Ben Keet

Experience

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  Geo & Hydro - K8 Ltd

  Jan 1988 - Mar 2003

  Managing Director

  Set up and owned / own business in Australia (Geo & Hydro Environmenatl Management Pty Ltd) and Holland Geo & Hydro Milieutechniek BV).

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  Geo & Hydro - Environmental Engineering

  Jan 1988 - now

  Managing Director

  Managing Director and Environmental Specialist for soil and goundwater services - visit my website for more information: www.benkeet.com

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  Geo &Hydro Melbourne

  Jan 1990 - Jan 1996

  Director

  Geo & Hydro in Melbourne won the first oil industry tender for the remediation of services stations in Australia - the start of a new industry. Based on 3 years experience in New Zealand we commenced with 16 s/s for Caltex, soon to be followed by Ampol and Mobil in Victoria. The company grew rapidly over 90 - 93 with more and more remediation projects on terminalsand refinaries (Shell, Caltex,) a major project recovering 1.4 million liters of kerosine from Sydney Airport, remedial projects in Queensland and WA. Over 94 - 96 the company was transferred to staff 'helped' by some unethical practices of former Melbourne manager, leading to total retreat from Australia leaving me to focus on building the European more R&D focused organization in Holland. Show less

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  Geo & Hydro Milieutechniek BV

  Jan 1993 - Jan 2010

  Directeur

  Initiated company and new in-situ remediation technologies in Holland, Belgium and Luxembourg. Formed a great team, Initially with Erik van der Berg who worked for me in Australia, and Stuart Coffa a real inventor and great chemist. Later joint by albert Smit as project engineer and Menno Wiegers a IT wish-kid who was able to tie all electronics together and develop some amazing remote control systems for our remediation equipment.As Theo Edelman often said: we were too far ahead of our times and as Maarten Pieters predicted the small co's would go under leaving only a few big ones to survive. Karel Verschueren, who called us 'one of the most innovative companies in soil remediation' saw correctly saw innovation would suffer from the new tendering system which effectively was only accessable to big contractors / consultants with 10 m + turnover. However I had a great time in Holland over the 10 years GHMT has been existing, with the first 7 being the most exiting. No regrets, but it was time to move out off the sinking ship of the EU. Show less

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  Sustaining Hawke's Bay Trust

  Apr 2009 - Aug 2011

  Chairman of the Board of Trustees

  SHBT provides governance to the Hawke's Bay Environment Centre (EC)and Trees 4 Hawke's Bay (T4HB) a native plant nursery. At trees for Hawke's Bay the emphasis is on 'growing people' by encouraging youth to actively participate in seed growing and planting out projects throughout the region.The EC and T4HB were is bad shape when Iand other new trustees arrived with the T4HB being heavy in the red and the EC's finances in a mess. Due to a lot of hard of all trustees we saved T4HB and turned it into at least making its way and the EC's management was improved by implementing systems and transparency. After 2 years and over 1000 hours of 'labour of love' it was time to handover the stick to a new group of trustees. Show less

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  GPSI Diabetes Ltd

  Feb 2012 - Nov 2013

  Managing Director

  GPSI Diabetes provides self management training and support to people with all types of diabetes (all 70+ types) including for those where their disease is complicated by other chronic diseases or weight management problems. Our doctor & nurse team is highly experienced and has a sound record of evidence based results. Our patients co-manage our facebook page and are able to tell their personal stories. Our clinic is unique in New Zealand, based on Patient Centred Care approach - a far cry from 'patient focused care' commonly applied. Our clinic provides doctor and nurse training in New Zealand and the US. Show less

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  GPSI Diabetes Trust

  Oct 2012 - Dec 2013

  Chairman of the Board

  GPSI Diabetes Trust administers the publicly funded GPSI Diabetes Service in Hawke's Bay; provides training and education to GP's and Nurses in Patient Centred Care approach to Diabetes.The Trust has developed a Strategic Plan to change the paradigm of chronic disease management from a provider (specialist, GP and nurse) centred approach to a Patient Centred approach. In the latter the patient is trained and empowered to make her/his own decisions. The provider explains the range of possibilities available. By finding 'common ground' trust is created, the patient not only feels empowers but actively takes charge of their own life (again) and their own disease. This is comparable to the business model of co-creation which makes the customer part of the sales team (take the Apple Community). With the current steep rise in healthcare costs the is no way the world can assign doctors and nurses to hold the hand of anyone having a lifelong chronic disease which needs management 24/7. Only by empowering the patient to get back in charge can we curb the ballooning healthcare costs and at the same time improve the patients enjoyment of life. As a side effect well self-managed patients are able to delay hugely the onset of diabetes related ailments, loose weight permanently and will be active and contributing members of our society for most of their life. The GPSI Diabetes Trust therefore is all about engagement and quality of life.The Trust is not for profit and the position is not salaried. Show less