Amsterdam — Feature Guild City of The Month

6 min readSep 20, 2022

Antique houses, lovely bridges, famous canals, bicycles everywhere, Poffertjes, great museums, a long list of world class attractions and our bet is that the people (like the reputation before them) are hypercreative, tolerant, worldly, passionate, diverse, smart and Guild-ready.

Amsterdam is our Guild’s September Feature City and we embrace the home of some of the Dutch masters. There is a different espirit de corps in Amsterdam that has led it to be the second most diverse city in the world after New York.

Inviting Amsterdam’s smartest, wide-eyed leaders, builders, experts and polymaths into our Guild world this month. Let’s don our orange, join our Guild Founders Friday, September 28th, 2022 over lunch 12pm CET. Let the voorpret , Gezellig and IJsberen begin.

Pre-register: https://bit.ly/gsgamsterdam

The Grey Swan Guild — What Do You Need To Know Amsterdammers:

Our Start — the Grey Swan Guild got together at the start of the pandemic as 40 people trying to make sense of this massive interruption that turned has just turned our worlds upside down, 30 months later, we are 130x that membership and keeping adding value.
Our Why — We make sense of the world’s biggest challenges and next Grey Swans as a collective of passionate and smart people under a not-for-profit umbrella.
Our How — We have four values that guide us — Aspirational, Curious, Collaborative and Purposeful
Our What — We have a beehive of activities across six different areas — Content & Publications (10+ pubs/150+ articles per year), Events & Experiences (10+ event each month), Intelligence & Foresight (4 big weathervanes), Experiments & Ventures (12 ventures), Global Community & Network (handpicked ‘000s of global members), Training & Learning (Craft-building and Masterclasses)
Our Who — 6,000+ global people from 90 different countries operating at the top of their game from around the world — read on about our 50 shades of Grey …Swanners below

Here’s our website: https://www.greyswanguild.org/

What has Us Intrigued about Amsterdam:

Amsterdam is already our 22nd biggest city in the guild and we want more of you. The world needs more Amsterdam— here’s why:

Amsterdam is the top tourist friendly city in the world
Amsterdam is the top rated city for LGBTQ+ inclusion and has the “most welcoming social attitudes”
Amsterdam is the fifth best city in the world to live
Amsterdam is the second best digital city in the world
Amsterdam is the eight rated fintech centre in the world
Amsterdam is the ninth best city in the world to work in
Amsterdam was the tenth most sustainable city in the world
Amsterdam is the 13th rated global tech city
Amsterdam is 24th innovation city in the world
the birth place of Van Gogh, Rembrandt, Rutger Hauer, Tiësto, Famke Janssen, Anne Frank and Johan Cruyff
Plus Rijksmuseum, The Royal Palace, Stedelijk, Vondelpark, Koningsdag, Heineken, coffee shops, Keukenhof Gardens, University of Amsterdam and Startup Village.

And for us, most importantly the people, the ambition and the Dutch passion, directness and heart.

What Do We Do at The Guild Town Halls

Let’s spend an energetic, fun and smart 75 minutes together, with a springboard for further participation. We hope you speak well of us after, gaze on what we do and hope to bring in: 25 regularly attending members, 7 people in core 200 members and 3 people that become local contributing champions:

Welcome — founders, aspiration for meeting and recap why Amsterdam
Introduce Amsterdammers — who are they, what do they do, why they love Amsterdam and metaphorical tool they represent
The Guild — our why — mission/our how — values/our what — 6 things we do/our who — types of people who join us
The Challenge — three ways to improve Amsterdam— interactive exercise — “How Might Amsterdam…”
What’s Next Guild-Wise — new events/new ventures/new content
Opportunities to Participate — seven steps to guild heaven + extras

Join us September 28th over Dutch treat of conversation, foresight and sensemaking — https://bit.ly/gsgamsterdam