Strategic advisory · Arnhem

Strategy gains value the moment it starts moving.

Giraffa Business Consulting helps organisations turn a shared ambition into plans they can actually carry out, in education, government, safety, care and heritage. Active across the Netherlands and Belgium. A single clear conversation is often enough to set the course.

Portrait of Marcel Veening, founder of Giraffa Business ConsultingMarcel Veening
Founder · Giraffa
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Entrepreneurship20YearsSince 2006Arnhem
Víco Pioneers

Partnership is the new leadership

All assignments of Giraffa Business Consulting run through Víco Pioneers, cofounded by Marcel Veening and Victoria van Krieken. Víco Pioneers builds and leads vital coalitions: partnerships that build momentum and deliver results. Giraffa Business Consulting remains the advisory practice, while the work is carried out from Víco Pioneers by a dedicated team.

  • Interim leadership in collaboration and programme management
  • Coalition building for education, government, care and safety
  • Available three days a week, more in consultation
vicopioneers.eu

Expertise & services

Four disciplines
One orange butterfly among many blue butterflies

Change & innovation

Rethinking how decisions flow: structures, roles and rhythms that let a team keep renewing itself.

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Digital strategy

Turning technology ambition into a sequence the organisation can actually deliver on.

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Glass office towers converging against a blue sky

Public-private partnership

Building coalitions where government, business and society share one agenda and one pace.

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Experience & assignments

From a focused six-week engagement to an embedded advisory role: the shape of the work follows the question at hand.

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Anniversary 2006 to 2026

Two decades.
Lasting impact.

From independent advisory practice to cofounder and strategic partner. Twenty years of building organisations, programmes and partnerships across the Netherlands and Belgium.

In November Giraffa marks twenty years of independent advisory practice.

Roles across twenty years

  • Cofounder
  • Managing director
  • Programme director
  • Strategy adviser
  • Coalition builder
  • Supervisory director

Entrepreneurial milestones

  1. 2024 – present

    Víco Pioneers

    Cofounder, building and leading vital coalitions with Victoria van Krieken

  2. 2006 – present
    Giraffa

    Giraffa Business Consulting

    Advisory firm for change, innovation, strategy development and delivery

  3. 2014 – 2022

    COG Valei & Gelderland midden

    Supervisory board member & chair of the audit committee, 11,000 students in secondary and vocational education

  4. 2015 – 2022

    Centre of Excellence

    Managing director of a hub for social and technological innovation

  5. 2018 – 2025

    Turner Organisatieadvies

    Associate consultant for education and public-private partnerships

  6. 2014 – 2015

    Luminis Groep

    Managing director consultancy & projects, 120 fte across 4 locations

  7. 2013 – 2014

    Be Informed

    Director professional services, 90 fte in 5 delivery teams

Entrepreneurship has increasingly become a team effort: bringing the right people together, setting direction and making shared leadership work.

Lasting value

Giraffa works on change that outlasts the assignment: structures, partnerships and leadership that keep working long after the programme ends. Twenty years on, what was built together is still visible in organisations across the Netherlands and Belgium.

Marcel Veening

20+ years in advisory

60+ leadership engagements

Arnhem, active in the Netherlands and Belgium

The founder

Marcel J. Veening, MSc

Directing collaboration that lasts, from first exploration to enduring results.

As a programme director, programme manager and strategy adviser, Marcel specialises in shaping a shared vision and translating it into concrete, workable plans. His background in business administration and information technology lets him move easily between the boardroom, the professionals and the technology.

With an eye for lasting value and long relationships, he combines creativity with analysis and leadership that carries people along. Through Víco Pioneers he builds vital coalitions that work in practice.

Expertise

  • Coalition building & PPP
  • Programme management
  • Strategic advisory
  • Change management
  • Digital transformation
  • Governance & supervision
  • Interim management
  • Education innovation

Sectors

  • Education, primary to university of applied sciences
  • Government & safety
  • Care & welfare
  • Culture & heritage
  • Professional services

Education & certification

  • 1993 – 2002ir. / MSc Business Information Technology, University of Twente
  • 1989 – 1993ing. / BSc Computer Engineering, Hogeschool Enschede
  • 2016 – 2024House of Coherence: leadership, supervision and strategy programmes
  • 2016 – 2024Governance University: leadership, supervision and strategy programmes
  • 2016 – 2024TIAS School for Business and Society: leadership, supervision and strategy programmes
  • 2008MSP Practitioner and Advanced PRINCE2 Practitioner (OGC)

Let's talk through the question that really matters for your organisation.

A first conversation takes the time it needs and carries no obligation.

Phone: +31 (0)6 51 37 35 39