Biography

Prof. Raphaël H Cohen

Prof. Raphael H Cohen is a keynote speaker and an expert in professional agility, "weapons of mass innovation" and in the levers for maximizing team engagement. As business angel and intrapreneur, he has already mentored more than 300 intrapreneurial and entrepreneurial projects exploiting real innovation opportunities in many industries.

The IpOp Model & ISO 56007

He designed the IpOp Model, which is one of the best practices recommended by ISO 56007 (Managing Opportunities and Ideas), unanimously adopted in 2023 by the 42 countries that developed it. This rigorous pre-project analysis is presented in "Concevoir et lancer un projet" (2016 and 2006), a stimulating book that has been a bestseller since its first publication and has been translated into English ("Winning Opportunities, proven tools for converting your projects into success. without a business plan") and Spanish. The IpOp Model that is taught in executive education seminars and MBA programs empowers entrepreneurs as well as intrapreneurs to identify, analyze and seize opportunities that bring competitive advantages to their company.

Team Engagement & Fair and Caring Leadership

Raphael is also an expert on team engagement, which is the topic of his latest book "Les leviers de l'engagement" published in 2019. He outlines the central role of fairness and benevolence in obtaining engagement through "just leadership" with the corresponding actionable tools. In both small and large organizations, Raphael's approaches boost innovation, entrepreneurial behavior, selling effectiveness, business development as well as employees' engagement.

ISO Standards Development

Because of his extensive experience in innovation Raphael has been actively engaged in designing a new set of ISO standards for managing innovation. As convenor of WG 3 for TC 279 he has been responsible for several years for coordinating the contribution of all international experts committed to produce ISO 56003, the standard on innovation partnerships, which has been adopted in 2019. He has also been one of the key contributors of ISO 56007.

Executive Education Programs

Raphael H also designed and runs AgilityBoosters / MicroMBA MB executive education programs customized to stimulate the agility and intrapreneurial behavior of middle and upper management in large companies such as Nestlé, Microsoft, banks as well as public sector organizations such as university hospitals. Since participants must find and implement real opportunities, their projects generate measurable profits exceeding by far the cost of the training programs. This profit-generating approach represents a paradigm shift in executive education. He has coached more than 300 real intrapreneurial projects.

MicroMBAs MB are the corporate version of the first four CREATE courses of Entrepreneurship for engineers and scientists in Switzerland (at both University of Geneva and EPFL, the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology) that Raphael has designed and run until 2002, when he started the AgilityBooster/MicroMBA MB programs.

Academic Positions

From 2001 to 2021, Raphael has been academic director of the "Entrepreneurial Leadership" specialization of the EMBA at the University of Geneva, which has awarded him the title of Academic Fellow. He has also been the MBA European Academic Program Director of the Thunderbird School of Global Management (Phoenix, Arizona), where he holds the title of clinical professor. He has also been the only non-French member of scientific committee of Institut du Management, the French Post corporate university teaching management.

Entrepreneurial Experience

As serial entrepreneur, active CEO and business angel, Raphael H Cohen brings his hands-on experience in his lecturing and consulting activities providing training, mentoring and management services to senior executives, bankers, directors and entrepreneurs. He has been serving on the board of directors of several companies, including one Swiss bank for 27 years, and is a regular contributor to several business publications including Forbes and Harvard Business Review France.

Education & Expertise

He obtained his Ph.D. in Economics in 1982 while managing an international group of companies. His diversified working experience on 3 continents and in many industries led him to develop expertise in innovation, leadership, strategy, business development, management, negotiation, sales, HR, coaching and mentoring, financial engineering, legal affairs (international taxation, licensing, real estate, M&A, etc.), asset management, turning-around businesses, interim and crisis management.