CHAPTER 2AN UNEXPECTED MEETING
“Rapport is the ultimate tool for producing results with other people. No matter what you want in your life, if you can develop rapport with the right people, you'll be able to fill their needs, and they will be able to fill yours.”
—Tony Robbins
It was mid‐September and still about twenty degrees Celsius at six in the evening. Not entirely unusual for Cologne, but much cooler weather would be on its way soon, for certain. Felix stood in front of the office building, his face looking skyward; the sun felt refreshing after such a stifled, frustrating experience back upstairs. “Crazy that there are still people out there denying climate change and global warming,” he thought. His thoughts were happy to wander for a moment. He hadn't a clue what to do with himself—or what to think. His mind was still reeling.
The office building was in a former media park. The park had been fully renovated with public money in 2012 after almost the entire media industry had moved from Cologne to Berlin. The Ministry of Economy, which had funded the renovation project, wanted to create a new tech hub in the heart of Cologne.
This tech ecosystem was supposed to attract innovative startups and founders who didn't want to live and work in Berlin or Munich, the cities where the German startup scene prevailed.
The area that had been the media park suited this plan perfectly. It was easily accessible; the subway to the main train station was nearby, as was the complete ...
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