Marc Kosicke: Klopp’s Key Strategist for German Football

Jürgen Klopp did not arrive at the DFB alone. He brought the man who has been at his side for almost 20 years, the quiet strategist who helped shape some of German football’s most powerful ideas.

Marc Kosicke is now officially Klopp’s “assistant coach for strategy, development and innovation” with the national team. To make that step, he has already walked away from his role as managing director of his company Projekt Five and ended his advisory work for other coaches. The bond with Klopp now moves from club level to the heart of German football.

“It is not enough for only a head coach to come in,” he said. “We have to change a great many things. We want to turn over every stone.”

If Klopp is the public force of nature, Kosicke is the architect in the background. He is widely regarded as the “inventor” of the modern coach adviser, a role that helped redefine how elite managers think about their careers, their image and their influence. Until 2021, he worked closely with Julian Nagelsmann, shaping the trajectory of one of Germany’s most talked‑about young coaches.

His fingerprints, though, reach far beyond individuals. They are etched into the identity of Germany’s biggest club.

A Werder fan and the soul behind “Mia san mia”

The irony still raises eyebrows: a Bremen-born, self-confessed Werder Bremen fan became the man who turned “Mia san mia” into Bayern Munich’s official slogan.

The story began in 2008, on a flight to a FIFA event in Switzerland. Kosicke was travelling with his then business partner Oliver Bierhoff. On the same plane sat Uli Hoeneß, frustrated and restless.

Hoeneß complained about his own players and about something deeper: nobody, he felt, could clearly say what Bayern actually stood for. An identity crisis at Germany’s superclub, voiced at 30,000 feet.

Kosicke seized the moment. He asked Hoeneß what he believed Bayern Munich represented. No clear answer came back.

So he drew on his past. He told Hoeneß about his years with Nike and Adidas, where “company bibles” set out the core values and messages for every employee. Hoeneß was intrigued and asked whether Kosicke could create something similar for Bayern.

Kosicke agreed, as he later put it, “with 100 per cent cluelessness but a lot of self-confidence.” Hoeneß made one thing clear: he wanted Kosicke himself, not “some Roland Berger tie-wearing troupe.”

A working group was formed. Not a slick consulting team, but a cross-section of the club: staff from the fan shop and marketing, the kit man, the youth coordinator, media chief Stefan Mennerich, chief scout Wolfgang Dremmler. For four weeks they worked on defining Bayern’s values.

The slogan, though, was already alive in Kosicke’s head. “Mia san mia” had been fixed in his mind since that first conversation with Hoeneß on the plane. He held it back, knowing he would “have shot [his] bolt straight away” if he revealed it too soon. The group instead concentrated on building the value system around it.

They eventually settled on 16 “commandments” – concrete principles, not abstract buzzwords. Among them: “We are a family and stand by one another.” And: “We do not communicate about one another in public.” It was an attempt to codify what Bayern wanted to be, on the pitch and behind closed doors.

When the time came to present the result to the board, Kosicke went for symbolism. He had several prototype copies of the club’s new “bible” bound in real lederhosen leather. The cover carried the slogan – or so he thought.

As he unveiled it, the reaction in the room was immediate. Delight, then a sharp correction from Hoeneß. “Great slogan, but this MIR is a space station,” he said. On the front it didn’t read “Mia san mia” but “Mir san mir.” A small but telling slip from a man from Bremen who was not, as he admitted, “100 per cent fluent in Bavarian.” The slogan was adjusted. The idea remained.

Kosicke’s work did not stop with a leather-bound manifesto. He also developed a roadmap for how Bayern should embed these values throughout the club. With that, his assignment was done.

When he sent his invoice, he handed over his rights to the slogan and gave Bayern a promise: as a Bremen native and adviser to Jürgen Klopp, he would not go around presenting himself as the great inventor of “Mia san mia.”

The plan for the club was clear. Every new arrival – an office employee, a youth player from Fürstenfeldbruck, a star signing like Sadio Mané – would receive this bible as part of their onboarding. The message: this is who we are, and these are the values we live by.

From Bayern’s identity to Germany’s reset

Kosicke’s role in Munich underlined how much power sits in the space between marketing, mentality and sport. Now that expertise moves to the national team setup.

Klopp has promised a reset at the DFB. “Turn over every stone,” he said. The appointment of Kosicke shows he intends to do it with a clear strategy, not just emotion on the touchline.

The man who once helped Bayern define “Mia san mia” now steps into a job where the task is even bigger: helping Germany remember who they are – and who they want to be.