South Korea
I work on how organisations build and sustain relationships with institutional funders - and on the less visible part that makes those relationships work: the strategy behind them, the systems, and the internal coordination that holds them together. Much of my work has meant starting from scratch - establishing engagement where there was none, building the relationships, the donor intelligence and the internal governance, and turning that into a real funding pipeline across multiple teams and markets. The recurring theme is the gap between knowing a funder exists and being genuinely positioned to win with them. Closing that gap is mostly process design, patient relationship work, and coordination across headquarters, regional and local levels - environments where influence matters more than authority. My background is deliberately mixed. Years inside a large, highly regulated institution taught me how slow-moving systems actually make decisions, and what institutional rigour really requires. Earlier work in the commercial and start-up world taught me ownership and pace. And operating across German, English and Korean contexts means I'm comfortable where cultures, hierarchies and unspoken expectations don't quite line up. That's usually where the interesting problems are. I'm a direct communicator and I do my best work in cross-cultural teams.
Leading public sector partnership engagement and resource mobilisation within Korea's sovereign ODA ecosystem - multilateral development financing and government funding channels. • Built Save the Children Korea's engagement with the Asian Development Bank from a zero baseline: direct relationships with thematic units, donor intelligence systems, and a place in ADB's NGO coordination mechanisms, including representation in the global movement's ADB Account Group • Developed an active ADB pipeline of approximately USD 3 million across four country offices within two years of establishing engagement. • Coordinated regional Expressions of Interest to the Mekong Institute's MKCF calls across three country offices • Saw a GGGI and a WFP proposal through to submission in close partnership with respective country offices, owning each opportunity end-to-end • Applied structured go/no-go assessment to institutional funding opportunities, including UNOPS and UNDP calls, before progression to technical teams • Ran the end-to-end governance process for the KOICA Civil Society Partnership Programme call: screened eligibility across 98 Save the Children offices down to a qualified pool of 39, then steered 16 through concept note submission and prioritisation in a single cycle • Replaced ad hoc processes with structured donor knowledge management - opportunity tracking, stakeholder mapping, and pipeline oversight
Digital Communication Specialist · May 2020 - September 2023 • Coordinated the end-to-end delivery of official publications, working across national central banks and authorities. • Appointed acting team lead after nine months, overseeing a team of nine and the delivery of 300+ publication projects • Drove workflow automation and process optimisation across publication cycles Senior Management Assistant · April 2017 - April 2020 • Coordinated cross-divisional activities, managing budget monitoring and confidential processes • Played a central role in recruiting and onboarding 40+ staff • Organised and facilitated 15+ working groups and training events with national central banks and authorities
Business development, account management and operational roles in international and multi-subsidiary environments, spanning marketing, technology and trade promotion. Highlights include experience marketing for major international accounts at Cheil Germany - managing budgets of up to €18 million and contributing to a Cannes Lions-recognised UNICEF campaign - business development and account management at Crytek (including the EN→KO localisation of a VR title), co-founding a retail and hospitality business, and earlier roles in sales operations and market-entry advisory at Samsung Semiconductor and KOTRA.