Faculty Spotlight: Luis Reina

Luis Reina enjoys teaching and it shows. His students praise his ability to prepare complex material in a dynamic and understandable way. He has won the Best Professor award for the School of Human Science and Technology, the predecessor of the current School of Science and Technology. As co-Academic Director of the Master in Business Analytics and Data Science, he helped reconstruct the curriculum-- leading the program to be ranked 10th in the world for the QS BUSINESS MASTER'S RANKINGS 2025: BUSINESS ANALYTICS. Outside the classroom, Luis is the Chief Technology Officer for IBM Spain Data & AI. He has been awarded the Best of IBM twice for extraordinary accomplishments and contributions of top IBMers from around the world.

Meet one of IE School of Science and Technology’s thought leaders. 

What brought you to IE? Where were you before? And what keeps you here?

Before IE, I have been a professor in several universities and  business schools like Universidad Pontificia de Comillas, Universidad Autónoma, Escuela de Organización Industrial etc. where I have taught many data and analytics related classes (database applications, database programming, multimedia databases, geographic databases, SQL practices, Hadoop, Spark, etc.). 

I joined IE as a faculty in 2014 and later as Academic Director helping Juanjo Casado The first year there were only 29 students, now we have more than 200.  This has been  an incredibly enriching experience. I really enjoy the way IE organizes things around students, but also around faculty to really make our teaching experience unique, with incredible possibilities to improve ourselves by attending amazing talks that make us grow. What keeps me here? My best motivation is the satisfaction you receive from students’ feedback. They are always so grateful. When I am tired of working so much, this not only gives me the energy to continue, but pushes me to improve my sessions with them.

Where do you work outside of IE and what is most exciting to you about this role in your professional career?

I work in IBM. I am the Data & AI CTO for Spain. I have been working more than 25 years as a Data Specialist in IBM. I was lucky that Data and Analytics has become one of the most important areas for most of the companies. It has been amazing the change since the time I started, I love that there is always new analytic technology to learn. Apart from learning, what I enjoy most is helping customers with their analytical technical needs.

Have you ever had an a-ha moment while teaching that furthered your research? What was it?

One of the good things of teaching is that it forces you to understand and learn things better so you are able to explain things in a simpler way. One of the great satisfactions I have had several times, is when explaining something you notice that one student has an aha moment because you can see how he lights up, shouting “Now I understand!”

What book do you wish your students would read before taking your class and why?

Most of my students don’t have a Computer Science background so I would recommend these two books “Technology is fun” and “Don’t get scared with technology.” To be honest, I don’t if such books exist, but I would love the read anything to can open minds so they understand that if they devote time, they can learn a lot and enjoy technical stuff.

Please name one of your articles or studies you feel addresses the most important issues for 2023? 

In the analytics world, the most important issue today has to do with what I call “Data Chaos.”  It refers to the problem companies suffer finding right and quality data, the solution is Data Governance. In this Spanish article, I talk about the CDO Roles and how data governance is key.

Whose research of your IE colleagues do you find interesting? Why? 

IE recently has created the Metaverse Research Center that promises to generate very interesting research around this topic and how this can be a differential in education and other industries. Even, to be honest, I believe it is still soon to state that metaverse will really change our life, but no doubt that it will be an interesting tool to follow because it will help many different industries improve.

Tell us one personal thing about yourself that none of your students know. A hobby, sport or talent? Strange fact? Unusual interest?

With my IBM job and IE dedication, I barely have time left to do much but enjoy my 3 kids (Ines, Isabel and Luis) and my wife Ana. But I do have a hobby--  golf. To be honest, I am not a great player but I dream one day to master it. Golf is fun, but you need a lot of time.