About PEPworldwide in Europe
It all began in 1984 with Kerry Gleeson developing and refining the PEP® principles while training and coaching the personnel of the Svenska Handelsbanken in Stockholm, Sweden “to get more work done in less time.”
The first IBT office was established in Sweden in the same year. IBT Sweden continued to grow and prosper and was instrumental in developing PEP® applications for mobile and flex working environments to meet the needs of her clients as far back as 15 years ago. Through the years IBT Sweden has shared this expertise and know-how with the other IBT offices resulting in tried and tested applications such as Flex-PEP® and Mobile Working-PEP® being available and delivered to our clients throughout Europe.
In 1985 the IBT UK office was established. PEP® was soon in high demand throughout the late 1980’s and 1990’s where companies such as Ogilvy & Mather, Lloyds Private Banking, The Sun Alliance, General Accident, The Britannia Building Society and many more put their entire organisations through PEP® services nationwide, in all their branches and throughout their head offices. Police services, oil companies, pharmaceuticals, banks, building societies and insurers all used PEP® extensively.
The last year’s average improvements in pilots conducted in a global oil company, a National Health Service unit and a national building society showed an average time saving of 1.6 hours per person, per day.
Through the efforts of IBT UK our IBT operations expanded into Australia where several PEP® operations were established and from there further into New Zeeland, Japan and Singapore.
1986 saw the first PEP® delivery in the Netherlands. The client was KLM Airlines. KLM wanted to start a Quality Program named “Kick” and “Kick-Plus” and they were looking for a practical instrument to help them implement it at “grass roots” level. PEP® fit the bill and a long standing relationship began. The KLM, now in 2017, is still a PEP® client.
IBT Nederland continued to grow into the largest and most productive IBT office in Europe. As more and more Dutch companies and organizations are cutting costs by migrating from the old traditional working environment to a modern, mobile and flexible working culture they are finding that PEP® is an essential tool and its consultants have the expertise to help them through this change successfully. One such project being implemented now involves 500-600 employees of a local authority who will move, work in a flex environment and be trained to use new, for them, mobile smart tools.
In 1988 IBT Norway was established by a Philips manager who had been PEP’d by Kerry Gleeson himself. IBT Norway has grown over the years with PEP® locations established in all of their major regions delivering the standard PEP® modules but also developing an application for successfully delivering PEP® on oil platforms in the North Sea. IBT Norway has now brought in new young blood into the management of its operations ensuring the continuity of PEP® far into the future.
In 1991 IBT opened up offices in Switzerland, then France.
In 1993, IBT opened Denmark.
IBT Nederland expanded into Luxembourg in 1993 and in the same year also into Belgium, forming IBT Benelux. IBT Benelux has a couple of remarkable achievements: some years back they won a major tender put out by the European Union. Then when Siemens, Belgium wanted a culture change moving her personnel from a traditional work environment to a smarter, flex environment called “hot desking”, PEP® was their obvious choice for a partner. In total over 800 Siemens personnel successfully migrated to the new “hot desking” environment with the help of a customized PEP® program.
In 1998 an IBT office was established in Poland. The first client was the Dutch insurance company Nationale Nederlanden. Since then IBT Poland has continued to grow and penetrate its market with PEP®, first focusing primarily on international companies and now also starting to work with Polish companies such as the oil company Orlen, the largest company in middle and eastern Europe, with which they have recently closed an exclusive contract to deliver PEP® to its employees for the next 2 years.
In 2004 IBT Ukraine was established in Kiev. IBT Ukraine put the whole national Microsoft office through the PEP® program and established itself as a Microsoft Knowledge Partner. At BNP Paribas 350 people were put through PEP®. IBT Ukraine is convinced that the future of business and organizations lies in the Mobile Working Environment (MWE). The traditional office culture has its roots in the Industrial Revolution of the 18th and 19th centuries and will have no place in the 21st century when we actually use the software tools available to us now. PEP® is an essential element in getting these tools used.
In 2005 Kerry Gleeson decided to take a step back from his operational function and concentrate on writing and speaking engagements. The IBT offices around the world and the PEP® rights and intellectual property were divided into 5 regions, each under a Regional Manager – owner.
In 2008 an IBT office was established in Iceland.
In 2009 an IBT office was established in Lisbon, Portugal, its first client being the Boston Consulting group.
In July 2009, based on the fact that we really are a global organization, delivering the PEP® program in more than 26 countries and in as many languages, the IBT Regional Managers unanimously agreed to change our name to PEPworldwide.
In 2015 a licensing agreement was signed with an organization in Sofia, Bulgaria, granting them exclusive rights to deliver the PEP® program in their country as well as in Macedonia.
Now PEPworldwide has teams in 35 countries.