Professor Tonći Lazibat, born in Dubrovnik, holds a degree in economics from the University of Split and completed his master’s degree at the University of Zagreb and his doctorate at the University of Mostar. He extended his academic qualifications with a second doctorate in humanities with a focus on philology/literature at the University of Zadar, which he completed with a dissertation in 2022.

He began his professional career in business and has worked at the Faculty of Economics and Business, University of Zagreb since 2000, where he was promoted to full professor in 2012. He served two terms as Dean of the Faculty and two terms as Vice-Rector of the University of Zagreb (2014–2022). Together with Professor Nikola Knego, he founded the scientific journal Poslovna izvrsnost – Business Excellence in 2007 and has been its editor-in-chief ever since. He is a visiting professor at the Faculty of Medicine at the Josip Juraj Strossmayer University of Osijek, the University of Zadar and the Faculty of Economics at the University of Sarajevo and has collaborated with the universities of Mostar, Dubrovnik and Rijeka. In 2011, he was appointed Honorary Professor at the National University of the State Fiscal Service of Ukraine.

He has developed his expertise at Harvard University and MIT, authored more than a hundred scientific and professional publications and supervised more than 200 diploma, master’s and doctoral theses. Professor Lazibat has received numerous prestigious awards, including the "Mijo Mirković" Award, the Croatian Society for Quality Managers Award and the Dragutin Tadijanović Foundation Award from the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts - HAZU. He has led 30 scientific and professional projects. He is a member of the Expert Committee of the State Audit Office of the Republic of Croatia and many national and international professional associations and bodies.