Transformation
"Transformation is an evolutionary process that we deeply feel and experience. Once it occurs, we move beyond just understanding it intellectually to fully and sustainably living the change. We embody a rooted version of our authentic self, with acceptance and clarity that transcends our past. This shift is such, that even under pressure or when very relaxed, we do not unconsciously revert to our old ways. Such transformation can occur multiple times in our lives." Lutz Otto
Lutz
Otto
♾️ Executive & Personal Coach
♾️ Leadership Consultant
♾️ Program & Retreat Facilitator
Who am I
Labels aside, I am multidimensional and evolving.
I am a seasoned executive, life, counselling and team coach, leadership consultant and facilitator. My practice is psychodynamically oriented, depth-based and grounded in substantial lived experience. I work comfortably with complexity, ambiguity and challenging processes where there may not be an immediate or obvious answer.
Clients choose to work with me when they want to work through internal and external challenges, navigate transitions, make more conscious choices, develop better relationships, build leadership capacity, and understand themselves more deeply in ways that support continued growth and movement towards their evolving potential.
Over more than 36 years, my professional experience, has been shaped by executive leadership, coaching, counselling, mentorship, change management, retreat facilitation and, simply, living a full life. Before establishing my coaching practice, I gained extensive local and international executive leadership experience, including more than a decade on the South African executive team of a London Stock Exchange-listed multinational. Explore my work foundation and approach.
Care, commitment, courage, focus and adventure form part of my essence — while I recognise that, at times, I experience their opposites too. I am committed to living consciously and authentically. I have learned through success and failure, and through significant personal and professional change.
Losing my father to cancer at a very young age profoundly affected our family. At 18, feeling hurt and like an outlier, I began a process of making sense of my experience, connecting more deeply with my authenticity, and exploring how to make the most of our finite time on earth. What began as a personal search gradually became a vocation — and continues to evolve through a deepening understanding of psychology, leadership, systems thinking and holistic wellbeing.
The bush, mountains, wild beaches and the garden at home are places of renewal for me. I love music and reading. I am a lifelong runner, both road and trail, as well as a backpacker, climber and adventurer.
I am still evolving.
Vulnerability
"Believing that vulnerability is unsafe is at its best a basic defense, and in reality, an illusion. Our psychological and physiological makeup, our humanness, makes each of us vulnerable, whether we would like to believe it or not. The vulnerability and courage of doing the work necessary to find and show our truth far outweighs the lifelong burden of living an inauthentic life." Lutz Otto
Experience
My professional experience has developed across executive leadership, coaching, counselling, mentorship, change management, retreat facilitation, and personal development.
Before establishing my coaching practice, I gained extensive local and international executive leadership experience, including implementing significant change processes, leading business turnaround initiatives, and serving for more than a decade on the South African executive team of a London Stock Exchange-listed multinational.
It was in leadership that my passion for working with people in the way I do today began to take shape. Through Spirited Adventures, a parallel business which I founded, we have also positively impacted many lives through wellbeing, healing, and leadership retreats.
Over time, I have come to appreciate what growth, leadership, healing and transformation uniquely ask of us. Working extensively with depth coaching has shown me what can become possible when people work honestly with difficult internal and external challenges. Personally navigating executive leadership has taught me about the anxieties and responsibilities associated with high-stakes environments. Working and living globally has deepened my understanding of cultural diversity. Leading mountaineering and backpacking journeys, and spending time on the fringes of conventional experience, has taught me much that cannot be learned from books.
I have, in many ways, spent my life on different sides of the fence — as executive and coach, leader and practitioner, guide and participant, professional and client. It is this combination of perspectives and lived experience that informs the way I work.
I graduated from business school in 1993 and have subsequently completed numerous leadership, strategy, coaching, counselling and therapeutic training programmes*. My training and mentorship work is underpinned by assessor certification, and I continue to invest in ongoing professional development.
Throughout my career, I have also developed and facilitated numerous training and development programmes. I currently facilitate my Conscious Leadership programme within a number of multinational organisations, as well as an internationally accredited psychodynamic coaching programme through the Universal Coaching Alliance for advanced practitioners.
Alongside my professional work, I am a qualified walking safari, nature and mountain guide, supporting the immersive experiences offered through our retreats. I also founded an Honorary Ranger Initiative in the Greater Kruger National Park, served for six years on the executive committee of the Field Guides Association of Southern Africa, and in 2015 was awarded the Order of the Bateleur for my then volunteer contribution to conservation initiatives.
Ultimately, the cornerstone of my experience and knowledge has been the privilege of working with clients, together with personal therapy, regular supervision and decades of consistent, in-depth reading and learning.
*Specifically with regards coaching, counselling, and mentorship, my qualifications and certifications include: Integrative Coaching Certification, Leadership Coaching Certification, Trauma Informed Coach Certificate, Somatic Foundations Certificate, Person Centered Counselling Certificate, Gestalt Therapy Certificate, Counselling Diploma, Emotions Focused Therapy Certificate, Dialectical Behaviour Therapy Certificate, Psychoanalytic Therapy Certificate, Timeline Technique Certificate, Transactional Analysis Certificate, Polyvagel Theory Certificate, Couples Counselling Using Systemic Family Therapy Certificate, Internal Family Systems & Psychedelic Therapy Certificate, Psychedelic Counseling: Foundations of Therapeutic Trip Sitting, Counselling Practitioner Certificate, Outcomes Based Assessor Certification, and Train The Trainer Program. Outside of these I have earned numerous qualifications and certifications in both the business and guiding fields.
Work Foundation
My practice is psychodynamically oriented, depth-based and grounded in substantial lived experience. At a foundational level, I practice integratively combining psychology, coaching, mentorship, counselling, trauma-informed, leadership, systems thinking, change management, and holistic wellbeing principles.
My work is grounded in the beliefs that:
-
Sometimes life is easy, and sometimes life is really hard. Forced positivity fails us. We are in an infinitely better psychological position by validating what we are feeling, in the reality of our experience, and moving forward drawing on our inner resources, a growth mindset, and when possible hope.
-
We are continually evolving, and if we choose to, we can grow through challenges in a way we never believed possible.
-
All human desires, responses to our needs, and mental activity are alive to a continuous, dynamic, interaction between feelings, cognition, and behaviour. They are inseparable in their link.
-
The past is with us in the present and will be with us in the future. It need not determine the future.
-
We are subjected to conscious and unconscious cognition - Our unconscious mind drives many of our responses, desires, fears, and behaviours, and until we bring awareness to this, we are driven, not driving.
-
Nothing happens in isolation.
-
The mind ♾️ body connection is inseparable.
-
Psychological freedom can only be found by doing the work within. The only way is through.
“Lutz is direct and insightful, driven yet humble, compassionate and kind. He easily connects to people, whilst his authenticity, veracity and depth of holistic experience position him uniquely to facilitate transformation work”
How effective is the psychodynamic approach?
Jonathan Shedler, a distinguished psychoanalyst and clinical professor, gained global recognition for his research that empirically proved the effectiveness of the psychodynamic approach. Read the outcomes in his article The Efficacy of Psychodynamic Psychotherapy
Approach
The who decide to work with me are committed to their journey and intentionally wish to work with an experienced practitioner. Our time together can serve as a powerful catalyst for sustainable change, healing, growth and moving towards what is truly important. Through our work, you can develop a deeper understanding of your behaviour, relationships and the unique workings of your mind.
My practice is rooted in dedication and respect. I offer a safe, neutral, confidential, supportive, collaborative, engaged, gently challenging, intuitive, informed and outcomes-focused approach.
I am adept at working with depth and am comfortable navigating complexity, ambiguity and processes where there may not be an immediate or obvious answer. I do not use formulaic or cookie-cutter approaches, personality profiling or forced positivity. Where we can, I bring lightness into our work.
Beyond the immediate things that you bring into the room, we will work towards enriching your full lived experience. To develop the insight that will assist you, I will get to know your life story, beliefs, challenges, hopes and ambitions. Depending on where we are in your journey, we may work towards a specific goal, or allow the work to unfold through emergence.
We build on the principle that energy flows where attention goes, and form follows flow. Attention creates the possibility for awareness; awareness creates the possibility for insight; and insight can create the possibility for conscious choice. Insight alone, however, does not necessarily create change. At the appropriate point in the work, insight needs to become lived differently — through conscious choices, experimentation and sustained action.
Confidentiality & Professional Association
Crucial to the success of your process is working with someone you can speak to without reservation, someone you can trust enough to reveal your most authentic self and what you might hesitate to share elsewhere. Confidentiality, ethical practice, and psychological safety are integral to our terms of working together.
All our work together starts with an alignment exploration, a discussion as to what you can expect, and a contracting process. I am admitted as a fellow member* of the Association for Coaching and work by the association's Global Code of Ethics.
*Fellow membership is an exclusive admission category granted to practitioners with significant coaching experience, that has been gained over an extended period of time, and who are able to demonstrate their contribution to the coaching profession.
Contact
If what you have read resonates with and you would like to learn more or have questions, let's schedule a discovery call to see if we can work together to help you meet your goals.
My practice and office are located in Sandton, South Africa. I provide my services in person, either indoors or outdoors in nature, as well as via online video conferencing. I work with clients in South Africa, the UK, Europe, and the USA.
The best way to make contact is by submitting the form below, alternatively leave a message at +27 (0) 82 777 5990 [my phone is off when in practice].