Wilco Kah

Wilco Kah started with numbers. After secondary school he joined EY in Utrecht, where he learned that a set of accounts rarely tells the whole story. That stayed with him. Over the almost fifteen years that followed in the building services industry he worked as finance director, consultant and change manager, and kept running into the same thing: organisations that knew exactly what was in their systems, but not what it meant.

That gap is what New Data is about. Not another dashboard, but the people who make the difference between having data and using it. As Chief Growth Officer, Wilco builds the four New Data brands and sits at the table for the conversations that matter.

He likes to call himself the data layman, which is less modest than it sounds. It is a way of working. Anyone who acts as if they already know stops asking the question that exposes the problem. In a field where people convince each other with terms nobody dares question, daring to ask the obvious is a skill.

His background in change management explains why he rarely starts with the technology. A report nobody uses is not a technical problem. Neither is a vacancy that stays open for months. In both cases the answer sits with people, and that is where he starts the conversation.

Wilco lives in Moordrecht, is married and has three highly gifted children. That last part keeps him sharp: at home every answer gets questioned until it holds up.