I have always been fascinated by human behavior and social interactions, which led me to live in several different countries and learn new languages. I have a thirst for understanding other cultures and continuously learn about behavior patterns. After living in The Netherlands, Malta, France, and Italy, I decided to come to Spain to study the Bachelor in Behavior and Social Sciences. Right now, I’m a third-year student, currently working part-time as a behavioral design intern, as a research assistant in projects of consumer’s behavior and attitudes change, and leading the IEU Behavioral Economics Club.
President of the IEU Behavioral Economics Club
The IEU Behavioral Economics Club was founded in February and launched in May 2020. Back then, I was a coordinator. I helped establish the club and create its presence on social media and inside IE University. Together with the team, I helped create the club’s identity, build a network of students, and organize our first events. Initially, our idea was to meet weekly, in informal environments, to discuss behavioral economics and related topics, have dinners, and invite speakers. However, since the club was launched in the middle of the pandemic, we quickly had to adapt to Zoom. We then started doing all of our events online, leaving them open to the general public to attract a larger and more diverse audience. Our events began with a few guests; we mostly had students with master’s degrees and professors from IE University, but it was growing quickly.
In September, I took the lead and became the club president. I truly embraced the idea that I wanted the club to grow, to create positive experiences for the members, and create value. We then started organizing events that covered different topics and different industries, inviting speakers from both academia and professional environments.
We strategically plan all our events for 7 pm because that allows guests from many different time zones to come together to discuss, learn and share. They’re planned to be instructive, make learning accessible and pleasant, share the knowledge of professional speakers, and give the opportunity and space for questions and networking. This is reflected in the club’s success—we hear from members sharing their experiences of how the knowledge they got from the club helped them with projects in the International MBA as well as in their careers.
From October onward, the club started to grow fast, and we quickly reached larger audiences. We began receiving guests from all over the world, and can now count on the presence of undergraduate students from various universities, workers, alumni, and even IE University staff and professors. We see a very diverse public: from Peru, India, the UK, the US, Brazil, Argentina, Georgia, Kenya, and The Netherlands, to name a few.
This experience has been incredible. Being connected live on Zoom allowed us to have people connecting from everywhere, including our speakers, who have participated from Boston, Rotterdam, London, and so on. The club created a network of over 1,000 people in a matter of months, created a presence on LinkedIn, and keeps on growing. We’ve had several speakers approach us to come to give a talk, and speakers from for example, the Behavioral Insights Team and Ogilvy.
This semester, we plan to keep growing and expanding this network of people. Everyone is passionate about behavioral economics, behavioral science, and psychology. We’re planning to develop the club’s activities and to keep creating experiences for students from all over the world.