]
Uber ignores edict and comes to Geneva
Uber, a licensed taxi substitute operating in more than 200 cities worldwide launched in Geneva this week. The controversial service connects people with a “private driver” at the tap of a button, boasting “Anytime! Anywhere! Without cash!” But all is not as it seems: the company ignores local licensing rules. Recently, licensed cabbies in London […]
Michael Schumacher moves home to continue recovery
Michael Schumacher has returned to his home near Gland from the cantonal hospital in Lausanne to continue his rehabilitation after suffering serious head injuries in a skiing accident last year. No further details have been issued regarding his condition, although a statement issued by his manager Sabine Kehm did say that he has been making […]
Managing workplace burnout
The phenomenon of professional exhaustion, or burnout, has given rise to a number of coaching and counselling services in Switzerland seeking to educate employees and managers how to recognize symptoms and to jointly take preventive measures. Job burnout is defined as chronic stress that affects both physical and mental health. In extreme cases, it can […]
Courage and company – dealing with cancer
On a rather cold and windy lakeside, a dozen or so corporate teams prepared to take each other on in the English Speaking Cancer Association’s (esca) annual dragon boat race at the Lac de Joux. All great fun and for a good cause – the event is esca’s major fund-raising event of the year. Hundreds […]
Ronald McDonald House overnight stays up by 10%
The Ronald McDonald House Charity provides families of seriously ill children with heavily subsidised accommodation close to the major hospitals in seven Swiss cities including Geneva, Bern and Basel. The service greatly assists families that have other young children and those that live far away. It allows parents and siblings to be together close to […]
Explaining Switzerland’s issues
Earlier this week, I had lunch with an expat friend from Vaud at one of Geneva’s leading hotels overlooking the Rhone River. He has been living in Switzerland for nearly 30 years, including a nearly decade-long stint in the German-speaking north. So he is very much aware of the divides that exist within Switzerland itself, […]
Hostages: To pay or not to pay, that is the question
The grotesque assassination of the American journalist James Foley has publicly raised the complex question of whether or not governments, companies or individuals should pay a ransom to free hostages. There are supportable arguments on both sides of the issue and, not surprisingly, there are differences on to how to deal with the problem. There […]
Top ranked Switzerland’s Achilles heel
GENEVA Broadly confirming the findings of IMD’s World Competitiveness Report last May, the World Economic Forum’s latest global competitiveness report once again ranks Switzerland, for the fifth time in a row, at the head of the 148-country listing. But there is a serious caveat. One of the country’s biggest problems is to maintain this lead […]
Geneva University submarine exploration
Geneva University and its partners have completed a two-week expedition – Terra Submersa – to explore Greece’s underwater past and the prehistoric landscapes in the Gulf of Nauplio. Operating from the MS Tûranor Planet Solar, the world’s largest solar catamaran, archeologists mapped the sea floor and uncovered Paleolithic and Neolithic remains dating back 36,000 years.
