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.

Rob Veersma

Gazprom International Training

Director Training & Development

Rob Veersma is the Director Training & Development at Gazprom International in Amsterdam, Netherlands. He is responsible for implementing training programs for Gazprom EP International, aligned with the competence management system and tailored to local needs.Previously he has been working for Shell International as the Commercial Academy Learning Manager, responsible for all aspects of global capability building that enables world-class deal making. During his long career he has been focusing on global onboarding, virtual working, leadership development and portfolio management. He is a published HR expert and has given many public speeches on among others, Performance Improvement, Just-in-time-learning, Learning and Ethics, Virtual Working, and ROI of Learning.

Anja Andersen

A.P. Moller - Maersk

Senior Brand Manager

Anja Andersen is a Senior Brand Manager in Maersk, a container, port and  logistics company  which mission is to enable and facilitate the global supply chain and provide opportunities for our customers to trade globally.  

Arturo Poire

Ericsson

Global Head of Talent Management

Arturo Poire is the Global Head of Talent Management for Ericsson. In this role, Arturo is directly responsible for Talent Management for the company, including: Executive and Leadership Development, Succession Planning, Performance Management, Diversity, Early Career Programs, Organizational Development and Employee Engagement. Prior to joining Ericsson in 2012, Arturo was the Global Head of Talent Management for Marsh & McLennan Companies (MMC), based in New York. Before MMC, he spent 12 years with Citigroup in HR Business Partner, Talent Acquisition and Talent Management roles and projects globally. The main areas of focus during his years at Citigroup were M&A Integration, Organizational Restructuring, Strategic Staffing and Talent Management.

Jonathan Kohn

Shell

HR VP Qatar & MENA, Russia Caspian HR Operations

Dr. Kholode Al-Obaidli

Qatar Airways

VP National Talent Management HR – National Talent Management

Dennis Frank

Deloitte North America Learning Lead for Human Capitol

Transformational Coach (former)

Simon Watt

Mattel

Former Head of International Organizational Development

Ibrahim Badredien

Bayt

Country Manager Qatar

Fran Newman

Unilever

Leadership Development Director

Teddy Frank

Philips

Former VP, Global Lead for Culture and Change Management

Teddy Frank, (Former) VP, Global Lead for Culture and Change Management, Philips, She brings her passion and over 30 years of experience to her current consulting practice as a Master Facilitator, Coach and Advisor on cultural transformation for senior leadership teams. She is recognized as an innovator in helping build human-centered, agile organizations by promoting authentic leadership, cultural transformation and broad scale engagement at all levels of the organization. Teddy is a trained as a clinical social worker, group psychotherapist, Barrett values practitioner and organizational effectiveness consultant. Most recently, as Vice President, Global Culture and Change Management Lead for Philips, Teddy developed the enterprise-wide strategy for cultural transformation and established a sustainable transformational leadership practice.

Albert Hakkers

Diageo

Former HR Director Europe

Albert Hakkers, Human Resources Director Europe, joined Diageo in February 2008 and is member of the Global HR Team and Executive Team in Western Europe. In his current role he is responsible for the people strategy for all business units in the region. Before Diageo he worked as Senior HR Director at Microsoft for EMEA (Europe, Middle East & Africa). During his 10 year career span at Microsoft he also held the role of HR Director for Germany and Benelux and contributed to the company winning the Best Employer Award in many countries several times in a row. Before joining Microsoft, Albert Hakkers held various international Human Resources functions at AT&T and Lucent Technologies, which involved assignments in various countries, including Hungary, Germany, Russia and Saudi Arabia. Albert Hakkers graduated with a degree in Human Resources Management in the Netherlands and has since followed various international leadership programmes, notably at Cranfield in the UK, Warthon in the US and INSEAD in France.

Kim Wylie

Builder.ai

VP People

Kim is the VP of People at Builder.ai (an approx. 1k global employees company, using AI to democratize access to software development. Awarded Top 3 Most Innovative Companies in AI, 2023 by Fast Company) She previously spent 12 years at Google and five years at Farfetch in a variety of leadership roles across Transformation, Change Management and People Teams. She is a Certified Clifton Strengths Coach, and Neuroleadership Institute 'Brain-Based' Coach, and practises a human-centred leadership style, informed by principles of Design Thinking, Positive Psychology, inclusion, wellbeing, and neuroscience.

Ofelia Nieto

Allfunds

Corporate HR Manager

Ofelia Nieto is a Corporate HR Manager at Allfunds, one of the world's leading wealthtech companies. Previously she has been working for a decade at Beiersdorf Holding. As a Human Resources Generalist, she was in charge for managing on a day to day basis, business policies, procedures, and programs such as training and development, organizational development, internal communication, and employment. Her main specialties are talent attraction and development. She has been a part of a number of International projects run by Beiersdorf, particularly concerning a huge project on change management.

Gabriele Metz

Ericsson

Global Head of Leadership Transformation

Gabriele Metz joined Ericsson in 2013 to lead the Talent Management organization in the Middle East region. Prior to joining Ericsson, Gabriele spent 18 years at Motorola in various HR capacities. She brings the insight and experience of a variety of HR functions applied across several geographies including Europe, Middle East and Africa. Her passion for strengthening young diverse talent developed during her very first HR role and continues to this day. She is currently driving a program within Ericsson which is focused on empowering and coaching young female talent. She has received regional recognition specifically for her work in diversity and for creating a mentoring circle to address the development of female talent. Gabriele is a strong advocate of building a diverse workforce because the results of doing so can be directly linked to the bottom line results of a business.