Chief Revenue Officer · Author · Munich
Stefan
Schweizer
Twenty-five years building market leaders.
Eight books in ten months.
One question driving both:
What does it mean to be irreplaceable?
About
The practitioner
who writes.
I have spent twenty-five years at the frontier of enterprise technology — building revenue organisations in Germany, Switzerland, and across Europe for companies that were doing something that had never been done before in their category.
In 2015, I was one of the first salespeople in the German market to sell AI-driven cybersecurity to CISOs who had never heard the term in a vendor conversation. That experience — educating before selling, building trust before pipeline — became the lens through which I now write.
Today I am CRO at Open Systems, a Swiss AI-powered cybersecurity company. And between the board meetings and the deals, I write — about negotiation, leadership, AI, and what it means to be human in a world where machines are getting very good at being useful.
„The future belongs not to those who know the answers, but to those who ask the right questions.“
Credentials
Published Works
Eight books.
One decade of thinking.
Written between board meetings and flights. Each one a distillation of something I could no longer keep only to myself.
Das Verhandlungs-Manifest
Schweigen. Klarheit. Macht. The psychology of high-stakes enterprise negotiation — 25 years distilled into 15 golden rules.
Firmen Kultur
Wie wahre Führung funktioniert. What genuine leadership looks like — not in theory, but in real offices, real teams, real conflict.
Das Ende der Wissensökonomie
AI has made the „how“ a commodity. The question now is: which problems are worth solving? A radical redefinition of human value.
Geschichten aus einer nahen Zukunft
Near-future fiction set between 2027 and 2035. The questions aren’t futuristic — they’re happening now.
NEIN ist auch ein Satz
Why „No“ is the bravest word in the language. Every courageous no is always a yes to yourself.
IDEA KILLER
How capable managers — with the best intentions — suffocate innovation. Stop managing. Start getting out of the way.
Das Ende der Wissensökonomie II
AI in the classroom. What does learning mean when an algorithm answers in 9 seconds? A passionate argument for human education.
How to Kill Good Ideas
The English edition. 8 deadly anti-patterns, the mirror effect, and the 24-hour protection zone for fragile new ideas.
Themes
What I keep
thinking about.
Across eight books and twenty-five years, the same questions return. Not as problems to solve — but as tensions to hold.
The end of the knowledge economy
AI has made „knowing how“ a commodity. What remains irreplaceable is the ability to ask the right question, to sense what matters, to decide under ambiguity. This is not a threat — it is a liberation, if we are brave enough to accept it.
Das Ende der Wissensökonomie I & II
Negotiation as a human art
Customers do not buy products or services. They buy a change in their lives. The best deals are not won by argument — they are won by silence, clarity, and a deep understanding of what the other person truly needs to transform.
Das Verhandlungs-Manifest
Leadership is a daily decision
Not a title. Not a methodology. Not a KPI. True leadership shows itself in moments — in how you respond when things go wrong, in how you create the conditions for others to do the best work of their lives.
Firmen Kultur · IDEA KILLER
The courage to say no
Every time we say yes when we mean no, we perform a quiet theft of ourselves. Boundaries are not selfishness — they are the foundation of authentic relationship, genuine focus, and the kind of work that actually matters.
NEIN ist auch ein Satz
Connect
Let’s think
together.
Whether you want to talk about a book, a keynote, a CRO challenge, or simply one of the ideas above — I read every message.