About Peter Sorgenfrei

TL;DR: I am a founder and CEO coach based in Copenhagen. I built companies for 15 years, from a strategy firm in New York to Holo, which became Europe's largest autonomous vehicle operator. In February 2020 I burned out, and my board let me go while I was on sick leave. I started coaching in 2021. Since then I have coached 70 founders and CEOs of companies from 20 to 500 people, in 15 countries. I wrote The Whole Human Leader (Wiley, 2026). I coach in Danish and English.

The jet fighter

A couple of months before I burned out, my board asked me how I was doing. We were in the middle of selling the company. I told them I was doing great.

Then I said the truest thing I said in that whole period. I feel like the pilot of a jet fighter, except I am not in the cockpit. I am hanging onto the wing, looking in, and nobody is at the controls.

I said it out loud, in a board meeting. Then I carried on as if I had not.

In February 2020 I came home from a ski trip on a Saturday. On Monday morning I could not get out of bed. I spent six weeks lying down and twelve weeks out of work. During that time the board let me go. They told me it was nothing personal. It felt very personal.

Fifteen years of building

Early in my career I worked at UBS on Wall Street. I saw people who ran businesses worth hundreds of millions, and many of them still looked worried about their future. I did not understand it then. I understood it later, when I did the same thing for 15 years.

Sorgenfrei, New York (2004). My first company, which I founded alone. Market research, competitive intelligence and corporate strategy.

Somewhere, London (2013). I helped build it. Picture the love child of LinkedIn and Instagram: a tool to recruit people for cultural fit.

Holo, Copenhagen (2016). I was the founding CEO. Holo became Europe's largest autonomous vehicle operator and grew to about 70 people. Two planes a week, raising money, no stopping.

In all, six companies on three continents. I also worked in Silicon Valley, Paris, Vienna and Asia.

My first CEO role, at my own company Sorgenfrei in New York, taught me three things the hard way. I acted before I understood why things were the way they were. I did not see that my mood became the company's mood, and that the team looked where I looked. And I thought doing my job was enough. You also have to manage the people above you.

The rebuild

My recovery was simple and slow. I walked the Charlottenlund forest loop north of Copenhagen more than 300 times in the first year. On a cold May morning I started swimming in the sea, and I still do it all year.

My Danish family has a word for what I was missing: tryghed. It is a deep sense of security that comes from belonging, honesty and a rhythm you can keep. I had built my security on being "the CEO who built something amazing from nothing." When the title went, there was very little under it.

Why I coach

When I looked back, I saw what I had been missing all those years. It was somebody like the person I am now. Somebody I could talk to who was independent of my board, my investors, my co-founder and my partner at home. Everybody around me had a stake in the answer. Nobody was only on my side.

I started coaching in 2021 for one reason. I want founders to avoid what happened to me.

What I do now

I coach founder-CEOs of companies from 20 to 500 people, usually three or more years in. The company works. The job has started to cost them something: sleep, health, a marriage, the joy of building.

The work follows the Whole Human Framework from my book. It has four parts. Personal Sustainability: your energy, sleep, body and mind. Relational Intelligence: your partner, family, co-founders and board. Team Synergy: how your leadership team works without you in every decision. Systemic Impact: what the company does to the people in it and around it.

Most founders come to me with one problem. Usually it is the one part of the four that drains the other three. We find it, and we fix it.

I work 1-on-1, with co-founder pairs, and with small groups. Sessions run in Danish or English, mostly remote, sometimes in person in Copenhagen. Every program is on the services page.

In numbers

70 founders and CEOs coached since 2021, in 15 countries. 40+ CEOs advised each year. Six companies built over 15 years, on three continents. 100,000+ leaders follow the work through my newsletter and social media.

The book

The Whole Human Leader: How to Lead Without Losing Yourself came out with Wiley in August 2026. It sold out right after publication and is now back in stock. It is for leaders who are succeeding by every measure and quietly wondering if this is all there is.

I am writing my next book now. It is about relationships.

Outside work

Most mornings start with a swim in the sea. I take long walks in the parks here in Copenhagen, and I take a nap every day. I spend my time with my teenage son Theodor and my girlfriend, with my clients, and with the next book. Honestly, I am living my best life.

Find me

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