Fellowship icon Fellowship

A practice community for CEOs.

A community of CEOs who treat leadership as a lifelong practice.

Apply for 2027 Refer a CEO
From the circle

Why we Practice

Niko on why the Fellowship exists, and who it's for.

Why we Practice — Fellowship film
Nota Bene DeepMind Neggst YURI Mojo SirPlus
The menu

One year. One shared rhythm.

Two retreats in person. Two practice months online. One circle, moving through the year together.

Silent Retreat

Silent Retreat

Five days of silence. Every year. The constant.

JUNE - 5 DAYS Learn more
Breathwork Retreat

Breathwork for Leadership

Nervous system recalibration. Breath as the fastest lever.

MARCH - VIRTUAL PRACTICE MONTH Learn more
Performance Retreat

Performance Retreat

Recovery, energy, and performing under real pressure.

NOVEMBER - 4 TO 5 DAYS Learn more
Jane Chirwa — Presence Training coach

Presence Training

Thinking on your feet. Leading without a script when the plan breaks.

SEPTEMBER - VIRTUAL PRACTICE MONTH Learn more

You don't need more hustle,
you need better reflection spaces.

Video testimonials

What people say about
the retreats

Mo Murad

Mo Murad · CEO, Hemmat Shabab

Silent Retreat 2024

Sven Przywarra

Sven Przywarra · Co-CEO, LiveEO

Silent Retreat 2025

Tim Dettmann

Tim Dettmann · CEO & Founder, Beat81

Breathwork Retreat 2026

Maria Birlem

Maria Birlem · CEO, Yuri

Performance Retreat 2026

Franziska Schmitt

Franziska Schmitt · CEO, Humanize

Silent Retreat 2024

Benita Bailey

Benita Bailey · CEO, Jabeza Films

Silent Retreat 2025

Leonard John

Leonard John · CEO, Dach für Dach

Silent Retreat 2024

Oddur Magnusson

Oddur Magnusson · Founder, Klang Games

Silent Retreat 2024

Fabian Vogelsteller

Fabian Vogelsteller · Founder, LUKSO

Silent Retreat 2024

Our Approach

We create reflection spaces for people in responsibility.

Stillness

Stillness

Space to step back from the noise.

Science

Science

Practices grounded in research, not trends.

Allies

Allies

Peers who understand what you carry.

The Teachers

Who we invite in.

The visiting experts of the Fellowship. Each gives a virtual session during the year, opening the door to the practice or retreat ahead. People who have spent decades inside the craft they now pass on. Some names you'll recognize. Others work quietly inside traditions most CEOs never touch.

Joe Hudson Emotional Leadership

Joe Hudson

Executive coach to leaders at Apple, OpenAI, and Google. Founder of Art of Accomplishment. Creator of the VIEW framework. Teaches the emotional terrain most leaders never learn to read.

Shoukei Matsumoto Stillness & Legacy

Shoukei Matsumoto

Japanese Buddhist monk at Komyoji Temple, Tokyo. Author of A Monk's Guide to a Clean House and Mind, translated into eighteen languages. World Economic Forum Young Global Leader. Holds the long view on karma, legacy, and what it means to be a good ancestor.

Jana Schmitz Assessment

Jana Schmitz

Specialist partner for psychological assessment across the Konstantin practice. She reads the patterns beneath the profile: drivers, blind spots, and the stories leaders tell themselves.

The Menu

One year. A practice.

Silent Retreat

Silent
Retreat

Breathwork for Leadership

Breathwork for
Leadership

Performance Retreat

Performance
Retreat

Presence Training

Presence
Training

Pillar 1 JUNE - 5 DAYS

Silent
Retreat

Five days of extended silence, daily leadership labs, and deep peer connection. This is where the real work begins.


Deep Stillness

Release the role. Land in the body.

Leadership Labs

Purpose, patterns, and presence

Peer Connection

Your Wisdom Council forms here

Lasting Practices

Skills you keep for life

The Journey

Arrive

Release the role. Land in the body.

Map

See your patterns with ruthless clarity.

Silence

Strip away the noise. Meet yourself.

Train

Build a mind that works for you.

Return

Leave with practices, commitments, and a Wisdom Council for life.

Pillar 2 MARCH 2027 - VIRTUAL PRACTICE MONTH

Breathwork for
Leadership

Breathwork is already widely accepted among top-level athletes and performers. It has yet to arrive in the business world. Learn how to regulate your state and respond on demand.


A Full Reset

Breath, silence, integration.

Breathwork for Performance

Energy and focus on demand.

Science of Breathwork

Stanford, Harvard-grounded.

Regulate Before You React

In the meeting, not after.

Your Coaches
Peter van Woerkum

Peter van Woerkum

Founder, Regulate

Corporate breathwork trainer. Works with Audi, Personio, RBI. Teaches CEOs to regulate state the way athletes do, with methods grounded in Stanford and Harvard research.

Pillar 3 NOVEMBER 2027 - 4 TO 5 DAYS

Performance
Retreat

Understand how your body handles pressure, learn practical breath and recovery protocols, and build a personal routine that fits your real life as a CEO.


Recovery Protocols

Rest as a trainable skill

Breathwork Training

Rapid state-shift protocols

Immersive Retreat

Two days of integration

Personal Playbook

Routines for your biology

Your Coach
Jan-Philipp Martini

Jan-Philipp Martini

Human Performance Scientist

Founder and CEO of Sapiens, and a former BCG consultant. After chronic stress triggered a serious illness, he left to study the biology of performance, and now studies medicine at Harvard Medical School. He has worked with over 3,000 executives, founders and consultants on stress biology, recovery, and the hidden cost of pressure. His approach isn't relentless optimization, but learning to work with your body's design rather than against it.

Pillar 4 SEPTEMBER - VIRTUAL PRACTICE MONTH

Presence
Training

The most magnetic person in the room is rarely the most prepared one. Charisma is a craft, the same one actors and improvisers drill for years, and in this practice month you drill it too. How to fill a room, think on your feet, and let your real personality lead instead of your notes. It feels exposing at first, then it feels like freedom. No slides, no script, just you, fully here.


Yes, And

Drop the reflex to say no. Build on what the room actually gives you.

Status Work

Raise or lower your status at will, and move the room with you.

Live Scenes

Your real high-stakes moments, played out live and unscripted.

Composure Under Fire

When the plan dies, get lighter instead of tighter.

Your Coaches
Jakob Lass

Jakob Lass

Director and Coach

Award-winning Berlin film director known for his improvised films. He coaches improvisation and creative expression, the art of staying open, inventive and alive when there is no script.

Jane Chirwa

Jane Chirwa

CEO of Jabeza Films and Coach

Berlin actor from film, television and stage, trained in improvisation since childhood. Her work is energy and connection, helping people hold a room and bring their full expression to it.

Frequently Asked

Questions CEOs actually ask.

What it costs. How it works. Why this isn't a peer group.

A practice community for CEOs who treat leadership as a lifelong discipline. Each year a small group gathers for two retreats, chosen from four, and stays connected through the Fellow network in between. The work centers on you as the leader: how you think, how you decide, how you hold pressure.
Peer groups run on advice: you bring a problem, the room offers opinions. The Fellowship runs on practice. We train together, and the learning lives in the doing. Real relationships form here, the kind that hold up outside the room.
Founders and CEOs running real companies, often a hundred people or more. People serious about their own growth, who have reached the point where the next edge is an internal one. Everyone applies, and the cohort stays small on purpose.
You join for a year. Four retreats are offered across that year (January, April, July, October), and you choose two. Between them you have the Fellow network and optional integration calls to help the work land.
Each retreat is led by a specialist teacher (see the Teachers section above), and Niko holds the overall container. Teachers are invited for their mastery and their gift for transmitting it. The faculty shifts partially each year, and Fellows hear first.
€6,000 for the year. That covers your two retreats, the Fellow network, and the integration calls in between.
You commit to two of the four. If something genuinely unavoidable comes up, we work it out individually. Retreats are not recorded; the experience is the room, the people, and the practice.
Not for someone hunting for a network to sell into, or a board to validate their strategy. And not for someone who has decided the work is all out there, with nothing left to look at inside. If you are here for deal flow or applause, you will be disappointed.
No. The practices (silence, breath, movement, reflection) are secular tools that happen to be old. We borrow from wisdom traditions where they earn their place, and leave belief systems at the door. Fellows come from every worldview.
Many Fellows stay. The relationships compound, the self-knowledge sharpens, and the practice settles deeper into how you lead. There is no pressure to return. Most do anyway.
You apply below. If there might be a fit, Niko books a thirty-minute call. No deck, no pitch, just a conversation. If it's not right, he'll tell you plainly.
Selection

Applications for 2027 are open.

Apply for 2027 Refer a CEO

How we choose you

Leadership impact

Leadership impact

Evidence you've built something real.

Clarity of vision

Clarity of vision

You know what you're wrestling with.

Experience with inner work

Experience with inner work

Meditation, coaching or therapy.

Contribution to the circle

Contribution to the circle

Show up honestly, hold space for others.

Is this right for you?

6 Questions to find out