22nd Annual Social Entrepreneurship Conference

Elisa Alt is Senior Lecturer (Associate Professor) in Entrepreneurship at King’s Business School, King’s College London. Her research focuses on social intrapreneurship—how employees drive social and environmental change from within organizations using entrepreneurial approaches. She studies how these insiders maintain their change-making drive while managing the tensions of working within established systems. Her work has been published in leading journals including Academy of Management Annals, Journal of Business Venturing, and Journal of Management Studies. At King’s, she teaches social intrapreneurship and entrepreneurship in the Executive MBA and postgraduate programs. She holds a PhD from the University of Seville, Spain.

Yanto Chandra is Professor at the Department of Public and International Affairs at the City University of Hong Kong, having previously served at the University of Leeds and University of Amsterdam. He studies how innovation and strategy shape performance in the public and social sectors, including how new technologies such as artificial intelligence and blockchain affect the society and policy, and how to better govern them. His research has been published in leading journals in management and public administration and policy. He is listed in the Stanford 2% based on citation count (2021-2025).

Benjamin Huybrechts is Professor at IESEG School of Management (Lille, France), where he teaches sustainability, business ethics and social entrepreneurship. His research explores how social enterprises organize and collaborate to pursue social change – in particular through creating “moral markets” such as fair trade, local food, recycling and community-based renewable energy. He is the Co-Editor of the “Social entrepreneurship and ethics” section of the Journal of Business Ethics and his work has been published in major journals such as Journal of Management Studies, Academy of Management Annals, Organization Studies and Journal of Management Inquiry.

Pascal Dey is Professor of Entrepreneurship and Organization Studies at the Department of Business, Bern University of Applied Sciences. Previously, he was Professor and co-director of the PhD program at Grenoble Ecole de Management and a senior research fellow at the University of St. Gallen. His current research interests are in social entrepreneurship, social innovation, and corporate responsibility. After several years as senior editor of the journal Organization Studies, Pascal now serves as associate editor of the critical management journal Organization. His work has appeared in journals such as Organization Studies, Journal of Business Ethics, Public Administration, Journal of Business Venturing, Entrepreneurship Theory & Practice, and the Journal of Management Studies.

Andreana Drencheva is a Senior Lecturer (Associate Professor) and Leverhulme Research Fellow at King’s College London. She researches the human side of social entrepreneurship – how founders maintain wellbeing and meaning when the mission never stops. Her work challenges the “lone hero” and “martyr” narratives, centring the human cost of purpose-driven work. Committed to both rigour and impact, she publishes in leading journals, including the Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship Theory & Practice, and shares research insights with practitioner outlets, such as Pioneers Post and NextBillion. She collaborates with social ventures from Global Majority communities supporting climate action, refugees, and inclusion in the creative industries to co-develop resources that actually get used, such as the award-winning Power in Partnerships toolkit. At King’s, she teaches entrepreneurship for social change across life sciences, medicine, and art.

Sönke Mestwerdt is an Assistant Professor in Entrepreneurship at Alliance Manchester Business School, The University of Manchester, UK. Before joining Alliance Manchester Business School, he held positions at EGADE Business School, México, ESCP Business School, Germany, The University of Southern California, USA, and The University of Glasgow, UK. His research focuses on (social) entrepreneurship in emerging and developing economies and extreme contexts (e.g., poly-crisis, war). Here, most of his work centers around contextualization of entrepreneurship theories. Sönke’s work has been published in internationally-leading journals, such as Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, Journal of World Business, Journal of Product Innovation Management, and more.

Dr. Arielle Badger Newman is an Assistant Professor of Entrepreneurship at Syracuse University dedicated to amplifying silenced voices and challenging dominant narratives of what entrepreneurship is and who it is for. Her research centers on entrepreneurs operating outside the mainstream—those navigating systems not designed for their success, and often designed to exclude them. From underground entrepreneurs in communist Cuba to informal market traders in postcolonial Ghana, Dr. Newman’s work uncovers how individuals innovate, resist, and create meaning amid deep institutional and social constraints. Drawing on postcolonial, critical, and institutional theories, she explores how race, gender, state control, trauma, and informality shape entrepreneurial experience and opportunity. Her research reveals not only how people survive exclusion—but how they build power, community, and resilience through enterprise. By highlighting these often-overlooked forms of agency and adaptation, Dr. Newman’s work contributes vital insight to policy, practice, and theory, and positions her as a rising thought leader redefining entrepreneurship in a global, unequal world. Currently, Newman serves on the editorial boards of JBV, ETP as well as for JDE. Her work has been published in JBV, ETP, Business and Society, and others.

Alisa Sydow is an Associate Professor of Entrepreneurship and Innovation at ESCP Business School. She primarily teaches entrepreneurship and corporate entrepreneurship with a focus on new technologies and impact. Her research interests center on entrepreneurship in emerging markets, particularly Kenya and South Africa. She focuses on technology and women’s entrepreneurship. She has authored articles published in leading management journals such as Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice and the Journal of Business Venturing, as well as case studies and papers presented at international conferences including the Academy of Management (AOM), European Group for Organizational Studies (EGOS), and European Academy of Management (EURAM). Recently, she was selected as part of the 2025 cohort of Thinkers50 Radar, highlighting her as one of the leading emerging voices shaping the future of management and entrepreneurship. Alisa holds a Ph.D. in Management and Innovation from the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore in Milan. Outside of academia, Alisa founded Nampelka, a start-up that provides continuous, tailored, and accessible support to African entrepreneurs.