ICGR Biographies

Below are the ICGR Biographies of the Conference and Programme Chairs, Key Note Speakers and Mini-Track Chairs.

Conference and Programme Chairs



Sandra Moffett is a Professor in Business Analytics and Head of the Ulster University Business School, Ulster University, Magee Campus.  Sandra is a core research-active member staff, her expertise knowledge management and business intelligence contributes to her being one of the UK leading authors, with over 100 high quality, international research publications. She has received a number of research awards and citations for her work.  Sandra has over ÂŁ6m external research funding enabling her to undertake extensive research on technological implementation and process improvement initiatives (based on data analytics) within Irish and UK companies.

Dr Andrea Reid is Programme Director MSc Marketing\Senior Lecturer Business Communication in the Ulster University Business School.  She holds a PhD from Queens University Belfast in Customer Relationship Management (CRM).  Her research area of expertise includes Customer Relationship Management, Data Management and Entrepreneurial Marketing Education. Andrea’s research has been presented at International Conferences and published in journals such as the European Journal of Marketing, International Journal of Information Management and the International Journal of Retail and Distribution Management.  Professional experience includes lead researcher/consultant in a number of Consultancy and Knowledge Transfer Projects with industry partners in various sectors with specfic foucs on CRM implementation. Andrea has been awarded an Ulster University distinguished teaching award in January 2019 for Distinguished Education Excellence in Professional Practice Innovation.

Dr Shirley Barrett is an experienced academic in higher education, and is currently the Associate Head of Department of the Ulster University Business School at Magee. She has acted as Course Director at both undergraduate level and postgraduate level, and has significant experience in leading the design, delivery and evaluation of programmes of study and university-wide initiatives at both undergraduate and postgraduate level. Shirley has a keen interest in gender issues and has conducted research into female entrepreneurship in the accounting profession, and also in female graduate employability.

Keynote Speakers

Prof Maura McAdam is renowned internationally for her pioneering work in the area of gender equality and women’s entrepreneurship, as a result of her exploration of the influence of gender and diversity upon entrepreneurial behaviour spanning more than 20 years. She has extensive experience of building and leading international research teams and of enabling and participating successfully in both regional and international entrepreneurial ecosystems, because of well-established research networks in the UK, Ireland, EU, New Zealand, US and the Middle East. Prof McAdam has made serious and lasting theoretical and methodological contributions to the area of women’s entrepreneurship, with her research has been published in FT Top 50 US journals and other top-rated US and UK journals across a range of theoretical disciplines. Additionally, she has authored the books Female Entrepreneurship (2013) and Women’s Entrepreneurship (2022). For the last two consecutive years, Prof McAdam has been ranked amongst the top 2% of scientists in the world for research impact for her research on women’s entrepreneurship. She is an invited Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts and a selected member of the Royal Irish Academy Social Sciences Committee. In 2019, she received an Irish Women’s Award and in 2022 she was a Women Mean Business finalist in the Empowering Women Category. Known by many aspiring women entrepreneurs, Prof McAdam is an engaged thought leader and regular media commentator on women’s entrepreneurship.


Darren McKinstry oversees a directorate developing policy priorities and recommendations designed to tackled key inequalities.  He works to engage Government and stakeholders to raise awareness, build advocacy and secure policy and legislative change to advance equality.  This currently includes work with Government to advance a range of social and equality strategies, and wider related strategies, including for example on childcare. Darren is a member of the EQUINET (European Network of Equality Bodies) policy formation working group and sits on a range of advisory panels such as the Northern Ireland Skills Strategy Diversity and Equality Group.  He was previously a member of the Northern Ireland Census Advisory Group; and has led strands of the Commission’s work such as an EU funded project to strengthen the capacity of the Equality bodies in other jurisdictions. He has a background in research and evaluation, and prior to joining the Commission was a Research Fellow at the Queen’s University of Belfast specialising in employment, unemployment and targeting social need.  He holds a Diploma in Advanced Management Practice; an M.Sc. in Geographic Information Systems; and a B.Sc. in Geography.

Mini-Track Chairs

Tindara Addabbo is a full Professor in Economic Policy at the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia. Her current main research areas include wage discrimination by gender, well-being, gender budgeting, gender gap in education, gender equity firm’s certification. She is the coordinator of Leading Towards Sustainable Gender Equality Plans in research institutions – (H2020-SwafS-2019 –873072). http://personale.unimore.it/rubrica/curriculum/addabbo

Ewert Aukes is Assistant Professor in the field of energy transition governance with a focus on frames, discourses, and identities at the dept. Governance and Technology for Sustainability (CSTM), University of Twente (NL). His tasks involve research and teaching. He has worked in EU H2020 projects in the fields of the local energy transition, forest ecosystem services governance innovations and science diplomacy.

Claudia Canali is Associate Professor in Information Engineering at the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia. Her research interests focus on cloud/fog computing systems and gender equality in ICT. She is responsible for her university in the Horizon 2020 Project EQUAL-IST Gender Equality Plans for Information Sciences and Technology Research Institutions and for the ‘Ragazze Digitali’ Summer Camp project (www.ragazzedigitali.it).   https://personale.unimore.it/Rubrica/Dettaglio/clcanali

Joy Clancy is Professor Emeritus of Energy and Gender, University of Twente, The Netherlands. Joy’s research has focused, for more than 30 years, on the social dimension of energy systems in which gender has been an important factor addressed in this research. Although she initially focused on the Global South, her area of interest now includes the Global North, particularly in relation to energy poverty.

Dr  Serene Dalati is director of Equality and Sustainability center and head of management department at the faculty of Business administration, at Arab International University, Syria (https://www.aiu.edu.sy/ ). Serene obtained a PhD in Leadership, Organizational Culture and Job satisfaction in 2008 which was preceded by British Chevening scholarship to study for an MBA in Banking and Finance from University of Wales, Bangor in 2002. She teaches for areas in Organizational Behavior, Leadership, Culture and Job satisfaction. Serene has also established experience in Erasmus+ Capacity Building in Higher Education and developed a project application with acronym FREE which has a scope of Female Resilience and Empowerment in Higher Education in the South Mediterranean Region.

EmĂ­lia Fernandes is an Assistant Professor in the School of Economics and Management of the University of Minho, Portugal, lecturing at undergraduate and post-graduate levels in courses of Management, Human Resources Management. Her publications have been in research areas related to gender discourses and identities, practices of resistance, entrepreneurship and small and medium enterprises, and professional embodiment.

Regina Leite in an Assistant Professor in Organizational Behaviour and HRM in the Department of Management of the School of Economics and Management at the University of Minho. Former coordinator of the master course in Human Resource Management. Research interests: Work and non-work spheres, privacy in the workplace, sexual and moral harassment, and gender issues

Workshop Facilitators