ABOUT

The story

Ben’s Bakery and the “Bennies” we make derive their name from Ben Leo, who was CSI’s corporate business manager for a while.

Before that, Ben was the CFO of DPG Media (mother company of the main Belgian TV and radio channels, as well as newspapers, websites and magazines) when CSI was engaged to design and roll-out the Lean transformation program. Ben got so excited by the positive results of the program, that he decided to join CSI and work with us to further develop our service offer.

Part of that work was a search for an interactive way to teach Lean principles and to provide a “taste” of the impact of such an approach.

In a previous life, Ben had already experimented with the production and sales of a Hungarian delicacy called “Kurtos Kalacs”. They come with a sweet or savoury filling and got sold like hot cakes at festivals and folklore festivities. However, the production process of the cakes and the organisation behind it appeared to be rather complex, and the prospect of standing in bad weather at festivals and markets wasn’t very tempting. The project to commercialise the product in our region was stopped, but it was granted a second life when – after thorough investigation – the process appeared to provide an ideal basis for a Lean training.

The process is sufficiently complex to apply the most crucial Lean tools and methods, yet “simple” enough to see and taste the results of various improvements.

And the rest is history .. 😉

Welcome to Ben’s Bakery!

SOME OF OUR INSTRUCTORS

Wim De Frenne

In a previous life Wim worked at Mckinsey & Company and ExxonMobil. Since 2001 he has been coaching management teams in large transformation programs. Together with his colleagues he shapes those programs and develops a client’s own internal team of change agents. He has a very extensive experience in the use of Lean management techniques and in change management in all its aspects. In 2008, he founded CSI Business consulting, a boutique consulting firm focused on business transformation.

He is also the proud dad of 3 lovely children. In his spare time he sometimes enjoys going full throttle on a racing circuit and he maintains a wide array of good (and less good) reasons for great wining and dining

Kees Aerts

Kees is a senior management consultant with over 25 years of experience in architecting and leading transformation programs to help clients improve their performance. He ran several small-scale projects but also large international programs. His focus has been operational excellence, Lean, and the integration of strategy, organisation, processes and technology. Kees mainly worked in the food industry, consumer goods, pharmaceuticals, and in the transportation sector.

He is still an enthusiastic sportsman, acting like he is still 25 years old, and he loves to travel the world together with his 2 children. In the meanwhile, he has spent more than half of his life in Belgium, which raised his skills in French quite a lot (for a Dutch guy).

Niels Strobbe

Niels is a real Lean expert at CSI Business Consulting. He helps clients in Belgium and abroad in executing business transformations, aiming for process efficiency, customer value, and employee engagement. Niels has about fifteen years of experience in Lean Six Sigma. Before CSI, he worked in the automotive industry and in the financial sector.

Besides his professional passion, he enjoys sports challenges and developing a co-housing project in his hometown.