ABOUT KAI
I'M INTERESTED IN WHAT HAPPENS NEXT.
I believe people can learn to make good decisions under uncertainty and to make something new possible.
That is where I help.
I'm Dr. Kai Bruns, business model innovation expert and founder of EntrepreneurSHIFT.
One question is on my mind right now:
Why do companies so often manage to develop good innovation ideas, but not to turn them quickly into reliable decisions?
ENTREPRENEURSHIP IS NOT A PERSONALITY TYPE.
It is a trainable skill.
A skill you need when you want to turn an idea into something of your own. When you want to drive innovation in an organization. Or when you have to lead people through change although nobody knows exactly what the future will look like.
That is why I connect entrepreneurship, innovation and leadership. Not as three separate topics, but as a progression:
CREATOR → ENTREPRENEUR → LEADER
CREATOR
You have an idea.
ENTREPRENEUR
You find out whether it can create value.
LEADER
You create the conditions in which others support and drive this change.
From idea to shared movement.
I DIDN'T START WITH ENTREPRENEURSHIP.
My path was anything but straight. I started out in Oldenburg, did my PhD in England, lived in Manchester, moved to Dubai and got to know a world that seemed far removed from entrepreneurship education at first glance.
Later, my path led me through international politics and Stanford University ever more strongly to innovation and entrepreneurship. Today I live and work in Emden.
And it is exactly these different perspectives that shape my work:
Education.
Innovation.
Entrepreneurship.
Organizations.
People.
I am less interested in telling people what to do. I am interested in how they can learn to make better decisions themselves.
WHAT I DO
I teach people the competencies, I help teams through the process of implementation, and I support companies with strategic innovation planning and with managing ambidexterity. At the university, in innovation and startup programs, in Labs and Sprints.
And with the EntrepreneurSHIFT Academy, this is gradually becoming a learning platform of its own.
Among other things, I work with:
Effectuation
Design Thinking
Customer Discovery
Lean Experimentation
Business Model Innovation
Entrepreneurial Leadership
But methods are never the real point for me. The decisive question is always:
Which decision do you need to make now to find out something you don't know today?
FROM THEORY TO ACTION
I come from education. That is why I don't want to simply transfer knowledge. I want people to be able to do something they couldn't do before. My learning logic is therefore simple:
RECOGNIZE → DECIDE → TEST → SHAPE → EMBED
You get input.
You apply it.
You observe what happens.
You learn from it. And make the next decision.
This is how entrepreneurial competence develops: not through a personality test, but through practice.
WHAT I BELIEVE IN
You don't have to know all the answers. You have to know what to find out next.
You don't get ready in order to act. You act in order to get ready.
Entrepreneurship doesn't begin with founding a company.
It begins with a decision under uncertainty.
A BIT OF KAI
OLDENBURG BOY
Grew up in Oldenburg and still enjoy spending time there.
AT HOME IN THE WORLD
Manchester · Dubai · Madrid · Basel · Stanford
Different places, cultures and perspectives have shaped my view of work, education and entrepreneurship.
I LEARN BEST
When a good question turns into a real experiment.
I CAN'T HELP IT
Taking complex things apart until they suddenly become simple.
WHAT MATTERS TO ME
Family. Curiosity. Learning. Helping people do something they might not have thought themselves capable of before.
MY MOTTO
Don't wait for confidence. Act now until you trust yourself.
FAQ
QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS.
Who is Kai Bruns?
I am a business model business model innovation expert and help people and companies move forward in the innovation process. I teach people the competencies, I help teams through the process of implementation, and I support companies with strategic innovation planning and with managing ambidexterity.
What are you working on right now?
One question: why do companies so often manage to develop good innovation ideas, but not to turn them quickly into reliable decisions? In many teams this seems to happen exactly at the interface between idea, experiment and business case.
What is EntrepreneurSHIFT?
EntrepreneurSHIFT is the brand I work under: competencies for people, implementation for teams and innovation strategy for companies.
ENTREPRENEURSHIFT
A PLACE WHERE PEOPLE LEARN TO BUILD SOMETHING NEW IN AN UNCERTAIN WORLD.
Whether they are building their own business, driving an innovation in their organization or want to learn to lead more entrepreneurially.
Because the world doesn't just need more people with good ideas. It needs people who turn ideas into decisions, decisions into experiments and experiments into impact.
Thinking and acting entrepreneurially can be learned. I'll show you how.
Dr. Kai Bruns