KEYNOTE SPEAKERS

Dr. Eleni "Lenio" Myrivili is Global Chief Heat Officer for the Atlantic Council's Climate Resilience Center and UN-Habitat. Dedicated to fostering heat resilience in cities worldwide, she was recognized among Nature's 10 people who helped shape science in 2023, as well as Earth.Org's Ten Women Leading the Fight Against Climate Change in 2023, and PlanetMark's 10 Inspirational Female Voices in the Climate Race in 2024.

She is a member of the EU Mission Board for Adaptation at the European Commission, a Heat Resilience Advisor to the Global Covenant of Mayors (GCoM), serves on the Advisory Board for the WEF Global Risks Report, and is a member of WEF's Global Future Council for the Future Economics of Equitable Transition. Myrivili is currently a Perry World House Fellow at the University of Pennsylvania, where she was honored a year ago with the Lawrence C. Nussdorf Urban Leadership Prize. She was also a resident Loeb Fellow in Advanced Environmental Studies at Harvard University Graduate School of Design in 2020.

Myrivili was elected to the Athens city government from 2014 to 2019 and appointed Deputy Mayor for Urban Nature, Urban Resilience, and Climate Adaptation. During that time, she spearheaded the city's Urban Resilience and Climate Adaptation Plan, anchoring €55m from EIB, and then led its implementation. Over the past decade, she has also held the roles of Chief Heat Officer and Chief Resilience Officer for the City of Athens, collaborated as a heat expert with the World Bank, and co-chaired the Steering Committee of the Resilient Cities Network. Her efforts in advancing heat resilience have established Athens as one of the leading cities in building heat resilience.

Dr. Myrivili's heat resilience expertise has earned her international recognition, including a TEDtalk Global and an invitation to speak to the House of Commons in British Parliament, while she features in prominent media outlets like CNN, NHK World, the New York Times, Monocle, and Politico.eu, where she was part of Politico's 28 list for 2022 of most influential Europeans. Formerly, she was a tenured University Professor and holds a Ph.D. in Anthropology from Columbia University.

Steven Van Belleghem is widely regarded as one of the world's leading thinkers in the field of customer experience. He shares his ideas through his six bestselling books, his popular social media channels, and his engaging keynote presentations. Steven has inspired world-leading companies such as Disney, Mastercard, Mercedes, Booking.com,  Heineken and Salesforce with his visionary approach to customer experience. Steven's latest book 'A Diamond in the Rough' was recommended by Forbes as the number 1 must read business book for 2024.

Steven believes in combining common sense, new technologies, an empathic human touch, playing the long game and taking social responsibility to win the hearts and businesses of customers over and over again. Steven finds his inspiration by visiting companies all over the world. He is the co-founder of Nexxworks, an inspiration agency that organizes inspiration tours in all corners of the world to inspire executives to improve their customer experience. Steven is also an investor in customer experience-related companies such as Hello Customer and IO Digital. Steven complements his entrepreneurial activities with his work as a part-time marketing professor at Vlerick Business School and guest speaker at London Business School.

• Steven is a huge Disney fan and had a dream come true when he was offered a small cameo in the Flemish-language version of Cars 3.
• Steven is an avid Club Brugge supporter. He was thrilled to be involved in the development of the team's social media strategy. As a result, in 2010 Club Brugge was the first Belgian team to professionally use the up-and-coming social media communication channels at the time.
• Steven lives in a small rural town in Belgium, a place where he thoroughly enjoys the analog world.