# from lions: Emma van Leeuwen

> Emma van Leeuwen is a freelance specialist in process, data and AI, based in Amsterdam, and cofounder of Plaiwrks. She helps teams turn AI ideas into tools people actually use, by combining process improvement, data and AI. Hands on: she would rather build a prototype than write another slide deck.

## What she does

- Combines process, data and AI: understand how the work flows, measure where it gets stuck, and use AI to make it smarter.
- Builds AI agents, agentic workflows, RAG assistants and AI automations that land in the tools teams already use (Slack, Microsoft 365, Google Workspace).
- Works with agentic coding: designs and decides, while Claude Code writes and tests the code.
- Helps with AI strategy and AI adoption, from first use case to governance and KPIs.
- Trains teams in AI as an AI trainer for an international training agency.
- Turns ideas into business cases that convince everyone at the table.

## Approach: from spark to scale

1. Ambition: start with goals, not technology.
2. Baseline: an honest look at data, tools, skills and the AI already in use.
3. Opportunities: find where the value is hiding, each idea with a business case.
4. Prove it: a small, fast, visible prototype or quick win.
5. Adoption: trainings, ambassadors and hands on sessions so AI actually gets used.
6. Scale: roadmap, ownership, governance and KPIs.

Ways to work together: the full journey from scratch, jumping in at any step, or just the spark (a single scoping session or a workshop that gets a team excited about AI).

## Selected work

- An internal AI tool for a consumer brand that turns every partnership brief into a standardized 360° report, answered against the same nine strategic questions. Departments deliver through Slack, Claude drafts the analysis with enforced guardrails, and an analyst approves every report.
- An agentic workflow that wrote the work instructions for a new absence management system at an occupational health provider, taking the work from eight people down to two.
- A RAG assistant in Slack that answers from a company's own research with source citations, fed by an automated n8n pipeline into Supabase.

## Tools

Data and analytics: SQL, Databricks, Snowflake, Power BI, GA4. Models and assistants: Claude, ChatGPT, Gemini, Microsoft Copilot, Copilot Studio. Orchestration: n8n, Make, Zapier, Power Automate, Apps Script. Agentic coding and building: Claude Code, Cursor, GitHub Copilot, Lovable, Supabase. Process and collaboration: BPMN, Miro, Jira, Notion, Microsoft 365.

## Contact

- Website: https://www.from-lions.com
- Email: emmac.vanleeuwen@gmail.com
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/emma-van-leeuwen-286080106/