Pricing Enablement with Diana Coelho: How is EPP shaping the next generation of pricing professionals?
This episode of Pricing Friends is about pricing enablement and the role a community plays in it, with Diana Coelho, Chair of EPP, the global pricing and revenue growth management community that turns 20 this year. It is also a special episode, because Sebastian hands over the mic to Dr. Amadeus Petzke, Partner in the hy Pricing & Sales team, where he leads the industrials sector and considers pricing enablement a topic close to his heart. Together they discuss why a neutral platform still matters in a world full of AI pricing tools, in-house pricing teams and large consultancies. For Diana, the gap EPP set out to close 20 years ago has changed shape but has not disappeared. Practitioners still need a space for "trusted peer to peer learning", beyond the internal focus of their own company and without the natural interests of software vendors or consultancies.
Beyond the community itself, Diana explains why she sees RGM (revenue growth management) as an expansion of pricing rather than a relabel, and why many companies still treat pricing as a project instead of building internal capability. She is clear that AI will make pricing faster, but that every recommendation still needs human judgement. That is why she names customer value, working with people and judgement as the skills every pricer should keep investing in. She also shares who she would like to see more of at EPP, from product and category managers to the IT leads who design pricing tools. The episode closes with a look ahead to the EPP 20 Years Global Pricing & RGM Summit, which takes place on 17 and 18 November 2026 at the Passenger Terminal Amsterdam, and with Diana's one takeaway for every listener, "don't try to solve every challenge alone". In that spirit, we warmly invite all pricing friends to join the community in Amsterdam and celebrate 20 years of EPP together, and Amadeus will be there too. You can find the full programme and all details here.
About the guest
Diana Coelho has been Chair and Co-Owner of EPP Pricing Platform since February 2026. That month, founder Pol Vanaerde handed over leadership after 20 years, and Pedro Fernandes became General Manager and Co-Owner. Her connection with EPP goes back about ten years. She joined the community in her first pricing roles and later became a trainer for the EPP Certified Pricing Manager programme, which she still teaches today. In November 2021 she founded HOLDEE GmbH, a consultancy for pricing, revenue management and commercial excellence. She has also held pricing roles in industry, including as EAME Pricing Manager at Axalta. Diana studied economics, started her career in consulting and has more than 15 years of experience in commercial management and advisory.
Transkript
Diana CoelhoAI will help set prices. It will make us faster. It won't make the decisions for us. I I still I I think that AI will not replace pricing professionals, because pricing is not only about optimization or finding the optimal amount. It's about strategy, it's about value communication, it's about trade-offs, right? Customer relationships, ethics, organizational alignment, how to get everybody on board with the next move. So, AI can make the recommendation, but it will be people really making the business decisions.
Sebastian VoigtHerzlich willkommen zum Pricing Friends Podcast.
Amadeus PetzkeDear Pricing Friends, hello and a warm welcome to a new edition of our podcast. I'm your moderator today. My name is Amadeus Petzke, a partner at hy, and I lead the industry sector in our pricing and sales team. Today, I'm super happy that we have a topic that is really, really dear to my heart: pricing enablement and training. And more concretely, we will talk about the pricing profession and the question whether the community still needs a home. Today, in a world full of AI pricing tools, of in-house pricing teams, and, of course, big consultancies, what's the case in 2026 for a neutral, community-driven platform? To answer this question, we have invited Diana Coelho, Chair at EPP, the global pricing and revenue growth management community. Diana, thank you for being here.
Diana CoelhoThank you, Amadeus, for having me.
Amadeus PetzkeDiana, let us start with you. How did you get into pricing, and what is also the path that led you into your role at EPP as the Chair?
Diana CoelhoThank you, Amadeus, for the question and again for having me on the podcast. Very happy with the opportunity. So, let's start with your question, right? So, what got me into into pricing and to where I am today? So actually, I think like like many, many people in pricing, I didn't actually start my career thinking that I would become a pricing professional, right? So, this was something
Amadeus PetzkeWho did?
Diana CoelhoYeah, exactly. Yeah. So, it was something that I gradually discovered over time that pricing actually sits at this, yeah, quite fascinating intersection between marketing, sales, strategy, data, IT, customer, commercial overall, and also the human behavior, right? So, it's a quite it's a very cross-functional discipline that I found out over time that somehow related to me and to who I am as a person, right? I studied economics. I started working in consulting and I went straight into commercial type of projects. And in the meantime, I still did, you know, things like internal audits and compliance and transformation projects. So somehow, all these skills blended and I got into into pricing. And what made me stay is that actually, I found out that it's a a profession where I can never stop learning, right? I I keep learning all the time. Pricing is approached very differently between industries, between companies, and every market really teaches you something something new. So, what got me into EPP and my journey with EPP started already maybe 10 years ago when I started my pricing when I had my first pricing roles. At that time, I found a community of people that were willing to openly share experiences, successes, but also mistakes and lessons learned and what to do differently.
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