Esade faculty welcomes new talent

Esade welcomes six new professors for the 2023-24 academic year, all with acclaimed international careers, qualifications from first-rate universities and a wide range of experience in different fields of knowledge. Their fields of expertise range from innovation in the digital world and the use of data and algorithms to forecast human and organizational behavior, to the analysis of apparently insignificant decisions related to buying strategies, and the identification of innovative organizational structures that contribute to the future of work.

With these new arrivals, the Esade faculty now includes 151 professors of 23 different nationalities. This increase reflects Esade’s commitment to classroom diversity and the on-going adaptation of approaches and methodologies in response to organizations’ changing needs, thereby maximizing the social impact of academic research.

Esade professors are well-known for their close links to the world of business, law firms and organizations, and also because they are prestigious experts in their respective fields of research. Thanks to their robust professional experience and dedication to research and consulting with a global mindset, the faculty members help enhance management practices and leadership of both today and tomorrow.  

The new members joining the Esade faculty this academic year are:

• Valentina De Marchi, associate professor in the Department of Society, Politics and Sustainability. She has a PhD in Economics and Management from the University of Padua (Italy). Before joining Esade, she was a lecturer at said university. Her field of interest is how companies can develop environmental innovations against a backdrop of global value chains and international business. She has conducted research into the circular economy and 4.0 digital technologies, amongst other fields. She joined Esade on April 1, 2023.
• Ariel Fridman, associate professor in the Department of Marketing. He has a PhD in Marketing from the University of California, San Diego (United States). He studies how people make judgments and decisions in real-life situations, and how the landscape in which a decision is taken can affect consumer preferences. Some of his most recent projects have analyzed how seemingly irrelevant market decisions affect purchases. Before dedicating himself to the academic world, he worked in the sector for several years including one year at HP.
• Joren Gijsbrechts, assistant professor in the Department of Operations, Innovation and Data Sciences. He has a PhD in Operations Management from KU Leuven (Belgium). Before earning his PhD, he gained professional experience in the Operations and Supply Chain division of Procter & Gamble in Sweden. His research focuses mainly on data-driven decision-making in Operations Management, with particular interest in the latest advances in machine learning and prescriptive analytics. He is currently working on combining machine learning with (robust) optimization and large-scale simulation techniques to develop data-driven algorithms.
• Philip Rogiers, assistant professor in the Department of People Management and Organization. He has a PhD in Business Economics from KU Leuven (Belgium). Before joining Esade, he was a visiting professor at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and a postdoctoral researcher at KU Leuven. His research concerns mainly the transformation and deconstruction of jobs, and the potential of work models inspired by the gig economy in business scenarios. By analyzing the pros and cons of these work models, he seeks to discover innovative organizational structures that can help make the future of work more people oriented.
• Maha Shaikh, associate professor in the Department of Operations, Innovation and Data Sciences. She has a PhD in Information Systems from the London School of Economics and Political Science (UK). Before joining Esade, she was an associate professor of Digital Innovation at King’s College London and, previously, an associate professor at Warwick Business School. She is an expert in digital and open innovation and is particularly interested in open-source communities and how these online communities leverage algorithms and technology to organize their collective production.
• Emilia Wietrak, associate professor in the Department of People and Organization Management. She has a PhD in Social and Organizational Psychology from the University of Barcelona and is a member of the Center for Evidence-Based Management (CEBMa). Her areas of expertise include people analytics and evidence-based management. As a consultant, she has helped organizations improve employee performance and general business efficiency by leveraging human resource data and research findings.