National conference Start Legally

Ana Brnabić was born in 1975 in Belgrade. She holds a master's degree (MBA) from the University of Hull from the United Kingdom and has worked for more than ten years with international organisations, foreign investors, local governments and the public sector in Serbia. In August 2016 she was elected Minister of Public Administration and Local Self-Government, and she held that position until the election for the Prime Minister. She is President of the Council for Innovative Entrepreneurship and Information Technologies of the Serbian government and of the National Minorities Council of the Republic of Serbia, as well as Vice President of the Public Administration Reform Council of the Republic of Serbia. As Minister of Public Administration and Local Self-Government, she worked on a faster systematic introduction of e-government in Serbia, with the aim of more efficient work of state administration and local self-government, direct raising of the quality of life of citizens of Serbia, building more modern and transparent administration and fighting corruption. Two most important projects implemented in this segment during her term are e-Baby ("Baby, Welcome to the World") and e-ZUP (full implementation of the Law on General Administrative Procedure). As President of the Council for Innovative Entrepreneurship and Information Technologies of the Serbian government, in day-to-day consultations with IT industry from Serbia, start-ups and innovative companies, she developed the Action Plan and started its fast implementation. In the fight against grey economy, she was in charge of the implementation of the "Take the Receipt and Win" raffle, in which more than 40% of Serbian citizens participated, which resulted in a significantly increased awareness of the importance of the fight against the grey economy. She is a member of the “New Leaders for Europe” group within the World Economic Forum. Prior to her election to the Serbian government, she was Director of Continental Wind Serbia (CWS), where she worked on the implementation of an investment worth €300 million in the wind farm in the municipality of Kovin. She took part in the establishment and was the first executive director, as well as a member of the Board of Directors of the non-profit foundation Peksim. She worked at various US consulting companies that were implementing the projects financed by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) in Serbia. She was Deputy Director of the Serbia Competitiveness Project, an expert on the Programme of reform of the local self-government in Serbia and a senior coordinator of the Programme for economic development of municipalities. She actively participated in the establishment of the National Alliance for Local Economic Development (NALED) in 2006. She became a member, and then the Chairperson of the Board of Directors of NALED. She has received numerous awards for the development projects she has worked on, for the promotion of social responsibility and tolerance.

H.E. Thomas Schieb is an Ambassador to Serbia since 2018. He earned his Master’s degree in Economics, University of Göttingen, Germany in 1992. He was in diplomatic training in Bonn until 1994 when he was deployed as an EU election observer to South Africa. He served in Task Force Bosnia as a desk officer in Foreign Office in Bonn (1994 – 1996). His diplomatic deployment included German Embassy Sarajevo (1996), German Embassy Dar es Salaam (1996-1998), Division Southern Africa, desk officer, Foreign Office, Bonn (1998 – 1999), Division Security Policy, desk officer, Foreign Office, Berlin (1999 – 2002), Counsellor, Political Department, Permanent Mission to the EU, Brussels (2002 – 2005), Spokesperson, German Embassy London (2009 – 2011), as well as service as Deputy European Correspondent in Foreign Office, Berlin (2005 – 2009),  Head of EU Coordination Group, Foreign Office, Berlin (2011 – 2014). Before post in Belgrade he was a Minister Plenipotentiary / Political Coordinator, Permanent Mission to the UN, New York (2014 – 2018).

Stanka Pejanović is a Board member in Gorenje Group system, the largest Slovenian and eighth largest home appliances manufacturer in Europe. A longtime director of the Mercator-S group, she held two mandates in the Mercator Group administration, responsible for Mercator’s business in markets of South East Europe. During her term at Mercator in Serbia, she increased sales spaces seven fold and raised market shares from less than 1% to nearly 9%. Very experienced in the fields of corporate management, acquisitions and mergers, business restructuring, strategy and brand value evaluations, category & supply management, pricing and sales strategies, as well as marketing and loyalty strategies. She is the Vice President of NALED Managing Board, being engaged in the MB since 2015, and the President of Serbian Association of Managers SAM. She finished both her BA and MA in Economics at the Economics Faculty of the University of Novi Sad, and is currently pursuing her doctorate at her alma mater. She speaks Serbian, English, Slovenian and Russian. Mother of two children.

Since 2017, Nenad Paunovic has been working as the Director of the IT and Entrepreneurship Team at the Prime Minister's Office, where he has dealt with the issues of digital economy development and digitalization of education in Serbia. Since 2012, he has co-founded and been the chairman of the Board of Directors of Serbian Venture Network at one time, which organized the Belgrade Venture Forum, a major international conference. From 2005 to 2017, he was the founder and CEO of EDGE, a strategic consulting company, and the exclusive partner for Southeastern Europe of a US company, Value Innovations. From 2005 to 2013 he participated in the organization of the Belgrade Design Week annual conferences many times. He occasionally works as a mentor for startups at Seven, Founder Institute, InCenter, Impact Hub and others, and supports the Maturanti Maratonci Sports Association. He completed his management studies at the Faculty of Organizational Sciences at the University of Belgrade, as well as an Executive MBA at Cotrugli Business School, where he was the chairman of the Board of Directors of the Alumni Club for a time. In 2001, as a scholarship recipient of the Cyprus Government, he attended a multi-week Customer Oriented Quality Management program. During his business career, he was a member of the Serbian Association of Managers, the American Chamber of Commerce, the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Slovenia and other business associations. As a recreational athlete, he ran multiple half marathons in Belgrade, Ljubljana, Vienna and other cities, and in 2011, he ran the entire marathon in Belgrade in 3 hours and 58 minutes.

Dragana Ilić is Corporate Affairs Director in CETIN ltd Belgrade, leading infrastructure telecommunications service provider, member of PPF Group. On top management level she is in charge of legal, regulatory, government relations and public affairs. She actively advocates reforms in the field of eCommunications and high-speed digital infrastructure in Serbia. Until August 2020 Dragana was collaborating with members and institutions in the capacity of NALED’s Head of Competitiveness and Digitalization Unit. She was Coordinator of the Government Expert Group for Combating Shadow Economy, NALED’s Fair Competition Alliance and eGovernment Alliance from its foundation in 2016. eGovernance Alliance was the key partner to the Government in developing strategic and regulatory framework for eBusiness, eArchiving, eGovernment, in establishing the Office for IT and eGovernment, promoting the eGovernment Portal and building cyber security capacity in local governments. Until 2015 in Government’s agency SIEPA Dragana was managing legal affairs in investment promotion and coordinating cooperation of the investors with the central and local governments. After graduating from the Faculty of Law, Belgrade University, Dragana was building her professional experience in public prosecution, tax administration and telecommunication company. She is distinctive of her enthusiasm in advocating reforms for common good. Apart from work, she can be seen while urban cycling or on top of some mountain.

Bane Spasović was born and finished elementary and high school in this city. He graduated from the Faculty of Law, University in Kragujevac. He started his professional career as a law intern in 1995 in the Municipal Court in Požarevac, later continuing as expert assistant in Municipal Public Attorney’s Office (1996- 2000). From 2000 to 2013 he was the Head of Legal Affairs and HR Department in JP PTT (Post of Serbia) in Požarevac, holding the position of the Chairman of Požarevac City Assembly from 2013 to 2016. He has been the Mayor of Požarevac since April 2016. Devoted to his community and city, he is an active member of a number of sports and cultural associations or clubs, and the President of the Society of Russian-Serbian Friendship “Breza”. He has been actively engaged in politics since 2003 and a member of Serbian Progressive Party since its establishment in 2008. As Assembly Chairman of Regional Development Agency „Braničevo-Podunavlje” he has personally promoted the benefits of investing in Požarevac and East Serbia and many ambassadors saw him as the first person to address on FDI matters in Braničevo District.

Milivoje Jovanović was born in 1979 in Niš. He started his academic at the Faculty of Economics, University in Niš, successfully moving on to Executive Master of Business Administration (EMBA) studies in Great Britain - City College, University of Sheffield. In 2012 he published his Magister paper “The influence of global economic and financial crisis on the work of entrepreneurs and SMEs in Serbia“. After successful career in international organizations (OSCE, HELP) and financial sector in Serbia (SoGe, UniCredit bank), Milivoje decided to apply the acquired knowledge and professional experience in the civil sector, as one of the founders of an NGO ENECA. The Program Start Up for Your Business created by Milivoje in 2009, has resulted in the establishment or expansion of more than 600 small and family business in 114 local governments in Serbia, employing more than 3,000 people. Milivoje guides the joint work of partners from the private, public and non-profit sectors, with the aim of jointly developing better conditions for the MSME sector, promoting entrepreneurship in Serbia.

Born in 1963 in Prijepolje, graduated from the Faculty of Law i Belgrade, completed a bar exam. He was appointed the Director of national Employment Service in 2014, and before this position he served for five years as a State Secretary in the Ministry of Labor, Employment and Social Affairs being in charge of labor and employment areas. From 2006 to 2007 he was  Assistant Director of the Service for Human and Minority Rights, while also serving as the Secretary of the National Council of Serbia for the ICTY. From 2003 to 2006 he was the Secretary of the Ministry of Human and Minority Rights within the Council of Ministers of the State Union of Serbia and Montenegro, and prior to this he served as Secretary of the Federal Ministry of National and Ethnic Communities. He also gained professional experience in the local administration, being the Secretary of Municipal Assembly of Barajevo and an expert associate in the Department of Property, Utility and Residental Issues in the municipality. During the 2012-2014 term of the Government, he was the President of the working group that prepared and conducted a public debate on the Draft Labor Law and the Law on Strike. During the same term, he was a member of Council of the Coordination body for Serbia's EU Accession and he Chairman of Negotiation group for Chapter 2 - Freedom of movement for workers. He completed the French School of Public Administration (École nationale d'administration - ENA), he speaks English and Russian. 

Bojana Tošić graduated from the Faculty of Law at the Belgrade University in 2004. Her professional career started in 2005 when she became a legal trainee. In 2008 she entered the Register of Lawyers with the Bar Association of Belgrade. She has more than 10 years of experience in the area of regulatory reform, public administration reform, and public policy managementShe has worked as a consultant at numerous projects funded by the European Union, the World Bank (WB), and the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). During the period 2007-2011 she was a legal adviser at the Secretariat of the Council for Regulatory Reform and Regulatory Impact Assessment, and during the period 2008-2010 she worked as a coordinator of the legal team of the Unit for the Implementation of Comprehensive Regulatory Reform of the Government of the Republic of Serbia (the so-called regulatory guillotine).In July 2013 she became Deputy Director of the Government Office for Regulatory Reform and Regulatory Impact Assessment. She participated in the drafting of numerous regulations, studies and reports needed by both the public and the private sector. She is a certified World Bank trainer in the area of regulatory impact assessment.In April 2014 she was appointed Acting Deputy Director of the Public Policy Secretariat (PPS). On 31 January 2018 she was appointed Acting Director of the PPS.

Jelena has been engaged in the reform of legislative process and regulatory framework for doing business, investment promotion, business support programs and establishing partnerships between the public and private sectors, as an expert in policy reform and implementation of economic development policies. She started her career in 2000, in the International Republican Institute (IRI) working on the development of political parties, civil society organizations and local governments. After that, she spent five years as the Head of Local Economic Development Team in USAID Municipal Economic Growth Activity program. During that appointment Jelena engaged in the development of more than 50 economic development strategies and institutional capacities for dealing with economic issues in more than 30 local governments. She worked at similar programs in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Ukraine, Slovakia, Kyrgyzstan and Jordan. Since 2010, Jelena joined NALED, first as the Program Director and then as Policy Director. For the past 3 years, she served as the technical and expert coordinator of the Government of Serbia Joint Group for improving Serbia’s position on the World Bank’s Doing Business list. Within this engagement, she coordinates the development of Government's Doing Business Reform Plans, leading the correspondence with the World Bank, by preparing reform updates and coordinating and monitoring the implementation of the Plan. During a period of 3 years (until 2017) she was the lead expert in construction permitting reform in Serbia, a reform that was recognized by the World Bank, as the biggest reform in Serbia for the past 10 years. She was the Project Manager for the implementation of the electronic construction permitting system (EBPS) in Serbia (supported by the German and Swiss governments) and led the implementation of the World Bank’s project targeted at training and mentoring of the EBPS users. In 2017 she was the key expert in designing the cadaster reform (property register reform), and in 2018 she worked on drafting legislation for this reform - the Law on Property Registration. She is a member of more than 10 Government's working groups, working on tax legislation, public procurement, shadow economy, and other business environment issues.