Ms. Eljona Avdo was born in Tirana, Albania on September 4, 1996. She has lived in Tirana where she graduated from “Isa Boletini” high school in 2014. In 2014 she started Information and communication technology in Faculty of Natural Sciences which was a degree she was passionate about and learned everything with commitment. All this passion and commitment ended up with the opportunity of starting the master of science degree for Information Technology at Faculty of Natural Sciences where she managed to lead and complete projects successfully. During her bachelor degree she had two internships on Entrepreneurship and Innovation at Protik , and Front end developer at Fabric. At the same time, together with some other students, Eljona competed at Start up Weekend Tirana 7 and this experience ended up with the first prize for creating a prototype device for blind people. With a cooperative and positive attitude, professionalism and creative problem-solving skills Eljona is now a business intelligence specialist at ALBtelecom Albania with almost 3 years of experience in the same company. She is an European Youth Envoy for Generation Connect at ITU and Director of Information Technology Project Department at Leadership Development Association Balkan.
Ms. Andreea Barbu works as a journalist for several newspapers and as a technical writer for the start-up FintechOS. She is the creator of the website Armenian Tales. She graduated English major and French minor from the University of Bucharest and is currently studying as a Master's student for International Economy at the Bucharest University of Economic Studies. She is interested in databases, 3D animation and hiking.
Ms. Priyanka Banerjee is the CEO and co-founder of BusinessWiz, a company helping organizations create a sustainable, diverse, and inclusive workplace culture in the Nordics. Originally from India, she completed her engineering in Electronics & Communication in 2012. Thereafter, she worked as an IT consultant in the corporate sector with global clients, eventually leading her to Finland. She also finished her Master's in International Business from Finland in 2018 while promoting inclusion in working life as an international keynote speaker. Inspired by her experiences in the ICT industry and a vision to promote inclusion, she started her own company in 2019. She aims to help tech organizations understand their existing company culture, provide them with tools to use diversity and inclusion as a competitive advantage, and help them create a future-proof organization. She is on the board of International Working Women of Finland Ry, a non-profit, which empowers women in Finland from all backgrounds and identities in their working life. She is also the Vice-President of the European Digital Society, a non-profit promoting an ethical and inclusive digital ecosystem across Europe. Links for your reference:BusinessWiz: https://businesswiz.fi/ European Digital Society: https://europeandigitalsociety.org/ International Working Women of Finland: https://iwwof.com/
Ms. Ajda Cuderman, born 11 November 1976, graduated in defence studies from the Faculty of Social Sciences, the University of Ljubljana, in 2003. She continued her studies at the DOBA Business School in Maribor, where in 2012 she obtained a master's degree in international business management. On 21 September 2020, she was appointed State Secretary at the Ministry of Economic Development and Technology. Before that she was Director of the Public Agency for Entrepreneurship, Internationalisation, Foreign Investments and Technology (SPIRIT Slovenia), where she began working at the beginning of 2019. With her wide experience, she strived to help the Slovenian economy to become more competitive in the global market and Slovenian companies to become more successful exporters and establish themselves as long-term business partners. Under her guidance, the Agency designed and implemented the extremely successful national communication campaign I FEEL SLOVENIA. GREEN. CREATIVE. SMART. for the comprehensive and unified promotion of the Slovenian economy on the competitive global market, and developed the programme content for Slovenia's presentation at Expo 2020 Dubai, which is to be held in 2021 in Dubai. Before that, she was employed with Petrol, where she worked as an assistant to the director of energy solutions for operations development and was Director of the subsidiary Eltec Petrol in Serbia, and, from the middle of 2017, worked as a regional sales manager for Austria, Italy, Serbia and Montenegro and Slovenia in the area of DisNet (Digital Intelligent Smart Networks) services. Prior to joining Petrol, for nine years she worked as a senior consultant for management and sales for Mercuri International, an international consulting company in the field of the management of sales processes, and before that, as a project manager for Laser Computer, an IT company working in the field of electronic document management.
Ms. Emilija Stojmenova Duh, Ph.D., is an assistant professor at the Faculty of electrical engineering, University of Ljubljana. She is also Head of Public, Private, People Partnership Digital Innovation Hub – 4PDIH. She has founded and is coordinating the national FabLab network in Slovenia. During 2014 and 2016, she was head of Demola Slovenia, part of Demola Network, which is recognized as best practice example for innovation policy makers by OECD and World Bank. She is coordinating several
national and European research and development projects on digitalization for innovation and rural development. She is Member of the Management Board of the Slovenian Research Agency, Member of the Expert Council of the Employment Service of Slovenia, Member of the Council for Development in Agriculture, Forestry and Food at the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Food and Member of Board of Forum Synergies.
Ms. Tamara Dancheva, International Relations Manager, GSMA. For over a decade, Ms Tamara Dancheva has worked in various roles in global organizations, with a primary focus on gender equality, human rights and international relations. In her current role as International Relations Manager within the External Affairs and Industry Purpose department at the GSMA, she is responsible for coordinating GSMA's strategy across various gender initiatives in the digital space. She also leads on GSMA’s
partnerships with UN Women, the EQUALS global partnership for digital gender equality in the digital age and the Commonwealth Businesswomen's Network among others. She is currently also a member of the European Union Delegation to the W20 Engagement Group of G20. Additionally, Ms Dancheva has extensive experience in political party systems and democracy stemming from a previous role as Head of the Human Rights Programme for Liberal International. She holds a Bachelor's Degree in International Business from Rockhurst University (Kansas City, MO, USA) and a Master's Degree in Politics and Government in the European Union from the London School of Economics (London, UK). Ms Dancheva is a dual national of the Republic of Bulgaria and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and was born in Sofia, Bulgaria.
Ms. Alia El-Yassir is UN Women Regional Director for Europe and Central Asia and Representative to Turkey since September 2018. She has been working with UNIFEM/UN Women since 1997. She previously worked as the UN Women Special Representative in the occupied Palestinian territory (oPt), managing a complex portfolio of programmes and projects, as well as supporting the UNCT and HCT on establishing coordination mechanisms for tackling gender equality and women’s empowerment issues. She is part of the UNDG roster of gender experts and has supported other UNCTs in this capacity. Before joining UN Women, she briefly worked with UNDP and was engaged in the education field. In addition to volunteering with a number of women’s and human rights NGOs, she has worked on educational media for children. Alia El-Yassir graduated from McGill University in Montreal and pursued post-graduate studies in Education and Anthropology, with a specialization on Gender Studies at Ben Gurion University of the Negev.
Ms. Belma Kučukalić is a women’s rights advocate with experience in NGO, business, and private sector. She spent five years working in Women’s digital rights program in One World Platform. She managed projects, campaigns and initiatives focused on the empowerment of girls and women through technology. She was a part of the research team on the first report made on gender-based digital violence in BiH, and has worked closely with authorities and victims of cyberbullying throughout her work in OWP.
Later on, she joins business hub Networks where she worked with female lead startups, and small businesses. She designed and delivered trainings that focused on scaling up businesses assisting them with marketing, sales, negotiation, and networking skills. As a gender officer and an external consultant, she worked closely with the local branches of USAID, UN Women, EU, and UNICEF, and Council of Europe. She was engaged as a consultant for many organizations of the civil society of the SEE region, mainly focused on women’s rights, LGBTIQA+, minorities, and youth. Currently, she obtains a role of a Community Manager in Mistral, one of the most prominent IT companies in BiH. She holds a BA degree in Political Science and International Relations, with a minor in International Business from the University of Buckingham (UK).
Ms. Mariam Lashkhi is a Member of Parliament of the 10th convocation, Political Party “Georgian Dream”. Mariam is an Innovation and Technology Champion, served as a Deputy Chairperson at Georgia’s Innovation and Technology Agency (GITA) and was involved in Innovation Policy elaboration from the early stages while working in the World Bank. Mariam was awarded as a Woman Leader in Government for her efforts in the process of building innovation ecosystem in the country. She is a promoter of Women in Tech initiative and encourages female participation in entrepreneurial ecosystem. Ms. Lashkhi is an Affiliated Professor in Business and Technology University (BTU). She is a Phd Candidate pursuing the thesis on Digital Economy.
Ms. Zerina Mandžo is a computer science engineer doing her Master's degree in Management and IT. Currently, she is working as an IT Girls Project Officer for UN Women Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH). The initiative focuses on gender equality in the information and communications technology (ICT) sector and increasing women’s participation through skills development, mentorship, economic empowerment, and confidence-boosting. Zerina worked for several IT companies and is a certified trainer by international organizations where she has worked on various initiatives promoting informal education and exchange among students, with a specific focus on sustainable development and innovation.
Ms. Babou Olengha-Aaby is the Founder & CEO of The Next Billion, a for-profit, for impact-driven startup with an infinite mission: To raise the visibility of 1 billion women in business. Empowering the next billion women entrepreneurs, producers, manufacturers, employers and leaders to show up and be visible. Why now, why visibility? Babou believes visibility is the key to investing in women's economic potential and unlocking access to growth opportunities such as; access to funding, to markets, to development and employment opportunities as well as access to a network of inspiring role-models. Her vision is to change the way we see business. one woman, one shoot, one find, one profile, one industry at a time through her company. Congolese born and mother of 3, Babou is a passionate advocate for Female Entrepreneurship and for greater diversity and mindfulness in business. She is a big believer in the collective power of one (I.e the Crowd) and technology to affect positive change in the world. Her company develops, invests and delivers VaaS (Visibility-As-A Service) products that leverage technology and the Power of the Crowd to raise the visibility of women in business globally. Their current portfolio of VaaS products includes Profileme and Globally Spotted. She’s also conceived and launched past initiatives such as Access2 as well as the social media campaign #WinningFacts #WinningEffects. Highlighting the benefits of investing in women. And why investing in women not only makes for smart economics but is a win-win for all. In addition to her role as a founder, Babou is the proud recipient of an Honorary Female Entrepreneurship Ambassador Award, awarded to her at the IV European Congress of Small Business in 2014 in Poland. She is also an enterprise mentor, who champions and advises ‘business underdogs’ (i.e. SMEs, purpose-driven companies, mature entrepreneurs and more precisely female entrepreneurs). She’s an experienced keynote speaker and TEDxWomen alumni on the topic of female entrepreneurship, diversity in business, women's economic empowerment, crowdfunding, tech for good and mindfulness in business. Photo credit: Profilemeshoots.com
Mr. Jaroslaw K. Ponder, Head of the Office for Europe at the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) (Geneva, Switzerland), representing ITU in Europe and directing actions, projects, initiatives and experts groups targeting 46 countries of the Europe Region. His portfolio includes set of Regional Initiatives for Europe, designed by the European Member States and focusing on the ICT Infrastructure, Digitization, Digital Inclusion, Accessibility, Innovation and Cybersecurity. Along the professional career, Mr. Ponder held official positions in the public sector and was a contributor to the legislative projects having the impact on the public policy. Since 2014 Mr. Ponder has been working for ITU holding diverse positions in the General Secretariat, Telecommunication Development Bureau, and Regional Presence, addressing complexity of information society development and digital transformation at national, regional, international level, including United Nations level. For several years he has managed ITU’s work on the United Nations World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) process, leading towards the establishment of the annual WSIS Forum, WSIS Prizes, WSIS Stocktaking, others.
