What our Clients say
“… Katinka started working with me just after I had taken over group-wide sales responsibility. I had “inherited” a team of highly ambitious sales guys who were making my life difficult by pulling into different directions and pursuing mainly their own advantage - at least that was my perspective.
It turned out they needed me to lead with a much stronger backbone and a clear corrective as they were preying on each other and discouraging the honest performers among them. They were begging for me to lead! But I felt uncomfortable as the bad cop and kept trying to collaborate.
Katinka challenged me to step up and create a level playing field for the whole division - and we dug deep and found some old roots that were holding me back. So, I dissolved my hidden fears and called the bigger egos back into line - and as a result of more order and fairness, the team’s engagement and our division’s performance rose dramatically. Interestingly, my work got a lot easier at the same time, which is something I had not expected. By working with her weird neurological tricks, Katinka truly “graduated” me and my brain and my instincts into the higher leadership league which I now play in.”
Head of Sales, European venture capital firm
“I found Katinka in a critical moment of my international e-commerce start-up. We were still in the advanced fundraising phase, our product was at different levels of market readiness, and our top management team had some great people, but also some serious non-performers who were put there by the supervisory board. Coming from a philanthropic standpoint I wanted to make it work and fuse everyone together in fairness and mutual hard work.
Katinka questioned my approach and challenged me immediately to correct the imbalance and to heal the underperformance of critical divisions and interfaces, which was in turn holding other areas back while the market was eagerly expecting our product, but tragically remained unharvested. Katinka boldly disrupted my comfort zone and actually got me to change my emotional landscape from self-appeasement to a form of righteous rage. By harvesting that energy, I executed some strong personnel decisions, replaced the non-performers and more boldly corrected my teams’ behaviors as needed. I forged collaboration and gave ultimatums where there had been unending conflict.
We designed a corporate culture around the values I carry deep in my heart and I rolled it out into the company with strong directives, acting as role model as best I could. In short, I experienced a true leadership breakthrough which led to a performance boost throughout the company. Katinka is the one who boldly challenged and empowered me to leverage my true alpha power while remaining the goodhearted guy I have always been. I am keeping Katinka on my speed dial as my go-to advisor going forward.“
CEO, global e-commerce start-up
“Katinka is an exceptionally insightful, powerful executive coach who effectively cuts through the difficult issues faced by women in the C-suite and on board level.
As the director for the Women Directors Leadership Summit, I have worked internationally with Katinka as our lead coach since 2016 and have seen first-hand the breakthrough impact of Katinka’s work.
I personally know many high-powered people whose lives have been transformed by Katinka’s work. She remains my trusted advisor whenever I face a challenging decision.“
Dr. Herta von Stiegel
Member of the Board,
London Metal Exchange
“Katinka recruited in several mandates as the exclusive Executive Searcher for our company, a global market leader in industrial plastics.
She has the experience, the intuitive intelligence and the nose of a “truffle hunter” to find the black pearl amongst all possible candidates - and often in difficult markets. With her outstanding business acumen and strategic perspective, Katinka understands organizational needs at the strategic level and she even helped us understand what and whom we would be needing, better than we had taken the time to spell it out ourselves.
She works with a handpicked selection through a thorough, well-prepared, and truly customer-centric search process. As a special bonus enabling her to generate interest and attracting the best talent, Katinka has a very personal and appreciative touch in addressing candidates, but also for us as her clients. Besides making all first and following candidate contacts herself to ensure that perfect impression, she continuously stayed in touch with us as her client throughout the entire process. This provides transparency, creates trust, and allows swift adjustments where needed.
Among others, one of the top of range talents in my team was recruited by Katinka, truly improving my bench strength! Katinka is a true and valuable secret weapon and eye-level partner in staffing talent, especially for hard-to-fill positions requiring exceptional talent. To top it off, as a boutique search-firm, her success-based rates are exceptionally fair. Unconditional recommendation!
A.S., Head of HR EMEA / global market leader industrial plastics
“Katinka focused on the challenges I have as a woman executive in a primarily masculine management setting, and has brought me from a place of self-doubt and non-recognition by senior management to a flourishing career.
She truly unleashed my leadership strengths and performance potential while carefully balancing those demands with my role as a mother.
Katinka is a secret weapon for any woman who seeks a career breakthrough while raising a family. I continue to reach out to Katinka now that I’m navigating the pharma-ceutical industry’s top echelons.
Dr. H. L.
Medical Director, Global Pharmaceutical Group
“I had experienced a leadership breakup in my previous organization and was out on the street by my own decision, not sure what the next step would be. Katinka challenged me to acid-test a special dream I had always had: to be a founder and entrepreneur in my special field, and to continue the work I loved under my own leadership.
Katinka has a special way of poking and insisting when she senses there is much more potential and strength than someone lets on. Which, she says is the case with most people, only very few ever find someone to gently press it out of them. Well she crushed it out of me in very challenging, emotional, strategic, hot and cool sessions. Katinka has an instinct of putting her finger right onto the mental pain point, then using it to convert that energy into leverage and healthy power.
Today I run a successful organization with my whole family involved, making a difference in people’s lives, and I keep sending dear friends in similar situations to Katinka’s coaching and advisory practice. The ones she accepts into her practice, which is not everybody, all come out renewed, strengthened, empowered and most importantly - they all make it in the long run. No quitters after Katinka has done her thing!”
Director, Germany-based philanthropic organization
“Dear Katinka,
I can not thank you enough for the excellent work you did in the last 2 days in supporting this (global Pharmaceutical executive) meeting. We are all so happy that you were there and took so much burden of the work in supporting the team and coordinating with them all transitions on stage and moderating so elegantly the overall meeting including these repetitions over the day. It was for us a pleasure to have you as part of the team and we hope this was the first and surely not the last one!! We shall see each other again soon!”
F.M., International event management group
“Katinka started working with me as my personal executive coach in 2014 when I was first promoted to an HR director role for EMEA, and she remained by my side over many years for ad-hoc leadership supervision and as an HR Strategy sounding board.
With Katinka by my side I could grow to my full potential in demonstrating a candid straightforwardness in the world of C-suite management while keeping my own authenticity. Katinka accompanied me in many difficult and tricky situations of corporate politics with her positive energy, clever savviness and her breadth of vision. At the same time Katinka was rigorous with me not take the easy route out of fear.
During one of the most important change processes in our company, Katinka had also taken the role as advisor for our internal communications, that included a Communication Strategy, a Deployment Plan, a Communication Guideline for Leaders, Messages to Employees and most importantly, how to manage the informal employee communication. Katinka’s work was the most professional Change Management efforts I have experienced in my career so far.
I strongly recommend Katinka for leaders who need to understand the prerequisites of systemically approaching the top management world – she stands for a direct, effective and honest way of finding your leadership personality that won’t allow fear to dominate your path! Between stimulus and response is our freedom and accountability – Katinka shows you how to fill it!
Thank you Katinka, I am so grateful for everything you did for me!”
A.G., Head of HR EMEA, global industrial metals group
“Katinka showed me a completely new path to how I can be successful as a woman executive. And without the effort of adapting to a power driven environment - but instead, by leveraging my true strengths. She helped me identify my leadership qualities and focus on the really important issues - and encouraged me to confront and dissolve my fears!
From decades of her own professional experience as an executive in banking and consulting, Katinka has real-life examples and cases which are also the very practical foundation of her research, and both make her a clever and “street-smart” executive coach who taught me to think like “the other side”… it works!
Her insights into corporate politics and how the game is really played, together with her own charisma and verve, make her an extremely effective companion on the executive journey to the C-suite.
Couldn't have found a better coach :-) !!!”
A.R., Head of HR Organization, European Food Group
“Leadership starts from within and as such one can only advance when one discovers one's true self. This is where your journey with Katinka will begin. Her coaching will help you discover your inner saboteurs to see clearly what is holding you back as a leader. She has a unique methodology to tailor her provocation and coaching around your specific personality and challenges, rather than some generalist textbook ideas of management best practice. Katinka’s coaching brought me to a place where I now act decisively and fearlessly in challenging situations, and also better understand the power of leading with love. I can highly recommend her coaching.”
A.S., CEO fintech startup, Berlin