Princess Anne's clever hack for handling public engagements revealed
Princess Anne topped the hardest working royal list in 2023!
According to an analysis carried out by The Telegraph, the 73-year-old ranked above her brother King Charles with an impressive 457 engagements. The monarch nabbed second place with 435 engagements, while the Duke of Edinburgh placed third with 297 engagements to his name.
And the royal mother-of-two has seemingly nailed the art of public outings. During an interview with Terry Wogan back in 1985, Anne revealed that she uses a rather nifty trick to ensure that her engagements always run smoothly.
When asked about how she manages to think of something new to say to each person she meets, Anne said: "It's rather like market research. You can ask everybody, literally everybody, the same questions.
"Like you have three questions for that afternoon, and you ask everybody the same questions. And with any luck, it shortens the time involved... Doesn't always happen."
Elsewhere, Anne also shared a glimpse inside her thought process when she's asked to open new buildings and sites.
"I'm very short about it. I don't say a lot," Anne explained. "Yes, it's more, 'I'm very much looking forward to seeing whatever it is I'm about to open' – or words to that effect.
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"But I frequently thank them for the opportunity of having seen it before I open it, if I've been allowed to see it."
Last week, Anne travelled to Scotland to attend a Food and Farming Day at Solsgirth Home Farm in Dollar. She also visited Hugh Black and Sons Limited butchers in Stirling in her role as President of the Scotch Chef's Club.
Earlier in September, meanwhile, the royal stepped in for her brother King Charles as she paid a visit to the Netherlands to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the Battle of Arnhem.
Alongside her husband, Vice Admiral Sir Timothy Laurence, Anne attended a service of remembrance and laid a wreath in tribute to troops who fought in Operation Market Garden in 1944.
The Battle of Arnhem, part of Operation Market Garden, was a manoeuvre intended to create a route for Allied forces into northern Germany in September 1944.
It saw around 1,900 allied airborne troops from the 4th Parachute Brigade jump from military aircrafts into the occupied Netherlands in an attempt to capture the bridges at Arnhem.
During her overseas visit, Anne also attended a reception at the Airborne Museum Hartenstein in Oosterbeek where she delivered a speech on behalf of her brother. The speech in part read: "Eighty years ago, on this very weekend, Operation Market Garden was underway in this region of the Netherlands.
"An ambitious joint airborne and ground forces operation designed to seize crucial bridges to enable the advance into Germany, its ultimate aim was to end the war within a matter of months.
"The friendships made during those difficult days of September 1944 between the Dutch and their liberators continued after the war.
"I saw this for myself five years ago when, as Colonel in Chief of the Parachute Regiment, I attended the 75th anniversary commemorations."
Anne finished by adding: "Today, on this 80th anniversary, it is with a deep sense of gratitude and humility that we remember all those in the British, Allied and Commonwealth forces who served and died fighting for our freedom."
