Lecturers

Vedran Kružić is the director of the regional development agency of the Primorje-Gorski Kotar County PRIGODA.

A graduate economist in the field of entrepreneurship economics, he served as an assistant to the Minister of Economy of the Republic of Croatia, held a number of positions in Croatian Telecom, and is currently advisor for the economy and EU projects in the City of Opatija.

Damir Medved is the manager for business development in the new business areas of Ericsson Nikola Tesla, and deals with topics such as smart cities, broadband networks, civic energy, the impact of robotization and artificial intelligence on the development of society and the creation of new products in these domains and on these topics has published several works in domestic and foreign publications. He is the technical coordinator of the Center of Competence for Smart Cities in Rijeka (an innovation cluster of 20 partners), and he also works in a large number of civil society associations with the aim of promoting and preserving local heritage, ecology and promoting new technologies in these areas. In 2017, he was declared volunteer of the year in the city of Rijeka.

Manager, consultant and authorized auditor with many years of work experience who successfully manages and directs the Qfact group. His narrower specialization is auditing, due diligence, consulting (IT, organizational…), financial reporting and accounting. In his work, he is driven by the desire to perform his work in an extremely professional manner to the satisfaction of associates and users of services. Its goal is continuous improvement and creation of new products and business solutions that the company will offer to clients and thus improve its competitive position on the market. He tends to think positively and look forward at all times. He personally enjoys interacting with people and looks forward to success, both personal and family, friends, clients and acquaintances. Those who know him can say that he has a vision.

Master’s computer engineer whose active field of work includes working with Ruby, Rails, MySQL and JS technologies and working with CI/CD systems and AWS infrastructure (EC2, ECS, ALB, RDS, Lambda…). For the last two years focused on product development, which includes managing technologies, teams, and marketing and business activities. In 2018, he entered the ‘club’ of 30 successful people under 30 years of age (BIG3), as one of those who will ‘in the near future significantly contribute to the overall technological ecosystem, both Croatian and global’. He is co-owner and CTO of the fast-growing and successful all-in-one SaaS solution company Productive.io, and when he is not working, he is sailing, doing sports and enjoying the outdoors with his family.

Nika Levak is an expert and trainer in the field of communication skills and public speaking. Nika is a graduated actress and master of public relations with 15 years of experience in public performance, criticism, creation. Nika could be described as an energetic initiator who makes things happen. After graduating from the faculties and continuing education, she worked for some time in the showbiz world (television, recording, radio, commercials) and began to realize that the systems did not suit her; due to the lack of quality communication and good interpersonal relations, frequent frustrations, lack of time and work overload. Enrolls in the NLP program at the Slavica Square Institute with the support of international NLP trainers. Today, Nika helps individuals and companies with communication and presentation every day, because being a leader is the only way to long-term success.

Katarina Šebalj is an assistant at the Department of Marketing and Management at the Faculty of Economics in Rijeka. She studied at the University of Rijeka and Ray Juan Carlos University in Madrid.

She participated in several market research projects and cooperation with the business community, and she also led a series of workshops for children and young people.

He is a graduate psychologist who has spent his entire career in the broader field of organizational psychology and management, studying and imparting knowledge on how to work smarter for the benefit of everyone involved. In February 2005, he launched the Optimum Educational Advisory Center, where he works as a consultant and lecturer. He held dozens of open seminars and internal trainings in the areas of personnel selection and development, organization management, quality and people management. Over time, Optimum has gained loyal users whom it helps to solve HR-related issues. In 2010, he launched the Croatian subsidiary Vanguard savjetovanje d.o.o. where he works as a consultant. According to need and demand, he works on interventions in the public and private sectors in Croatia and Great Britain.

Master’s degree in logistics and management engineering, associate on EU projects in the science and technology park of the University of Rijeka – Step Ri. Step Ri is an entrepreneurial support institution founded in 2008 by the University of Rijeka with the support of the Business and Innovation Agency of the Republic of Croatia – BICRO, the City of Rijeka and the Primorje-Gorski Kotar County.

Mario Vukelić specializes in design thinking and innovation in services. He has a “Servitization manager” certificate issued by Bureau Veritas.

Prof. Ph.D. Nela Vlahinić Lenz from the Faculty of Economics in Rijeka is the head of the MBA study Energy Sector Economics. He is a full professor of macroeconomics and energy economics with a proven track record in the higher education sector. Skilled in lectures, macroeconomics, energy, research and teaching.

She is the leader of several research projects in the field of energy restructuring and energy reforms. She is the author of several books and over 100 scientific articles.