Leadership Development · Munich · Worldwide

The way is
under your feet.

Business results improve through leadership. Culture is not a soft initiative. It is the operating system of your organisation — and it drives the numbers.

Real leadership starts with self. Strategy follows. Structure follows. Self-awareness is the foundation. Everything else is downstream.

The answers are already within you. Leaders don't need more frameworks. They need the conditions - and the courage - to access what they already know.

Freedom without accountability is noise. Accountability without freedom is control. Real leadership lives in the space between.

Business is inherently noble. When built on voluntary exchange and genuine value creation, business is one of the most powerful forces for good in the world.

Work is an expression of who you are. Not just what you do. Leaders who understand this build cultures that outlast them.

The future is abundant. Leaders who operate from possibility rather than fear attract the best people - and keep them.

Rolf doesn't give you answers. He creates the conditions where you find your own. That's far more powerful - and far more lasting.

Managing Director · Financial Services

One of the most enriching professional experiences I've had. He created connections between ideas and between people - and made sure every person in the room was included and moved forward.

Senior Leader · Retail Industry · Portugal

I express these beliefs through coaching, workshops, and keynotes.

Book a conversation The Work →

The Work

Impact starts
from within.

Three formats. One method. Every engagement follows the same inner logic.

01 - Coaching

Executive Coaching

1:1 work with senior leaders ready to go deeper. We explore the patterns below the surface - the beliefs, blind spots, and behaviors that shape everything above it. Conducted in your language of choice.

02 - Workshops

Leadership Workshops

Immersive experiences designed to create a spark. Participants leave with something more lasting than a framework - a new relationship to themselves, and to the impact they have on others.

03 - Keynotes

Keynotes

Ideas that challenge, reframe, and ignite. Delivered in English, German, French, Spanish, or Portuguese - for leadership conferences, senior offsites, and company events.

The Approach - You Already Know
Step 1

Get Real

"Where am I really - and what's been keeping me stuck?"

  • Deep listening. Your own answers.
  • What truly matters right now?
  • Patterns shaping your leadership
  • What's really holding you back
Step 2

Trust What You Know

"It's about trusting the answer you already carry."

  • New awareness. Lasting change.
  • Blind spots become choices
  • Your best thinking finally has room
  • From self-doubt to self-trust
Step 3

Change Everything

"One conscious leader changes everything around them."

  • Awareness becomes action
  • One conscious leader. A movement of many.
  • You light it. Others keep it burning.
  • The momentum you create outlasts you.
↓ Download the one-pager ↓ Auf Deutsch herunterladen ↓ Transforming feedback conversations with awareness and AI: an example

New

Combining the power of awareness with the power of AI.

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Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.

It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us. Your playing small does not serve the world. There's nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you.

We are all meant to shine as children do. It's not just in some of us, it's in everyone, and as we let our light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. Our presence automatically liberates others.
Marianne Williamson ↗ watch the clip

The Story

The breakdown
that became
the work.

At the height of professional success - as a founding partner building a consulting business - everything fell apart. Because of the invisible forces inside the room: values in conflict, blind spots unexamined, relationships unable to hold the weight.

"The way out wasn't a new strategy. It was a journey inward. And what I found there changed everything - not just for myself, but for how I see every leader I work with today."

That journey led to over 18 years at the intersection of leadership, culture, and human transformation - working with senior teams across industries and continents, rooted in the principles of Conscious Business.

Before that: Senior Principal at AT Kearney in New York, leading global strategy and organisational engagements. Founding partner at Sustainomics, delivering over $400M in annual savings across client projects.

The hard business credentials matter. They mean that when we talk about results, I know what results means.

Education MBA, Wharton School · Postgraduate Diploma in Economics, London School of Economics
Former Senior Principal, AT Kearney New York · Founding Partner, Sustainomics
Languages English · German · French · Spanish · Portuguese
Based Munich, Germany · Works worldwide
Rolf-Alexander Schimrock

What shapes my thinking

  • Byron KatieThe Work · Loving What Is
  • Eckhart TolleThe Power of Now · A New Earth
  • Ken WilberA Brief History of Everything
  • Jordan Peterson12 Rules for Life · Maps of Meaning
  • Fred KofmanConscious Business
  • Blair EnnsThe Win Without Pitching Manifesto
  • Ayn RandAtlas Shrugged
  • PodcastsAll In · Moonshots with Peter Diamandis

Together

Let's have a real conversation.

Just a conversation. About where you are, where you want to go, and whether working together makes sense. Most leaders I work with knew within the first twenty minutes. One conversation will tell us.

Book a call

30 minutes. Walk away with clarity on where you stand and what's possible.

Or write directly: rolfschimrock@hotmail.com

Munich · Worldwide · 5 languages

Book a 30-min call

Former clients

Companies I've worked with over the last twenty years - many of them through partners such as Axialent, the Center for Creative Leadership, and AT Kearney.

ItaúItaú
CitibankCitibank
SantanderSantander
BNP ParibasBNP Paribas
KPMGKPMG
Mercedes-BenzMercedes-Benz
FordFord
SiemensSiemens
BoschBosch
Booking.comBooking.com
Mercado LivreMercado Livre
TIMTIM
RocheRoche
NovartisNovartis
BioNTechBioNTech

Current and former partners that have shaped me

Axialent

Global leader in culture transformation, founded on the principles of Conscious Business.

axialent.com →

Wisnet

São Paulo-based consulting firm specialising in leadership and organisational development across Latin America.

wisnet.com.br →

Center for Creative Leadership

One of the world's premier leadership development institutions. Research-based tools that accelerate growth at every level.

ccl.org →

AT Kearney

One of the world's leading global management consulting firms. Rolf served as Senior Principal in New York, leading strategy and organisational engagements across industries and geographies.

kearney.com →

Sustainomics

A consulting firm co-founded by Rolf, delivering over $400M in annual savings across client projects through integrated strategy, sustainability, and organisational performance engagements.

sustainomics.com →
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Evidence · Leadership & Business Results

When leadership changes,
the numbers follow.

Case Study 01

Fastest-growing region in the company — white goods, Munich

Consumer Electronics  ·  Munich  ·  Confidential

The business was under pressure from every direction. Chinese and Asian competitors were eroding market share and squeezing margins — compressing both the top and bottom line. The leadership team faced the kind of moment where most organisations cut costs and tighten control. This team made a different choice.

They decided to invest in leadership and culture as a strategic priority. That meant defining — clearly and collectively — what kind of leadership they stood for, what behaviours they expected from one another, and what kind of culture they were building together. It was not a values exercise on paper. It was a working commitment, held accountable from the top.

The region became the fastest-growing in the entire company. Not despite the external pressure — in part because of how the leadership team responded to it. Clarity of culture, when it is real, becomes a competitive advantage.

Case Study 02

Microsoft — from "know-it-all" to "learn-it-all"

Technology  ·  Global  ·  Public

When Satya Nadella became CEO of Microsoft in 2014, he inherited a company with a toxic internal culture: competitive, siloed, and driven by the need to appear to already know everything. Innovation was stalling. The stock had been flat for a decade. Talent was leaving.

His diagnosis was cultural, not strategic. Drawing on Carol Dweck's research on mindset, Nadella identified the shift that needed to happen: from a "know-it-all" culture to a "learn-it-all" culture. That change — in how people led, how they collaborated, and how they related to failure and growth — became the foundation for everything that followed. New products, new partnerships, new platforms. All downstream of a different way of being.

Microsoft's revenue grew from $86 billion to over $236 billion under his leadership. Market capitalisation rose from $300 billion to over $2.5 trillion. The transformation was widely cited as one of the most significant corporate turnarounds of the decade — rooted not in technology strategy, but in a decision about culture.

These cases reflect a consistent pattern: when a leadership team commits to a shared culture and a different quality of being, the doing — and the results — change with it. That is the work.