Chairos (Kairos) is one of the two Greek gods of time. As the name suggests, Chronos - better known of the two - governs the chronological time, constantly and irretrievably passing by.  The other god Chairos, however, is concerned with „the right moment“ and seizing opportunities. Chairos is depicted with winged legs and a bald head with a tuft of hair on his forehead. The German saying „seizing the opportunity by the tuft“ refers to this depiction. Once the moment is gone, you cannot grab it anymore.

We see this as a beautiful allegory about choosing the right moment to concern ourselves with important issues of the time, investigate them thoroughly and devise new and creative approaches in dealing with them.

Kairos was set up in 2004 and is registered as a limited liability and not-for-profit company. It has two managing directors and a supervisory board consisting of three additional persons. The salary structure is moderate and corresponds to that of the public service. Kairos is entirely funded through projects.

Kairos is an independent organisation that is committed to the principles of wisdom, justice, moderation and courage. 

 

The original purpose of work has been to „make a living“ and to directly produce whatever is necessary for life.

As communities evolved, the phenomenon of specialisation developed very early on. Certain people performed certain tasks and had certain functions in society, partly due to natural talent but also for greater efficiency of producing whatever was needed for the common good.

While specialization had its advantages, it also brought with it new problems and risks. It divided people and opened the door for inequality and greed. Whoever was master at something, was able to sell their skills and services for large amounts of goods or money.

As we see it, the purpose of work should draw again on this original idea: to produce what is necessary for the benefit to the common good. Furthermore, the remuneration of one’s labours should largely correspond again to the actual costs of living, not the theoretical market value of a skill or service produced by specialisation and the law of supply and demand.

Therefore, at Kairos we consistently set out to

ii)         adjust our fees in line with the actual costs of living

iii)        measure success not by business volume and financial turnover but by the impact achieved by our work