Speakers
Ada Wong founded the Hong Kong Institute of Contemporary Culture (HKICC), a unique non-profit organization whose mission is education innovation and a creative civil society. Among other projects, HKICC founded Hong Kong’s only “art high school”, the HKICC Lee Shau Kee School of Creativity and Ada is the School’s supervisor.
She also founded the Make A Difference (MaD) initiative, a continuing platform to groom the next generation of creative leaders and innovative changemakers in Asia. Ada’s latest social venture is The Good Lab, an inspiring co-working space and a collaborative community for social innovation and entrepreneurship development in Hong Kong.
Ada was an elected member of the Urban Council and Wan Chai District Council between 1995 and 2008 with the last four years as Chairperson of the Wan Chai District Council. Ada received her BA (Hons) from Pomona College, California, USA and M Ed from the University of Hong Kong.
Ayla Goksel is CEO of Özyeğin Social Investments, a network of non-profit organisations, including ACEV (Mother Child Education Foundation), Hüsnü M. Özyeğin Foundation and Iz Child and has over twenty years of experience in education programs, policy and infrastructure impacting 1.5 million people across Turkey with award winning programs implemented in 14 other countries. Goksel is Trustee of Ozyegin University, Board Member of Education Reform Initiative and has been selected a Young Global Leader of the World Economic Forum, Senior Fellow of the Synergos Institute, Qatar Foundation WISE Laureate and World Economic Forum Global Agenda Council member. She holds a BSc from University of Bath, MSc from London School of Economics (LSE) and has conducted fellowships on non profit organisations at Johns Hopkins University and Harvard University.
She is currently a Visiting Fellow at LSE.
Ayşe Sabuncu is one of the co-founders of Impact Hub Istanbul. After completing her undergraduate studies with a double major in computer engineering and business at Johns Hopkins University, Sabuncu started her career in banking industry at Citi Group in New York where she served at different levels for 5 years.
While working at Citi Group, through Adım Adım (Step by Step) Initiative she came across a fundraising project for the welfare of the youth “Gençlere Değer Projesi” by Toplum Gönüllüleri Vakfı (Community Volunteer Foundation). In support of this cause, Sabuncu climbed Kilimanjaro Mountain with her friends and after this experience she decided to give another direction to her life.
She did an MBA program at Stern School of New York University to advance her knowledge on social impact, innovation and entrepreneurship. She specifically focused on social entrepreneurship, microfinance and social investment subjects. In the summer of 2014, she started working in the field of microfinance with Kiva - a global non-profit organization - in Zimbabwe and South Africa where she was introduced to Impact Hub.
In the last two years, Sabuncu and her partners have been working on mapping and analysis of social entrepreneurship ecosystem in Turkey. Having moved into their new home at İstanbul’s upcoming industrial district 4.Levent Sanayi in June 2016, Ayşe Sabuncu believes that Impact Hub Istanbul will be the meeting point of all impact driven individuals as well as serving as an inspirational space to foster social innovation.
After graduating from Istanbul High School, Ayşesu completed her bachelor degree in Economics from Boğaziçi University in 2015. After graduation, she attended a digital design boot camp in Chicago where she worked with startups on user experience, research and design. Since March 2016, she has been part of the ATOLYE team, focusing on user experience design, research and strategy.
Batuhan grew up in a family that has been involved in education for four generations since his great-grandfather as a graduate of Darülmuallim (school to educate teachers), founded the village schools of the young Republic of Turkey in Muğla. He holds a bachelor’s degree in Business Administration from Marmara University and a master’s degree in International Education Policy and Management from Stanford University. He is a policy analyst and education specialist who has been working in the area for nearly 20 years. In 2007, upon the invitation of Liberian Ministry of Education, he served as the coordinator of Liberia Primary School Construction Program developed with partners such as the World Bank and UNICEF with the support of Open Society Foundation. As a result of his work, he received “Distinguished Service Award” given by the Ministry of Education in Liberia. Finally, he participated in the 4th Evaluation Meeting of Anti-Corruption in Azerbaijan organized by OECD Anti-Corruption Network and prepared the chapter on prevention and prosecution of corruption in education. In 2012, he was awarded the Patricia Blunt Koldyke Social Entrepreneurship Award for his contributions to public education in Turkey by Chicago Council of Global Affairs, one of the most respected think-tanks of United States of America.
Batuhan is an Advisory Board Member of Mother Child Education Foundation (AÇEV). Prior to this, he was an Executive Board Member of Teacher Training Academy Foundation (ÖRAV), Darüşşafaka Society and the Network of Education Policy Centers, a regional network based in Croatia.
Berivan Eliş is the Director of Istasyon TEDU - Center for Social Innovation at TED University, Ankara, Turkey. She previously worked at the European Union Delegation to Turkey, United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), Community Volunteers Foundation (TOG), and Bilkent University. She worked in projects and programmes related to youth, gender, human security and social development issues. She has been working in the establishment process of Istasyon TEDU since December 2015 and teaching civic involvement and social innovation under the Global Citizenship Secondary Field Program at TED University since September 2016.
Berivan studied International Relations at Ankara University (BA degree) and at Bilkent University (MA degree). She is passionate about information activism.
Bugra Celik has a Bachelor's degree in Mechanical Engineering from Istanbul Technical University and a Master’s degree in Business from Istanbul Bilgi University. Bugra started his entrepreneurship journey when he was a freshman student. Since then, he has focused on building communities around products, ideas and companies. His latest venture is Ahtapot, a start-up that allows NGOs to build their own private social network. He also works with several start-ups as an advisor on growth and investment.
Currently, he works as the Director of imece.
Having almost 20 years of experience in Project Management and Implementation, Bülent Özcan has been working as the Director of the Project Implementation in the Ministry for EU Affairs in Turkey since 2010. Prior to this position, he served as the assistant expert, expert and coordinator within the Ministry.
After gaining his Bachelor’s Degree in the Department of International Relations in Middle East Technical University in 1999, he completed the Master’s Programme on the European Union Economy at the EU Institute of Marmara University. He also attended the Harvard University John F. Kennedy School of Government Executive Education Programme in 2011.
He has an outstanding role in managing project portfolio in the fields of capacity building of civil society, improving the legal environment, strengthening public-CSO dialogue, social entrepreneurship, corporate social responsibility, volunteerism, civic innovation and strengthening the civil society dialogue between Turkey and EU.
Alongside his experience, he takes the lead for the development of “Civil Society Sector Strategy of Turkey”, which is one of the fundamental sector within EU Instrument for Pre-Accession (IPA) Funding to Turkey and responsible for programming and management of “civil society sector” under IPA Funding.
Caitriona Fay is a senior philanthropic leader in Australia. She has fifteen years of private family and institutional grantmaking experience in Australia and Europe.
At Perpetual, Caitriona oversees approximately 1,000 charitable trusts and endowments, and more than $3bn in community funds. Under her management, Perpetual’s clients distribute more than $100million annually through philanthropic trusts, estates, and endowments.
Prior to her time with Perpetual, Caitriona has worked in government and philanthropy via The Ian Potter Foundation and The Heritage Lottery fund in both Scotland and England. Outside of Perpetual, Caitriona is a leader in genderwise and LGBTQIA+ philanthropy in Australia.
Caitriona is a founding board member of The Channel, Australia’s first sexuality-sex-and gender-diverse giving circle, reflecting her passion for the power of democratised philanthropy. Caitriona is also a founding member of Melbourne’s Women’s Fund, and an Australian member of the International Women’s Forum.
Carolyn Curtis is CEO of The Australian Centre for Social Innovation (TACSI), one of Australia’s most respected social enterprises focussed on addressing challenging social issues. Carolyn leads TACSI’s vision for systems that deliver real and sustainable social outcomes, through working with the people facing the challenges we are trying to solve.
Carolyn brings to TACSI over 15 years of experience at the front-line and in management in the social sector, including as founding Director of TACSI’s Family by Family program which won the NAPCAN award for Innovation and the International Good Design Australia award in Service Design.
Carolyn is also a leader of social innovation beyond TACSI, as a Director for the Social Innovation Exchange, the world’s leading social innovation network, and in leading a number of initiatives for better social outcomes nationally and as a judge for the Good Design Australia ‘Social Innovation’ Awards.
In addition to her role as the Strategic Design Director at Doteveryone, Cassie Robinson is also co-founder of the Point People and Tech For Good Global, as well as founder of the Civic Shop. She’s spent the last 15 years working in and actively building the field of social innovation: she was an early service and social design practitioner working with organisations like thinkpublic, Participle, 00:// and the Young Foundation, and in 2004 she was awarded by Nesta as a Creative Pioneer.
Cassie’s developed network strategies for the British Council, Somerset House and Comic Relief, and has designed and delivered social innovation and systems change programmes for organisations like Nominet Trust, Lankelly Chase Foundation and the Gulbenkian Foundation. Her experience also extends to local and national Government. She has also worked with corporates like the Co-op, working with their communities team to identify ways national brands can be useful for local communities and social infrastructure.
Charles Leadbeater works internationally as an independent adviser on innovation to governments, cities and organisations both public and private.
The New York Times anointed his idea, The Pro-Am Revolution, as one of the biggest global ideas of the last decade. His 1997 Demos report The Rise of the Social Entrepreneur was one of the first in the UK to predict the rise of the social entrepreneurship movement, with which he has been closely involved ever since. His most recent book on education – The Problem Solvers – argues that in an age of smart machines and artificial intelligence, education systems need to help young people to learn to be more human.He was an advisor to Prime Minister Tony Blair and his governments. Between 1997 and 2007 he worked as an advisor at several government departments including the DCMS and the Department of Education.
Charles was the first chair of the start-up social enterprise Apps 4 Good, a winner of the £500,000 Google Global Impact Challenge in 2013.
Chris Sigaloff is a longtime social innovator fascinated by our society’s transitions. Her primary focus is on putting innovative ideas into action and to find new approaches, strategies and (design) interventions for complex social problems.
For the last 10 years she was the director of Kennisland, a think tank for social innovation, where she developed many innovative programmes, methods and startups, such as Education Pioneers (an innovation fund for teachers), LinC (a school for cultural changemakers), the Kafka Brigade (a method to tackle bureaucracy) and Social Labs (a laboratory for social change). The common element to all these initiatives is the idea that innovation and learning go hand in hand, that theory must support practice, rather than the other way around, and that asking questions can be more powerful than knowing the answers.
Chris regularly advises, speaks and teaches on social innovation. Currently she is an advisor for the Council of Culture and serves on the board of various public organisations.
Dave Knight believes there are huge opportunities for those organisations willing to adjust business models to deliver the Sustainable Development Goals. An Environmental Technology Masters graduate from Imperial College London, he has spent over 20 years working internationally, across multiple industries at the interface of business and society.
He translates the science of sustainability and human rights into workable solutions, enabling business to reduce risks and build opportunities. A systems thinker, he drives change through creating alternate visions, training, writing, consulting and assuring. He has convened and supported many multi-stakeholder forums and initiatives to professionalise sustainable development and increase its appeal.
An entrepreneur, he has founded several consulting companies and has led a global certification body’s North American Sustainability practice. He is a Lead Certified Sustainability Assurance Practitioner and a CSR advisor to UNICEF. He has written and contributed to, a number of publications for UNEP, including ‘The Business Case for the Green Economy’. He tweets @daveknight25
Based in Istanbul over the past two decades, Ms. Didem Altop describes herself as a serial community builder and agenda setter, addressing a diverse range of vital social and economic development issues. She is best known for her role as the Cofounder and Managing Director of Endeavor Turkey, developing and leading the first, and most competitive, growth acceleration program in the country for selected high impact entrepreneurs since 2006, in collaboration with a local network of 150+ and global network of 3.000+ C-level and subject matter expert mentors and investors across 30+ countries. Through Endeavor Turkey, Didem is also the spearhead of Global Entrepreneurship Week in Turkey and Endeavor CaseCampus Entrepreneurship Learning Program, engaging a nationwide community of 300+ partners plus 100+ university faculty members and 800+ aspiring student entrepreneurs, respectively. Most recently, in cooperation with Turkey’s most prominent semi-governmental organizations and thought leaders, Didem also served as the Executive Director for the Global Entrepreneurship Congress, hosting 3,000+ ecosystem builders from 170+ countries in Istanbul on April 15-19th 2018.
Duygu Kambur has a Bachelor's degree in Management from Bogazici University and gained experience in business development, project management, brand management, strategy and operations in the fields of civil society, art and entrepreneurship throughout her studies. Following her graduation she worked at Garanti Bank in the department of Corporate Communication and Brand Management. Since she wanted to deepen her knowledge on social impact, she moved to Berlin to do a Master's in Innovation Management and Entrepreneurship at TU Berlin. While pursuing her Master's degree, she studied Design Thinking in the HPI School of Design Thinking and worked on social impact oriented design; participated in Climate KIC programs supporting entrepreneurship on climate change. She started her thesis on examining the social innovation ecosystem in Turkey.
Since November 2016, she has served as the head of business development and strategy at imece, a social innovation platform based in Istanbul. She triggers social change on several fields from early-stage social entrepreneurship to developing multistakeholder projects and partnerships to strengthen the social innovation ecosystem. She has recently spoken in Istanbul Development Dialogues conducted by United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and GEC 2018 Istanbul.
As the CSR and Sustainability Coordinator of Koç Holding, Ebru Bakkaloğlu Tüzecan plays an active role in developing relationships with stakeholders on awareness, collaboration and partnership levels, providing guiding materials on sustainability and creating and implementing community projects. Before joining Koç Holding, Tüzecan led reputation management and sustainability work at Coca-Cola Turkey, Caucasus and Central Asia Business Unit for 15 years. Tüzecan launched the community projects of Coca-Coa Life Plus Foundation and started partnerships with UNDP, WWF, Ministry of National Education and Ministry of Agriculture on issues including protecting water resources, empowering women and dissemination of physical activity.
Dr. Ecmel Ayral has pursued and followed a multi-faceted path since the beginning of his career in 1983, when he had to undertake the family business while still studying Management and Finance in Marmara University.
His role in Istanbul Bilgi University has been a life changer for him as he finally had the opportunity to combine two apparently different aspirations: success in academia and business. As a member of the top executive team he had the chance to take part in strategic decisions and their implementation processes. Following the acquisition of Istanbul Bilgi University by an international group, he refocused his efforts in private ventures ranging from property development, to finance, and education.
He currently deploys most of his capacity on the design, development and delivery of on-line and off-line training programs. As an education professional, he has been actively taking leading roles in corporate and academic education projects since the year 2000 and has designed & delivered hundreds of trainings. The scope of his favorite training areas ranges from macro issues such as Chaos Theory and Strategy to behavioral issues such as Leadership and Sales. He is currently teaching in Management Departments of Boğaziçi University and İstanbul Bilgi University.
He has a PhD in Organizational Behavior and his thesis is named “How to Manage Chaos: Fast, Innovative, Flexible and İntegrated Organizations”. He recently developed a pedagogic model based on Bloom Taxonomy, called Unlearn-X. The model constitutes a basis for the design and delivery of learning projects.
Ella Saltmarshe’s work sits at the intersection of culture and systems change. In 2018 she published Using Story to Change Systems in the Stanford Social Innovation Review. She’s currently working with funders, CSOs and the creative industries on how to most effectively use culture to change systems.
Trained as an anthropologist, Ella started her career working in international development. Here she realised the limitations of atomised responses to complex issues and returned to the UK to develop the field of systems change. She co-founded systems change network The Point People, worked with the University of Oxford to develop The Systems Compass, co-wrote Keywords: Building a Language for Systems Change & and has worked across sectors to design and deliver systemic initiatives.
Alongside this work she simultaneously realised the importance of culture in systems change, co-founding the Comms Lab to pioneer purpose driven innovation in advertising, co-authoring Reclaiming Agency: How to Save Advertising (and create a better world) and co-designing the Reclaiming Agency leadership programme funded by the Joseph Rowntree Charitable Trust.
Ella also harnesses the power of creativity in very practical ways with initiatives like SHEvotes. Her writing on innovation and social change has been published in The Guardian, The Financial Times, Stanford Social Innovation Review, Wired, Monocle, Fast Company & Creative Review.
Emre is an educator who throughout his career sought to reveal the fantasizing skills which are inherent in every child without an exception. He worked as the director of photography of the monthly Kadınca magazine in 2010-2011. His education career which started accidentally in Van, now continues in Istanbul.
He developed “Ask, Discover, Produce” approach focused on curiosity and need and based on children’s questions, curiosity and skills. This is a system consisting of elements such as “Question and Curiosity Library”, “Story-based Learning”, “Assembly of Can Do It”, and “Learning Through Production”.
“Imagination Center” was the name he gave to the place simultaneously shaped with the Ask, Discover, Produce system. Starting from 2016 Emre has been organizing across Turkey trainers’ trainings in cooperation with the Central Imagination Community’s voluntary educators and experts. Together with Imagination Central Community he worked with thousands of children between 3-18 ages and hundreds of university students and adults. Imagination Center is defined as a space, and not a school, for learning and new generation socialization where individuals can freely express their differences. It is a place empowered by “Ask, Discover, Produce” system aiming at generating social and individual benefit, starting a transformation in education and learning, and facilitating the production of art, science and technology outputs
He participated and spoke, as the representative of the Imagination Center, at many outstanding conferences and took part in teams such as Best Examples in Education, Future in Education Conference, Teachers’ Network, New Generation Learning. He gave a Tedx talk with the name “Evrensel Kamil” (Universal Kamil) on behalf of the Imagination Center, under the heading “Disciplining the Coincidences”.
Having been qualified, in 2017, as one of the projects supported by imece, a social innovation platform that connect individuals and organisations with various sources of funding, Imagination Center continues its cooperation with educational institutions and organisations committed to produce children-focused social benefits.
Emre is part of New Generation Learning, ATÖLYE, imece and TedxReset communities.
Born in Istanbul in 1984, Mehmet Emre Zorlu graduated from the Electrical and Electronic Engineering department at Koç University in 2006. He attended a master program at Essex University in the UK on Innovation and Technology Management. After completing his master program in 2008, Emre Zorlu Joined Vestel Elektronik as a board member in 2009, and he assumed active positions at Vestel on the areas of consumer electronics, white goods, digital products, information technologies, LED lighting and defense.
Between 2010 and 2014, he worked as a Board Member at Zorlu Center project which was built with an investment of USD 2.5 billion as a complex involving residences, a shopping center, offices, a performing arts center and a five-star hotel.
In addition to being a board member at Zorlu Holding and some other holding companies, Emre Zorlu is also, since 2015, a member of the Board of Directors at Vestel Ventures, which seeks to support and provide funds to the entrepreneurs in many fields including technology, innovation and IP investments.
Mehmet Emre Zorlu is also a member of the Board of Trustees at Turkish Entrepreneurship Foundation, a Social Innovation Exchange (SIX) Global Council partner, and a member of the Endeavor Turkey.
Engin Ayaz is the Co-Founder and Head of Design at ATÖLYE.
After graduating from Istanbul German High School, he completed his BS degrees at Stanford University in Civil and Environmental Engineering and Architectural Design. He received project fellowship on green buildings from US EPA and Merage Foundation. He worked in the European and US offices of Arup, a leading international engineering and architecture company, as the sustainable design consultant. He took on the role of teaching assistantship in California College of Arts and Copenhagen Institute of Interaction Design programs. Recently he got his MPS in interactive design, media arts and interactive installations from Tisch School of Arts ITP of New York University. Besides ATÖLYE, he is an adjunct professor in Bilgi University, Faculty of Architecture.
Eren Öztürk works for S360 on sustainability strategy, participatory learning design for organizations, stakeholder engagement, leadership development for systemic change, as well as business case for strategic sustainability. He has strong knowledge on scientific foundations of sustainability, framework for strategic sustainable development, organizational learning, participatory decision-making processes, systems thinking and corporate sustainability. After graduating from Environmental Engineering Department at Middle East Technical University (METU), he had worked for Regional Environmental Center (REC) Turkey Office between 2009 and 2013. The main areas of his work are Education for Sustainable Development, Local Environmental Action Plans and Sustainable Cities, Climate Change, and Regulatory Impact Assessment.
In 2012, he has finished his MSc. degree on Strategic Leadership towards Sustainability at Blekinge Institute of Technology, Sweden. Some of the areas he is interested in are; change invitation, learning organizations, transformational leadership, chaordic design, non-linear systems, developing intrinsic motivations towards sustainability.
Having served first as a consultant/ advisor in 2014, Filiz Bikmen has been serving as Founding Director of Esas Sosyal since its establishment in 2015. Having graduated from Columbia University in 1998 with a Masters in Organizational Psychology, Filiz worked as a management consultant at Andersen Consulting and with financial institutions in New York and Istanbul. Since 2001, has been working to promote social justice and philanthropy, serving in the senior management of TUSEV and Sabanci Foundation, and as an adviser and executive board member for several other Turkish, European and American NGOs and foundations.
She published more than 30 articles on topics regarding civil society and philanthropy and was a research fellow at the Graduate Center in New York and at the Bosch Foundation in Berlin. Filiz currently serves as the Vice Chair of the Interaction Institute for Social Change in Boston and supports the EMpower Emerging Markets Foundation, headquartered in New York, in managing their Turkey funding portfolio (focusing on youth at risk).
Geoff Mulgan is Chief Executive of Nesta, and has been in post since June 2011. Under his leadership Nesta has moved out of the public sector to become a charity (in 2012), launched a range of new initiatives in investment, programmes and research, and has implemented a new strategy involving partnerships with other funders in the UK and internationally.
From 2004-2011 he was the first Chief Executive of the Young Foundation, which became a leading centre for social innovation, combining research, creation of new ventures and practical projects.
Between 1997 and 2004 Geoff had various roles in the UK government including director of the Government’s Strategy Unit and head of policy in the Prime Minister’s office. Before that he was the founder and director of the think-tank Demos.
He is currently chair of the Studio Schools Trust and the Social Innovation Exchange.
Gianluca Misuraca is Senior Scientist at the European Commission's Joint Research Centre where, since 2009, is conducting research in the area of ICTs for governance and social inclusion. He is currently leading the research on ICT-enabled Social Innovation to support the Social Investment Package (IESI) in collaboration with DG Employment, Social Affairs and Inclusion.
Before joining the European Commission, Gianluca was the Managing Director of the Executive Master in eGovernance at the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL). During his career he held several positions as policy advisor for different International Organisations, cooperation agencies and consulting in the area of eGovernment, regional development, research and innovation.
Gianluca's background is economics with focus on the interface between ICTs and public sector innovation. He holds a Diploma of Specialisation in EU Economics and Law, a diploma in Security Management, an Executive Master in eGovernance and a Ph. D in Management of Technology.
After graduating from Saint-Benoit Private French High School, Gonca Ongan completed her undergraduate studies in Economics at İstanbul University. Afterwards, she received her master's degree in global MBA in Fordham University, New York. Then she continued to her postgraduate studies at the Marmara University European Union Institute in Economics of European Union. Following her experiences in the field of private sector, public sector and civil society, she started working in Koç University in 2010. Her research field is "Sustainability and Social Impact" and she has been working in KUSIF since 2012. She is the founding member of AÇIK AÇIK Platform promoting individual donation and fostering transparency & accountability among civil society organisations in Turkey. She has been at the board of directors of AÇIK AÇIK since November 2016. Additionally, she was elected to the advisory board of International Sustainable Campus Network in March 2016 by the member universities.
Gorka Espiau Idoiaga is Professor of Practice at the Centre for Interdisciplinary Research on Montreal (CIRM-McGill University) and Senior Fellow at the “Agirre Lehendakaria Center for Social and Political Studies”, a collaborative research project to share internationally the Basque case of socio-economic transformation under extreme difficulties. Espiau is also a Senior Fellow at the Young Foundation, founding partner of Social Innovation Laboratory Koop (SILK) and advisor to the Work4Progress initiative powered by La Caixa Foundation Previously, he served as Senior Adviser to the Executive Office of the Basque President.
Gorka Espiau is also a former Senior Fellow at the United States Institute of Peace and a former Senior Associate to CICR (Columbia University). He initiated his professional career in Elkarri, the Movement for Dialogue and Accord in the Basque Country. Espiau is the author of “Pluja Seca” (TV3 2011) and “Parlem les Lluls” (TV3 2012) documentaries and is co-author of many articles and publications on social change.
Born in 1959, Mr. Ateş graduated from Middle East Technical University, Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences, Department of Business Administration after completing his studies at TED Ankara College. He started his banking career in 1981 as an Internal Auditor at İşbank. After serving at various Interbank units from 1986 to 1993, he worked as a Branch Manager at Elmadağ, Şişli, Bakırköy, İzmir and Central Branches. He established Interbank’s Cash Management System and was promoted in 1993 to Executive Vice President in charge of Central Operations. Mr. Ateş worked as Executive Vice President in charge of Financial Affairs and Operations at Bank Ekspres between the years of 1994 and 1996 and led the bank’s restructuring project under the consultation of Bank of America. He established Garanti Bank Moscow in Russia and worked as CEO for one year starting from June 1996. He has continued his duties as the President & CEO at DenizBank, where he started in June 1997 as the Founder President. During his management tenure, DenizBank shares were offered to public in October 2004 where 5.5 times oversubscription was recorded. His management also ran the process of selling Zorlu Holding-owned DenizBank shares to Dexia S.A. in May 2006 for 3.250 Billion Dollars with 4,7 times its book value which is a record in Turkey, as well as the sales process of 99.85% of DenizBank shares owned by Dexia Group to Sberbank 6 years later in June 2012 for 3.6 Billion Dollars with 1.33 times its book value. In addition, the transfer of Deniz Emeklilik for 256 million Euros with 10 times its book value with a 15-year sales agreement in 2011 and taking over the retail Banking of Citi Turkey with about 1500 employees in 2013 also took place under the management of Mr Ateş. Also serving as the Chairman of the Board of Directors at DenizBank subsidiaries Deniz Yatırım Menkul Kıymetler A.Ş., Intertech A.Ş, DenizBank Moscow and DenizBank AG Vienna, Hakan ATEŞ was granted the “Those who Add Value to Turkey” award presented by Bahçeşehir University in 2015.
Harvey Koh is a Managing Director at FSG where he co-leads the Inclusive Markets approach area. Based between Mumbai and London, he works to develop and scale business models that benefit poor and marginalised populations, spanning a range of sectors including housing, water and healthcare. Harvey also leads FSG’s partnership with the Rockefeller Foundation on market system innovation towards inclusive economies.
Harvey has lead-authored influential reports in the inclusive business and impact investing field including From Blueprint to Scale, which introduced the notion of the ‘pioneer gap’ and called for greater supply of more patient, risk-tolerant capital to bridge it. Until 2011, Harvey was the founding Head of Investment & Performance at Private Equity Foundation (now Impetus-PEF), a venture philanthropy fund established in London by leading U.S. and European private equity firms.
Harvey was born and raised in Malaysia.
Inderpaul Johar is a trained & registered architect, Graham Willis Professor and over the course of the last 15 years he has co-founded & established a RIBA London Building of Year award winning Architectural Practice - Architecture 00, Multiple Social Start up Accelerators, Multiple Impact Hubs in the UK along with supporting the development of multiple Open Source Manufacturing Ventures in london - from Open Desk to Wikihouse, and most recently Dark Matter Laboratories.
Indy is the Executive Director of Dark Matter, Fellow of the RSA, UNDP Innovation Facility Advisory Board Member, member of Mayor of London’s Good Growth By Design panel, Future Cities Canada Senior Fellow, Young Foundation Senior Innovation Associate, EU Start Up Ambassador. He works with Dark Matter is focused on co-designing new institutional infrastructure of Good growth & systems change or assisting then transition of 20th century institution - from work is focused on participatory strategy development, 21st Century Governance Innovation, System change to System Venturing.
Indy has taught & lectured at various institutions from the University of Bath, TU-Berlin; Architectural Association, University College London, Princeton, Guggenheim Museum & UNDP. He has given lectures and led discussions on various issues, including how strategic design meets policy and place making in various forums from Demos, Centre of Social Justice, Helsinki Design Lab, European Parliament, LSE, Royal Academy, Royal Society of the Arts and Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors. He has written for many national and international journals on the future of social systems and venturing and the future of development.
Dr Itır Erhart studied philosophy and Western Languages & Literatures at Boğaziçi University. She completed her M.Phil in Philosophy at the University of Cambridge.
In 2001 she started teaching at Istanbul Bilgi University, Department of Media and Communication Systems. In 2006 she earned her PhD from Boğaziçi University in philosophy. In 2015 she became an associate professor. Itır is also the co-founder of two social enterprises, Adım Adım (Step by Step), and Açık Açık (Openly). In 2009 she was featured on CNN Turk’s "Turkey's Changemakers".
She was awarded a Ten Outstanding Persons (TOYP) award in 2010. In 2014 she became an Ashoka Fellow.
James Stauch is the Director of the Institute for Community Prosperity at Mount Royal University (MRU), which connects learners to knowledge, research, tools and networks to help them make transformative change in their communities. The Institute has led the creation of undergraduate credit-based programming in social innovation, Certificate programs for practitioners in Social Innovation and corporate Community Investment, and have just opened a 5,000 square foot on-campus community co-working and social R&D space - the Trico Changemakers Studio. The Institute also served as the backbone for MRU's campus-wide changemaking strategy and Changemaker Council. James has also developed and taught social innovation credit and non-credit courses, as well as a new experimental community-service liberal-arts hybrid course: Rethinking the Public Sphereand a low-income accessible informal certificate program - the Economics of Social Change. James has also served as a foundation executive and consultant with nearly two decades of experience working in the field of philanthropy, including as senior executive for the Walter & Duncan Gordon Foundation in Toronto, where he co-developed the Jane Glassco Northern Fellows program, for emerging social change leaders in the Arctic and far north. He has also chaired or help found a number of membership-based philanthropic foundation networks and collaboratives, including the Arctic Funders Collaborative, International Funders for Indigenous Peoples, Circle on Philanthropy and Aboriginal Peoples in Canada, and the Canadian Environmental Grantmakers Network.
Jordan is responsible for growing and developing the network globally, managing new programme design and delivery, and contributing to research. Jordan is the lead for SIX's foresight work exploring the future of social innovation with our Wayfinder series and providing strategic insight and guidance to our Global Council. She also manages the SIX Funders Node, an international collective of 50 foundations from over 15 countries, helping them to be better funders of innovation by connecting them to their peers. She develops the programme of work for the Funders Node including hosting retreats, dinners, meetings and leading on research. She led on SIX's programme of in Africa hosting events in Johannesburg, Nairobi and Harare. She also managed the first three Unusual Suspects Festivals in Northern Ireland, Glasgow, and London.
Karl Richter is Co-Founder and Executive Director of EngagedX, which specialises in providing bespoke consultancy, thought leadership, advocacy and policy work. He works internationally across private, public and social sectors. He is an experienced entrepreneur and has held numerous leadership, management and executive positions.
He is Head of Research and Knowledge for the UN’s Social Impact Fund (UNSIF), for whom he leads a global research consortium to improve the analytical framework for social impact investing; also a member of Groupe d’Experts de la Commission sur l’Entrepreneuriat Social (GECES), which is appointed by the European Commission to advise on its Social Business Initiative; sits on the OECD expert group on social impact investing; Senior Fellow of the Finance Innovation Lab, which was set to explore, innovate and evolve the financial system to sustain people and planet; Adviser to the Global Value Exchange, which is an open source database and platform for measuring social and environmental values.
Kelsey Spitz-Dietrich is an advisor with SIX. She works closely with Jordan Junge as a partner-in-crime, supporting strategy development for the SIX Funders Node and Wayfinder series. Kelsey shares her time between SIX and CKX in Canada, where she is the Reflective Practice Director.
A long-time collaborator with SIX, Kelsey had the great privilege of partnering with the SIX team as Senior Associate at Social Innovation Generation (SiG) National from 2014-2017. In her time with SiG, Kelsey co-created and facilitated the Alberta Social Innovation (ABSI) Connect Fellows initiative and collaborated with her team to foster an enabling ecosystem for systems change in Canada. In celebration of SiG’s sunset in December 2017, Kelsey and her colleague, Geraldine Cahill, co-authored Social Innovation Generation: Fostering a Canadian Ecosystem for Systems Change to capture the lessons and insights of the SiG story.
Following the SiG sunset, Kelsey served as a social innovation specialist at the Centre for Social Innovation (CSI) from January - March 2018, supporting an ongoing feasibility study for a pan-Canadian network for social innovators. Kelsey holds a MSc in Culture and Society from the London School of Economics and a BS in Foreign Service from Georgetown University. She lives in Toronto, Canada.
Kerem Alper obtained a dual degree in Mathematics and Economics at Wesleyan University and completed his MBA at Stanford University along with a Master of Science in Interdisciplinary Design from Stanford University’s Hasso Plattner Institute of Design (dschool), where he was also a lecturer.
In 2012, Kerem was selected a Lightspeed Venture Partners Fellow through which he founded an agriculture software startup. Later on, he worked at Nest Labs which was acquired by Google in 2014. After Nest was sold to Google, he returned to Istanbul to establish ATÖLYE. In 2014, Kerem was awarded the Young Creative Entrepreneur of the Year Award by the British Council. He has
spoken at several conferences including the Stanford Entrepreneurship Conference, TEDxReset, Inspired Istanbul, Smart Cities Summit, and hello tomorrow.
Karem is also an adjunct professor at Ozyegin University and Istanbul Bilgi University on design thinking and innovation.
Kerem Okumuş is the founding partner and managing director of S360. He is an impact entrepreneur and successfully leveraged multiple social investments. He is the head of B Corp Turkey and official affiliate partner of Shared Value Initiative and a board member of imece. He worked for the World Bank to channel investment funding for climate adaptation.
Kerem was the head of business at the Regional Environmental Center for Central and Eastern Europe based in Budapest (REC) and also worked as the Deputy Director of the REC Country Office Turkey. He is a Chevening Scholar and completed the Sustainability Management Programme at TiasNimbas Business School/SCF. He has a post-graduate degree on International Studies from the University of Birmingham and an undergraduate degree on Political Science and International Relations from Bilkent University.
Kriss Deiglmeier is Chief Executive Officer of Tides Network, a global social enterprise. Kriss has more than 20 years of senior executive experience that spans the business, social enterprise, nonprofit, academic and philanthropic sectors. In 2016, she was named one of the “50 most influential women in Philanthropy” by Philanthropy Insider. In 2015, Tides granted over $150 million in the United States and in 110 countries globally. Before joining Tides, Kriss was the founding Executive Director for the Center for Social Innovation at Stanford.
Kriss is recognized as a pioneer in the field of social innovation and has presented internationally on social innovation, social entrepreneurship, design thinking and public-private partnerships as well as guest-lectured at Stanford Graduate School of Business, University of California, Berkeley, Hitotsubashi University, Kyoto University, and Kyushu University. Kriss developed and taught the course, “Social Innovation through Corporate Social Responsibility,” at the Stanford Graduate School of Business.
Kristin Wolff, thinker, doer, aspiring rainmaker. Kristin has worked in the social change space for over 15 years. She is a Senior Associate at Social Policy Research Associates (Oakland, CA), where she works on work – especially the #FutureofWork – and all things aimed community prosperity.
She has worked in communities large and small, rural and urban, in and outside the US. Kristin also runs thinkers + doers, and is “DIYing” her second masters – an un-degree comprising formal, informal, and experiential learning in HCD and innovation, open data and data journalism, and collaborative technologies. She also chairs a local nonprofit board, and is a three-time Hack Oregon Project alumna, a seven-time alumna SIX Social Innovation Schools, and a founding member of the Solutions Journalism network in Portland.
She lives in Portland, Oregon and likes bikes – and chocolate. Ask her about the Tomorrow Project.
Lee (@thisleerose) is an accidental social innovator with a knack for working across systems to drive change. He led the creation of CKX in his role as the Director of Community Knowledge at Community Foundations of Canada, and now as CKX’s Managing Director.
A former camp director, Lee is prone to tipping canoes and shaking things up both on the water and at work. He recently wrapped up terms on the boards of Imagine Canada and the Ten Oaks Project, an organization engages children and youth from LGBTQ+ communities through activities rooted in social justice and play.
Lee lives in Gatineau, Quebec with his three kids and all of their hockey gear.
Leonardo Letelier has over 20 years of experience in business, finance, and the social sector. Before
founding SITAWI, he spent 2 years as the director of the Economic Citizenship for All initiative for Ashoka. He also spent 8 years at McKinsey, advising clients on strategic and operational challenges, with a focus on the telecommunications and energy sectors. Prior to McKinsey, he worked in derivatives trading, and with CADE, the Brazilian antitrust agency.
He was elected a Synergos Senior Fellow and a Responsible Leader by the BMW Foundation. Leonardo is recognized as one of the pioneers in the Social Finance and Impact Investing landscape, globally and in Brazil having served as co-executive director of the Brazilian Social Finance Task Force. He earned an MBA from Harvard Business School and an Industrial Engineering degree from USP – University of São Paulo.
Liana Varon, completed her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in International Relations at Koç University. Prior to joining Third Sector Foundation of Turkey (TUSEV), Liana worked with several civil society organisations and consulted them on fundraising and project development strategies. Currently, Liana is working as the Deputy Secretary General of TUSEV and her areas of interest include civil society infrastructure development, philanthropy and strategic giving, civil society law. She has contributed in various research initiatives and reports in the areas of civil society development and philanthropy and she continues to pursue a master’s degree in Philanthropic Studies at the Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy. Liana has been a steering committee member of the CIVICUS Affinity Group for National Associations since 2016.
Louise Pulford is the Director of the Social Innovation Exchange (SIX), the world’s leading social innovation network. Louise has been responsible for building SIX over the last 6 years. Under her leadership, SIX spun out of the Young Foundation in 2013.
Louise is a seasoned speaker on the value of networks and social innovation globally, and regularly designs and facilitates social innovation training programmes for governments and universities around the world. Louise also publishes regular articles on networks and social innovation.
Louise has worked on social innovation with the European Commission since 2010 when she co-wrote a Study on Social Innovation for the Bureau of European Policy Advisors in 2010 and has since co-managed several large consortiums building communities of innovators across Europe, including the current Social Innovation Europe programme. Louise sits on the Mayor of Seoul’s Advisory group for social innovation.
Luisa Covaria is the Senior Design Lead for OpenIDEO– IDEO’s open innovation platform. Luisa designs and leads projects focused on building movements and increasing the platform’s social and educational impact through collaboration.
As part of her role to push the boundaries of what is possible, she has designed boot camps, online environments and programs blending online and offline experiences to help early stage entrepreneurs in the social impact space take their initiatives to the next level.
Luisa has a passion for working in international development. She has led projects to increase participation of those with no access to the Internet in online challenges and has designed and built in-country networks to empower social entrepreneurs in East Africa and Asia.
Before this role, Luisa worked as a user experience designer for various boutique agencies and NGO’s in New York City, started a social venture to facilitate collaboration and co-creation around pressing social issues and developed programs to empower marginalized communities through participatory filmmaking, from Asia to South America.
Luisa graduated with a masters in interaction design from the Interactive Telecommunications Program at New York University and a bachelor’s degree from Middlebury College. She is the recipient of various social entrepreneurship fellowships such as the Reynolds Fellowship and is part of the United World College scholar program.
Marcello Palazzi BSc, MSc, MBA is the Founder President of Progressio Foundation for Human Progress (Rotterdam) and Co-Founder & Board Member of B Lab Europe (Amsterdam). He is the Chairman of the SIX Executive Board.
Marcello is a serial entrepreneur for human progress. Following 11 years as co-head of his international family business in environmental technologies from Italy and the UK in the 80s and early 90s, he founded Progressio Foundation, which has completed 300 projects in 30 countries with dozens of partners under his leadership, in pursuit of the ‘civic economy’, ‘civic enterprise’ and ‘civic innovation', which Palazzi wrote about in 1990 in a pamphlet which has proved prescient, predicting the rise of CSR, sustainability, public-private partnerships, ethical investments, social enterprise and other forms of a more ‘integrative’ economy and enterprise.
Since 2014, Marcello has been leading the B Corp movement in continental Europe from Amsterdam.
Marcos is an Economist and PhD in Business Administration. He is the Executive Director of the Global Alliance for Banking on Values (GABV), based in the Netherlands. He is an entrepreneur that has started companies in different industries including financial services, technology and professional services. He brings a wealth of experience including banking, consulting, management and research. Marcos is known for his ability to lead the strategic delivery of profitable, sustainable, values-based business models. As Executive Director of the GABV Marcos is building the values-based banking movement and growing our work with members, partners, experts and policy makers to influence the banking system so that it is more transparent, ethical, robust and real-economy focused. Marcos is also a professor of Business Administration at Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya.
Markus Lux studied History and Politics at the universities of Mainz and Riga. From 1993 to 1996 he worked for the German public television channel “ZDF” in Mainz. From 1996 to 2002 he was a Visiting Lecturer at several universities in Latvia and a Researcher at the »Jews in Latvia« Museum in Riga. Markus has been at the Robert Bosch Stiftung in Stuttgart since 2002. He is currently Deputy Head of Department “International Relations – Europe and its Neighbours” and responsible for the topics “International Affairs and Global Issues”, “Civil Society International” and “Building a Stronger Europe”. He is also in the Strategic Development Unit responsible for International Relations, Alumni and Social Investing.
Martín Cosarinsky is the Director of Breadwinners, a grassroots charity selling organic artisan bread and supporting refugees with work. He is also a board member at Praxis, an organisation that provides vital support to vulnerable migrants. He has also lead a WASH implementation in rural Nicaragua and is an active volunteer for Refugee Youth. With vast experience in corporations like GSK and Lindt&Spruengli, he has established himself as a continuous improvement expert.
As part of the On Purpose leadership programme, Martin did a six month placement with the Social Innovation Exchange (SIX), helping with strategy and finance, building robust plans and scenario analysis. He now sits on the board for SIX.
Millie Begovic Radojevic works on bringing innovation to development. She works with teams (UNDP and national/local partners) across the region of Europe and CIS to find out new ways of tackling stubborn problems, test out fresh ideas and new perspectives in UNDP context.
Her main areas of expertise include social innovation and change management; design thinking, user innovation, citizen engagement, foresight, social network analysis, tech and complexity science and development as well as natural resource planning, disaster risk reduction and local development.
In 2013, she ran UNDP’s first challenge, subsequently taking part in drafting UNDP’s first corporate policy on innovation challenge prizes. Between 2014 and 2015, Millie designed and tested a new approach to ‘scaling up’ in development, borrowing principles from sciences (biology, ecology, cognitive science and psychology). In 2014, she also introduced a new method (micro-narratives) for weak signal detection, analysis of underlying causes of development issues, and impact evaluation.
Nader Kabbani is the Director of Research at the Brookings Doha Center and Senior Fellow with the Brookings Global Economy and Development Program. Kabbani works at the nexus of research; policy and practice and has helped start and played leadership roles in a number of social initiatives and policy research organizations. Most recently, Kabbani served as the Director of Policy and Research at the non-profit Silatech Foundation in Qatar and as the Founding Director of the Syrian Development Research Center at the non-profit Syria Trust for Development. Kabbani also co-founded the Community Mediation Program in Baltimore (USA) and led a UNDP-supported project that established a Platform for Development NGOs in Syria. He currently serves on the Board of the Massyr initiative (Lebanon). Kabbani has served on the faculty of the American University of Beirut and on the policy research staff of the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the California State Senate. Kabbani obtained his B.A. in Economics from Claremont McKenna College, an M.A. in Public Management and Organizational Behavior from California State University, Sacramento and a Ph.D. in Economics from the Johns Hopkins University in 2001. He has completed executive education programs on NGO management and NGO leadership from the Maastricht School of Management and the Harvard Kennedy School of Government.
After his bachelor degree in Economics at Bogazici University, Neset Dereli started his advertising career in a creative agency. He managed many blockbuster projects as a copywriter and creative director, and then took place at senior management in many local and international agencies. In the meantime, he was rewarded with various international/local awards such as LIA (London International Awards), Kristal Elma and Felis. Then, he moved to a new challenge at Turkish Airlines as the Brand and Digital Advertising Manager. He has been the key person for many awards that Turkish Airlines won in the digital world, including Golden Drum, and Smitty. In 2016, he became the Halkbank Head of Corporate Communications Department and managed the Public Relations, Sponsorship, Advertisement and Digital Communications departments. Since August 2017, he has been the Corporate Communications Director of Turkcell. He has been an instructor in advertising at Bogazici University since 2004.
Nova Franklin, Principal at Meld Studios, is passionate about collaborating with others to develop, test and deliver creative ideas that positively impact people’s lives. Underpinning her approach is an understanding of human behaviour; methods designed to infect stakeholders with a sense of the possible; and techniques for designing and implementing “sticky” behaviour change initiatives.
Nova began her professional career with Andersen Consulting (now known as Accenture) in 1994 and since then has held a series of consulting and in-house Organisation Design and Change Management roles in blue chip organisations such as Westpac, Barclays Global Investors and The NSW Police Service. Most recently Nova worked as Asia Pacific Head of Engagement and Cultural Change for a complex global service company with over 100,000 employees.
In the early naughties – in conjunction with a stint as a Freelance Web and Graphic Designer – Nova completed a Graduate Diploma in Media Arts and Production at UTS. Nova has been a Registered Psychologist for over 15 years. Prior to this she earned a Bachelor of Arts majoring in Psychology and Statistics, and a Graduate Diploma in Applied Psychology from Monash University.
Paul is currently the CEO of donkey wheel foundation - a leading impact investment and philanthropic foundation, Co-Founder and Executive Chairman of The Difference Incubator - a prominent incubator of investable social enterprises in Australia. He is also co-founder and an executive director of Ethical Property Australia - a property development and management company seeking to create spaces where organisations can come together to make a difference. He also advises, mentors and coaches; helping people make the world a better place, through the development of leadership, strategy and innovation.
Rachael Brown is a leader within the creative and social enterprise sector who thrives on solving problems and turning ideas into reality.
Rachael is currently Chief Executive at Cultural Enterprise Office. She is Leader at Entrepreneurial Scotland, Social Entrepreneur in Residence with Social Investment Scotland, Chairperson at Youth Theatre Arts Scotland, Board Director at Social Enterprise Scotland and Fellowship Councillor for Scotland at RSA.
She previously spent over a decade at Impact Arts and has worked on joint ventures with the Scottish Government and leading agencies including Creative Scotland and Scottish Enterprise.
Rachael works in Scotland and the rest of the world! Enabling ideas, connections and impacts to happened. With a strong track record of operational success, as well as using her imagination, Rachael works extensively supporting creative and social enterprises to deliver, grow, develop and sustain.
Sierra Hawthorne is an Engagement Manager in PwC’s Health Industries Advisory Practice. She brings seven years of experience in behavioral science and predictive analytics applied to public health. Her clients have included national health insurers, integrated delivery networks, charitable foundations and local government.
Sierra oversees PwC’s internal research and development for Behavior Predictor, a machine learning tool used to forecast health behavior across a population. This tool is used along with simulation modeling to predict the effect of community health interventions before real-world implementation; allowing private, social and public sector clients to channel investments to areas of highest impact.
She received her Master of Public Health from University of California Berkeley and her Bachelor of Science in International Politics from Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service.
Mr. Ayhan graduated from Marmara University Department of Political Science and Public Administration in 2000. Mr. Ayhan completed the master program at Marmara University European Community Institute EU Law Department and wrote his thesis, which is titled “Free Movement of Workers in the EU and Free Movement Right for Turkish Nationals”. He began to work at the Ministry for EU Affairs in 2001 held the posts of Assistant EU Affairs Expert, EU Affairs Expert, Coordinator and Director respectively. Between 2010-2013, Mr. Ayhan was assigned to EU Counsellor position at the Permanent Delegation of Turkey to the EU in Brussels. Between February 2016- February 2018, he served as the Director of the Economic and Financial Policies. Currently he is working as the Director of Social, Regional and Innovative Policies. He is responsible for the nation-wide coordination of the EU Programmes including the Employment and Social Innovation Program (EaSI), social-regional policies and social instruments.
Born in 2006, studying her 6th grade at Acı Schools, Istanbul, Turkey, Talya Özdemir is the spokesperson for Girls 4 Girls in Science Program, The Royal Academy of Science International Trust. Her Children’s Vision presentation at the 1st RASIT International Agora, June 2016, United Nations Headquarters, New York, when she was only 10 was followed next year by Girls in Science Vision presentation at the 2nd Commemoration of the International Day of Women and Girls in Science, February 2017, again at United Nations Headquarters, New York. This year she released her video message regarding ‘Girls in Science for Sustainable Future’ at the Women and Girls in Science, Towards the 17 Sustainable Development Goals, March 2018, The University of the West Indies St. Augustine Campus, Trinidad and Tobago. She continues with her classical ballet training since 2012, and complementary dance (Street Jazz) training since 2014 at Tan Sağtürk Academy, Istanbul, Turkey.
Tarik M. Yousef is a senior fellow in the Global Economy and Development program and the director of the Brookings Doha Center.
His professional career has spanned the academic world at Georgetown University and the Harvard Kennedy School; the public policy arena at the IMF, the World Bank and the UN; and more recently the NGO space at Silatech where he led the implementation of innovative solutions aimed at youth economic empowerment in the Arab countries. He has served on the advisory boards of development organizations and boards of directors of financial institutions including currently the Arab Financial Services Company.
His research has focused on the political economy of policy reform and the challenge of youth inclusion in the Arab world. His most recent publications include “Young Generation Awakening: Economics, Society, and Policy on the Eve of the Arab Spring (2016)”.
Teresa Franqueira is a professor at the University of Aveiro and a member of the Executive Committee of the Communication and Art Department of the UA.
She is senior researcher at the ID+ and coordinator of the ID+ DESIS Lab, a member of the international DESIS Network – Design for Social Innovation and Sustainability. Her research interests are focussed in themes related to service design and social innovations, and alternative scenarios towards more sustainable economic and social models. Within this scope she has written and published papers and participated in several international conferences. She won the ICEP Glass Award, held a scholarship at the FCT and received the João Branco Internacional Award for the Best Paper in the 8Th EAD Conference in Aberdeen. She has been invited as keynote speaker and to take part in several workshops, namely through scenario building and identification of possible solutions to be used in specific projects of creative places (Italy, Portugal, Sweden and UK).
Teresa has a PhD in Design from the Politecnico di Milano, a Master's degree in Industrial Design from FEUP / ESAD, a postgraduate degree in Industrial Design from the Glasgow School of Art / CPD and a degree in Equipment Design from ESAD Matosinhos.
Tim Draimin is a Senior Advisor at McConnell Foundation. He was previously the Executive Director of Social Innovation Generation (SiG) National. As Executive Director, Mr. Draimin supported SiG’s growing network of academics, practitioners, social entrepreneurs, allied institutions and partnerships in expanding Canada’s Social Innovation ecosystem.
A leader in the non-profit sector, Mr. Draimin was the founding CEO of Tides Canada Foundation. Mr. Draimin guided the Foundation’s expansion, established Canada’s first national support system for social entrepreneurs – Tides Canada Initiatives – and supported a world-renowned model of integrated conservation: BC’s Great Bear Rainforest initiative.
Tim is the author of Canada’s first national study of social entrepreneurship and a frequent advisor to government, non-profit associations and business. He has worked for or consulted in Canada and abroad with the Canadian Council for International Co-operation, the International Development Research Centre, Synergos, and Ford Foundation. He has served on many international delegations and participated at UN prepcoms. He was a member of Canada’s official delegation to UNCED.
Violaine Des Rosiers is co-CEO of a new organisation based in Montreal, Maison de l’innovation sociale (MIS), which contributes to eliminate obstacles that stand between a social impact idea and its implementation, and stimulate the emergence of social entrepreneurship in Quebec.
Between 1999 and 2008, she led and supported various organisational transformative initiatives in North and Latin America, Africa, South East Asia and the Middle East.
Later she served as the Head of the Middle East and North Africa regional department for Organisational Strategic Development at the International Red Cross as well as the Country Director in Lebanon. Upon her returned to Canada in 2013, she was appointed as the CEO of the one of the most important private Foundations in Canada, where she and her team developed and implemented an “Strategy for greater philanthropic impact” which radically transformed the Foundation’s approach to funding and partnership building.
Violaine describes herself as an action-oriented and pragmatic thinker and she likes seeing concrete results in action. As a thought-leader, she has a respected public presence, a passion for social issues and the desire to drive change at a national and global level.
Wren Laing joined Big Society Capital as an Investment Manager in September 2017. Her work focuses on our Homes for People in Need and Communities strategic areas. Prior to joining Big Society Capital, she was part of the Housing and Land Directorate at the Greater London Authority, working on investment solutions to help increase the delivery of affordable housing across London. Wren is Canadian and moved to the UK to complete her MSc at the London School of Economics prior to working as part of the development team on the transformation of the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park. Wren’s interests and expertise include affordable housing delivery and its impact on urban economic development in the UK and developing contexts abroad.
Zeynep Bodur Okyay is the President and CEO of Kale Group of Companies which has investments in construction materials and chemicals as well as defense and aerospace. She holds a bachelor’s degree in management engineering from Istanbul Technical University and has completed graduate degree in management at Harvard University.
Having assumed the Presidency of Steering Committee of the C20 (Civil 20), an official engagement group of G20, during the Turkish Presidency of the G20 in 2015, Zeynep Bodur Okyay holds active duties in various non-governmental organizations, associations, foundations and chambers. She serves as the president of the general assembly of the Istanbul Chamber of Industry, vice-president of the Economic Development Foundation, board member of the Foreign Economic Relations Board, president of Turkey-Italy Business Council and vice-president of the female entrepreneurs’ board of the Union of Chambers and Commodity Exchanges of Turkey.
Zeynep Kadirbeyoğlu (PhD in Political Science at McGill University; MPhil in Social and Political Sciences at University of Cambridge) is an Associate Professor in Political Science and International Relations Department at Bogazici University (Istanbul). Her research interests include democratization, migration, citizenship and enviroment and politics. She has previously been published in Public Administration and Development, Environmental Politics and a couple of edited volumes.