When Church history has been made in Sweden during the past 15 years, chances are that Hakan Palm was there, standing quietly in the background.
He was the first Swedish coordinator of seminaries and institutes in 1973; the first public communications director, serving from 1975 to 1986; and was on the Stockholm Sweden Temple Committee. He's also made inroads for the Church among business and industry leaders in Sweden.Palm, 38, now a temple worker and high councilor in the Stockholm stake, is a deeply spiritual man who is equally at ease with children or company presidents. His unassuming personality belies an approach to business problems that has brought industry leaders to his doorstep. He is senior vice president of Philipson Car Company, which is the sales agent for Nissan and Mercedes in Sweden. In addition, he is a consultant to Sweden industry through the Swedish postmaster general, with whom he works closely, and has published books on the psychology of business communications.
Palm and his family live in a subdivision in Handen, located some 25 miles from Stockholm and about four miles from the temple. On his property are his home, his parents' home, and homey offices for his consulting business. Other Church members also moved into the subdivision. Some 45 members now reside there, probably the most densely LDS populated area in the Nordic countries.
Many business leaders, and the postmaster general, are well aware of his religious beliefs. For example, a few months ago he had just dropped his children off at school and was prompted to drive to the postmaster's offices in Stockholm. There he noticed a sign on the door that announced a breakfast meeting concerning a project he was involved with, called "Prima Vista."
"My first reaction was that I felt pleased that they would organize this without my help," he said. "My next reaction was like feeling an electric shock. I vaguely remembered a discussion of several months ago that I was to be keynote speaker at a meeting like this. They were to have sent me a letter, which I had never received."
So Palm slipped into the room where 100 leaders of industry were just finishing breakfast. About three minutes later, on schedule, he delivered his speech.
Afterward he spoke to the postmaster general: "I told him that he should be happy that our family had morning prayer," said Palm. "Otherwise I wouldn't have been there."
Palm attributes much of his success in business to such blessings.
"I have been quite alone in the marketplace," he said. "I haven't had any big organizations or mentors. I have just had the Holy Ghost and the Lord. It is rewarding spiritually to see how the Lord blesses me to come into positions . . . where I have been able to give my testimony about the Church."
A few years ago Palm formed his own consulting business in order to spend more time with his wife, Barbro, and their children Daniel, 12, Helena, 10, Samuel, 7, Mikael, 4, and Ann, 1. (Their oldest son, Magnus, died of cancer at age 5 nine years ago.)
But Philipson Car Company sought him out and offered him a vice president position, which he accepted. "Church members should participate with the world," he said. "When you have the right principles, you can live in the world but not be of the world."
Being a Mormon is this nation is still somewhat of a novelty. Church members comprise about one-tenth of 1 percent of the population of Sweden. But even fewer members lived in Sweden when Palm was a child. He was reared in Borlange, about 150 miles north of Stockholm, where his father, Gustav, was a branch president and then district president. His parents, both converts, now live next door to his family.
As a child, Hakan was shy by nature. He was greatly surprised at age 13 when a teacher asked him stand in front of a school assembly of 800 students and tell about the Mormon Church. "I don't know how he found out I was a Mormon," said Palm. "I hadn't told him.
"I thought about what Jesus would have done," he said. "I gulped and said I would do it."
As he stood in front of the assembly, he said his knees "were really shaking. I delivered a speech for 10 minutes. When it was done, I was so proud I didn't watch where I was going and I rolled down the [podium] steps." He quickly recovered from the mishap. Afterward, he found that respect for the Church had increased in the school.
He and his wife were members of the same M-Men and Gleaner class. They became engaged and planned to be married in the Swiss Temple. They skipped the traditional trappings of a fine wedding in Sweden and hopped on a low-budget charter flight to Italy, and then boarded a train to Switzerland. They were married in the temple, but with their low budget, could only afford an unheated hotel room that December 1972.
In 1973, at age 24, he was coordinator for seminaries and institutes in Sweden and helped enroll the first students.
Teaching materials were hastily translated and distributed by him buzzing across the countryside on a small motor scooter. Once a desperately needed batch of teaching materials was lost. A printer's dog had chewed it up. "That was a proving time," he said.
Yet, when President Spencer W. Kimball came to Stockholm to an area conference in 1974, Hakan Palm's supervisor reported to the prophet that 92 percent of the seminary and institute students had completed their first year. "President Kimball smiled," said Palm, "Then he asked, `Why didn't you have 100 percent?'"
Later Palm was public communications director when BYU's Lamanite Generation came to Sweden. The performing group was greeted by rainy skies and scant media interest until Palm suggested the dancers do a sun dance for Stockholm. That brought wide media attention, and the Lamanite Generation was a hit with Swedes. Some 18,000 people attended the performances.
As public communications director, Palm helped set up the first televised sacrament meeting in Sweden.
He also served as counselor to Sweden Stockholm Mission presidents, Richard Oscarson and Marcus Holmgren, and was stake mission president.
"It has been interesting to see the many historical events I have been blessed to be part of," he said. "Enormous changes have come in the last 10 years. Church members have a greater influence in this country than our numbers would suggest."
And one of the reasons why is Hakan Palm.
