Flamboyant and Swiss are adjectives not often found in close proximity to each other, particularly when the individual being described is a career diplomat. Thomas Borer, who is both these things and was until April his country's ambassador to Germany, thinks this is a problem. "If you're a diplomat of a small country like Switzerland, you have to work on bringing a new image across, on raising the country's profile," he says. "You can only do this through your own personality. You have to make people have an interest in you."