Tobias Rennebaum

Tobias Rennebaum spent over twelve years in Tier-1 automotive manufacturing in southern Germany, first as a production team leader, then as plant director's assistant at a major equipment supplier (Sindelfingen, Neckarsulm). Within this highly hierarchical and complex environment, he discovered the limitations of conventional HR tools when confronted with real, recurring interpersonal conflicts. These daily challenges — production shutdowns due to tensions, high turnover, manager burnout — showed him that conflicts in industrial settings are primarily a structural problem, not just a personal one. In 2013, while remaining within the group, he pursued an MBA in Operations at the WHU – Otto Beisheim School of Management (Vallendar, completed in 2015), deepening his expertise in organisational development and change management in production environments. His academic interest was far from abstract: he wanted to understand how organisations are structured to generate conflicts — and how to modify those structures rather than simply "fixing" the individuals involved. After an additional year in manufacturing, he transitioned to independent consulting in 2019, relocating to Hamburg. He completed coach training at the Institut für Lösungsfokussierte Beratung (ILFT) and obtained his ICF-PCC certification (International Coaching Federation, Professional Certified Coach) in 2021, supplemented by advanced training in change facilitation and conflict mediation. This solution-focused approach allowed him to escape the details of any conflict and quickly identify what progress actually looks like. Today, Tobias works primarily with senior leadership teams in mid-market industrial companies and tech scale-ups across the DACH region. He regularly speaks at the Personnel Swiss conference (Zurich), supports plant directors on conflict culture, and published a whitepaper titled « Konfliktdynamiken in agilen Produktionsteams » in 2023 for the German employers' association Gesamtmetall. His specialisation lies at the intersection between traditional manufacturing and agile methodologies — a space where new conflicts continuously emerge.