Hi! My name is Irina and I'm the Chief Creative Sherpa here.

My journey started in Romania as a little girl witnessing the 1989 revolution, I grew up seeing that even in the face of overwhelming force and violence, people were willing to stand up for their rights and demand change. Not here for a history lesson but if you’re not familiar with the facts, this one inspired other pro-democracy movements across Eastern Europe, leading to the eventual collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War.

I grew up asking questions and seeing another way of doing things. It stayed with me. 

Fast forward to decision-making age, I started and sold a small financial consultancy company in London, it wasn’t PwC but it taught me how to leverage community, built a marketplace that was on some VC lists as one of Europes most promising 200 startups, scaled to multiple locations around the world, fought the demons of product-market-fit valley that sparked an internal revolution and questioning the alignment between my personal and business purpose. Took time to connect with that inner “why”, it brought me full circle back and cofounded Romania’s only dedicated wellness resort in a quiet little village where some +5000 people and a lot of corporate teams from all over the world came in search of their own purpose. 

Some found theirs but mostly I found mine, helping people and their businesses stay connected with what really matters. 

In 16+ years of being an entrepreneur and finding my way to Everest I learned that “axis mundi” was not just some new age concept it is this fundamental alignment of profit with purpose that your customers, stakeholders and employees look for in your brand positioning and growth strategy. An invisible ladder that is hard to quantify, harder to apply and for some impossible to climb. 

Not the hypothetical Everest, the actual mountain…

As I sat there, in front of this absolute perfection of a giant, I begun contemplating my own mountains: innovating brands that stand out, navigating through customer acquisition & conversion optimisation, deploying growth focused marketing tactics, generating € millions in revenue. Along the way I saw many startups that worked hard, great tactical skill, disruptive solutions but ineffective in bringing these to market. I soon got talking to startups and established brands that were getting the runaround being sold strategy plans full of mysterious behind-the-scenes work, cumbersome roadblocks, shallow results, and quick wins with no follow through. 

I climbed many of these personal hypothetical mountains since and now I want to help you through yours.

Maintaining a competitive edge in today's noisy, crowded digital world is the same as mountaineering. You need skill, the right team, strategy and spotless execution to steer away from "death valley" and stay on track. Keeping things focused, simple and uncomplicated comes from staying connected with your purpose, why you started, where you want it to go, what it means for your users and for the greater landscape. 

A bit like a sherpa getting you beyond base camp…

Sherpas form life saving relationships, navigate challenging and unpredictable terrain, pass down their mountaineering skills and cultural traditions from generation to generation, creating a sense of continuity and community. 

The Sherpa is my archetype, albeit not defined by Jung but nevertheless as poignant. I literally travelled across the world to find a set of values I apply into a sustainable business model and now help others do the same. I embody my metaphorical sherpa by thinking like one, borrowing their guidance, expertise, resilience, and partnership and translate it into powerful, meaningful relationships I build with the people and startups I work with. 

Sherpas never work alone, they’re deeply rooted by community. 

I have a knack for finding places and people that inspire, out of the many places on this beautiful planet I could have ended up in, my journey brought me to Mumbai, India where I now live with my family. There’s a lot of that here, India is going through it’s own revolution of a different kind, the underdog that’s coming up behind the scenes tapping at a deep and vast potential for prosperity and opportunity. Here I work with a remote first team of highly effective idea generators, growth coaches, content creators and marketing strategists. Misfits that could never enter a board room in suits but they deliver on creativity, challenge you to think differently and come up with crazy ideas that truly work.  

If this sounds like you’d want to know more please connect with me on Twitter or LinkedIn or send me an email to hello@thecreativesherpas.com.