Keynote Speakers

Carl Andrew Castro, Ph.D.

Carl Castro is a Colonel in the U.S. Army and is currently the Director of the Military Operational Medicine Research Program, Headquarters, U.S. Army Medical Research and Materiel Command, Fort Detrick, Maryland. He began his military career as an infantryman in 1981. Colonel Castro joined the Medical Service Corps after obtaining his doctorate from the University of Colorado in 1989. Over the past eighteen years, he has served in a variety of research positions to include Chief of the Applied Pharmacology Branch at the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Chemical Defense, Assistant Program Manager at the Armed Forces Radiobiology Research Institute, Director of the Primate Research Facility at the WRAIR, and Commander of the U.S. Army Medical Research Unit-Europe, located in Heidelberg, Germany. Colonel Castro’s operational experience includes serving tours of duty in Iraq, Bosnia, and Kosovo. He has authored over 60 scientific articles and reports in numerous research areas. Most recently his research efforts have focused on assessing the effects of combat and operations tempo (OPTEMPO) on soldier, family, and unit readiness.

Prof Dr Martin C. Euwema

Martin C. Euwema (1960) is a full professor in Organizational Psychology at the Catholic University of Leuven since 2007. Until 2007 he was associate professor at Utrecht University, the Netherlands, in the department of social and organizational psychology. He received his Ph.D. in 1992 at the Free University in Amsterdam, on conflict management in organizations.

His research interests are conflict management, and conflict mediation, peacekeeping, negotiation policies and skills, organizational behaviour and change management, and cross-cultural studies on leadership and team performance.

He has published in international scientific journals, such as Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Journal of Applied Psychology, Work and Stress, Journal of Organizational Behavior, Military Psychology, Group and Organization Management, International Journal for Conflict Management, and others, and is (co-)author of several practitioner oriented books, bookschapters and articles.

Martin Euwema worked with the Dutch army and defense college for many years, developing and conducting training and instruction in negotiation and conflict management for military peacekeepers. He was involved in large scale surveys on training and performance and morale and well being in the Dutch army, and was involved in the development of the new instruments for assessing morale in the Dutch army.

Martin Euwema teaches organizational development, OB, group dynamics and conflict management. He has over twenty years experience as trainer and consultant for both profit and not-for-profit organizations. He acts as program chair for different post-graduate masters in conflict management and mediation, at Leuven University, Utrecht University, University of Amsterdam and University of Copenhagen, and was visiting lecturer at the University of Seville. He initiated an interdisciplinary minor in mediation at Utrecht University, and an International Master conflict management and mediation with Copenhagen university.

Further activities:

• Associate editor for Negotiation and Conflict Management Research, the official outlet for the International Association for Conflict Management.
• Editorial board member for Journal of Managerial Psychology.
• Co-editor for "Tijdschrift Conflicthantering", professional journal for management in the Dutch language.

Prof Dr Jacques Mylle

After his studies at the Royal Military Academy, Prof Dr MSc Jacques Mylle started his career in 1969 as an Armoured Reconnaissance officer in the 1st Belgian Army Corps (Germany). After 21 years of service in the Belgian Forces in command- staff- and in trainer jobs, he joined in 1990 the Royal Military Academy as head of the Psychology Section in the Behavioural Sciences Department. Prof Mylle owns, aside a Masters in Social & Military Sciences, and a PhD in Psychology, a special degree in education and a Masters in Quantitative Methods in the Social Sciences.

As for each university professor, his responsibilities are threefold: teaching, research and services to the military community.

Courses taught are Introduction to Psychology, Communication psychology, Personnel and Work Psychology, Crisis Psychology, Military Leadership, and Didactics.

As a researcher, with a background in mathematical and cognitive psychology, he uses his competencies in various domains of application, mostly related to modelling behaviour aiming at optimising the performance of the soldier in a crisis response operations context. He is the chairman of the International Military Mental Health Association and Belgian board member in the International Military Testing Association. He maintains contacts with several civil universities among others through common doctoral students (e.g. KULeuven, Belgium; University of Utrecht, the Netherlands).

Finally, he shares his expertise with military psychological services and military universities or academies in former Eastern bloc countries (e.g. Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Estonia).