Check out the podcast featuring Ronald van den Hoff:
Ronald van den Hoff is the co-founder of CDEF Holding BV, a Holding company with remarkable range of ventures operating on the disruptive intersection of the Hospitality Industry and the entrepreneurial world of Internet. CDEF incorporates ‘much discussed’, disruptive exponential formulas, like the co-working and meeting centers Seats2meet.com and the Society 3.0 Foundation.
Seats2meet with over 150 locations worldwide, has become an interactive breeding ground for entrepreneurship, inspiration, innovation, cross-linking and cross-pollination. They develop in-house software and smart software like ‘The Serendipity Machine.’ A publishing company, Society3.0, completes this range of innovative ventures.
Ronald’s book, Society 3.0 was published in April 2011 by the Society 3.0 Foundation, creating a context for all CDEF’s activities. This foundation is a movement, a guiding light and a change agent in our ever-dynamic world. Its activities, books, publications, events, and website are the visualization and exploration of the vision and mission of the CDEF Holding.
In addition to being a hospitality entrepreneur, Ronald is also an online entrepreneur and enthusiastic Web-trendstrategist. In addition to his work within CDEF Holding BV, he works on innovation with (international) hotel chains and other service companies in the field of E-commerce, E-communication, Business Modeling, Value Networks and Organizational Innovation.
What you’ll learn about in this episode:
- Why Ronald believes economics are a social science and not a “mathematical prediction machine”, and why artificial economic growth is the wrong way to grow
- Why rapid technological advances are becoming almost impossible to keep up with, and why our societal structures are struggling to stay relevant
- How societal systems in the Netherlands differ from those we use in the United States, and why inefficiency is a problem for both nations
- How Ronald came up with the idea of Seats2Meet, and what specific services his business provides
- Why an abundance of unused space and the free exchange of knowledge and social capital are at the heart of Seats2Meet’s business
- What benefits “co-working” and “flex offices” offer, both to the owners of the space and to the collaborators who use it
- Why co-working is rapidly growing in the U.S., but why Ronald’s model is having trouble breaking through because of its focus on people instead of real estate
- Why connectivity, virtuality, networks and the exchange of data are the future of the working world
- Why privacy and data protection are important to Seats2Meet, and what steps have been taken to protect those assets from misuse
- What plans Ronald has for the upcoming year, and which projects and thought leadership initiatives Ronald is working on
