Staff
Dr. Daniella Fridl, Director
Daniella is the Director of the ICONS Project. Her expertise is in the area of statehood, state failure, state recognition, conflict management, and post-conflict reconstruction and development. Her recent work has focused on the mediation process and techniques in international negotiations over issues of state formation. She conducted field research and consulting in the Balkans, mainly Bosnia and Hezergovina and Kosovo.
Daniella is the Director of the ICONS Project. Her expertise is in the area of statehood, state failure, state recognition, conflict management, and post-conflict reconstruction and development. Her recent work has focused on the mediation process and techniques in international negotiations over issues of state formation. She conducted field research and consulting in the Balkans, mainly Bosnia and Hezergovina and Kosovo.Daniella is also the Center for International Development and Conflict Management's Assistant Director for Training and Education. As the Assistant Director of CIDCM, Daniella coordinates the center's Minor in International Development and Conflict Management and manages the ICONS Project's training and development.
She holds a Masters Degree in International Economics and Conflict Management and a PhD specializing in Conflict Management and International Law from Johns Hopkins SAIS University. She is a recipient of an independent research grant from the International Research Exchanges Board (IREX) sponsored by the U.S. State Department and the American Academy of Sciences fellowship for her post-doctoral work, which she completed at the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA) in Laxemburg, Austria. She is fluent in Croatian and German.
Jayne Nucete, Training Manager
Jayne is the Training Manager for the ICONS Project. She oversees all aspects of ICONS' professional training programs, serving as course facilitator and client manager, as well as managing the administrative aspects for each session.
Ms. Nucete began facilitating interpersonal skills workshops and trainings in 1998. She specializes in trainings focused on interpersonal competencies for leaders, including diversity and social justice issues, self-awareness, communication, conflict resolution, decision-making, and goal-setting. Her clients have included youth-at-risk, college students, survivors of domestic violence, and professionals in the public and private spheres, domestically and internationally. In Malaysia, she facilitated training for rising leaders at a major bank. In Mexico, she facilitated cross-cultural exchanges and sustained professional relationships with villagers in the remote Copper Canyon. Jayne has also extensively negotiated difficult conversations between youth-at-risk and their parents as they attempted to improve their relationships.
Jayne is an adept outdoorswoman who has spent more than 700 days leading wilderness expeditions through challenging terrain and (often more challenging) group dynamics. She worked for Outward Bound, Inc., first as a field instructor and then as a manager. Her facilitation style emphasizes an experiential approach. Ms. Nucete is also trained as a Wilderness First Responder and has experience managing emergency evacuations with limited resources in wilderness contexts.
Jayne earned her MA in International Relations, Conflict Management, and International Economics from the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies in Bologna, Italy, and Washington, DC. She holds a BSW in Social Work and a BA in Spanish from the University of Missouri.
Bern Beidel, Adjunct Trainer
Bern Beidel, M.Ed., CEAP, is the Director of the Office of Employee Assistance at the U.S. House of Representatives in Washington, D.C. He has been involved with the House employee assistance effort since its inception in 1991. He is responsible for the planning, development, management, evaluation, and continued enhancement and integration of the House's employee assistance service into the larger organization, including assuring its continuity of operations during emergencies and in response to disasters or terrorist situations.
Prior to joining the House, he developed the Employee Assistance Program (EAP) for the New Jersey State Police in 1981 -- one of the first EAP efforts in a state law enforcement agency in the country -- and managed the service throughout the 1980s. The EAP effort in the New Jersey State Police was initially funded through a project grant from the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA) and served as a national demonstration project for other state, municipal, and local law enforcement organizations throughout the decade. His ten years with the New Jersey State Police provided a foundation for developing and executing an EAP's critical incident stress response and management services for the employees, managers, and leaders of an organization.
His employee assistance experience began in the private sector in the late 1970s as the recipient of another federal project grant to develop an EAP consortium serving small and mid-size businesses and public sector organizations in rural Virginia. Prior to his employee assistance career, Bern served as a Drug and Alcohol Education Specialist during his active duty military service with the U.S. Coast Guard.
Bern has written extensively about the employee assistance field over the years, focusing particularly on the integration of EAPs into the workplace and the larger organization; the role of the EAP in the organization's disaster response and continuity of operations; the vital role of program evaluation in the management of employee assistance services; and other best practices and standards of operations, such as the follow-up of clients, and the mentoring and coaching of new practitioners in the profession.
He holds a Master's degree in Education with a specialization in Rehabilitation Counseling and Alcoholism studies, as well as a number of professional and training certifications. He currently sits as a Commissioner with the Employee Assistance Certification Commission (EACC) -- the international body that credentials employee assistance practitioners around the world.
Joseph G. Gray, Adjunct Trainer
Joe Gray is a consultant to public and private organizations in providing leadership development and organizational clarity. He has held responsible positions in federal civil service, military, business, civic, non-profit and ministry organizations.
Joe has served in a Senior Executive Service (SES) position in the Veterans Health Administration (VHA) in the Department of Veterans Affairs. As the principal advisor for external relations to the Under Secretary of Health, he was responsible for the federal and private medical resource sharing programs, communications, liaison to Veterans Service Organizations, consumer and community relations, legislative programs and emergency medical preparedness. He represented VHA on the Policy Committee and Directorate of the National Disaster Medical System, the Armed Forces Retirement Home Board, DOD/VA joint sharing committee and the Federal Emergency Management Agency's Catastrophic Response Group. He has served on VHA's Executive Board, budget and policy review committee, performance review board, national data reports committee and the National Leadership Board.
He began his forty years in the military as a Private First Class, promoted to Sergeant, commissioned as an Infantry Second Lieutenant and retired as a Major General.
General Gray has had an extensive military career in the U.S. Army -- Active, Reserve, National Guard, that included command of three infantry companies, a battalion, a group, a brigade, and a division size organization (ARCOM.) He served in numerous staff positions as the Operations and Plans Officer of a brigade, training command, and a division. He was Chief of Staff of a Theater Army Area Command. His last assignment was Assistant Deputy Chief of Staff for Operations and Plans (G-3) Mobilization and Reserve Affairs, Department of the Army. He served on the Department of Defense Reserve Forces Policy Board.
In the private sector he has been a real estate specialist, corporate government relations consultant and a regional manager for public affairs in the General Electric Company. He was a Vice President for Public Affairs of the Christian Broadcasting Network, Vice President for Economic Development for two large Chambers of Commerce; and most recently as the National Director of Military Ministry of Campus Crusade for Christ, International.
Joe is a graduate of the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College; Army War College; George Washington University Institute for Federal Health Care Executives; University of Houston Institute on Organizational Management and Harvard University Executive Program in National and International Security. He received a Bachelor of Arts Degree from Northwestern State University of Louisiana. Joe is an ordained Minister. He has been married to his wife and best friend, Betty, for over forty years. They have three children and five grandchildren. They reside in Williamsburg, Virginia.
Dr. Victor Asal, Adjunct Trainer
Victor has worked as a conflict resolution trainer in a variety of settings, most notably as a trainer for army officers. In addition to his years of training professionals, Dr. Asal has taught courses in conflict resolution, crisis management, terrorism, and the strategy and tactics of bargaining and negotiation. He is an investigator for the START Center (Center for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism) and Director of the Public Security Certificate at Rockefeller College, SUNY, Albany.
He holds an Advanced Training Certificate in Conflict Management and a PhD from the University of Maryland's Department of Government and Politics. He is currently an Assistant Professor of Political Science at the State University of New York, Albany. He is a co-author of Mediating International Crises (Routledge, 2005). He is also the author of The Sword of Justice: Ethics and Coercion in International Politics (Praeger, 1998), as well as numerous studies and articles on foreign policy issues.
Bob Weinkle, Adjunct Trainer
Bob served for 21 years in the United States Marine Corps and he commanded Marines, sailors and soldiers at the platoon, Company and Battalion levels, culminating in Battalion Command during combat operations in Iraq in 2003. He also served in senior operational and strategic planning positions throughout his career in the Marine Corps. Upon leaving active duty, Bob served with the Centers for Disease Control in the Division of Strategic National Stockpile. As Chief of the CHEMPACK program he managed Nerve Agent antidote readiness programs in over 1,300 sites across the nation. He currently serves as the Veterans Administration National Program Coordinator for the Veterans Transportation Service.
During his 24 years of federal service Bob actively participated in multiple crisis response operations including: Operation Iraqi Freedom, Beirut Contingency operations, Operation Sharp Edge (Liberia), Southwest Georgia Flood recovery response, Super Typhoon Bart recovery response, H1N1 flu public health response and the federal response to the Haitian Earthquake disaster.
Bob's academic experience includes service as an Associate Professor at the Georgia Institute of Technology and Morehouse College in Atlanta, Georgia where he taught Leadership, Management and Logistics courses. He also served on the faculty of the Army Logistics Management College. Bob earned his MS in Logistics Management from the Florida Institute of Technology. He holds a BS in Communications from the University of Tennessee. He is certified in Executive Logistics Management by the Society of Logistics Engineers.
