Speakers

IFLA President Gloria Pérez-Salmerón

Glòria Pérez-Salmerón

IFLA President

Glòria Pérez-Salmerón became IFLA President in August 2017. She is also President of FESABID, Federación Española de Sociedades de Archivística, Biblioteconomía, Documentación y Museística (Spanish Federation of Archivist, Librarianship, Documentation and Museum Associations). She works at Diputació de Barcelona and has held many leadership roles in her distinguished career including Director of the National Library of Spain (2010-2013) where she also was member of its Governing Board and Executive Committee (2008-2013). Under her management, the Library developed many innovative projects including the systematic digitalization of holdings, thanks to a partnership agreement with Telefónica, which foresaw the digitalization of 200,000 book titles. Gloria's involvement with IFLA is long-standing, being a former member of IFLA’s Public Libraries Standing Committee (2005-2012) and member of the Executive Committee and Vice-President of EBLIDA, European Bureau of Library Information and Documentation Associations (2008-2015). Gloria is an experienced public speaker and regularly gives professional lectures.

IFLA Secretary General Gerald Leitner

Gerald Leitner

IFLA Secretary General

Gerald Leitner took on the role of IFLA Secretary General in June 2016. He is responsible for the strategic and operational direction and financial management of IFLA. Gerald Leitner has worked in senior positions at international organisations and in Austria’s cultural, scientific and educational sectors. Prior to becoming IFLA Secretary General, he was the Secretary General of the Austrian Library Association. Gerald studied literature and history at the University of Vienna, and after his studies worked as journalist, chief editor of the Austrian Library magazine and head of training for public librarians in Austria. He is a past president of the European Bureau of Library Information and Documentation Associations (EBLIDA) and a member of national and international advisory bodies in cultural, education and scientific sectors. He is highly experienced in negotiating with politicians, authorities, lobby groups, publishers, artists, businesses and strategic partners. In 2017, Gerald Leitner initiated the Global Vision project.

Roger Baig Viñas

Roger Baig Viñas

Guifi.net
Spain

Roger Baig Viñas joined the guifi.net community as a volunteer in 2006. In 2011 he was hired at the Foundation for the Neutral, Free and Open Network, the non-profit organization that represents the guifi.net project. He is currently coordinating its participation in international projects. He has actively contributed to many aspects in guifi.net, such as organizing community events, promoting projects, giving talks, etc. and has gained a broad knowledge about community networks. His research interests are on business models, sustainability, and governance of community networks. Currently he is the secretary of ISOC-CAT association. received his degree in Industrial Engineering (2002) from the Universtiat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC) and currently is working on his PhD on community networks at the same university.

Mercè Conesa i Pagès

Mercè Conesa i Pagès

President of Diputació de Barcelona
Spain

Mercè Conesa i Pagès is President of the Diputació de Barcleona (the provincial government of Barcelona) and Mayor of Sant Cugat del Vallès, a town of nearly 90,000 inhabitants in the north of Barcelona.  She graduated in Law at the Autonomous University of Barcelona (UAB), holds a master’s in law and public management (Universitat Pompeu Fabra, UPF) and a postgraduate course in leadership and innovation in public policies (Escola Superior d’Administració i Direcció d’Empreses, ESADE).  Among her many remarkable professional activities in the field of public administration, including at the Council of the Province of Barcelona (Diputació de Barcleona), the County Council (Consell Comarcal) and at the local level, she is also now a lecturer of public (administrative) law at the Autonomous University of Barcelona and head of the legal service of the Association of the Catalan Municipalities.

Matt Finch

Matt Finch

Library Story-Teller
United Kingdom

Matt Finch helps communities, companies, and institutions to create new and exciting activities, programmes, and partnerships. His work spans policy consultation and strategic direction, community outreach, collection and events development for cultural institutions, and professional development for staff at all levels. Matt is regularly invited to keynote at conferences and events including LIANZA 2017, SWITCH 2016, and VALA 2014. He has spoken at the British House of Commons and Australia’s Parliament House on literacy issues. He is currently developing community engagement projects for the University of Southern Queensland while serving as Creative/Researcher at British Library Labs. Matt holds a Ph.D. in Modern Intellectual History from the University of London. His writing credits cover a range of print and online media in the US, UK, and beyond.

Toby Green

Toby Green

Head of Publishing
OECD
France

Toby Green is member of the OECD’s communications leadership team. He pioneered the way books and data are published online alongside journals and working papers via the OECD iLibrary platform and he launched the iLibrary Partnership programme which now comprises five other intergovernmental organisations. He has led the establishment of the freemium model for the organisation’s publishing, as well as the creation of a number of innovative services, and in 2011, the Better Life Index – a totally new way to make complex data accessible to a broad audience – which won the ALPSP Award for Innovation in Publishing. He is currently focused on rebuilding its impact and media monitoring efforts. Toby started his career with Academic Press, before moving to Applied Science Publishers, Pergamon Press and Elsevier Science. He is a member of the Royal Society of Chemistry Publishing Board.

Iskra Mihaylova

Iskra Mihaylova

Member of the European Parliament (MEP)
Bulgaria

Iskra Mihaylova is a Bulgarian politician and Member of the European Parliament (MEP) since July 2014. She is a member of the Movement for Rights and Freedoms, part of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe Party. She is the current chair of the European Parliament Committee on Regional Development. Ms Mihaylova earned a master's degree in Library Studies and Information Technologies from the Saint-Petersburg State University of Culture and Arts in 1980. She worked for the Saints Cyril and Methodius National Library from 1980 to 1996. In 1996, Mihaylova was an American Library Association Fellow working at the Colorado State Library. She was Deputy Minister for Regional Development and Public Works in Bulgaria from 2005 to 2009, and held other roles in both government and parliament..

Glyn Moody

Glyn Moody

Journalist, writer, speaker
​United Kingdom

Glyn Moody writes about the Internet, and related areas such as free software/open source, copyright, patents, open access, open data, trade deals, and digital rights. He has been a journalist for 35 years, and is best known for his book "Rebel Code: Linux and the Open Source Revolution" (2001), which describes the evolution and significance of the free software and open source movements, with many interviews of all the notable hackers. He is based in London; his writings have appeared in Wired, Computer Weekly, Linux Journal, Ars Technica, Techdirt, The Guardian, Daily Telegraph, New Scientist, The Economist and Financial Times, among others. He can be followed as @glynmoody on Twitter, where he has posted over 300,000 tweets.

Rafael Ramirez

Rafael Ramirez

Director of the Oxford Scenarios Programme and Professor of Practice
Saїd Business School and Green Templeton College, Oxford University
​United Kingdom

Rafael Ramirez is one of the world’s leading experts on scenario planning, having developed the Oxford Scenarios Planning Approach with colleagues Angela Wilkinson and Kees van der Heijden. He has also been one of the first scholars to develop theories on the aesthetics of business and organisation; theories that help to clarify how scenario planning can be rendered more effective. He is currently director of the Oxford Scenarios Programme and the first Professor of Practice at the Saїd Business School and Green Templeton College, Oxford University, ​United Kingdom. He was previously Chairman of the World Economic Forum’s Global Agenda Council on Strategic Foresight, and Visiting Professor of Scenarios and Corporate Strategy at Shell International. He received his PhD from the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania, and masters from the University of Oxford and the Environmental Studies Faculty at York University, Toronto. 

Cassie Robinson

Cassie Robinson

Strategic Design Director
Doteveryone
​United Kingdom

Cassie Robinson has worked for fifteen years in the field of social innovation, social finance and public value, in particular in the digital age. She is currently the Strategic Design Director at Doteveryone, where she leads work on how the Internet is changing society and strengthening and protecting what matters most. She is the co-founder of Tech For Good Global, as well as founder of the Civic Shop. She is the UK Ambassador for SIX (Social Innovation Exchange), a global network for social and civic innovation, and is on the Advisory Board for Participatory City, the Good Lab, Atlas of the Future and Collectively (soon to become Vice Impact). She is also a visiting fellow at the Institute of Innovation and Public Purpose at UCL, and has worked with UK Government and the British Council.

Moderators

Barbara Lison

Barbara Lison

IFLA Treasurer

Vicki McDonald

Vicki McDonald

IFLA Governing Board Member

Christine Mackenzie

Christine Mackenzie

IFLA President-elect