Ms. Oak is responsible for developing, implementing/monitoring, and training project-specific, impact-oriented, and compliant grants programs. A highly accomplished international development professional and senior grants specialist, she brings to GRI 26 years of hands-on capacity building experience for local organizations to receive, implement, and account (programmatic and compliance) for donor-funded programs. Ms. Oak is well-versed in managing large and complex United States Agency for International Development (USAID) programs covering project design, strategic programming, capacity building, operations, and grants and compliance management.
Previously Ms. Oak served field-based and headquarters positions for Tetra Tech for 16 years, As a member of the headquarters management team, she provided cross-sectoral support in capacity assessments and improvements, technical visioning to integrate capacity building through the use of innovative grants programs, and project management with full attention to compliance. She successfully fulfilled several field-based senior management positions, including the Chief of Party for the USAID Office of Transition Initiatives project in the West Bank and Gaza, where she led an integrated team, responsible for rapid yet strategic grant-making program during an intense period of political transition. Additional experiences include; 1) Spearheaded a CSO capacity building program that created synergy between stakeholders receiving grants and local government reform program in Bangladesh; 2) Through the design and implementation of capacity assessment and improvement tools, led local organizational capacity to receive USAID funds, implement, and account for program deliverables while maintaining compliance to USG requirements.
Ms. Oak is a Certified Performance Technologist. She received her Ba from Texas Tech, and her MBA from the University of Phoenix. She is fluent in English, Korean, and Spanish.