Pascal Verhoest is professor of Critical Thinking in Communication Studies at the Free University of Brussels (VUB) and Research Manager of the ECHO research group on media, culture and politics. Pascal Verhoest started his carreer at the VUB, where he obtained a Phd in social sciences in 1996. He remained conected to the university with 0,1 fte ever since. He rejoined the university full-time in 2015, after a career in research and policy.

Between 1998 and 2006 he was Senior Researcher and Strategist, and acted as head of the Division on the Knowledge Economy at TNO, the national research organisation of the Netherlands. His main contractors were the European Commission, the OECD and several national European governments. Between 2001 and 2004 he also acted as director of the European Network for Communication and Information Perspectives (ENCIP), a European Economic Interest Grouping of research organisations in ICT. In 2006, Pascal Verhoest seconded by TNO as crisis manager for BruDISC, a support centre for ICT research and business development financed by the Brussels-Captital Region.

In 2007 he was called by the Belgian governement to temporarily act as Chief of Cabinet of the Federal Ministry Informatisation. In 2008, he subsequently took charge of the development of the e-Society Programme of the Federal Service for ICT (FEDICT). From FEDICT he was seconded to the European Commission, as national expert to assist in the elaboration of the eGovernment Action Plan of the European Commission for the period 2011 to 2015.

From 2010 to 2014 Pascal Verhoest acted as Research Manager at Artevelde University College in Ghent (B). His assignment was the reform of the organisation of research and services of the University College and to develop its capacity to attract new contracts and subsidies. He then decided that it was time to go back to his initial calling: academic research and teaching.