Bob Kohli has almost two decades of experience as a global advisor and consultant, nine of them advising family enterprises across the world, predominantly in the Middle East and South Asia. He currently serves as a Board Director for a Saudi-based family conglomerate and as a board advisor for several family businesses in the region. His specializations include long-term strategic planning, family enterprise governance, conflict resolution, next generation development, and succession planning.
A “third culture person” with international work experience, Bob has a keen awareness and sensitivity of the cultural nuances of increasingly global families, which help him to engage and connect with families from various backgrounds and to support them in finding the right balance between traditions and transitions. He enables multigenerational alignment by creating a psychologically safe environment in which family leaders can openly discuss, debate, and decide on the future of their legacy.
In advising leading G2 and G3 families, Bob supports the design and launch of foundational governance structures like councils, constitutions, and boards to stabilize, sustain, and grow their family enterprise. He has extensive experience working with leadership teams consisting of family and non-family executives, and driving an analytical and performance-based leadership rooted in accountability, transparency, and collaboration. Bob also works with next generation family members to help them develop an owner mindset and prepare for collaborative stewardship. He firmly believes that sustainability in family enterprises is achieved by nurturing transgenerational entrepreneurship, which enables the growth of both the enterprise and the family leadership team.
Earlier in his career, while at a leading strategy consulting firm, Bob led several projects in strategy (investment, growth, turnaround) and change management for Fortune 100 clients. His sector experience includes pharmaceuticals & healthcare, oil & gas, tech, private equity, venture capital, and consumer and luxury goods across verticals of retail, trade, manufacturing, supply chain & logistics, and services.
Bob holds an MBA from Columbia Business School in New York, a combined Bachelors and Masters in Computer Science from Loyola University Chicago, and Advanced Certificates in Family Business Advisory (ACFBA) and Family Wealth Advisory (ACFWA) from the renowned Family Firm Institute in Boston. Bob is also an Associate Certified Coach with the International Coaching Federation, an accredited Belbin Team Roles Coach, and an accredited Advanced Practitioner of Enneagram Personality Types.
Bob is married with a teenage daughter. He is a family man and spends his free time being a doting father, spending quality time with his retired parents, and keeping up with global affairs and family enterprise literature.