Johan van de Gronden

The typically packed calendar of the executive in full function may look intimidating, but idleness is like an abyss to creative innovation

Johan van de Gronden (1963) is a Dutch philosopher of science, writer and executive. He has been Chief Executive of KWF, the Dutch Cancer Society, since 2018. Prior to joining KWF Johan served as the CEO of the World Wide Find for Nature (WWF-NL) for a decade. He started his career at the Foreign Office (Suriname and The Hague), moved on to the United Nations Development Programma (Copenhagen) and served on the Executive Board of SNV Netherlands Development Organisation. He currently serves on a number of non-executive roles, e.g. as Chair of the Early Music Foundation, Chair of the Physical Environment Consultative Council and member of the Board of DOB Ecology. He is the author of two books (both in Dutch published by Athenaeum-Polak & Van Gennep), “Wijsgeer in het wild” (2015) and “Het vlindertje van Methusalem”(2022)