ABOUT ME

Hi there, I am Marilena Timotheou,

I’ve spent my career at the intersection of startups and corporates — two worlds that approach innovation differently, yet share the same truth: without leadership alignment and stakeholder buy-in, innovation never scales.

I started out as a startup founder, learning how to build and adapt in lean and agile ways — making progress with limited resources while staying close to customer needs. That entrepreneurial grounding shaped how I approach innovation today: with pragmatism, speed, and focus on impact.

From there, I joined a venture clienting SaaS company and consultancy, where I first worked as an Innovation consultant / Manager, supporting multinational organisations such as BSH, LGE, Miele, STIHL, and Infineon in adopting venture clienting and open innovation models. Later, I transitioned into the product team and became Head of Product, where I designed tools to help corporates systematically source, test, and embed startup solutions.

This progression gave me both perspectives: how to consult and coach innovation units, and how to actually build and scale the systems that make innovation repeatable. It also revealed the biggest barrier to success: no matter how strong the solution, without leadership alignment and stakeholder buy-in, innovation efforts remain stuck in pilots and theatre.

Alongside this, I hold a Professional Diploma in Coaching and Mentoring (ICF & EMCC), advanced training in Transformational Change Strategy, and I am a dedicated student of the International School of Self-Awareness. These experiences have shaped my conviction that innovation isn’t just about strategies and systems — it’s also about the leaders and cultures who drive them. I use a coaching approach to unlock the full potential of those leaders, so they can champion innovation and build cultures that sustain it.

Too many organisations fall into the innovation circus — pilots that never scale, disconnected initiatives, or projects that fail to embed into the business.

My work tackles the two points where most innovation fails:

• Upstream: aligning leadership, culture, and strategy to create clarity and commitment.
   
• Downstream: embedding outcomes into systems so innovation becomes sustainable and repeatable.
   

I don’t “do innovation” for you — I walk beside you. 

As a Corporate Innovation expert, together, we design the path to innovation mastery, ensuring progress doesn’t just start, but sticks.

Because every organisation has another level of innovation to unlock.