My Biography
If I had to pick two leadership skills worth practicing, I’d go with kindness and curiosity.
Hi, I am Robin. I am a leadership strategist and entrepreneur operating at the intersection of strategy and organizational change… and the open ocean. I help executives develop and execute strategies for organizational transformation by combining leadership practices with an entrepreneurial mindset and technological understanding. The result: Systems that actually work in dynamic environments and develop teams that are robust enough to survive the next crisis. My philosophy is simple: Leadership starts where control ends. It's the art of activating people toward a common goal, even when the context shifts. I don’t just teach this but I live it. As a founder of the venture capital firm Njordis and the education company Global Institute of Leadership and Technology, I’m a builder first. For more than a decade, I’ve been advising leaders and executives across Europe, Asia, the Middle East, and the Americas on how to develop progress-driven teams. I also work with HR teams to design organizational learning programs that not only deliver content but instead focus on behavior change and actual skill adoption. I don’t hand out generic motivation. I partner with you to fix problems, seize opportunities, and move from stagnation to progress. Over the last decade I:→ Worked with 3,000+ executives on their transformation efforts to deliver results in dynamic environments across Europe, the US Asia, and the Middle East.→ Designed leadership development strategies for Deutsche Telekom, Lufthansa, Volkswagen, and Banco Santander, among others.→ Advised 650+ founders and startups on strategy, fundraising, scaling, and organizational development.→ Taught leadership, entrepreneurship, and innovation at universities including the European Business School, Frankfurt School, the University of Barcelona and NYU.→ Advised global bodies like the European Commission and the World Economic Forum on innovation ecosystem strategies.→ Built ventures in software, education, healthcare, logistics, and retail — and am now launching an investment platform to scale innovations in the blue economy In my work, I’m most interested in what people do when things are unclear. Not what they say in slide decks, but how they sense the next step, adjust to take action, and challenge their decisions. I believe leadership should feel real and that kindness and curiosity are key skills to focus on. And that the most useful question is often: “What’s one thing we can do by the end of today?” If you’re looking for someone who brings structure without rigidity, energy without theatrics, and clarity without fluff, I’d be happy to talk. If there’s good coffee and a marker in the room, even better.
Essays
A Toast to the Boring Wins
NYE is basically the world’s biggest collective planning meeting with zero agenda and too much champagne. The countdown feels like progress, but it’s just a cue. A strong year isn’t a personality upgrade; it’s a minimum viable year built to work on a bad Tuesday. Boring wins are repeatable actions that survive mood and noise. Pick one boring win for 2026 and protect it. Go big tonight. Go boring tomorrow.
Calibrating for Weather You Haven’t Met Yet
Executing harder is often just a way to avoid admitting the conditions have changed. Adaptability isn’t a vibe; it is strictly the speed and quality of your updates. Most teams fail because they are more loyal to their old routine than the current reality. If your behavior doesn’t change after you learn something new, you haven’t adapted. True calibration means matching your effort to the wind you have, not the wind you remember.
Adult Supervision as a Service: Why Leaders Hide Behind Experts
Many executives hire consultants not to solve problems, but to purchase "Adult Supervision as a Service"; an expensive insurance policy against personal blame. By outsourcing the risk of decision-making to external experts, leaders unconsciously trade their authority for emotional safety. This dynamic creates a dysfunctional inversion where consultants effectively run the show while executives merely "align," leaving the organization void of genuine accountability. The result is a workforce of passive passengers waiting for direction rather than captains taking ownership of outcomes. Ultimately, while leaders can rent intelligence and analysis, they cannot outsource the courage required to say, "This decision is mine."