Dr. Irene Ciccarino is a management professor and researcher, and an expert in project management and sustainable development. Her professional and academic work contributes to strategies, policies, and investments aimed at social entrepreneurship and innovation. She is a Ph.D. in business management from the Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro (Brazil), and an M.Sc. in the same field from IBMC-RJ (Brazil). She also has a specialization in public policies for social equality, granted by the Latin American Council of Social Sciences (CLACSO). Two of her studies were awarded by CLACSO and EMES International Research Network. Nowadays, Dr. Ciccarino is a postdoc fellow at the ShareForest project to study participatory methodologies for public and stakeholder engagement in the protection and valorization of forests in Portugal funded by FCT – Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia. She is also a lecturer of project management classes in Masters at the Polytechnic Institute of Leiria (Portugal). She also helps local brands development and traditional product marketing as a fellow of the HOD company.

With over 20 years of management experience, she has worked in consultancy for public, private, and social economy clients, such as Petrobras, Transpetro, Capgemini, and Viva Rio. She contributed to public policies’ elaboration, such as the employment and income axis of the “Minha Casa, Minha Vida” program and the creation of the Youth Reference Centers of Rio de Janeiro (Brazil). She developed projects Proximidades, Casas Vivas and Espaço Elos to support audiences of different age groups in situations of extreme social vulnerability and drug abuse. As a project manager in CUFA (Brazil), she coordinated the projects “Rebelião Cultural” in the high-security prison system and the TV program “Aglomerado”  to spot peripheral culture.

She is currently on the board of the Óbidos Social Innovation Hub (Portugal). She is also associated with the European Anti-Poverty Network (EAPN), European Council for Small Business and Entrepreneurship (ECSB), UMAR, a historical Portuguese women-right union, Zebras United (USA), Donut Economics Action Lab (Global).

Dr. Ciccarino supports training and professional development under Project Dpro methodology by local partnerships within the Iberian academy and social economy.