Teachers

Aðalsteinn Leifsson: Effective Negotiation

The State Conciliation and Mediation Officer (ríkissáttasemjari) and assistant professor at RU

Aðalsteinn was a counselor at the Delegation of the European Commission to Iceland and Norway, stationed in Oslo, served as an officer at EFTA and as a special advisor in the Icelandic Ministry for Foreign Affairs. He has lectured on Negotiations in MBA, MSc and LL.M. programs.

Adalsteinn was the Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Icelandic Financial Supervisory Authority and has been a Director in EFTA since 2014 in Geneva/Brussels, and been called upon to assist the Icelandic State Mediator in labor conflicts since 2019.

Adalsteinn has a BS degree in Political Science from the University of Iceland, an MS in European Studies from the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) and an MBA from Edinburgh Business School. Since 2016 Adalsteinn has pursued doctoral studies at Grenoble Ecole de Management alongside his work for EFTA. 

Auður Arna Arnardóttir: Organizational Behaviour

Edi Soler: Managerial Accounting

Senior Lecturer, IESE Business School

Edi Soler is full-time senior lecturer in the Accounting & Control Department at IESE Business School (University of Navarra). He is Ph.D. in Business Administration (Accounting) from Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya, Executive MBA from IESE Business School, and BSc. in Industrial Engineering from Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya.

His research and academic interests focus on product and customer profitability, pricing policies, cost systems, management control systems and earnings management. He has carried out consulting projects related to management accounting and control systems, and has interned as financial analyst at a few companies in Spain. He accumulates over 10 years of experience in the management of educational institutions and over 4 years in the energy supply industry, as CFO at Holaluz. He teaches classes in financial accounting, managerial accounting, management control, analysis of business problems and other courses at graduate and executive programs in Spain and abroad.

More info: Edi Soler at IESE

Svafa Grönfeldt: Final Project

Senior Advisor to the Dean at MIT School of Architecture and Planning, Chair of MIT DesignX

Dr. Svafa Grönfeldt is a venture designer and entrepreneur who has built parallel careers in academia and industry. She serves as Senior Advisor to the Dean at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology SA+P. She is a founding member of MIT's newest innovation accelerator DesignX and a co-founder of the MET fund, a Cambridge based seed investment fund.

With over 25 years of leadership experience, Svafa currently serves on three NASDAQ OMX listed Board of Directors: Ossur, Icelandair and Origo. Previous positions include Chief Organizational Development Officer of Alvogen, an international life science company, President of Reykjavik University, and deputy to the CEO of Actavis Group an international generic pharmaceutical company.

Svafa holds a PhD from the London School of Economics. She completed the Design Discovery program at Harvard GSD and studied architectural history and design at the Academy of Art University. 

Eric Weber: Strategic Decision Making

Associate dean of IESE Business School and professor of accounting and control

Eric is a member of both the Executive Committee of IESE and the Harvard Business School – IESE Advisory Committee.

He has formerly served as the associate dean for the MBA program, as the associate dean for Executive Education and Executive MBA Programs, and as the academic director for the Global Executive MBA program.

Dr. Weber earned his Ph.D. in Management (Accounting and Information Systems) from the Kellogg Graduate School of Management, Northwestern University, USA, and his MBA from IESE. He also holds a degree in mechanical engineering from the Universidad Simón Bolivar, in Venezuela.

More info: Eric Weber at IESE 

Gísli Marteinn Baldursson: Personal & Professional Development

Part-time Lecturer at RU and television host

For more than 30 years Gísli Marteinn Baldursson has studied public speaking. He has held numerous courses and seminars for schools, institutions and companies on public speaking and media relations.

Gísli Marteinn is an award winning television talk show host who has been working in TV for over two decades. After starting out as a news reporter in 1997 he soon moved on to form and host a new daily current affairs show, Kastljósið, that is still running to this day. Apart from that Gísli Marteinn hosted "Saturday night with Gísli Marteinn" a talk show with celebrity guest, "Sunday morning with Gísli Marteinn" a Sunday morning news show and now "The Week with Gísli Marteinn" that is on its fifth season.

During a 8 year break from television Gísli Marteinn served as a city councillor on Reykjavik City Council. As such he was the chairman of the environment and transport committee, he was also member of the steering committee that wrote a new General masterplan for Reykjavik, and was member of the international jury for new plan for Vatnsmýri.

Gísli Marteinn was a Loeb Fellow at Harvard Graduate School of Design, he has an MSc in The City from Edinburgh University and a a BA in political science from the University of Iceland. 

Ketill Berg Magnússon: Responsible Leadership

Lecturer at RU Department of Business and HR Manager at Marel Iceland

Ketill is a member of the International Advisory Board for Kozminski University School of Law, Poland.

Former roles include being a Managing Director for Festa - Icelandic Center for Corporate Social Responsibility, VP of Human Capital at Iceland Telecom, and Chairman of Almannaheill - Icelandic Association of Non-Profit Organzatons.

Ketill Berg gained his MA degree in philosophy and business ethics at the University of Saskatchewan in Canada and MBA from ESADE in Spain.

Vasiliki Kostami: Data Analytics for Management

Patricia Gabaldon Quiñones: Managerial Econonomics

Professor of Economics at IE Business Schools Madrid

Prof. Patricia Gabaldon received her PhD from the University of Alcala, in Madrid, Spain. Since then she has served as professor of Economics at IE Business Schools, in Madrid, Spain, where she is also the Head of the Economics department and Vice dean of Pedagogical Innovation.

Prof. Gabaldon's research interests center on economic institutions, gender equality and diversity on corporate governance, and their contribution to business and society. Her publications have appeared in high impact academic journal and she is very much involved in numerous conferences in Europe and the United States.

Lori Riznek: Human Resource Management

Associate Professor at University of Toronto, Canada

More info: Lori Riznek at University of Toronto

Patricia Gabaldon: Managerial Economics

Josep Valor: Competing in the Digital Age

Steve Byers: Corporate Finance

Professor of Finance, Idaho State University

Dr. Byers received his Ph.D. in Finance from Texas A&M University. He also holds a degree in mathematics and an MBA in Finance, both from Indiana University.

His research has been published in academic journals such as Journal of Money, Credit, and Banking, Journal of Corporate Finance, Applied Economics, European Business Review, and Applied Financial Economics. Steve has corporate finance experience with NCR Corporation and Bristol-Myers. He also served in the U.S. Navy as a nuclear submarine officer.

Qyvind Kvalnes: Responsible Leadership

Associate Professor, BI: Norwegian Business School

The philosopher Øyvind Kvalnes is an associate professor at the Department of Leadership and Organizational Management, BI Norwegian School of Management. He is an experienced facilitator, lecturer and researcher.

In 1998 he defended his PHD-thesis entitled “Living with Moral Luck”. For ten years he was the CEO of Humanistisk Akademi in Oslo, a small unit of philosophical consultants. He has written three books on practical philosophy in the workplace. His main interests outside academia is family, football and music.

Research areas: Human flourishing and fallibility, ethics, communication, personal integrity, organizational identity, self-determination and autonomy, wisdom in leadership

More info: Qyvind Kvalnes at BI

Salóme Guðmundsdóttir: Final Project

Board Member at the Icelandic Chamber of Commerce and Eyrir Venture Management

Salóme is the former CEO of Icelandic Startups, the leading startup community organisation in Iceland, working in close collaboration with experienced founders, universities, government, investors and industries.

Currently on her second maternity leave, with over a decade of experience in operations and management she has extensive insights into the tech and startup scene, and significant experience of Nordic collaboration.

Salóme has an AMP degree from IESE and is a Board Member at the Icelandic Chamber of Commerce and Eyrir Venture Management.  

Þóranna Jónsdóttir: Final Project

Lecturer at RU and advisor

Þóranna received her MBA from IESE in Barcelona in 1998, and her PhD at Cranfield University in 2010 in the field of Corporate Governance.

Þóranna is the former executive director of operations for Reykjavik University and has been an executive manager at Auður Capital hf., Vistor, Lyf og heilsa, and other leading companies. She is the former Chair of RU´s Department of Business Administration.

Hulda Dóra Styrmisdóttir: Personal & Professional Development 

Rakel Heiðmarsdóttir: Personal & Professional Development

Consultant, teacher, trainer, executive coach.

Ph.D. Counselling Psychology, The University of Texas at Austin, including 12 month long predoc research internship at UC Berkeley.

Career

• 2017- Consultation, teaching, training and executive coaching at own consulting service (Inventus ehf & Birki ráðgjöf ehf)

• 2013-2017 Director of Human Resources – Blue Lagoon
• 2005-2012 Director of Human Resources – Century Almuninum (Norðurál)
• 2003-2005 Human Resources Consulting – City of Reykjavík
• 2002-2003 Independent executive and HR consulting and executive coaching

John Steen: Competitive Strategy

Associate Professor at EY, Distinguished Scholar at the University of British Columbia

Ingvar Sverrisson: Personal & Professional Development

Chief Executive Officer at Aton.JL

Garðar Víðir Gunnarsson: Business Law

Partner at LEX Law Offices.

Mr. Gunnarsson completed his legal studies at Reykjavik University and has an LL.M. degree in international commercial arbitration law from Stockholm University.

Eduard Calvo: Operations Management

Professor in the Department of Production, Technology, and Operations Management, IESE Business School and the holder of the CELSA Chair of Competitiveness in Manufacturing.

Professor Calvo is an electrical engineering by training, he holds an M.Sc. and a Ph.D. from Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC) and has been visiting scholar several times at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). In 2005 he received the Salvà i Campillo Award to the Best Young Engineer by the Association of Electrical Engineers of Catalonia. In 2014 he appeared among the world's top 40 business school professors under the age of 40. In 2019, his research received an honorable mention at M&SOM's Practice-Based Research Competition.

Professor Calvo does empirical research in operations management, and is an expert on analyzing massive datasets for the obtention of causal inferences relevant to top management teams. His research works—published in top academic journals such as Management Science and Manufacturing and Service Operations Management span online retail, procurement, and supply chain management.

Professor Calvo is the director of the Industrial Excellence Award in Spain—a competition that benchmarks European competitiveness in the industrial and service sectors—and of IESE's Initiative for the Excellence in Operations (INEO)—a learning community for the C-level executives of +15 manufacturing companies. Thanks to this, he has visited the plants and discussed the operations strategy with the top management teams of a number of industrial companies exceeding 2.5% of Spain's GDP. He consults on strategy and operations and speaks in corporate events. 

Ramón Díaz-Bernardo: Marketing Management

Professor of Marketing, IE Business School in Madrid.

Professor Diaz-Bernardo holds a degree in Engineering from Universidad de Oviedo (Spain), an MSc in Engineering by the
University of Nottingham (UK), an MBA and he received his Ph.D. in Business
Administration (Marketing) from IESE Business School in Barcelona (Spain).

Professor Diaz-Bernardo is currently the Director of the IE Loyalty Research Centre,
a research center focused on the field of customer loyalty. He also serves as
Academic Director of the IE-Coursera Marketing Massive Online Open Courses
(MOOCs).

Dr Diaz-Bernardo teaches strategic marketing at MBAs, Executive MBAs, Executive
Education and In-Company programs. His research and consulting interest is
focused in services marketing, and more specifically in Tourism Marketing both in the
private side of Tourism (the hospitality and restaurant industry) and in the public side
of Tourism (national tourism organizations NTOs and tourism promotion institutions).

Professor Diaz-Bernardo serves regularly as a consultant for the United Nations
World Tourism Organization and for both private and public companies and
institutions in the Tourism and Hotel Sector in Europe and America.

Dr Diaz-Bernardo is an active member of the Academy of Marketing and the
American Marketing Association, where he is a regular contributor at their annual
meetings. Furthermore, he has been visiting professor at Cornell University
(USA), Nanyang Institute (Singapore), ESSEC Business School (Paris), INCAE
(Costa Rica), Hong Kong Polytechnic (Hong Kong), IAE Business School
(Argentina) and Universidad Adolfo Ibáñez (Chile), among other international
business schools.