Kai Gilb has partnered with Tom in developing these ideas, teaching courses on them, and practicing them with clients since 1992.
Tom and Kai work well as a team, but they approach the art of teaching the methods somewhat differently. Consequently, the students benefit from two different styles.
Many organizations and individuals use some or all of their methods. IBM and HP were two early corporate adopters. Over the recent years, 20,000 engineers at Intel have adopted the Planguage requirements methods. Ericsson, Nokia, and A Major Multinational Finance Group use parts of their methods extensively. Many smaller companies also use the methods.
Kai Gilb was born in Norway in 1968. From 1987, he lived in South Carolina, Hawaii, and Los Angeles for about five years, where he studied and worked as a commercial pilot and instructor and pursued a career as a professional windsurfer. Kai did his first workshop with Tom in 1986 and has worked full-time with Tom since 1992, pursuing project management and delivery excellence. When not traveling, Kai now resides in Norway.
Experience from decades of practice worldwide in tiny companies with tiny projects and some of the world's largest companies and projects is carefully incorporated through a relentless vision of excellence, farsightedness, clarity, efficiency, practicality, and simplicity.
Kai is driven to simplify (getting rid of nice but not critical information) and purify the methods (distinguishing one idea from another). He is a keen observer of 'life' (the methods should reflect what is, not make its own reality) and logical. With this drive and mindset, he is continuously improving the methods.
Kai Gilb was teaching Agile project management long before the term existed (for example, in 1993, teaching large corporations, like Ericsson and Nokia, working on large projects (like mobile phone base stations and networks) to divide their projects into weekly cycles of value delivery. Today, dividing the projects into cycles is the norm, but the norm is to do it regarding the solutions, not the value. Today, Kai Gilb is in the Agile forefront of changing people's minds, motivating and teaching people how to focus on delivering value (quality, improved, enhanced, better systems) as viewed by stakeholders.
His teaching recognizes the challenge of seeing things from a new perspective, and he loves to help people make the necessary paradigm shift.
He is a frequent keynote speaker, invited speaker, and tutorial speaker at international conferences.
His pro bono activities are focused on all aspects of the Art of Living Foundation, where he organizes courses and talks, teaches, and enjoys himself.
Kai is also involved with other Environmental (EPA) and Third-World Aid charities or organizations.
