Topic: Conflict Resolution

Maickel Melamed Trujillo

Maickel Melamed was born on April 27 of 1975 in Caracas, Venezuela. Melamed was diagnosed at birth with "motor delay" (a state of general hypotonia of the body) due to asphyxiation with umbilical cord and the doctors did not give him long life. What defines Maickel Melamed, from the beginning of his life, has been his self-motivated and courageous everyday bet against adversity, the fullness of his existence and his transcendence.

Maickel Melamed is passionate about HUMAN POWER; he is an economist, psychotherapist, Life Management coach, author, speaker, communicator and high performance athlete. All this defines his areas of action, from which he builds with tools and methodologies to facilitate his vocation: expansion, productivity, development and human growth. From his integral vision of the human being, he shows through the most diverse forms, that we all have the ability to build, through our talents and passions, a fantastic story worth living, enjoying and sharing.

Transforming the impossible into reality has been his signature, conveying his message of possibility, effectiveness and humanity. For more than a decade, he has been a speaker, facilitator and workshop director for organizations in Venezuela, Colombia, Mexico, Peru, Costa Rica and the United States.

He is a Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations in Venezuela and a member of the Young Global Leaders of the World Economic Forum. His purpose in life is to help others be better, beyond what they think they can be, through the discovery of their true potential and its later usage. Maickel Melamed has practiced extreme sports such as paragliding, parachuting, diving, and mountain climbing. He is currently dedicated to athletics. He climbed the highest mountain in his country Venezuela, the 5007m high Bolívar Peak.

Despite his condition, Melamed has participated in several marathons and has been able to conclude successfully. In 2011 he participated in the New York marathon, subsequently in Berlin, Chicago and Boston in 2015.

Putting what he believes in into action, both personally and professionally, is his contribution to the planet he wishes for future generations, a world in which success is too small a goal and human transcendence comes to take its place.

Javier Solana

Javier Solana’s official title is High Representative for Common Foreign and Security Policy for the European Union. He took the post following his four-year position as Secretary General of NATO.

Javier Solana was born in Madrid in 1942. As a youth he joined the then-outlawed Spanish Socialist Workers Party, and supported the party’s opposition to NATO.

After the socialists won the 1982 elections, they reversed their NATO policy. Spain had joined the organization earlier that year.

Javier Solana is one of Spain’s cleverest political figures. Personable and smooth-talking, an able negotiator, fluent in English and French, the former Madrid University Physics professor is one of the few members of the socialist government headed by Felipe González whose image was relatively untouched by the corruption scandals that cost the González government the 1996 general elections.

Solana was a socialist member of parliament from 1977 to 1995. He served variously as Minister of Culture, Minister of Education and Science and finally Minister of Foreign Affairs, a post he held between 1992 and his appointment as NATO Secretary General in 1995. His appointment came at the same time as the Treaty’s deployment of a peace-keeping force in war-torn Bosnia.

He has negotiated numerous Treaties of Association between the European Union and various Middle Eastern and Latin American countries, including Bolivia and Colombia. Solana played a pivotal role in unifying the remainder of the former Yugoslavian federation.

Solana spent six years as a Fulbright Scholar in the United States and received his Ph.D. in physics from the University of Virginia.

Fred Kofman

Fred Kofman is an executive coach and advisor in leadership and organizational culture. He holds a PhD in Economics from the University of California, Berkeley, with a specialization in advanced theory and industrial organization. Between 1990 and 1996, Fred was a professor of management information systems at the MIT Sloan School of Management, where he also served as a senior researcher at the Organizational Learning Center, under the direction of Peter Senge, author of The Fifth Discipline. In 1996, Fred founded the consulting firm Axialent, where he delivered leadership programs to over 15,000 executives worldwide.

He later founded and still presides over the Conscious Business Center International, an organization dedicated to promoting human flourishing through business coaching and conscious leadership programs. The company currently has over 33,000 members in its community, with a presence in 30 countries.

In 2013, Fred took a position as Vice President of Executive Development at LinkedIn. During this time, Fred and LinkedIn offered the Conscious Business Academy program to professionals worldwide. In 2018, he accepted a position as Vice President of Google, overseeing leadership and culture advisory for the CEO’s office. That same year, he partnered with the TEC de Monterrey to create the Conscious Leadership Center, where he taught Conscious Leadership programs for executives and students.

Throughout his career, Fred has worked with renowned global companies such as Google, LinkedIn, Microsoft, Facebook, Axa, Citicorp, Chrysler, General Motors, Heineken, PwC, Telefónica, Vodafone, Yahoo, among others. He has also worked directly with some of the most influential leaders and CEOs, including Jeff Weiner (CEO LinkedIn), Reid Hoffman (Founder of LinkedIn and senior partner at Greylock, one of the most famous technology venture capital firms), Sheryl Sandberg (COO Facebook), Sam Altman (CEO OpenAI), Satya Nadella (CEO Microsoft), Sundar Pichai (CEO Google), and Astro Teller (CEO X, Alphabet).

In 2024, Fred was recognized as one of the top 5 business coaches in the world, according to The Information in their article “The Very Best Executive Coaches.”

Fred is the author of several books, including Metamanagement (2001), Conscious Business (2008), and The Meaning Revolution: The Power of Transcendent Leadership (2018). Conscious Business has been translated into 14 languages and is available as a free audiobook in Spanish. In her book “Lean In”, Sheryl Sandberg, former COO of Facebook, states that Fred “will transform the way you live and work.”

Beyond his professional life, Fred loves sailing, freediving, spearfishing, climbing, skiing, gliding, and practicing mindful meditation. These activities reflect his holistic vision of a conscious life, which advocates for personal well-being as a fundamental pillar of organizational success and human development.