Susan van Hes is originally a chemical engineer and also holds a Master of Business Administration. She has been working with Best Value for 5 years, of which 3 years as an A+ certified Best Value trainer. She has over fifteen years experience as a project manager. She specializes in conveying the philosophy behind Best Value and achieved the highest score twice at the Trainers exam in the USA.

As one of the few people in the Netherlands, Susan provides in-depth training in the philosophy of Best Value. Besides supervising Best Value projects she also supports a number of organizations in the implementation of the Best Value philosophy so that they become a transparent, learning, efficient, pleasant and open organization.

Susan enjoys working with other (Best Value) experts, which she does frequently.

At Best Value Europe Susan is responsible for coaching and peer reviews of Best Value experts, organizing conferences and seminars, research and development of Best Value and developing Best Value implementation in organizations.

Dean Kashiwagi is the founder of Best Value. He was born in Hawaii in the early 1950s and retired director of the Performance Based Studies Research Group (PBSRG) of the University of Arizona. His life questions prompted him to formulate the Information Measurement Theory (IMT). Initially IMT was developed and tested within the Kashiwagi family.

As the youngest child of three, Dean grew up with Japanese parents who were constantly worried about money and their retirement. Although there was no real need for it because the Kashiwagi’s were a middle class family. Because Dean was the youngest there was no need to make decisions, that was done for him. This was an environment that awakened the rebel in him and he had no idea what he should do with his future. In search of himself, he left school to spend two years meditating in Japan.

After two years 'rest' Dean went back to America, graduated and joined the US Air Force. In 1992, at the age of 40, Dean was married to Judy and father of eight children. He resigned from the military to pursue his dream. He wanted to develop a method based on the idea “the less I knew, the better off I was, and that what I could observe, would still allow me to know more than anyone else”. That dream, that vision, led to IMT and Best Value. 

Best Value has been applied more than 1550 times in projects over the past 20 years with a total value of $ 6.3 billion. Best Value is used in Canada, the Netherlands, Norway and the US. In 2012 Best Value won the Dutch Sourcing Award. Best Value is a system that is constantly evolving, which makes sense because new things are learned from each Best Value project.