From one-day workshops
to full transformation.

"When AI goes on a rampage, does that spell the end of good manners?"

One of the questions Vivian Hecker and I were asked in an interview for Welt am Sonntag.

The conversation was about chatbots that are too polite.
About people who insult their language models.
And about apologies an AI makes without feeling any remorse.

One detail seems unremarkable at first glance:

The language models studied confirmed their users' behaviour on average nearly one and a half times as often as humans in comparable situations.

Sounds harmless.

But anyone who receives nothing but agreement every day runs the risk of questioning themselves less and less.

What does that mean for teams and leaders who use AI as a sparring partner on a daily basis?

These questions led us to our book.
Human values, in our view, belong in every AI training.

Thank you to Jörn Lauterbach for the stimulating questions and to the team at Welt am Sonntag for the interview.

Be nice to the machine or not?
Trust it or not?

For me the two are connected:
how we treat AI and how critically we examine its answers.

What do you think?

Link to the article in the first comment.

#KIKnigge #AuthenticMeetsAgentic #WeltamSonntag

Read the interview in Welt am Sonntag (German): https://www.welt.de/regionales/hamburg/article6ac782f66e0a564ee52e92f3

It's here. In print and in shops:

“Der KI-Knigge. Authentisch trifft Agentisch. Wie wir Mensch bleiben, wenn die Maschine mitarbeitet.” (How we stay human when the machine works alongside us.)

AI is everywhere. Good manners are not.

Emails write themselves.
The assistant books the meetings.
Replies arrive in seconds.

And suddenly everyone sounds the same.

Yet every company has its own tone.
Its own culture and identity.
How you greet people. How you politely say no.

The human side between the lines.
Leave it to AI and you lose it, bit by bit.

That's why this book:
So that good style survives, even when AI is co-writing.

Vivian Hecker, a certified etiquette trainer and active member of the Deutsche-Knigge-Gesellschaft, brings the manners. I bring the daily work with AI in companies.

One sentence of hers has stuck with me:
“The faster the machine answers, the scarcer attention, respect and genuine interest become.”

Thank you, dear Vivian, for the intense exchange of ideas. To Julia Neubauer for the wonderful, loving design on every page. And to Isabelle Romann for her strict eye in proofreading and editing, and her endless patience with us.

To finish, a question I am genuinely curious about:
How important is good style to you, and does it still come through now that AI is co-writing?

What makes a good AI course?

50 participants from my courses, surveyed anonymously. Overall satisfaction 4.3 out of 5. Recommendation 8.6 out of 10. 94 percent say: expectations met.

More exciting than the numbers is what lies behind them. Three things make an AI course valuable:

1. Your own topics are the best practice material.
Made-up case studies are cumbersome. Take your real tasks, and you will see the same day what it does for you.

2. You grow as a person, too.
You learn to think through tasks more clearly, hand them over cleanly and ask better questions. That stays, even when the tools change.

3. Live takes you further than any video.
Videos are everywhere, many of them free. What moves you forward is the moment you build something together.

And the modules? Top rated: prompting with FOKUS+ (4.6), building your own assistants (4.5), automation with approval points (4.4), your own AI policy (4.4), setting up agents (4.4). Weakest: the model comparison (3.9). We are rebuilding it.

What would the perfect AI course look like for you? Tell me in the comments. I read every answer and will include it in the next evaluation.

Authentic meets Agentic.

2 days. 35 minutes. One real task.
The whole IONITY leadership round watching.

That was my favourite moment of our two-day AI workshop.

No slides about someday. Just hands-on proof of what actually works.

They challenged me live in the meeting:
Here's a real business challenge. You have 35 minutes.

So I delivered.

Silence.

Feedback afterwards:
external partners would have needed considerably longer.

That's the whole point of an AI Sprint:
Show it. Prove it in the room, with real work.

Thank you for the openness, the sharp questions, and the trust, Jeroen van Tilburg, Torsten Kiedel, Dr. Meta Kessler, David MIGNAN, Daniel Heßelmann, Matthias Rehm.

IONITY is a genuinely cool company with a leadership crew that doesn't just delegate AI downward. They roll up their sleeves.

Two great days with you.

Looking forward to seeing you again.

Authentic meets Agentic. ⚡

Campaign Germany asks:
Who will be the next Chief AI Officer?

For an article on future CAIO candidates in companies and agencies, my name came up and I was asked for my view.

My counter-question:
Will companies really need a permanent Chief AI Officer in the future?

After quite a few gigs, from mid-sized businesses to large corporations, these are my three questions before you create a dedicated AI position:

1️⃣ Does your management understand AI itself?
If not, no new role will solve the problem. Delegated transformation fails. The most important AI investment is in your own judgement at the leadership table.

2️⃣ Do you have an adoption challenge or a technology challenge?
In almost every case: adoption. The tools are there. What is missing is the translation into your teams' daily work. That is a job for culture and leadership, and no IT role will do it.

3️⃣ Is the task permanent or a phase?
In my view: a phase. In a few years, nobody will need a C-level function for employees to use AI. So don't build a permanent role for a transitional problem.

I am currently doing exactly this job on an interim basis at several companies. From coaching management to enabling the teams.

In, enable, deliver, out.

Because right now, mid-sized businesses are deciding whether we ride this wave the right way.

Which of the three questions is the hardest one in your company right now?

Thanks also for sharing your insights, Markus Neckar, David Henkel-Rick, Karin Immenroth, Sascha Derx, Achim Schauerte, Daniel Maurer, Christian Thron, Stephan Baier and Sven Doerrenbaecher

How an AI rollout to 80+ employees succeeds.
Last Friday was the kickoff of my AI Camp at ARNO Group.

A hybrid concept:
live sessions + for the first time, avatars of me and the team.

22 employees turned up to the very first session.
And honestly: days like this fascinate me every time.

Companies that don't just talk about AI. They do it.
And where it then really takes off.

A quick look back: a few months ago we started with individual workshops.
A small team. Lots of curiosity. The first AI agents of their own.

Then last week, onboarding for the whole company.

3 things that were confirmed once again today:

1. Pull beats push.
Nobody had to be ordered to be here.
People wanted to come, and they came.

2. The best use cases don't come from the top.
They come from the team.
“Hang on, couldn't this work for our process too?

3. Enthusiasm is contagious.
The first 22 bring in the next ones.
That is exactly how it scales.

What came back:

Questions that went deeper than expected.
Ideas I hadn't thought of myself.

This is really picking up speed now.
80+ is only the beginning.

Thank you to the whole ARNO Group team.
For the pace and your enthusiasm.

How does change start in your company:
an order from the top or a spark from within?

Which LLM for which job?

The honest answer: it depends.
The better answer: it depends on what for.

Coding? Claude.
Autonomous agents? GPT.

Entire sets of contracts in one go? Gemini.
Bulk tasks on a small budget? Flash-Lite or Haiku.

I have sorted all current models from OpenAI, Anthropic and Google.
With strengths, weaknesses and a quick-pick matrix.

As of 07/2026.

The most important insight while putting it together: no provider wins everywhere.
If you still use one model for everything, you are giving away quality or budget.

Usually both.

The compass is available as a PDF.

Just comment “Compass” and it will come to you by DM.

Which model is your default right now?

Whether retailer, micro-business, shop, advertising agency, start-up, mid-sized company or large industrial client: Google offers every company the right online marketing product to drive its growth. With authentic video documentaries, we portrayed companies of all sectors and sizes and showed which approach led each of them to success.

Task

Inspiring companies to use Google products and services.

Challenge

Inspiring audiences with different levels of knowledge and presenting all relevant messages in an entertaining, convincing format.

Approach

Preliminary research, interviews and on-site documentation.

Execution

90- to 120-second videos that concisely and entertainingly show each company's challenge and the matching Google solution.

Outcome

Inspiring company portraits that give surprising insights into Google products and services and encourage viewers to think about how they could use them in their own business.

Watch the films

Some companies talk about change.
And some take their shoes off.

And step barefoot right into the middle of it.

FRANK Gruppe is one of the second kind.

Today I had the pleasure of working with their leadership team together with my co-speaker Sven Doerrenbaecher. And we were seriously impressed.

No “maybe we'll do something with AI at some point”.
Instead, a whole day dedicated to change.
With more than 35 leaders.

In focus: AI agents. Magic dashboards.
Real tools for everyday work.

Sven kicked things off with the motto of the day:
Embrace change”. And his book EMBRAICE.

Then I got to lead the hackathon with Unlocktomorrow.ai.
Under my guiding principle: Authentic meets Agentic.

What happened was exactly what Sven and I had hoped for:
And what you can never force.

The teams simply took off.

The dashboards? Insane.
Numbers: live. Clear. At a glance.
Every team built its own view of the business.

And as for the assistants. They take real work off people's plates.
Research, writing, tedious routine.
No gimmicks. Colleagues who help out in everyday work.

The best part was not the technology.

It was the faces.
Sceptical looks that suddenly turned into grins.
And into shining eyes.

The winner was an onboarding assistant.
From now on, it brings new colleagues into the company faster.

Less searching. Less waiting. More arriving.
Real added value. The whole room celebrated it.

And the surprise of the day?

The entire workshop ran exactly on schedule.
Every team. Delivered to the minute.

That's how you want it.

And what I'm taking away:

You recognise a strong team by what it does
when you give it the right tools.

We delivered them.
The FRANK Gruppe worked the rest of the magic themselves.

Thank you for your trust, Indra Renzler, Dr. Ulf Schauenburg, Julia Albrecht, Daniel Seifert-Ziehe MRICS.

And to everyone who made this day possible.

We look forward to the journey continuing 🚀

And for everyone else out there:
What does your transformation look like: shoes or barefoot?

Co-created content campaign launching the new Nike Hypervenom 3 boot on social networks. Around the race for the top scorer's trophy, we developed real-time posts with custom emojis of the players, their Nike boots and their current goal tally. In collaboration with artists and influencers around the world, we created relevant content with more than one million views.

Task

Launch of the Nike Motion Blur Pack at the 2017 season finale among football-mad teenagers, pro athletes and influencers.

Starting point

At campaign launch, Bayern are already confirmed as Bundesliga champions and main sponsor Adidas is in the spotlight. How do we create attention?

Challenge

Young football fans have no interest in plain packshots of boots or athletes. They want content with meaning that stands apart from the look of conventional football posts.

Approach

Interviews on media habits, weekly rhythms and relevant football moments, combined with studies on youth culture, football fandom and social media use.

Execution

An influencer goal countdown. Around the race for the top scorer's trophy, we developed real-time posts with custom emojis of the players, their Nike boots and their current goal tally.

Outcome

Over 1.2 million views. 460,000 views on photo posts and 810,000 on video. We received comments on the emojis and boots from all over the world.

AI saves you time.
And that is exactly the trap.

Anthropic has just analysed 400,000 Claude Code sessions.
The result: the tech-savvy are not the ones getting the most out of it.

It is the people with the deepest expertise.

I see it the same way. Which leads to an interesting thesis:
What do you do with the time AI gives you?

The easy answer: lean back, nod the output through.
I do the opposite: I put it back into my own knowledge.

Not to chat.

To judge what the machine spits out.
And to keep learning, constantly.

That is where the leverage lies:
The agent can generate.
Whether it is any good is decided by someone who understands the subject.

The thesis matches what I see in my workshops too:
The best concepts never come from those who just push buttons.

They come from those who understand what it is all about.

Time saved is no gain in leisure.

It is the chance to invest in your own expertise.

How do you see it?

Repositioning concept to revive the isla brand. We created a logo and packaging relaunch and developed an international brand strategy including CI, TV, print and online campaigns, POS communication and a trade campaign, as well as employee training, sales presentations and extensive sponsorship campaigns.

Task

A brand relaunch that catapults the former market leader back to the top.

Challenge

Saturated market, lack of consumer relevance, loss of medical credibility, declining pharmacy loyalty.

Approach

Awareness through a highly emotional TV and print campaign. Product relevance through new packaging, product launches and trade campaigns.

Execution

TV spots, packaging relaunch, online communication, training, promotions, POS activation, trade ads, sponsorships.

Outcome

Sales up by more than 300%. Most successful product launch of the year.

Watch the films

Two days. One hot-and-cold shower.
And that was exactly the best part.

Two intense workshop days at the ARNO Group.
Igniting the next stage.

Phase 3 of the Agentic Company: autonomous systems.
From the first node to a multi-agent system.

Day 1: hot. The adventure day.
My colleague Moritz Hahn shows the team:

Build nodes. Wire them up. Let the data flow.
There was experimenting. Trying things out. Bold building.

The feeling: “This? We can do.”

Day 2: cold. My part: landing the plane.
“Let's just build something” suddenly turned into “Oh. We have to be done by 5 pm.”

And suddenly you could feel it.
The difference between having fun and really delivering.

One participant summed it up:
“Half of a good n8n workflow is debugging.
So at least 90% of your time.” 😅

Three learnings:

1️⃣ Building is the beginning. Landing is the work.
The first approach? Done in no time.
One stuck node, one changed data set: suddenly everything grinds to a halt.
Quick rethinking required.

2️⃣ A sense of time is worth gold.
If you know how long debugging takes, you promise less.
And deliver more.

3️⃣ Fun and sobering moments belong together.
Only adventure? Nothing gets finished.
Only slog? The team and the mood tip over.
You need both.

That is why the format was spot on.
First ignite. Then land.

The team mastered both sessions brilliantly.
The result: a finished content machine. 8 agents in n8n.

Hand in hand. Strong. 🚀

Huge thanks to Moritz Hahn, who sparked real learnings on day 1.
Without that foundation, no sprint on day 2. 🙌

Thank you to the ARNO Group for your trust. 🙏
Katrin Mischke, Andreas Thüringer, Till Fetzer, Kai Haenssler, Marcus Klein, Sophie Keim

The next shower will be warm again. Promise. 🔥

How is it for you?
Do you see that mix of adventure and landing in your team too?

Around this claim, we help Snapchat grow in the DACH region with campaigns and event communication, strengthening its position as a leading provider of effective “AR shopping” solutions for brands.

Task

Strengthen Snapchat's position as a leading provider of AR technology and innovative shopping and e-commerce solutions.

Challenge

Snapchat's AR solutions offer real value for brands and business clients across the entire funnel. With the claim “Discover the power of Snapchat”, we create the right communication platform for it.

Approach

Innovative trade fair concepts and digital campaigns for Snapchat Germany: hands-on AR filters, user, conversion and ROI figures as an experience instead of a slide.

Outcome

Business clients who no longer have AR explained to them, because they have tried it themselves.

The best workshops aren't won by tech.
They're won by team spirit and energy.

8 hours. One online sprint.
All-in on Agentic AI. ⚡

This was Pillar No. 2 of our AI Series wit IONITY.
And it hit different.

Not because of the frameworks.
Because of the current in that session.

IONITY powers Europe's fastest EV chargers.
We powered the team with Agentic AI.

Same principle: high voltage, max output.

Here's what landed:

1️⃣ Dashboards beat decks.
Live dashboards with AI instead are a game changer.
Data-native companies don't need more PowerPoints.
They need faster answers.

2️⃣ Focused prompts save real time.
Our FOCUS+ framework turned vague asks into sharp outputs.
No more "make it better."
Just precision. And less brain fry.

3️⃣ Many small quick wins = one big bang.
30 minutes every Friday to refine what you built that week.
Stack them. Repeat them. Compound them.
That's how dozens of 10% gains add up to a real big bang by year-end.

Huge thanks to the IONITY team, your energy, your sharpness, your willingness to dive in made this sprint what it was. 🙌

Aleksandra Gąsiorowska, Amanda Navarrina Potter, Barbara Ławniczek, Carl Schlyter, Christin Glienke, Markus Volk, Niek Wolters, Ruben Petri, Teresa Brügmann

What's one small AI win you've stacked this week?

Authentic. Meets. Agentic.

Integrated campaign that breaks down marketing and media decision-makers' existing prejudices about YouTube and reveals new potential. Delivered as a multi-stage event: an emotional film concept carried over into informative, entertaining quiz formats.

Task

Convincing marketing directors from around the world to add YouTube to their media plan.

Challenge

Show that YouTube users are much older and more diverse than many people think.

Approach

Analysis of global data and studies on YouTube usage.

Execution

An activating event concept with film and promotion. We surprised visitors with emotional scenes and let them discover the facts playfully.

Outcome

An event and content format that YouTube rolled out internationally for marketing decision-makers.

In January, I fired off 5 theses on Agentic AI.
Today is half-time. Time for an honest review.

Based on the numbers rather than gut feeling,
the numbers that have landed on the table since then.

1️⃣ Agents become operating systems ✅
Came true, faster than expected.

McKinsey describes the shift to agent-native enterprise software as the defining architecture pattern of 2026. The key question has moved away from the model and towards the orchestration layer.

2️⃣ The agent labour market emerges 🟡
Here I was too fast.

What is actually emerging are new roles for humans, not for agents. Forbes maps around 20 new job profiles around Agentic AI.
IBM shows: one in four companies already has a Chief AI Officer today.

3️⃣ Orchestration becomes a core skill ✅
The thesis was too cautious.
Orchestration is more than a skill. It is the bottleneck.

McKinsey measures: 62% are experimenting with agents.
Only a quarter scale them into operations. In most business functions, the scaling rate is around 10%.
Pilot yes, production no. That is exactly where everything will be decided in 2026.

4️⃣ Lifecycle management becomes reality 🟡
For the pioneers yes, for mid-sized businesses not yet.

Gartner predicts: more than 40% of Agentic AI projects will be stopped again by the end of 2027. Escalating costs, unclear value, lack of control.

Bitkom backs this up from a German perspective: a third of AI users report that the rollout turned out much more expensive than planned.

Lifecycle sounds unsexy. Until it is missing.

5️⃣ Ownership becomes a question of power ✅
Came true harder than expected.

Bitkom 2026: 41% of companies use AI. Only 21% have a formal strategy. It is exactly in this gap that ownership is being fought over today.

19% have already cut jobs as a result of using AI.

The number that appears in no keynote.
Responsibility has long stopped being a tool question.
It is a leadership question.

And now a new thesis I was missing back then:

6️⃣ The data foundation beats any model
In January, I wrote about architecture, orchestration
and ownership.

About what really decides things in the end, not a word:
the data the agent gets to see.

A recent study from May puts it in one number:
41% already use Agentic AI in production.
Only 15% have a data foundation built for it.

85% are building autonomous systems on a foundation that was never meant for autonomy. The result is more than “a little worse”.
It is “wrong, faster”.

My half-time verdict:
Three theses fully came true. Two partial hits.
And a sixth that, in hindsight, turns out to be the most important.

The studies agree on one point:
In 2026, success or failure will hinge on something other than technology.
It hinges on the invisible prerequisites: data, responsibility, leadership.

What do you think?
Which topics do you currently see as the most exciting in the AI market?

Design, icons and animations for the world's first smartwatch “Summit” by Montblanc. We developed an iconographic black-and-white design language: premium, functional and instantly readable.

Task

Design, icons and animations for Montblanc's “Summit” smartwatch.

Challenge

Design that lives up to the brand's standard of quality and fits the zeitgeist of a smartwatch. Animations that explain functions quickly. Individual CI for the partners Uber, Foursquare and Runtastic.

Approach

Delight in microseconds: watch faces, icons and transitions that bring the signature of a 100-year-old brand to a display, innovation projects at the intersection of luxury and technology.

Execution

An iconographic black-and-white design that combines timeless quality with a modern smartwatch look. Bold icons and pulsing animations with high recognition value that make the watch's functions instantly clear.

You can't tell a good sales and marketing team by its pitch.
You can tell by the way it talks about its clients.

At ARNO, it sounds like a conversation about old acquaintances.
And new friends.

This week, I once again got to spend two intense days at the ARNO Group with Moritz Hahn.

The continuation of what Martin Schaible and I started with “Empathy meets AI”.

This time: “Authentic meets Agentic.”

We worked through a lot on #AI, #assistants and #frameworks.

As amplifiers that make routines more pleasant.
So clients can be served even better.

But the methods were not what made the real difference.
It was the personalities.

Because at ARNO, it is never about “personas”.
It is about the people behind them:

The retail head of purchasing who is responsible for millions and has to make a decision he can still defend a year from now.

The brand manager caught between creative vision and hard reality, who has to protect her brand at the point of sale.

The rollout lead who lies awake at night when dozens of stores are due to open at the same time.

That is the foundation everything at ARNO has been built on for more than 85 years:
genuine interest in those who trust them.

Three things I am taking away from these days:

1️⃣ The ARNO team has something you cannot train:
Genuine interest in people and their clients.
You hear it in conversation. You see it in the questions they ask.

2️⃣ Courage is stronger than any technology.
Tools are everywhere. But the willingness to honestly question and adapt yourself for two days makes a real difference.

3️⃣ Authentic and Agentic is the ideal combination.
If you really listen and stay true to yourself, you can use technology and scale with it without losing yourself.

A huge thank you to Alien Wolter, Sophie Keim, Katrin Mischke, Joachim Stier, Andreas Thüringer, Julia Zwink, Natascha Kaupp, Hendrik Buttlar, EWA WARDAK, Till Fetzer, Elias Weber, Kai Haenssler and Melina Scheufele for the sprint together.

How does it look for you out there:
Does technology lead in your company, or people?

PS: This week, Hamburg is all about #OMR. I was 700 km further south. Some moments simply don't happen on big stages. They happen behind the scenes at the #hiddenchampions our country so urgently needs.

Integrated campaign launching VW's new Alltrack vehicle category. We had a Passat Alltrack drive across Europe with its GPS signal switched on, drawing a gigantic victory sign on a map. From this, we generated the worldwide campaign material.

Task

An interactive vehicle premiere for the new Passat Alltrack, from which all material for campaigns, catalogues and sales collateral can be generated.

Challenge

An interactive premiere drive on every type of road, so that, in line with the claim “Confident on any terrain”, a gigantic victory sign takes shape.

Approach

Show unusual everyday versatility: a production shot and photographed once and reusable for all channels and markets, including for the Touareg.

Wild: it used to take me eight hours.
Now just one.

That sentence came up yesterday in one of my sessions with the IONITY team.
Exactly the jolt I love seeing in every session.

This week, I am running an Agentic AI training there almost every day.
For the leadership team and the Sales & Growth departments.

Does it get boring? Not at all.

Because no two trainings are alike.
Different learnings. Different fails. Different quick wins.

Moments like these make me happy every time, because they show:
This is where real productivity happens.

No blah-blah about AI. Real solutions.

What blew me away: how quickly this team switched gears.
From “interesting” to “I want to put this into practice right now”.

No bored spectators. A team that rolls up its sleeves straight away.

By the end of the day, everyone had a long list of use cases.

Three things that stuck yesterday:

→ Psychological frameworks and AI complement each other perfectly.
→ The model is not the bottleneck. Your own time is.
→ One small detail can suddenly get a workflow running.

And the biggest lever is not in the tool at all.
It is in the way you collaborate.

The learning curve is steep, but it only scales as a team.

→ Share the prompt that saved you an hour
→ Optimise workflows together with others
→ Pool your questions instead of getting stuck alone

That is how yesterday's energy becomes next week's output.

AI transformation is no tool problem.
It is a question of a culture of sharing.

Thank you to the IONITY team: Damla Godefroy, Johanna Heckmann, Kim Dohanici, Sarah Schneider, Filippo Laita, Manuel Heidelsberger, Simon Oetter.

You were really strong yesterday. 🙏
See you again soon.

What is on your mind out there:

Do you collaborate with AI too?
Or is everyone working away on their own?

Authentic meets Agentic.

Composing music for the eyes: a visual language that makes sound visible, from the logo and the launch campaign to the approach for future employees.

Task

Corporate design, B2B launch campaign and recruitment approach for the world's first music hotel in Berlin.

Challenge

At the time the advertising materials were produced, the hotel had not yet been built.

Approach

Composing music for the eyes: a visual language that makes sound visible, from the logo and the launch campaign to the approach for future employees.

Execution

Collages of sound waves, renderings and photo elements in which people step into a surreal world of hotel and music. Advertising materials as unusual as the hotel itself: catalogues styled as record covers, augmented reality with MTV legend Ray Cokes and a dedicated Coke Edition.

“What you showed us today will completely change the way we work.”

Goosebumps.

Two intense workshop days on AI in Sales at the ARNO Group are behind us.

For more than 85 years, the team there has been building unique experiences at the point of sale.

Their most important building material? Humanity. They are true architects of emotion.

We put exactly this pioneering spirit into turbo mode with AI.

Martin Schaible poured a perfect foundation. With his feel for "sales charisma", he builds the bridge between human and machine.

Together with an incredibly motivated team, we ignited the first stage. The journey to the Agentic Company has begun.

What surprised me most?

How quickly an entire sales team can outgrow itself.

When output suddenly rises.
When razor-sharp pitches come together in record time.
When personas suddenly turn into risk managers.

The iron rule still stands:

People matter most.
Technology is the lever.
But a courageous team is the engine.

What does this mean for your sales?

1️⃣ The journey to the Agentic Company needs pioneers.
AI only scales what is already there culturally. ARNO proves it: openness and the drive to shape things are the absolute essence.

2️⃣ AI as research machine, humans as closers.
When agents take over the preparation, 100% of the energy flows into real empathy and building relationships.

3️⃣ Hyper-personalisation instead of the watering can.
No more standard pitches. Workflows have to revolve precisely around the decision-maker and their ROI.

A huge thank you to Alien Wolter, Sophie Keim, Hannes Hagelloch, Joachim Stier, Julia Zwink, Natascha Kaupp, Andreas Thüringer, Hendrik Buttlar and Ewa Wardak.

For your pioneering spirit, your trust and this powerful energy. You are brilliant and true "Profit Architects".

I am looking forward to the next stage:
Authentic meets Agentic 🚀

Where is your team on this journey right now?

To protect people in Germany from misinformation and manipulation attempts online, we created a video campaign based on the "prebunking" method for Google subsidiary Jigsaw, the social science company Moonshot and six German NGOs. Prebunking is a scientifically researched communication technique that helps people recognise and reject manipulation attempts.

Task

Misinformation has an Achilles heel: it often relies on the same patterns of manipulation techniques or narratives.

Execution

A series of 90-second videos that use everyday examples to show, in an easy-to-understand way, the patterns by which misinformation spreads and how the "prebunking" method can help people recognise manipulation attempts.

Watch the films

Hallucinations are no bug. They are standard.

Last week, we were doing routine maintenance on a multi-agent system.

Everything ran smoothly. The outputs sounded perfect.

But something was off.

So we dug deeper, and lo and behold:

One fact, completely made up.
It almost slipped through.

And that got us thinking:
If we have to check this manually, it doesn't scale.

Because the more agents we deploy, the bigger the risk.

One agent researches.
A second one summarises.
A third one writes.
A fourth one sends it out.

And who checks that it is all correct?

That is why we brought in two new team members:

1. RAG Rita: our fact supplier.
She pulls information from vectorised knowledge bases.

No fantasy.
Only verified sources.

She uses Retrieval Augmented Generation.
So hallucinations drop to a minimum.

2. Challenger Clara: our AI auditor.

She checks more than our own agents.
She checks every AI system that delivers outputs.

Internally used LLMs, external solutions, prompts included. Everything goes through her.

Scoring from 1 to 10.
Approval only from 9.5.
Below that? Back into the loop.
With clear feedback.

Together, they are our QA team for AI outputs.

Before content goes out.
Before the bot replies.
Before the error reaches the client.

That is the difference
between

“We use AI”
and
“We trust our AI”.

How do you safeguard your AI outputs?

Best, Flo

PS: If you want to dig deeper → unlocktomorrow.ai

For the Google Pixel 8, we delivered a multi-touch advertising campaign based on the global Pixel strategy. Tailored precisely to the needs of the German target audience across all channels: from TV and cinema spots and premium OOH placements to online ads, social media content and YouTube spots, as well as innovative audio ads and exclusive TV sponsorships.

Task

Create attention for the Google Pixel 8 in Germany.

Approach

Market launch with more than 300 marketing assets, from social clips to retail materials, and four films showing the phone's AI features in everyday life.

Watch the films

AI assistants here. AI agents there.
But where many companies still get stuck:

The leap from experiment to working together.

Experimenting with assistants in a workshop? Playground.
Working with AI assistants every day? That is operations.

Three tips for a smoother transfer:

1️⃣ One format for all job descriptions.
A shared template makes every assistant instantly understandable.

By the way, we use a principle we developed ourselves for this (FOKUS+).

→ Write a one-page job description for your first assistant. Develop a fixed structure.

This framework becomes your standard template for all the others.
That way, everyone in the team can instantly find their way around anyone else's job description.

2️⃣ One org chart for all assistants.
No owner? Won't be maintained.
No department? Won't be found.

→ List all assistants in a table, ideally one you can query with AI.
Columns: owner, department, access rights.

Every one of our assistants lives in Airtable.
Accessible from our hub nuwacom and via n8n.

So everyone always has an overview of the AI team and who has which rights to it.

3️⃣ Review cycles, just like for real employees.
Models change. Tasks shift.
Without a review meeting, an AI assistant will be working on the wrong task after six months.

→ Get feedback on the assistant from the team every 30 days.

Three questions for the team:
What's working?
What isn't?
What's missing?

We use Google Forms for this.

Then: rebuild the assistant.
Get feedback again.

The effect goes beyond efficiency. It is orientation.
The team sees what already exists. Instead of building in parallel.

New AI assistants become productive quickly.
Leaders know what is happening in the AI layer.

And everyone knows everyone. The assistants included.

That builds trust.
In the team and in working with AI.

And it creates exactly the right mix of "Authentic and Agentic".

How are you handling this at the moment?

Everyone is talking about AI agents. Almost nobody about how they fit into the team.

My LinkedIn feed is full of it right now: 
“My AI prompt does X.” “That AI assistant can do Y.”

Cool. But that is phase 1.

The real question is: what happens when several agents work together, and with people?

We build Agentic AI in three stages:

Phase 1: People chat with AI. Copy & paste. 
Phase 2: AI assistants become part of the team. Digital colleagues. 
Phase 3: People lead, agents work. Independently and in teams.

And here is what I have learned along the way:
The technical part is solvable. With time and money. Workflows, APIs, prompts: craft.

The hard part: how do multi-agent systems, some of which work together autonomously, fit into a real team? So that working with them every day is fun instead of a nuisance.

For that, agents need more than skills. They need personality. A tone. A way of communicating, of knowing when to ask, of presenting results. And very fine tuning in how they work together.

They have to feel like colleagues. Tools feel different.
That is the difference between “We have AI in use” and “We work together with AI”.

So every now and then I will give you a glimpse of how things work here. What works. What we have learned.

Kicking things off today: Lead Lara and her lead qualification team.

She researches potential clients, scores them and prepares everything so sales teams can jump straight into the conversation. She is supported by Persona Paula, Elevator Pitch Eva and Battlecard Ben.

Thank you, dear Lara, for letting us have you and your team on board.

Best
Flo 💚

PS: If you want to dig deeper: unlocktomorrow.ai

Cross-channel campaign for Google AdWords. We developed an integrated, flexible campaign concept including a brand claim that can be applied to any industry through multi-stage mailings, banners, landing pages and film sequences.

Task

A multi-touch campaign enabling Google to generate new leads for the AdWords ad format across all industries.

Challenge

Explain a technical product in seconds to a target audience with little online affinity, and make it scalable for thousands of companies.

Approach

Analysis of verticalised industries and research into specifically relevant data and facts. From this, strategy development as an umbrella brand concept.

Execution

An integrated, flexible campaign concept applied to mailings, banners, landing pages, film sequences and more.

The organisation of tomorrow starts today.

For 17 years, we have been providing brands with tailored setups of talent and technology. unlocktomorrow.ai is the next step: agent-based AI solutions that make companies more productive, more capable and able to scale more efficiently.

The journey has three levels of maturity:

Phase 1: People chat with AI. Employees use AI and parts of its output to become more productive.

Phase 2: Human-assistant teams. AI assistants are integrated into the teams and work as digital colleagues, with a role, rules and a person responsible.

Phase 3: Autonomous agentic systems. Leaders steer strategy and direction; AI agents run workflows on their own, and a human gives the approval.

The roadmap: we analyse the current setup and develop a joint plan for how best to complement the existing teams. Then we put together the right team and design a workflow that fits the company culture. Finally, we build the agent setup and keep developing it based on the results.

Three formats: AI leadership trainings for managers across three maturity levels, agentic workshops (one to two days: roadmap, use cases, first solutions built right in the workshop) and hands-on AI projects, from developing your own agents and automations to training the team for maintenance and scaling.

An online and offline campaign that stands up against hate speech and for a better culture of conversation. We handled project management, steered communication with influencers (creators) and produced various video clips, banners and plenty of merchandise around the initiative.

Task

An online and offline campaign through which YouTube encourages people to think and act for a better culture of conversation online.

Challenge

Win the attention of a fast-moving and largely “oversaturated” audience for a serious topic.

Execution

Influencers (creators) as ambassadors of the initiative to reach deeper into the target group. Production of various videos and cross-channel distribution of the content. Nationwide school workshops with media education partners.

Watch the films

Wow … how do you actually build these decks?
Is that AI?

This question comes up in almost every workshop.

And yes, it is AI. Just not “open the tool, press a button, done”.
It takes method. Smart orchestration.

Most decks don't fail on content.
They fail on form.

Before I think about the first slide, I clarify three things:

➡️ For WHOM? The persona sets the tone (DISC).
➡️ HOW to tell it? Proven storyline frameworks (Pyramid, Sparkline, SCQA …).
➡️ THEN prompt. Structure first. Then storyline. Then design.

Three steps.

Each with its own AI model.

What comes out at the end is a deck with real pull.

I've summarised the six frameworks on a single page.

Follow me and comment “Framework”, and I'll send you the .pdf.

For YouTube Kids we developed an emotional and informative campaign showing how educational, inspiring and safe the content for children is there.

Task

Raise awareness of YouTube Kids among parents and expert bodies and show how educational, inspiring and safe the content for children is there.

Execution

A multi-touch campaign with more than 98 assets across all major social media platforms and national magazines and newspapers.

Watch the films

Choose your model with care:
Yesterday Google launched Gemini 3.5 Flash.

Subagent dispatch as a first-class feature.
4x faster than other frontier models.
Interactive UIs straight from the model.

Sounds like tech news?
It isn't.

It's a decisive question for your company:
Are you ready for AI teams?

Until now, we orchestrated multi-agent systems laboriously in external tools. Now this capability is moving straight into the model, everywhere.

Three themes I see:

1️⃣ The models take on long-running tasks.
Gemini 3.5 is built for “long-horizon agentic tasks”:
workflows that run for hours or days.

→ If you still think in prompt mode, you're leaving potential on the table.

2️⃣ Subagents become standard.
One agent coordinates several others. Like a team lead dispatching the crew.

→ Without an org chart for your AI assistants, you lose track.

3️⃣ Interfaces appear on demand.
The model generates interactive UIs and graphics right as it answers.

→ If you still launch a separate tool for every visual, you're getting slow.

What does this mean in practice?

After Anthropic, Google is now making the next leap too.

From assistant to team.
From tool to crew.

Really exciting.

Have you tried the new model yet?

An interactive mailing that used augmented reality to introduce media and broadcasting executives around the world to the Bundesliga's five new digital business areas and their core topics.

Task

Promote the Bundesliga's five new digital business areas and highlight its digital expertise.

Challenge

Spark curiosity for digital topics among an audience that had mostly associated the Bundesliga with traditional media.

Approach

Bring a new business area to life digitally: campaign material that turns data, rights and platforms into tangible offers for partners.

Execution

Interactive playing cards that managers can bring to life on their desks in an entertaining way using augmented reality.

AI does more than hallucinate.
Above all, it mirrors what it is given.

In many projects I see the same discussions at the start:
Which model? Bigger context window? Which prompt?

Almost never the question that really counts:
What does the AI actually get to see?

Clean concepts, solid technology, and the systems still deliver wrong results.
The model isn't the weak point. The foundation is.

👥 Picture a new colleague on their first day.
He asks three people the same thing.
Gets three answers.

Each offers a different view.
None of them means to mislead.
And yet they all contradict each other.

He goes with the most plausible one. Which isn't the right one.

That is exactly how AI works with data in most companies.

What actually helps:

1️⃣ Ownership per data domain
Customers, products, processes, knowledge. Every domain gets one clearly responsible owner. Never just “the team”.

2️⃣ Reviews like with code
Master data doesn't change by itself.
Four-eyes principle for core data records.

3️⃣ Metadata before model choice
Timestamp. Status. Ownership. Validity.
Unsexy, but decisive.

4️⃣ Life cycles instead of folders
Every document has a beginning, a review, an end.
“Filed somewhere since 2019” is a risk waiting to happen.

Models change. The foundation stays.

Agentic only works when the foundation is right.
And if the foundation is off, the result is off too.

How do you handle this?

Are you tackling the issue actively,
or still hoping the AI will smooth out messy briefings?

For WSOP Prague 2026, Europe's biggest poker tournament with €10 million in guaranteed prize money, we developed an international campaign around the tournament's re-entry mechanism. The Easter motif of resurrection became the central metaphor. Claim: Rise in Prague. Miracles happen.

Task

International online campaign for WSOP Prague 2026 focusing on the Golden Re-Entry Ticket promotion.

Challenge

Give re-entering the tournament an emotional charge and scale it across different markets.

Approach

Promote the second chance at €10 million: films and digital visuals that explain the tournament format and speak to players worldwide.

Execution

Films built around the motif of resurrection. The hero film shows a giant poker chip rolling through the streets of Prague and exploding in a firework of golden eggs. Humorous short spots show failed attempts at resuscitation, until someone whispers: “Late registration's still open”.

Watch the films

Be honest: do you always want just a yes?
Or an answer that really moves you forward?

With multi-agent setups, perfect, harmonious AI systems are your biggest mistake.

Many companies use AI like a glorified calculator.
They want the perfectly compliant AI.

But compliant means average.
And average won't get you ahead of the competition.

My tip:
Use the principle of friction deliberately.
Make your AI multi-agent system more productive.

Here are three ways to add punch:

Give them personality
A system without a stance delivers flat answers.

1️⃣ Give your agents a psychological profile.
For example based on the DISC system or our HWP 4P method.

Our lead agent Lara acts like an energetic profiler.
HR agent Siggi is calm and analytical.
Performance manager Paulchen loves numbers and facts.

-> Whoever adapts better to the other side convinces faster.

2️⃣ Implement business frameworks.
Use techniques that have proven themselves in business.
Store mental models in your system prompts.

Let agent A dream using the Walt Disney method.
Let agent B analyse with ruthless logic following Kahneman's System 2.
Let agent C hunt for the real customer problem using the SPIN principle.

->You get strategies with real depth instead of empty phrases.

3️⃣ Let agents debate.
Pure yes-men add no value.
Let your agents discuss and improve your pitch.

Let your sales agent compete internally against different buyer personas. They take the first draft apart and keep optimising until the pitch reaches an internal score of 15/20. Only then does it land on your desk.

->No more drafts that wobble at the first real objection.

Think about it for a moment:
Are you already using friction deliberately, or are you still prompting along in perfect harmony?

P.S.: The fastest way to test artificial tension right away: in your next prompt, skip the role of the well-behaved assistant and cast your AI as your toughest competitor.

For a slot machine provider we developed an integrated branding and campaign approach, including a TV and online flight.

Task

Development of a casino brand, including online and offline campaigns.

Challenge

Engage users by showing that luck has many facets.

Approach

How do you sell luck? With a brand that brings lightness and humour into a regulated market, from name and design to TV and online spots.

Execution

As the brand's home we created the name DrückGlück and designed a cheering slot machine logo, which we brought to life in a comprehensive TV campaign featuring Luck and Bad Luck.

Watch the films

Don't hunt for the elephant in the room.
Give it a path.

Wondering how to make AI transformation work better in your team?
Forget pressure.

Use the Switch framework from psychology and its three levels:

The rider is our logical mind.
The elephant is our gut feeling.
The path is the direction.

When rider and elephant argue, emotion always wins.
Pure logic is no match for old habits.

Stop shaking the elephant.
Shape the path.
Make the way so exciting that the team sets off on its own.

How do we do that?

We give our AI agents strong human character traits.
Nobody wants to operate sterile software.

This is what our agents look like in practice:

Annabelle, AI use case specialist
She is chronically grumpy. Everyone laughs at her sarcastic remarks when you hand her a task. But afterwards she delivers the absolutely perfect automation concept.

Battlecard Ben, strategy agent
He starts every in-depth competitor analysis with an absurd, creative battle cry. The team loves calling him up to see what he'll be yelling today.

Lead Lara, sales researcher
She screens leads like a psychological profiler. If a contact turns out to be worthless in the analysis, she tells sales so in a frighteningly direct and unsparing way.

The result? Employees don't log in to use a system. They chat with Annabelle, Ben and Lara.

Curiosity drives them.
The barrier drops.
The elephant walks the path all by itself.

My credo: Authentic meets Agentic.

Be honest: what moves you more, orders or curiosity?

Multichannel campaign around Wimbledon legend Boris Becker. We showed the idol back on court, with a new passion for the game. Using vivid comparisons, we moved poker away from the image of pure gambling towards a clever, learnable game full of tactics and skill, and took the brand to the top worldwide.

Task

A brand campaign that brings online poker closer to people around the world.

Challenge

Many beginners believe poker is pure gambling and distrust online platforms.

Approach

In-depth psychological interviews on the drivers of and barriers to playing poker.

Execution

Sports and poker testimonials around the world explain poker as a learnable sport and reveal their secrets of success.

Watch the films

Today a video reached me that genuinely moved me.

Because I know how hard it is to hold your own every day as a solo self-employed person. To keep your business running. To win clients, do the marketing, carry the sales, all by yourself, all at once.

Patrick Gottwald of Selfmade Pool is exactly that kind of person. Pool builder, solo self-employed, and he wanted to make it on his own. To be able to do everything himself, to understand everything himself.

That's why he booked our course “Business Professional AI”.

In the video he says things like:

“You push open a gate into a world where before I could only guess at what was possible.”

“I save 2–3 hours every day and invest them in other things.”

“I finally built landing pages myself. Within minutes.”

A pool builder who now builds his own landing pages, uses AI assistants in his daily work and creatively steers his own sales and marketing processes.

Really cool.

Thank you, Patrick, for your trust and this great feedback. 🙌
We designed the Solo Helden course for entrepreneurs exactly like you.

And for everyone who wants to know how to take their own solo business further with AI:

The next “Business Professional AI” course starts on 17 March 2026:

30 hours of concentrated AI know-how. 100 % live. 100 % hands-on.

From your own website to AI assistants to the legal module, everything you need as a solo self-employed person to really get ahead with AI.

By the way, with KOMPASS funding you can save up to 90 % of the costs.

👉 More info & save your spot: www.solo-helden.com

Best, Flo

International TV, print and online approach to the bronchodilating effect of Prospan with its special ivy extract EA 575. We developed a dual campaign that can showcase both children's and adults' products across countries.

Task

Showcase the bronchodilating effect of Prospan cough syrup boldly in print, TV and online.

Challenge

Depict the abstract mode of action with concrete images while finding a bracket for the adult and children's product ranges.

Approach

Development of two campaign key ideas with connecting mechanics and a uniform mode-of-action animation.

Execution

2 TV spots, 6 print and online visuals, plus animation and rendering of the mode-of-action animation.

Outcome

DACH brand campaign with more than 300 % sales growth.

Watch the films

The new year is barely a week old,
and slowly everything is getting up to operating temperature.

Time to look ahead.
My 5 theses on agentic AI in 2026:

1. Agents become operating systems
Agents are moving out of individual tools into the backbone of value creation. From “feature in the app” to a digital operating system made of specialised services.

The question is no longer just: which model? It is: what does the agent architecture look like? Which agents orchestrate end-to-end processes, which run as utilities in the background?

2. The agent job market emerges
Agents are increasingly becoming digital colleagues, and the first standards are being defined. Skills, seniority, prices. In 2026 the first companies will define profiles such as “Junior Research Agent” or “Senior Sales Agent”, with clear skill stacks, benchmarks and day rates.

Who sets the market benchmark for what a “senior agent” can do? What may it cost? Will there be day rates, salaries, proof of performance? And who will make the first move with transparent agentic price lists?

3. Agent orchestration becomes a core competence
In 2026 the winners won't be the companies with the most agents. They'll be the ones that make their agents play together best.

One agent researches, one evaluates, one writes, one checks compliance. The art lies in the interplay more than in any single agent: who starts when? Who hands what on? Where does the human step in?

4. Agent lifecycle management becomes reality
Agents have a life cycle, just like software. In 2026 the first processes are emerging: deployment, updates, deprecation, replacement. How are multi-agent systems organised within companies?

The question is no longer: do we use agents? It is: which version runs where? When do we update? And when do we switch old agents off?

5. Agent ownership becomes a question of power
Who owns the agent? IT? The business unit? The team? In 2026 the first conflicts arise: everyone wants to control, adapt and prioritise “their” agent.

The question is no longer: do we use agents? It is: who decides about them? Who may change them? And how do we avoid agent sprawl?

What are your theses on AI agents in 2026?
Which questions keep you busy the most?

Best, Flo 💚

Anyone who orders from online shops knows the problem: products are often not shown at their best. Surfaces, materials and colours don't match reality. Disappointment is inevitable. What follows are unnecessary, costly returns for customer and retailer alike. With digitally movable, interactive elements we create unique stagings of product details. Many reflections on materials, whether matt or glossy, are only perceived by the eye in motion. Our technology lets users experience products almost 100 % true to life through razor-sharp macro shots with integrated lighting settings.

Task

Create a new experience in the field of e-commerce configurators.

Challenge

Break through the market of 2D visualisations and create smooth, lifelike 3D experiences.

Approach

Collaboration with leading developers from the automotive, furniture and architecture industries, further developed for e-commerce products.

Execution

Real-time renderings that enable near-perfect 3D experiences.

Watch the films

95 % of all AI initiatives fail, but what do I really see day to day?

Last week I was on the move a lot:
sometimes on video calls, sometimes in live sessions, always talking with people who are developing right now and want to make things happen.

Anyone who knows me knows:
I love constantly feeding myself new input.
Sometimes the Handelsblatt, sometimes an online course, sometimes a trade magazine, sometimes simply news apps.

And then I read this figure:
“95 percent of all AI initiatives in companies fail. Only five percent create real value.”

Handelsblatt, hot off the press:
https://lnkd.in/eBKFTGdT

That sounds harsh at first.

But as soon as I'm back in a coaching session or workshop, I see:
The mood is often completely different.
Optimism, an appetite for progress, plenty of energy.

And still, when it gets down to the nitty-gritty, it shows again and again:
The real homework stays the same.

The magic rule of three that shows up everywhere:

1. Truly master the technology.
Go beyond a quick try-out and apply it so that it works for you. Better a few tools used really well than many used superficially.

2. Use the right frameworks.
Structures and best practices give you something to hold on to. But only if they really fit you. And if you have good people around you who can apply the right methods successfully.

3. Make the difference with your own leadership decision.
And that is exactly what gives the whole thing an individual touch.
The possibilities are huge, yet real difference only comes with your decision. When everyone applies the same technology and the same frameworks, only your own “secret sauce” can make the difference.

My conclusion after all those sessions:
The companies really making progress right now are doing exactly this homework.

They invest in technology, and just as much in structures and leadership.
They reflect, decide and readjust.

Where are you right now?
Tell me in the comments. I'm curious about your reality.

Use our technology to create high-resolution, richly detailed digital product images, perfect for online shops and digital presentations. Our solutions give you the flexibility to adapt image content quickly and efficiently, so you can respond to market dynamics and meet specific customer requirements.

Task

Accelerate digital photo and video productions.

Approach

Automated image production: standardised sets, lighting situations and workflows that turn one production into hundreds of visuals, for Google, YouTube, Nike, Montblanc, Osram and Paulaner.

Outcome

Productions in days instead of weeks, consistent imagery across all channels.

This morning, a short video call with a technology manufacturer from the security sector. Three people, a relaxed round.

The product: genuinely exciting, real innovation potential. The presentation starts, and I notice my attention slowly drifting. After five minutes I'm curious, after ten I'm wondering where all this is heading. Only after 17 minutes do I finally understand everything the product can do.

In that moment it became clear to me once again how important it is to have a good elevator pitch.

We live in the age of information overload. If you can't get your topic to the point quickly, you lose your audience. No matter how brilliant the idea.

In a world full of distractions, clarity is what really makes the difference. Your elevator pitch is like a springboard: it decides whether someone listens or switches off inside. Whether you come across as a pro or as someone who gets lost in details.

What makes a good elevator pitch:

1. Clarity: what is the core of your offer?
2. Relevance: why should the other person listen now?
3. Emotion: what sticks? Story beats facts, always.

A strong pitch is no accident. It is the result of practice, feedback and the courage to keep it simple.

Can you say in a few sentences what you do and why it matters?
Would the other person become curious within a few seconds?
Or does it take minutes for the spark to jump?

Mini workshop, your pitch in 5 minutes:

Write down what you stand for, in a few words.
Ask yourself: what is your target group's biggest challenge?
Write one sentence that connects the two.
Test it, in conversation, in a meeting, on your next call.
Polish it until it feels like you.

Then: post your pitch. Share it with others. Get feedback.
Improve it. Because the best pitch is the one that creates resonance.

Give it a try.

In the end it's all about impact, more than the perfect sentence. A clear elevator pitch is no luxury. It is a survival strategy. It makes you and what you stand for visible fast. And today that makes all the difference, more than ever.

Photo and film productions for lifestyle brands: campaign visuals, lookbooks, moving images for social and retail.

Task

Stage fashion and lifestyle so that they sell.

Approach

Photo and film productions for lifestyle brands: campaign visuals, lookbooks, moving images for social and retail.

30 success stories. One insight.

Over the past 8 years I had the chance to interview more than 30 founders for an international corporation, for a case study series documenting key moments on the road to entrepreneurial success.

I spoke with people who built mid-sized companies from nothing.

With founders who were successful nationally and then suddenly pulled off global rollouts.

With entrepreneurs who were stretched to the limit in a crisis and then made the decisive move.

What I expected: big visions, growth formulas, innovation systems.

What I got as the essence: it was never the sheer number of ideas that made the difference.

It was always one single, smart, far-reaching decision that set a chain of events in motion.

In psychology this is called decision fatigue: exhaustion from too many options. The more there is on the table, the less clear the path becomes. And the more likely it is that you never set off at all.

This applies especially today, by the way. We get a thousand suggestions. From people and machines.

But no direction towards the best decision.

That, as always, only comes from your own head.

And if you ask me what helps me most in moments of overload: computer off. Running shoes on. And when I'm back at my desk: out with the Post-its.

When my thoughts fit on three notes and I catch myself nodding as I read them, I know I'm on the right track.

My offer: if you're working on a decision right now with too many options, let's look at it together.

In 30 minutes I'll ask you a few questions.

And give you three inspiring Post-its.

The ones on which everything suddenly becomes clear.
https://lnkd.in/ewkfwrnk