My name is Mikael Arendt Laursen. I was born on a sunny day in the small town Lemvig in the western part of Denmark in May 1969. I grew up in Northern Germany where I lived from age 4 to 16 which gave me German as my second language even though it is a little bit rusty by now. I studied trade and economics for some years but did not end my education because statistics killed my motivation.
I met my wife Hanne in 1991 and married her in 1992 – now more than 25 years ago. Hanne has been working in health care all her life. Our daughter Isabella (24) is studying political science in Copenhagen and is working at the Happiness Research Institute which also is a partner of Krifa. Our son Alexander (21) is studying economics in Aarhus and working at the ARoS art museum. Our family is part of the Lutheran church in Denmark and the inner mission organization.
In my professional career I have been working in tourism, publishing, marketing, management, retail, having my own business, Sunday school organization and today I am secretary general in the christian media user organization KLF, Kirke & Medier (KLF, Church & Media)
I have been a member of Krifa since the beginning of my working life. I was elected to the Krifa board in 2009 and was re-elected for the second time last year. In 2016 I was elected vice president of Krifa and joined the leadership with Søren Fibiger Olesen, our president. As vice president I have a great deal of contact to our regional boards – one of which I was part of myself for some years. I am part of the board of Trinity – which is a beautiful hotel and conference centre owned by Krifa. I actually worked there many many years ago also.
As I am sure you already know Krifa has a vision about job satisfaction. We call it God arbejdslyst, and I am especially proud to have been part of creating this vision and working towards its success for the past three years or so.
I think I have participated in WOW events two or three times for the past nine years and being elected to this board is a great vote of confidence for me. All my life an international connection has been an important part of my personal inspiration. And I do sincerely hope that I have been part of other people’s inspiration as well through the years. This is also my hope for my time at this board. To be an inspiration to you as well as you for sure will be to me. I will do my best to let this happen.
