Bernard Vercaemst

Enterpreneurial senior executive with 30+ year leadership experience in international industrial and consumer goods environment.

C-level and CEO track record in Family owned businesses and Private Equity context.

Convinced of the importance of good and empathetic leadership at all levels of an organisation, based on a shared mission and vision.

Passionate about people and culture and guided by core human values such as authenticity, respect, loyalty, reliability, accountability and honesty.

Coming out of a modest, warm, socially minded and adventurous family, I inherited a passion for travelling, sports, food, family and friends. Still today the most important things in my life. Professionally and privately I have been travelling all around the world being able to meet and work together with very different people and cultures, always driven by a passion to learn and understand.

Having a very competitive and result oriented nature, I have never been driven by material greed. During my professional carreer I have derived the most satisfaction and pleasure from achieving goals together with a team in a motivating and inspiring environment and from building long term valuable human relationships.

I have no specific motto in live but I am rather driven by important human values. These values reflect in the advice I tend to give younger people. Be authentic, be loyal to yourself, be respectful, have no prejudices, follow your intuition, find your passion, be brave, be curious,.. and happiness lies in small things.

In different stages of my carreer I have been inspired by different mentors. One of them introduced me to the concept of "The Line" within the theory of Accountability. (book: Above the Line, Urban Meyer-2015). As I am a great believer in the positive impact of 'Above the Line Behavior' in private life as well as in organisations, I have been using this concept in all stategic and team building workshops I moderated since then.

Mentoring and coaching people within the organisations I led has always been a major priority and I am proud that at many occasions people out of my team succeeded me in my position when I was promoted. Therefoe I am eager to share my experience and passion and help others to further grow and develop themselves.