Staff Profiles - Pact Headquarters

Sarah Newhall President and Chief Executive Officer

Sarah Newhall, Pact's first female president and CEO, is an innovator and leader in citizens' empowerment programs in the United States and around the world. Her work is founded on the passionate belief that a responsive government with firm political will and empowered citizens working together can change the course of a nation's history. Since Ms. Newhall became president of Pact in June 2000, the organization's revenues have nearly tripled to $50 million and Pact has twice been named by Worth magazine as one of American's 100 best charities. In addition, Ms. Newhall has supported expansion of Pact's award-winning women's empowerment program, WORTH, which now operates in eight countries in Africa and two in Asia. WORTH recently was selected by Amazon.com, in partnership with Stanford School of Business, as one of 10 finalists in its first NGO Nonprofit Innovation Award. Ms. Newhall also has guided creation of a new dynamic global network of capacity building organizations, the Impact Alliance, which now has 11 partner organizations and over 171 members. Building Pact as a globally networked organization based on trusted and respectful partnerships is a key part of her leadership vision. Ms. Newhall is a strong voice for INGO standards and accountability in the international development sector.

Before becoming president of Pact, Ms. Newhall was executive vice president and country representative in Cambodia, where she launched a large-scale democracy and governance capacity-building program shortly after the signing of the Paris Peace Accords. Under her leadership the project spurred many new and young organizations to find their voice and to serve a growing civil society constituency.

Prior to joining Pact Ms. Newhall participated in Thailand's successful war on HIV/AIDS and designed and implemented the South-to-South Global Innovations Program of the Population Community Development Association, which awarded 22 grants in eight countries for community-based self-reliance projects linking rural development with family planning activities. She also served as Asia regional coordinator for Ashoka, Innovators for the Public, a global fellowship that provides financial resources to global change agents known as social entrepreneurs.

Before going overseas Ms. Newhall, who hails from Portland, OR, held several leadership positions with city government and nonprofit organizations. She also served on the Portland School board and ran a city bureau reporting to the mayor of Portland. As a part of her own personal advocacy, she was a volunteer talk-show host for a cable TV public affairs program. She also worked at Center for Urban Education; the human services arm of Ecumenical Ministries of Oregon.

Ms. Newhall has a bachelor's degree from Occidental College, Los Angeles, California, and a master's degree in public administration from Portland State University, Portland, Oregon. She is chairperson of the Women's Edge Coalition. She is a member of Interaction's board of directors and co-chair of InterAction's Commission for the Advancement of Women (CAW), where she has contributed to broadening the programmatic vision of the commission and putting a strategy in place to scale up CAW's service delivery. She is also a member of Interaction's Private and Voluntary Organization Standards Committee.

Areas of Specialization
Executive nonprofit management, NGO capacity development, NGO network building, public administration, policy and budgetary planning, community mobilization, community development, project administration, cross-sectoral programming, citizen's empowerment, democracy and governance, refugee and youth services, family planning and health, primary and secondary education

Previous Positions
Country Representative, Pact Cambodia; Regional Coordinator for South and Southeast Asia for Ashoka: Innovators for the Public; Program Coordinator, Population and Community Development Association, Thailand

Countries worked in
Bangladesh, Cambodia, Laos, Nepal, Thailand, USA, Vietnam, West Bank/Gaza

Education
Bachelor of Arts degree from Occidental College, Los Angeles, California; Master's degree in public administration from Portland State University, Portland, Oregon

Other
Director, Office of Neighborhood Associations, Office of the Mayor, Portland, Oregon; appointed member of the Portland Board of Education; Associate Director, Center for Urban Education, city of Portland; Youth Services Coordinator, city of Portland; member, executive committee, InterAction

What gets me up in the morning
"It energizes me to lead an incredibly talented, dedicated group of individuals, who daily are incubating and implementing common sense, people-centered, close-to-the ground, trailblazing ideas for capacity building activities that give people the chance to make profound changes in their lives."