Ron Thomas

Human Capital Institute

International Country Manager: Middle East, Africa and Asia Pacific Region

Ron Thomas is the Managing Director of Strategy Focused Group an international consulting firm based in Dubai. He is a visiting executive faculty member at the Global Human Resources Leadership Institute at Howard University School of Business in Washington, DC. He is also a senior faculty member of the Human Capital Institute, covering the MENA/Asia Pacific & Africa Region.
Ron is the former CEO of Great Place to Work-Gulf and CHRO of Al Raha Group, based in Riyadh. He holds certifications from HCI as Global Human Capital Strategist (GHCS), Master Human Capital Strategist (MHCS), and Strategic Workforce Planner (SWP) as well as New York University. Prior to consulting, he worked in senior level roles for IBM, Martha Stewart Living, Xerox HR Services [HR Consulting] in the US.
He has been identified as one of the top 5 HR/Leadership thinkers in the Middle East by CIPD.  He received the Outstanding Leadership Award for Global HR Excellence at the World Human Resources Development Congress in Mumbai, and was named as one of the 50 Most Talented Global HR Leaders in Asia. As a consultant and management educator, he has worked with companies such as Central Bank of Nigeria, Iran MTNCell, King Faisal Hospital-Jeddah Saudi Electric Company, BASHRM, JLT [Saudi Arabia], Dubai Tourism, American Hospital of Dubai, Dar Al Riyadh, Gulf Bank-Kuwait, Boybyan, Kuwait, CIMB Bank and Singapore Government Civil Service.

Anne Morrison

Pearson College London’s Governing Body (former BAFTA chair, former BBC Academy Director)

Chair

Anne Morrison is Chair of Pearson College London’s Governing Body and is a senior media executive, coach and keynote speaker. She is Creative Director of Factual Programmes at Nevision, a London-based independent production company, where she has recently executive produced several feature documentaries, including The Missing Children for ITV’s Exposure strand. 
She was Chair of BAFTA from 2014 to 2016, the second woman to hold the position in the organisation’s history. She is a member of the Communication and Engagement Committee for the British Academy and of the Annual Review Panel for BBC-branded magazines at BBC Studios. Previously she was a Governor of the University of the Arts London, Chair of Creative Skillset’s TV Committee, a Trustee of the Charleston Trust and a board member of Women in Film and TV.
She is a frequent speaker internationally on issues such as diversity, employability, and creativity and has her own coaching practice. Throughout her career, she has been committed to the development of new talent. Until 2014 she was Director of the BBC Academy, the BBC’s centre for training, which she launched in 2009.
In her television career, having worked as a producer/director, she held senior management positions for 20 years at the BBC, and was responsible for hundreds of hours of factual television including many award-winning programmes.
Anne was educated in Belfast and Churchill College, Cambridge.

Torben Pedersen

Novo Nordisk

Senior Project Manager, Digital Transformation, Global HR

Torben Pedersen, is currently in charge of the Digital Transformation of Global HR for Novo Nordisk. Previous to this role he was in charge of the Oral Launch Plant in Novo Nordisk and an SVP HR Partner where his main field of work was the optimization of the core HR processes leading up to talent recruitment and developing and implementing a new talent management process.

Matthias Kempf

adidas

Director HR Emerging Markets

Matthias Kempf, currently Senior Director HR Emerging Markets at adidas Group based in Dubai/UAE, started his career as HR Manager in 1988 for a Mail order and later then Retail company. Until 2001 he worked as Head of Human Resources for an international Automotive Supplier, before he took over the HR responsibility within an Energy Corporation. In 2005 he joined the adidas Group, first as the Head of Human Resources for Global IT, before he moved in 2006 to the US as the Director Group Development & Training Americas. He returned in 2010 to the Headquarter as Director HR CoE Talent EMEA to be responsible for People Development, Talent Management and Recruiting in HQ and the EMEA markets. He has practical experience as a Coach, Mentor and Mediator, is Graduate of the Human Resource Executive Program at University of Michigan/Stephen M. Ross School of Business, also an instructor, author and facilitator of different lectures, articles and workshops in the US and Germany mainly for intercultural and leadership topics.

Diaa Mohamed

HP

Vice President HR Global Services

Diaa Mohamed is Vice President and General Manager of HR Global Services in HP. In this role, he is responsible for the development and delivery of HR services for over 300,000 employees worldwide. In addition, he manages the strategic “Bureaucracy Buster” program for HP which aims to make HP processes easier for both employees and customers. Diaa has most recently served as a Vice President of HR in Growth Markets which consists of 72 countries from around the world. Prior to joining HP in 2010, Diaa served as a Vice President of Human Resources for Middle East, North Africa, and South Asia at British Petroleum (BP) and as Regional Director of Human Resources for the Middle East and Africa regions for Motorola.

Jenny Arwas MBE

BT

Formerly Director, BT Group Functions HR

Jenny joined BT in 1977 and has enjoyed a varied career in a number of operational and HR roles across the BT Group. She spent the early part of her career in catering. Since managing the HR interests in BT’s European ventures, Jenny was appointed HR Director, for BT Openworld, BT’s own Internet Service Provider arm. In her role as HR Director for BT’s Group Functions, she has also managed BT’s talent and executive appointments, and implemented the 10-year HR Global outsourcing contract with Accenture HR Services. Jenny is a Fellow of the CIPD and was appointed MBE in the 2008 New Year’s Honours, for services to charity. She is a member of the Princes Trust London Council. She holds a non-executive appointment in the pharmaceutical industry.

Haitham Samman

Alcatel-Lucent

Global HR Director - Strategic Industries

Ameer Sherif

WUZZUF

CEO

Zahra Shirazi

Ericsson

Head of Talent Management (Western Central Europe)

Yolaine von Barczy

Shiseido EMEA

Vice President Human Resources and Sustainability EMEA

Yolaine von Barczy is Vice President Human Resources & Sustainability EMEA at Shiseido. She has a track record of HR roles in various countries and has occupied many pan European functions in the pharmaceutical, insurance, and most recently beauty business for global companies. She started her career in Germany where she spent 8 years in different HR specialists and generalist roles. During this time she supported several mergers & acquisitions activities from an HR perspective. She then moved to France where she joined Tektronix and then Biogen before moving to Bristol-Myers Squibb where she spent 11 years in HR leadership and talent development roles. She also worked at Chubb and joined Shiseido EMEA in 2018. Throughout her career she has worked on many transformation projects and has a passion for talent, engagement, and culture development.