TEDxSpeaker · TEDxSanStefano, Alexandria
Facilitation · Conflict Transformation
I host spaces where teams and organisations make the unspoken visible — and move forward where conversations keep circling because everyone feels slighted.
Grounded in international peace work
The third space
— Christina Wessendorf
The most important thing in communication is hearing what isn’t said.
In international teams and negotiations, collaboration rarely stalls on the content alone. More often it is about feeling slighted, hidden assumptions, and the way people talk to each other under uncertainty.
The “third space” opens when a group stops standing against each other and starts looking together at the same image. SIM-Translation makes implicit emotional and relational dynamics visible — turning them into something a group can observe, reflect on and work through together.
What is at stake
Culture is complex — inside a team and across national borders. It decides whether a strategy holds or fails at the level of collaboration.
Culture eats strategy for breakfast.
I make visible the cultural patterns working beneath the surface — global alignment as much as everyday teamwork. A vague “culture question” becomes something concrete you can work on.
Unresolved conflict ties up attention, slows decisions and wears teams down — often long before anyone names it.
I work as a facilitator and as a neutral party so the conflict becomes discussable — so energy flows back into the work instead of the friction.
What that looks like in practice — for the acute situation, immediate impact, or building for the long term — is shown in the three ways into the third space below.
How we work together
Xchange Facilitation
Structured dialogues and workshops for teams and organisations in change — especially where people work together across nations and cultures. Psychological safety, group dynamics and collective intelligence, in the xchange approach.
Tell me moreConflict Transformation
My signature method: the emotional layer of a discussion translated into a live image — a “conflict picture” the group can look at together, one that shows common ground and ways forward as much as the conflict, where words fell short.
Tell me moreCurriculum-based workshops and keynotes — from teacher trainings to peace-ambassador formats in schools, tested internationally (HWPL).
Tell me moreWho it is for
I work across industries. What matters is not the size or the field but the will: that you, your team or your venture want to become something greater — for a better future.
TEDx · Live proof
There, in the city that shaped her, Christina argued that belonging isn’t a place you reach — it’s a capacity you carry. That same conviction now sits at the centre of her work: helping groups feel at home enough with each other to look at the hard thing together.
Official TEDx channel · “Feel anywhere at home in the world”. Transcript on request.
Method
Graphic recording visualises information. SIM-Translation (Sound-to-Image) visualises emotion — turning not only the conflict but also common ground and possible ways forward into an observable object, a “third instance in the room”.
Simultaneously with the discussion, an image emerges that makes connections, tensions and stances visible — free of judgement and manipulation.
The group looks at the image together. What stood between the participants now lies in front of them — as something they can examine side by side.
In dialogue or 1:1 coaching, participants communicate with the conflict picture — on a deeper, human level.
Impact
“When teaching, it is important to lead the children’s hearts and teach from your heart. I learned that I should approach everything from the heart.”
Participating teacher · HWPL peace-education workshop, Mongolia (2024)
“I learned from this workshop that you should listen to your students very attentively and always love them.”
Participating teacher · HWPL peace-education workshop, Mongolia (2024)
Reference: HWPL teacher workshop Mongolia (≈100 participants).
Ask the mature holodyne if it is willing to teach you everything you need to know in order to solve the problem.
Because behind it lies a deeply hopeful assumption:
Perhaps the images that frighten, confuse or block us already carry part of the solution within them — if we learn to relate to them, instead of fighting against them.
Grounded in intercultural communication (Hall/Hofstede), Nonviolent Communication (Rosenberg), Appreciative Inquiry and the iceberg model — used in communication, psychology and organisational development to illustrate implicit and explicit processes.
About
Peace work is my life’s task. I see a world in which intercultural understanding happens and peace emerges: when teams manage to work together on innovations that serve the world, without failing at the human level. When negotiations satisfy everyone’s needs, because the unspoken is seen too. When leaders no longer carry their power and powerlessness alone, but are equipped to decide with resilience, peace, calm and joy. When the next generation — especially tomorrow’s decision-makers — learns to turn anger and fear into clear communication. Then I have contributed a small part to peace.
I pursue this in two ways. On one hand, I support systems by making emotions visible and addressable through SIM-Translation — a process I have been developing since 2017. On the other, I offer whole peace-education programmes, across generations.
My path as a German teacher led me to Egypt, into a Muslim marriage, onto the stage of TEDx Alexandria, through two certifications as a facilitator and coach, and to India for workshops in schools.
Ever since studying Cultural Management, I have worked and thought across disciplines — and therefore differently from others. I live with joy and for peace, for growing trust in the present and the future.
B.A. Cultural Management (Business & French) · DE / EN / FR / Arabic
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