Building innovation that lasts, from the inside — Stephan Klaschka — advisor, keynote speaker, and author of The OrgChanger.
The OrgChanger book is coming!
The OrgChanger book (2027)
The OrgChanger book is a practitioner’s account of building a financially self-sustaining innovation ecosystem inside one of the world’s largest pharmaceutical companies — for years without a formal mandate, and then for three years with one that produced a portfolio of 75+ projects and a 10x return across the portfolio (calculated conservatively). – Book release in January 2027.
It is the documented decade behind the HBR/Ivey Business School case study “Boehringer Ingelheim: Leading Innovation,” now taught at 40+ business schools across 20+ countries from Harvard, INSEAD, Wharton, Kellogg to the London Business School.
Where the case stops — at the 2012 decision point, asking “what do I do now?” — the book answers: what I actually chose, what it produced, and what it cost.
Join the conversation between the chapters in my field notes at OrgChanger.com on Substack.
The OrgChanger book (release January 2027)
Read the first chapter for free and get notified when ‘The OrgChanger’ book becomes available! – No Spam, opt out at any time.
Thank you!
Thank you for your interest in ‘The OrgChanger’ book!
I will send you the first chapter, “The Blockbuster Trap,” via email as soon as it becomes available (January 2027). I will also let you know when the book is released for pre-order.
The Ivey Business School case studydocumenting this work — “Boehringer Ingelheim: Leading Innovation” (Ivey Publishing, January 2015) — has been taught in over 42 business schools across at least 23 countries, including Harvard Business School, INSEAD, the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University, Wharton, and the London Business School. The case study is also available at HBR.
A Teaching Case Study The Ivey case is a decision-point case: it presents Klaschka’s threefold mandate, his three self-identified challenges, and a menu of unpursued options — then stops before any choice is made. Students analyze what he should do; the book reveals what he did and the results (a 75+ project innovation portfolio returning 10x its investment — calculated conservatively — an institutionalized School for Intrapreneurs, and the ERG-to-BRG model that reached the C-suite). Assigning both lets students test their own recommendations against a documented ten-year outcome — rare in case teaching..
The OrgChanger book is the full account behind that case: the decisions that were not obvious at the time, the relationships that took years to build, the failures the case study format cannot accommodate, and the human cost that sits behind every set of documented results.
It is a practitioner’s account of building a financially self-sustaining innovation ecosystem inside one of the world’s largest pharmaceutical companies — for years without a formal mandate, and then for three years with one that produced a portfolio of 75+ projects and a 10x return across the portfolio (calculated conservatively).
It is the documented decade behind the Ivey Business School case study “Boehringer Ingelheim: Leading Innovation,” now taught at 40+ business schools across 20+ countries from Harvard, INSEAD, Wharton, Kellogg to LBS.
Stephan Klaschka is an award-winning strategy leader and a transformation catalyst with more than 25 years of global work experience.
He drives transformation, innovation, turnaround, and operational excellence in life-sciences companies of all sizes — from startups to Global 20 enterprises in converging industries including Pharma, Biotech, Diagnostics, and Medical Deviceswith passion, integrity, and hands-on leadership.
His international executive positions included CEO, COO, CIO, Chief Growth Officer, Chief of Staff, Chief Innovation Officer, Chief Strategy Officer, Principal, and Regulatory Compliance Officer with extensive experience in entrepreneurship, start-up, academia, government, global corporations, and startups in various industries and geographies including Europe/Middle East/Africa (EMEA), the Americas, and Asia-Pacific (APAC).
25+ years practitioner experience 75+ innovation projects built10× portfolio ROI
From $700M Portfolios to $10M Project Rescues
A Proven Track Record: Over 25 years of global experience driving digital evolution, clinical operations excellence, and organizational effectiveness.
The HBR Standard: Featured as a thought leader in the Harvard Business Review teaching case “Boehringer Ingelheim: Leading Innovation,” utilized by business schools worldwide.
Regulatory Precision: Expert in navigating GxP, 21 CFR Part 11, and emerging AI/ML ethical governance to ensure innovation never compromises compliance.
Global Versatility: Executive leadership experience spanning the Americas, Europe, APAC, and LATAM.
Stephan holds three Master’s degrees in Computer Science, Management/Project Management, and Business Administration (MBA), and advanced degrees in Strategic Innovation, Entrepreneurship, AI in Business, Technology, and Leadership from leading schools in Europe and the United States.
He is a certified Project Management Professional (PMP), a Professional Scrum Master (PSM-I), and a graduate of the MIT Advanced Certificate for Executives (ACE), as well as a winner of the IMD/MIT Entrepreneurship Development Program (EDP).
For 25 years, I built innovation inside one of the world’s largest pharmaceutical companies — not as a theorist, but as the person doing it. The work returned more than 10x its investment, became an Ivey Business School case study taught at 40+ schools worldwide, and is the subject of my book, The OrgChanger.
Now I help other organizations do the same: build innovation that lasts, turn stalled programs around, and equip the people trying to change their companies from the inside.
Most innovation efforts don’t fail for lack of ideas or talent. They fail for lack of pathways — the sponsors, structures, and conditions that let a good idea travel from where it starts to where it gets funded and built. That’s the work. – Here is how I can help you with it:
Advisory — For Leaders & Organizations
Hands-on engagements for executives and innovation leaders who need results, not a framework.
Innovation Program Rescue & Diagnostic
Your innovation initiative launched with energy and went quiet. Before you fund another program, find out why the last one stalled. In a focused diagnostic, I pinpoint which of the three structural barriers is killing it — ideas that can’t travel up, can’t travel across, or die in the gap between talk and action — and map the pathways that get work moving again. It’s the fastest way to work together, and often the first step toward everything below. Grounded in the same approach that drove a 360% revenue turnaround as interim CEO of a stalled company.
Innovation Ecosystem & Intrapreneurship Design
You have ideas and talent, but nothing reliably turns them into results — and your best builders stay hidden in the org chart. I help you build the system that fixes both: sponsor structures and seed-funding mechanisms that let early-stage ideas travel, plus a merit-based intrapreneurship pipeline — a “School for Intrapreneurs” — that surfaces inventive people and develops leaders through real work, not training modules. This is the system behind a 75+ project portfolio that returned over 10x, refined with Gifford Pinchot III, who coined the term “intrapreneur.” The same pathway-building applies when the goal is to turn employee and business resource groups into business-critical contributors.
Fractional & Interim Innovation Leadership
You need senior innovation leadership now, not a year-long search. I step in — as I did as an interim CEO — to stabilize, focus, and build: cutting the priority list down to what matters, standing up the structures, and preparing the organization for what’s next. For companies in transition, turnaround, or a critical build phase.
Facilitated Workshops
High-energy, hands-on sessions that move a team from talk to a concrete next move — in a half-day, a full day, or a multi-session program.
Innovation & Intrapreneurship Workshops
Your team is ready to work on the real problem, not sit through another presentation. I design and facilitate working sessions where your people diagnose their own barriers, pressure-test a live initiative, and leave with a completed diagnostic and a decision — not a deck. Formats range from a single keynote-plus-workshop day to a structured program. I’ve run these for corporate teams internationally, from an “Intrapreneurial Spirit” workshop for a global pharmaceutical group in Paris to innovation and digital-transformation sessions across Europe. Ideal as a leadership offsite, an innovation-program kickoff, or the practical follow-on to a keynote.
Speaking — For Events & Conferences
Keynotes and sessions for leadership offsites, innovation summits, industry conferences, and executive education.
Keynote — “Why Organizations Reject the Change They Ask For”
Every company says it wants innovation, launches a program, and watches it quietly die. This talk reveals why — the organizational immune system that rejects even the change an organization needs — and the counterintuitive way insiders get past it. Practical, story-driven, and grounded in a decade of doing the work. For a broad leadership audience.
Keynote — “Your Organization Doesn’t Lack Ideas. It Lacks Pathways.”
The idea at the center of my work: the bottleneck to innovation is never a shortage of ideas or talent, but the missing routes that let them travel. Audiences leave able to spot the missing pathways in their own organization — and with the confidence that anyone, at any level, can start building them.
The Ivey Case, Live
A session almost no one else can offer: I teach the Ivey Business School case study written about my own work — “Boehringer Ingelheim: Leading Innovation” — then reveal what the case leaves out: what actually happened next, what worked, and what it cost. For corporate leadership teams, executive-education programs, and business schools.
Every speaking engagement can be paired with copies of The OrgChanger book for your attendees. Ask about bulk and workshop packages.
Coaching — For Intrapreneurs & Change-Makers
For the people driving change from inside — with or without the authority to do it.
You have a good idea and no mandate. One-on-one coaching for people trying to build something inside a large organization: navigating the immune system, finding and keeping sponsors, building the credibility and evidence that protect you, and doing the work without burning out. For the person who keeps hitting walls and wants to learn where the doors are.
I also coach ERG and BRG leaders — individually or as a cohort — who want to move their group from social to strategic, prove its value, and grow their own influence in the process.
Start a Conversation
The best way to know if I can help is to tell me what you’re working on. Whether it’s a stalled innovation program, a team that needs a working session, an event that needs a voice, or your own fight to change a company from the inside — let’s talk.
Stop managing symptoms and start building a framework for sustainable growth. Let’s discuss how to align your technological roadmap with your clinical and commercial objectives.
Thank you for your message, I will contact you shortly!
Thank you for your message!
I will contact you shortly (typically within 24 hours) and look forward to talking to you very soon!
Best regards,
Stephan Klaschka
Principal, Klaschka&Co
OrgChanger@Klaschka.Co
