Work-life Balance in Our Global Cities

Cristina García-Peri Álvarez

Azora

Cristina García-Peri is one of the Senior Partners of Azora and heads up Corporate Development and Strategy for the group.

Prior to joining the Azora Group in 2011, she worked for 16 years in the investment-banking sector at both Merrill Lynch (2 years) and JP Morgan (14 years), where she held various positions in the area of Mergers and Acquisitions for 4 years and for 10 years as Managing Director responsible for Corporate Equity Derivatives for Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Her last two years in investment banking took place at Merrill Lynch where, in addition to continuing to lead Corporate Equity Derivatives, she also was responsible for Equity Capital Markets for Spain and Portugal. She started her career in McKinsey in Spain.

She is also independent board member at Evo Banco in Spain, a c. €5bn asset bank with s strong focus on digital banking, where she also chairs the Risk Committee as well as being a member of the Financial and Audit Committee. She is Chairwoman in of the Spanish board of trustees of Plan International, an independent and humanitarian not-for-profit organization focused on advancing children’s right and equality for girls, as well as member of various association including GRI, INREV´s ESG committee and Círculo de Empresarios.

Cristina has a degree summa cum laude in economic and business sciences from ICADE (Spain) and an MBA from Harvard Business School.

Helena Burstedt

Aliseda Inmobiliaria (Blackstone Group)

Helena Burstedt is currently heading up the Hotel department at Aliseda (owned by Blackstone and Bank Santander) in Spain, carrying out active asset management and/or disinvestment of the more than 60 owned hotels across Spain. Previously, Helena co-headed the Transaction Real Estate department at EY and led the Hotel Real Estate team, she has also worked at JLL and Knight Frank as well as run her own business, always in the hotel sector.

Helena has a PDP from the Cornell School of Hotel Administration, and she is a teacher in various programs at the IE Business School, as well as a member of the RICS and Women in Real Estate Spain.

Carmen Panadero

WIRES Association (Women in Real Estate Spain)

Carmen Panadero boasts a career spanning over 16 years in the real estate sector. Now, she’s the Director of the Master in Real Estate Development at IE University, as well as the Business Director of the DCN (Distrito Castellana Norte). Carmen also serves as the President and Founder of the WIRES Association (Women in Real Estate Spain); Coordinator for the Madrid chapter of the ULI (Urban Land Institute); and she also serves on the Executive Committee of the IE Real Estate Club.

Previously, Carmen worked at Estudio Lamela, holding several leadership roles such as Business Director. From 2014 to 2018, she worked for CBRE, where she launched and directed the Customer Service & Business Development Department (a department that managed the firm’s top clients in Spain), and later directed the Development Services Department, which focused on maximizing the value of real estate assets through asset repositioning.

Carmen is a certified architect, having earned a degree in Architecture at the Superior Technical School of Architecture of Madrid in 2002, and an MRICS-accredited professional in the area of Management and Consulting. She gained additional training at IE in the areas of Strategic Management, Project Management, Corporate Finance, and Digital Marketing, and she also completed a course in Management of High Performance Teams at ESADE.

In May 2015, Carmen received the IE Woman of the Month Award, and previously, in 2011, she was awarded the Women and Leadership Program Scholarship at the Aliter International Business School, granted by the Rafael del Pino Foundation (Grupo Ferrovial).

Taba Rasti

Foster and Partners

Taba Rasti studied at the Madrid School of Architecture (ETSAM), graduating in 2003.

Taba joined Foster and Partners (London) in 2005 and moved to Madrid in 2007 where she co-directs the Spanish practice branch in Madrid.

She has 17 years of experience in the field of Architecture, design, urbanism and Real Estate, she has worked in a diversity of projects and won public competitions, working closely with Lord Norman Foster. Worked on a range of projects across Europe and North America including, The Hall of Realms – Prado Museum, the new extension for the Bilbao Museum of Fine Arts.

Developed European projects such as Axis building in Madrid, Chateau Margaux extension and the Pavilion for the Holy See at the Venice Biennale and projects in Switzerland, London, New York, California and Israel.

Cristina Mateo

IE School of Architecture and Design

Cristina Mateo is Associate Dean at IE School of Architecture and Design. She is a specialist in urban ethnography, branding, communication, and E-Transformation & New Business Models.

Prior to joining IE, she was Head of Strategic Planning at Fundación Siglo, The Department of Culture and Tourism for Castile and Leon between 2011-2015. She was in charge of implementing the e- tourism strategy for the region, as well as an events´ and a partner building strategy & Revenue generation plan. She also contributed to the development of an ecosystem of online and offline services for the región.

She worked at Madrid City Council, for the International Strategy and Action Bureau, Madrid Global. Her work involved managing the city brand through a strategy of participation in large events such as the Olympics and World Expos. Prior to her position with the City of Madrid, she worked between 2002 and 2007 as marketing manager for Spain and Portugal at VisitBritain (Britain´s Tourism Board), leading the E-commerce strategy for income generation for VisitBritain.

In Madrid and London she worked for AT Kearmey, marchFirst and Razorfish managing the customer experience for transactional, information and service oriented portals, between the years 2000 and 2002.

Cristina Mateo trained as a journalist and holds a Ph.D. in Sociology, from Goldsmiths College, University of London and an Executive MBA specialised in E-business, from IE Business School.

She lived in London for 12 years, where she gave university lectures on the topics of the Media in Spain and Spanish contemporary culture. She lectures and writes regularly on the impact of technology in everyday urban living.