I’ve been on both sides of this. There’s a way through.
I'm a dual citizen with German heritage, based in Munich. I've navigated this from both sides — the American leadership identity and the European organizational logic. That's not something you get from a cultural briefing.
I work with senior leaders and executives who have taken on international roles in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland, and are discovering that the tools, authority, and instincts that made them successful at home no longer work the same way here.
The business problems show up fast. The team responds differently than expected. Influence that came naturally at home has to be rebuilt from scratch. Decision-making slows because the informal networks don't exist yet. The 90-day plan that looked clear in the briefing now feels like it was written for a different context. And the personal cost follows close behind — the exhaustion, the distance in relationships, the growing sense that the life being built here isn't quite the life that was imagined.
Most leaders wait too long to get real support. The first ninety days are not the time to push through alone. They are the highest-leverage window for getting the assignment right.
How I work
The work we do together isn't about optimizing performance or surviving the assignment. It's about using this moment — disorienting as it is — as the threshold it actually is. A chance to lead more honestly, think more clearly, and close the distance between who you are and how you're showing up.
I understand both sides — the American leadership identity and the European organizational logic, the consensus culture, the hierarchy signals, the feedback norms — because I have lived and worked inside both. That translation is not something learned from a cultural briefing. It comes from experience.
Leaders who do this work make better decisions faster. They build influence and trust in the new context without abandoning what made them effective at home. The assignment stops being something to survive and starts being something to actually inhabit — professionally and personally.
Selected Background
Twenty years of executive coaching and leadership facilitation across the U.S. and Europe, including The Energy Project, PwC U.S. Leadership Coaching Center of Excellence, PwC Germany Workforce Transformation, UNC Executive Development, and global leadership programs across EMEA.
ICF PCC · Georgetown Leadership Coaching · ORSC · Leadership Circle · Hogan · HBDI
A More Personal Note
I've navigated this myself. New country, unfamiliar culture, figuring out how to lead and build a life in a place that didn't yet know me. I know what it costs — professionally and personally — to perform at the highest level while privately disoriented. That experience is not a footnote to this work. It is the foundation of it.
I work with a small number of leaders at a time. The work is private, serious, and built around what's actually happening — not a generic program.
Selected Credentials
ICF PCC · Georgetown University Leadership Coaching · ORSC · Hogan Assessment · Leadership Circle 360 · HBDI · Positive Psychology & Wellbeing Coaching · The Energy Project Certified Facilitator · Global Team Coaching Institute · National Board Certified Health & Wellness Coach · Unified Mindfulness
Want to connect?
If you're a senior leader navigating an international assignment in DACH, or an organization looking to support the leaders you've sent, I'd be glad to hear more.