You need a clear path. Then you won’t be consumed by the distance of the horizon.
I hike. I bike. I run. All three teach me that you need a plan and milestones to get to your destination.
My name is Philipp Rosenthal.
I was trained as a communicator.
I work as a business coach & consultant.
I am an outdoor person and pretty “informal”.
I gathered my 20+ years of experience all over the place: in large corporations, on the agency side, in consultancies and since 2017 as a freelance business coach. I’ve worked in Europe and the US and have delivered mandates in Asia, the Middle East and South Africa.
I’ve worked as…
copywriter (yes, really),
business consultant,
start-up & people manager,
business & thought leader and,
team & project coach (of course).
What I can bring to the table comes from success as much as it comes from failure. To learn not to try certain things again is an essential step in personal development. I can only recommend it.
Working with large companies is something I feel comfortable with. I am very aware of corporate and regional culture aspects, politics and power dynamics.
If there is one thing I am particularly good at:
I ask the right and often uncomfortable questions…
I get my energy from spending time in the mountains and away from anything digital. On my feet (hiking), on my bike, on the SUP or while bouldering I learn about pacing myself, planning the right route and making sure that I am prepared to handle surprises.
The Digital Sherpa is my metaphor for how I see myself. Whenever possible, I relieve my clients (or colleagues) from the unnecessary weight, make sure we find the right way and pace for the journey and create a common understanding of what’s lying ahead.
I sincerely enjoy guiding people through complex situations with an outside view and the ability to take a step back and look at things from a different angle. Sometimes that’s all it takes to discover the right next move. To do that I, apply engaging and challenging but also fun workshop concepts – sometimes entire sequences of different workshops.
These, often custom-tailored workshops allow people to access and structure the required information or insight and at the same time become an active (and a lot of the time even committed) part of a change and transformation process.
Through my time in the IT industry, I have learned to understand the meaning, magnitude and influencing factors of complex technology. That’s why I am able to help business and IT people to get on the same page and understand that they only use a different language to describe the same idea, objective or solution.
Why the Sherpa?
Because I cannot climb the “digital mountain” for the people I work with. But I can make their journey to the summit a lot more pleasant.
I learn & teach.
In 2018 I’ve started my training in mimic resonance and am now a certified Mimic Resonance ® Consultant … but that was only the first step of a long journey.
I frequently listen to podcasts & read about sociology, psychology, organisational development and pretty much anything that grabs my attention at TED.com. I strongly recommend…
The Knowledge Project; Hosted by Shane Parrish
Work Life with Adam Grant (a TED podcast)
NPR’s “Hidden Brain”; Hosted by Shankar Vedantam
Zeit Online “Alles gesagt” (German)
Since 2020 I am a visiting lecturer at the EPFL, Lausanne. As part of the Executive MBA (EMBA) program, I run a course on Change Management in the context of Digital Transformation. The course is a mix of change theory (systemic thinking, theory frameworks, motivation) and practice insight (pitfalls & success factors).