Here’s an introduction to explain what speaking at Lunch at the Circle is about:

I thought I would ask you if you might be interested in being the invited lunch speaker at a series of events that I/we organise in Paris, called “Lunch at the Circle”.

Who are we?

It is a group of people mainly in the field of entrepreneurship and tech, but not only. There are a total of around 300 people in the group and at each lunch event there are usually 15-20 people who come for lunch. There are people of many different nationalities, mainly French, but fairly international. It is, of course, very focussed on networking.

It’s all quite informal, it’s over lunch, which starts with a 15-20 minute presentation by the invited speaker, on his/her chosen subject, followed by a discussion over lunch. It is never a formal “presentation” from a lectern but more of an introduction by the invitee followed by the open discussion.

What to talk about?

The subject is very much up to the speaker. It usually touches entrepreneurship or tech in some way but can be on other things too. For example, we’ve had a journalist talk about French elections, a medical doctor talk about hypnosis as stress therapy, a panel with head hunter on how to work with them etc. The theme is usually something that is quite personal, e.g. “how I did (this)”, or “my insider view on (something)…”, or “how to succeed in (whatever) based on my experiences” and so on. Here is a list of all previous speakers and themes.

Something that I thought could be interesting to hear you talk about is, as an example,… (well, this depends on the speaker)… or something else that you feel motivated by and that is quite “personal”.

What we usually try and do is subjects with stories based on the speakers personal experience, history, background, interests… not so much traditional “consultants’ stories” about theories of management or business pitches. For example this on building a company with M&A or this about how he moved from software developer to a disruptive finance entrepreneur.

I should add that it is a very informal group. The “members” of the group are there because they have been invited by other people already part of the group. No one is there because they have a certain job or title (although most “members” are senior executives).

You can see some of the previous speakers here on the front page of the L@C site, including videos: https://www.lunchatthecircle.com/

And a little more background: https://www.lunchatthecircle.com/about/

I can add that we usually are at the Swedish Club (Cercle Suédois) in Paris, but otherwise there is no connection at all to the Swedish Club or to Swedes. Language is either French or English (the speaker decides).

Hope it can be something that can interest you.

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