Seminars
The Seminars will be held Sunday (October 9th) afternoon after the General Assembly. The Seminars differ from the workshops, held on Saturday, by the fact they will give the participants practical tools to use in their professional and personal lives. Attendees are encouraged to come to the seminars prepared to learn something new and exciting.
The participants can choose one of the following seminars, their choice will be noted during Registration, Friday (October 7th) afternoon.
1) How Your Idea Can Transform the Arab World
Attendees are provided with practical guidelines of the steps necessary for developing and implementing their idea. Attendees should be made aware of challenges of turning ideas into reality, things that they should be on the lookout for. We want attendees to be encouraged to start finding real-world problems in the Arab world and find market solutions to solve them.
Leader - Ahmad Al-Ashkar:
Mr. Ahmad Ashkar is the Founder of the Hult Global Case Challenge – the world’s largest crowd sourcing idea platform for social good. Ahmad has held senior level positions as a management consultant, banker and real estate executive specializing in innovation, new market entry and global expansion with an expertise in idea generation and development.
Ahmad’s work at the Innovation, Excellence and Leadership Center (IXL Center) includes coaching executives from world-class companies on utilizing the latest innovation tools and techniques. Corporate clients include the likes of: Emirates NBD, HSBC, Natura, Johnson Controls, AliBaba, Lufthansa, GE and Levis.
2) Using Social Media for Change in the Arab World
Leader - Ahmad Shihab Eldin:
Upon finishing Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism, Ahmed began teaching New Media courses as an Adjunct Professor, including 'The Bronx Beat' and 'New Media Skills'. Ahmed is digital producer and co-host of “The Stream” a new online community with a daily TV show on Al Jazeera that taps into the extraordinary potential of social media to help us understand the world's untold stories.
Before joining Al Jazeera, he worked as a reporter and producer for PBS’s award-winning documentary series Wide Angle, The New York Times, and The Doha Film Institute. He has also worked as a freelance reporter in New York, Lebanon, the UAE, Kuwait, Qatar, and Jordan.
3) Adaptive Leadership
At a time in which societies, communities, and organizations face enormous adaptive pressures, the practice of leadership – mobilizing systems of people to thrive in changing and challenging times – requires a new way of thinking. This seminar will bridge theory and practice, clarifying the relationship among key relevant concepts – leadership, management, authority, power, influence, loyalty – to provide a practical, coherent framework for exercising leadership in times of deep adaptive transformation. We will consider diagnostic tools for analyzing the resistance to change in social systems, and strategies of action, for example: using authority and power properly, orchestrating multi-party conflict, regulating disequilibrium, refashioning narratives to both build and depart from history, and building a long-term culture of adaptability. In addition, we will explore the challenges of managing the inevitable personal stresses from the dangers of practicing leadership.
Leader - Ashraf Hegazy:
Ashraf Hegazy is the Executive Director of the Dubai Initiative at Harvard University -- the program that established the Dubai School of Government to be the regional equivalent of Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government. Mr. Hegazy studied leadership traits and the adaptive leadership framework as an undergraduate and graduate student at Harvard. He has 15 years of experience consulting to the public and private sectors, with a client roster spanning startup social enterprises through Fortune 50 companies. While at the Kennedy School, Mr. Hegazy was awarded the Presidential Management Fellowship and the Lucius N. Littauer Fellowship for "exemplary academic achievement, social service, & potential for future leadership.” He sits on a number of boards, including as a Director of the Harvard Alumni Association, a Member of the Arab American Institute's National Policy Council, and a Founding Director of the Egypt NEGMA Conference for entrepreneurship and social entrepreneurship. He co-founded the Harvard Arab Alumni Association in 2001 to build an active network of Arab leaders educated at Harvard. His research interests are in adaptive leadership and negotiation frameworks in the Middle East. He teaches adaptive leadership in executive education workshops and is a frequent commentator on Middle East policy and politics.
4) The Future of the Arab Development Initiative
Majed Halawi and Yezin Al-Qaysi:
Majed and Yezin are the coordinators of the Arab Development Initiative. Majed is finishing his degree from McGill University, Majoring in Civil Engineering and Minoring in Economics. Yezin graduated from McGill University, Majoring in Political Science and Minoring in Management. The will be leading the Seminar to familiarize the participants with the current and future projects of the ADI, and taking in the participants input on how they would like to see development lead in the region
