Agile 50 - The World's 50 Most Influential People Navigating Disruption

Amer Hashmi is a leading IT executive and entrepreneur. After serving in several leadership positions in major tech companies such as IBM and Si3, Amer applied his expertise as Chief Strategy Officer at the National University of Sciences and Technology of Pakistan, where he set up a global think tank for tech innovation. The Pakistani government then appointed Amer to lead the development of Special Technology Zones, hubs for technological entrepreneurship throughout Pakistan. Rather than traditional bureaucrats, Amer recruited experts from the tech sector to help set up the hubs, which helped drive innovation in the region.

Anna Ekeledo is passionate about leveraging technological innovations for social impact. Anna is the Executive Director of AfriLabs, a network organisation of over 300 Technology Innovation Hubs spread across 50 African Countries which develops programmes and builds partnerships that support high potential entrepreneurs to stimulate economic growth and social development in Africa. Anna holds several advisory roles and is a member of the Advisory Board at African Europe Innovation Partnership, a European Commission initiative which aims to support and connect innovation. Anna is also the Regional Innovation Lead at the EdTech Hub, the world's largest education technology research and innovation project which seeks to drive research and adoption of evidence-based education technology in developing countries and is supported by the World Bank, FCDO, and Bill & Melinda Gates.

Bruna Santos is the Innovation Director of the Escola Nacional de Administração Pública (ENAP) in Brazil. Bruna leads transformative innovation projects in Brazil and empowers public servants and entrepreneurs with the necessary skills, mindset and values to bring about positive change within the Brazilian government. Bruna also serves in leadership positions on several civil society organisations promoting transparency, integrity, accountability and stakeholder participation in support of democracy and inclusive growth. She is an Eisenhower Fellow, president of the Board of Open Knowledge Brazil and Board Member of Instituto Cidade Democrática and Transparência Brasil.

Through his numerous roles at multilateral development banks, bilateral aid agencies, and policy think tanks, Carlos Santiso has enabled development projects in over 40 countries in Europe, Africa and the Americas. He currently leads digital innovation in government practice at the Development Bank of Latin America, where he promotes digital and data solutions to transform government, encourage innovation, and tackle corruption in Latin America. His work aims to reset governments to "startup mode", to foster more agile, open and innovative governance through technical advice and financial support. He set up the Governance Practice unit and its GovTech Lab to incubate GovTech innovations through analytical insights, advisory services, technical assistance and impact investments. This resulted in the launch of a global GovTech Leaders Alliance, support to the first GovTech government innovation lab in Colombia and the first GovTech innovation fund in Cordoba, Argentina.

Darja Isaksson is the Director General of Vinnova, Sweden's innovation agency. She has been reforming the agency and furthering its impactful work as Sweden's key innovation enabler. The agency has channeled 300 Million Euros to Swedish entrepreneurs and researchers. Darja is also a member of the Swedish Government’s National Digitalisation Council. Previously, Darja worked in business and product development for clients such as Sony Ericsson, Ikea and Husqvarna and served as an advisor to the Prime Minister’s Innovation Council. She has been recognized as one of Sweden’s most powerful opinion-makers by the financial magazine Veckans Affarer and was named one of Apolitical's World’s 100 Most Influential People in Digital Government.

Huda Al Hashimi ensures the successful execution of the UAE Vision 2021 and National Innovation Strategy. In addition, Huda is responsible for the launch of the Government Accelerators, the world's first Accelerator focusing on the rapid delivery of high-priority government programmes following a unique and innovative approach. Huda is also responsible for leading the set-up of and running the Mohammed Bin Rashid Centre for Government Innovation, employing an integrated innovation framework.

Mr. Mukarram leads investment climate reform programmes in Pakistan and has been instrumental in spearheading Pakistan's digital governance and digital regulatory service delivery initiatives. These efforts have boosted Pakistan’s ranking on the World Bank’s Doing Business Index and minimised both the compliance costs and physical touch-points between businesses and government departments. Some key agile projects include the Pakistan Regulatory Modernisation Initiative to reduce compliance-burden on businesses and improve the effectiveness of regulations, as well as the Pakistan Ease of Doing Business Project, an ongoing reform process that is consistently making efforts to improve business environments in the country.

Zhang Ying has been instrumental in efforts to digitise Shanghai, championing new ideas of information consumption. This includes government informatisation, which started very early in Shanghai and plays an important role in supporting new technologies. Zhang Ying leads an accelerator project to boost the use of artificial intelligence in the medical field. Many stakeholders have joined the initiative, including the Shanghai Development Research Centre of Economy and Informatisation, Amazon's cloud computing service AWS, and the citywide AI incubator, AISPACE. The aim is that competition will drive the integration of AI and medicine through the sharing of data and technology as well as an injection of capital in a bid to turn intelligent medical care into an imminent reality.

Ailish Campbell currently serves as Ambassador of Canada to the European Union, representing Canada's interests to the 27 EU member states. Ailish is an expert in international relations, global trade and fiscal policies who began her career as a trade negotiator at WTO negotiations. She later worked in the private sector and returned to government to serve in Finance Canada where she worked on defence and innovation policy, and as Chief Trade Commissioner of Canada, a role in which she led a global team in over 150 offices to serve exporting companies and create new digital services for entrepreneurs. Ailish has always advocated for an agile approach to governance, placing emphasis on a data-driven approach that can respond quickly to changing demands and the opportunities of new technologies. She is a member of the Finance Leaders Fellowship of the Aspen Institute.

Dr. Bais has lobbied, collaborated with and held accountable when needed, the Government of Malaysia during the COVID-19 pandemic through strategy and policy suggestions around work wellness, organisational change, and mental health. Utilising a powerful international network of contacts and stringent verifications, she enabled procurement of much needed PPEs and ventilators for workplaces. She has introduced wellbeing, resilience and Zoom-fatigue-coping-techniques to the International Board of Amnesty International, which has held meetings on the toughest human rights governance decisions online for the last 1 and a half years. With a foresightful digitial strategy, Dr. Bais' consultancy was well equipped for the COVID-19 pandemic, helping to usher in a new norm of how digital healthcare is delivered in Malaysia.

Rachel leads the implementation of the CSIR’s research, development and innovation strategy in various sectors. She works closely with local and international partners to improve sectoral competitiveness and socioeconomic performance through innovation. She was recently responsible for development of the CSIR’s current 4IR-anchored strategy across its multidisciplinary areas of focus and recently chaired the Panel that developed the Gauteng 4IR Growth and Digitalisation Strategy.

Shuhei has worked with 218 partners, including governments, private companies, universities and business people, to establish businesses and implement policies that help solve social problems. Shuhei operates a "think & do" tank facilitating collaboration between industry, academia, government and citizens and promotes initiatives to strengthen the responsiveness of regional economic agents and advocate for agile policies in light of economic changes. He recently worked with the Fukuoka City Government to create strategies for industry and urban development, enabling various regulatory reforms, such as revising laws on remote medication guidance for remote medical care. Currently, Shuhei leads the creation of a 50 hectare Smart City and is working with local residents on a proof-of-concept for autonomous driving.

Chuy Cepeda works at the forefront of GovTech, helping governments deliver citizen-centric digital services. He is CEO and Co-Founder of OS City, a software company that has worked with governments across Ibero-America to implement blockchain solutions to provide self-sovereign digital identity, increase transparency and reduce red-tape. OS City is UNICEF's first Blockchain Cohort Portfolio company and one of DKV Global's GovTech Top 100 Companies. OS City has helped governments across Ibero-America apply blockchain solutions to services such as subsidies traceability, city inspector badges, commercial permits and construction permits. They are now working hand-in-hand with CAF, UNICEF, the Ethereum Foundation and the President of Argentina to provide Digital Identity to citizens and empower the public service toward digital transition. Chuy has also co-founded the GovTech Hub, an organisation that fosters the GovTech Ecosystem in Ibero-America by creating bootcamps to build GovTech capacities in public servants.

Daniela Braga is Founder and CEO of one of the fastest growing scale-ups in the AI space, Defined.ai, which provides AI training data that aims to be as bias-free as possible. This year, Daniela was appointed to Joe Biden's National Artificial Intelligence Taskforce. Daniela has been vocal on being ethical, unbiased and protecting privacy, and has suggested an Alliance for AI-oversight at an international level. During the pandemic, Defined.ai responded to increased demand for bias-free data by launching an online marketplace of off-the-shelf datasets.

Dr. Fadi Makki heads the first behavioural insights and nudge unit in the Middle East, B4Development (formerly Qatar Behavioural Insights Unit) at the Supreme Committee for Delivery and Legacy, and is the founder of Nudge Lebanon. He has over 23 years of experience in public policy, socioeconomic development, behavioral economics and social entrepreneurship. He currently holds teaching and research positions at AUB and Georgetown University in Qatar. Dr. Makki pioneered applications of behavioural insights and nudge concepts in the Arab region, in a variety of public policy areas, including healthy lifestyle, COVID-19 compliance and vaccine uptake, sustainability, education, rule of law, inclusion and the prevention of violent extremism. He has been instrumental in growing the use of behavioural science tools in the Global South through advocacy and capacity-building for governments, NGOs, academia and private sector entities with a social purpose.

Through Igor’s strategic private-public dialogue, he has promoted the digital transformation of Brazilian companies. His portfolio of evidence-based and results-oriented initiatives focuses on areas such as Industry 4.0, Amazon 4.0, smart cities, electromobility and the future of work. Over the last two years, under ABDI's Smart Cities initiative, he has established partnerships to employ Sandbox and Living Labs projects in different regions in Brazil. The initiatives aim to create technological solutions for urban-environmental transformation, improved quality of life and responsiveness to rapid technological change. Under Igor’s leadership, ABDI’s pandemic response contributed solutions and partnerships to confront the crisis and transition to a new, post-pandemic reality.

Othman’s organisation, Color Health, partners with public and private institutions, such as the National Institutes of Health, the State of California, City of San Francisco, the Teamsters Union, Salesforce, and United Airlines, to make it possible for large populations to access basic healthcare services directly where they live or work. Through easy-to-use software and infrastructure, Color has increased access to preventive healthcare services and infectious disease management. For example, in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, Color has partnered with more than 100 major employers and universities to provide critical testing and vaccination programmes. Color's partnership with the City of San Francisco has helped the city maintain one of the nation's highest per-capita COVID-19 testing rates.

Takeshi is a Fintech entrepreneur (Founder and CEO of Crowd Realty) and applies technology to financial solutions. In addition to this, he is a Committee Member of the Government of Japan’s Regulatory Sandbox. He is the only entrepreneur among the committee members and advocates on behalf of Japan's start-up ecosystem. He also serves as an advisory board member of the Ministry of Economy’s Governance Innovation Committee, as a Vice Chairman of the Fintech Association of Japan and leads a Regtech & Suptech Committee. Takeshi has strong relations with regulators and Fintech hubs in many countries and develops interoperability with other regulatory sandboxes by facilitating G2G dialogues and coordinating cross-border public-private initiatives.

Cathryn Ross is Chair of the Regulatory Horizons Council, an independent committee that advises the UK government on the policy reform required to adapt to digitisation and technological innovation. The Council has made recommendations on fusion energy and will offer guidance on genetic technologies, medical devices, remotely piloted aircraft systems and more. The UK's Business Secretary, Kwasi Kwarteng, has described the Horizons Council as a "key part of modernising our approach to regulatory reform."

Jeanette leads the Government of Singapore's foresight work at the Centre for Strategic Futures (CSF). Her work has a strong focus on bringing technology into foresight analysis. Jeanette has adopted a “perpetual beta” approach — releasing early versions and refining them continuously. Jeanette has used COVID-19 as an opportunity to enlighten Singapore's entire government to the importance of foresight and agility, producing a series of insightful analyses on how COVID-19 has impacted major policy domains in Singapore. She led an insightful series of COVID-19 themed foresight analyses, distributed to Singapore Government members and the CSF's network.

Stephen is a strategic, influential leader with expertise in transforming regulators worldwide to respond to technological innovation. He leads the ICO’s work to anticipate, interpret and shape the impact of new technologies on how people’s data is used. This includes overseeing the Digital Regulation Cooperation Forum – the ICO’s ground-breaking collaboration with the competition, financial services and communications regulators to shape how digital technologies and markets evolve. Stephen has championed agile governance, playing an important role in brokering the establishment of the Agile Nations in 2020, bringing together 7 of the world’s most innovative economies. He previously designed and delivered the £10m Regulators’ Pioneer Fund to invest in regulator-led innovation projects, developed the UK Government’s White Paper on Regulation for the Fourth Industrial Revolution, and established the Regulatory Horizons Council.

Xue Lan is a leading scholar in China with a solid research basis and a broad academic vision. He is noted for both his positions on many research and educational councils, as well as his work in science, technology and innovation policy. Xue Lan is a big proponent of agile governance for the future of AI in China. Recently, he has been actively calling for top universities in the US and China to be more collaborative in artificial intelligence research, even while US-China tech tensions have escalated. He has also monitored increased use of AI during the pandemic, has raised important data privacy concerns, and has called for a set of proven rules to regulate the AI market.

Anne has worked as an academic advisor under the authority of the German Federal Administration and has supervised several important agile research projects for many years. Through this, she has sustainably digitised public administration services. At the same time, she is a tireless advocate for open data and legal tech. Thanks to Anne, the German Federal Administration has been offering training on digital topics for two years. Moreover, Anne played a decisive role in determining the legal basis for the Coronavirus Warning App and thus laid the foundation for its successful use. In addition, she was in charge of writing the data strategy for the German Federal Government, provided training on data-based decision-making, and negotiated a unified federal government line despite divergent interests. Currently, she coordinates the German Federal Ministries on the establishment of further data labs and provides advice on data-based administrative work in governmental contexts.

As Deloitte’s Emerging Technology & Innovation Leader, Combiz Abdolrahimi is responsible for helping governments to design, build, and implement innovative programmes using new and emerging technologies. Combiz has over 15 years of public and private sector experience, serving as a national security lawyer, trusted advisor and technologist for three US Presidential Administrations & Cabinet Secretaries at the US Department of State, Treasury, Commerce, The White House, & US Senate. He has worked with senior government and industry executives and foreign leaders from over 100 countries, setting policies and priorities for emerging issues and global priorities such as economic equity and inclusion, energy security, climate action, cyberspace security, digital freedom, rule of law, and diplomacy.

Over the last three decades, Edward Olowo-Okere has worked with government institutions around the world, helping them to become more accountable, transparent and citizen-centric. He is now the Global Director of the World Bank's Governance Global Practice team which provides expertise on issues ranging from public financial management, to public sector digitisation and anti-corruption. Ed provided strategic leadership for the development of the World Bank’s GovTech Initiative that promotes a whole-of-government approach to public sector modernisation with a focus on helping governments achieve more accessible, transparent and citizen-centric service delivery. He leads the World Bank Group’s Governance Global Practice to work on initiatives to help control corruption. Currently, he also leads the Global Practice on the Future of Government. This is a reimagining-government-initiative that aims to identify potential transformation pathways by which governments can seize the opportunity presented by the multiple shocks triggered by COVID-19 as well as the climate crisis, to start the journey towards green, resilient and inclusive development outcomes.

As Mayor, Fátima has led the City of Novo Hamburgo through various crises, employing the principles of agile governance. She led the recovery of a sovereign loan of $46 million with the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), executing a programme foreseen to take 4 years, in just 2. She created the largest economic recovery programme in her State, Pact for the Future, assisting over six hundred small and mid-size enterprises. Fátima has stood out in the fight against COVID-19, with new health measures and vaccination strategies, public policies for inclusive and equitable economic recovery and citizen engagement. She established the Municipal Emergency Operations Centre - COVID 19 (COEM COVID-19) as the main municipal policy of institutional rearrangement for an agile and real-time response to confront the challenges posed by the pandemic.

Mariam Chammat is an Executive Advisor at the French Behavioral Insights Unit within the Interministerial Directorate for public transformation (DITP). Her work consists of translating findings and methods from cognitive and behavioural sciences into improvements in public policies and programmes. Mariam also works on strengthening evidence-based policy making by developing and piloting projects between policymakers and researchers.

Mariam holds a PhD in affective and cognitive neuroscience where she studied various ways in which emotions can bias perception. She also completed a postdoctoral research at Brain and Spine Institute in France (ICM). Her research focused on the neural basis of cognitive dissonance resolution and choice-induced preference change. Passionate about belief update, in 2015 Mariam co-founded a think tank (CHIASMA) where she developed debiasing programmes aimed at improving critical thinking skills. CHIASMA’s main aim is to translate findings on cognitive biases into tools that can help improve people’s mental habits and their metacognitive skills.

Rachel leads policy and services to drive teacher recruitment. She brings policy and delivery expertise into single multidisciplinary teams to tackle one of the department’s biggest challenges – ensuring there are excellent teachers for every child. This includes services to support those entering the teaching profession as well as those already teaching. Rachel was the driving force behind the Department for Education's Get Help with Technology Programme, which provided laptops, tablets, routers and free mobile data to support disadvantaged young people to learn remotely during the pandemic, as well as platforms and training to schools to support teachers with the challenges of remote education.

Alexander Holt heads Emerging Opportunities and Partnerships at the Digital Directorate of the Scottish Government. He is a pioneer of digital innovation and public entrepreneurship, establishing the CivTechⓇ Programme in 2015, comprising the world’s first digital public services accelerator and Europe’s first GovTech programme. His passion is in developing international collaborative networks which power ‘Innovation Diplomacy’, so in 2020 he set up the CivTech Alliance, a global network enabling governments to share insights and discoveries, and actively collaborate with innovative fast-growth businesses through the ground-breaking Global Scale-up Programme. Alexander champions the mindset of public entrepreneurship - the persistence to move forward, the resilience to take the flak and the urgency to get results. Using an agile approach, he seeks to shift public service mindset from a place of risk aversion to a place of risk receptiveness. This has enabled public sector organisations to redefine their procurement methodologies, develop pathways to harness the power of digital innovation and create new products for the public sector that improve services, cut costs, free up resources, and improve the user experience.

Aura Cifuentes is the Director of the Digital Government Directorate of Columbia's Ministry of Information, Communication and Technology. During her term, she has supported the Ministry in designing, adapting, and promoting ICT policies with a user-centred approach. She previously served as Director of Colombia’s Observatory of Transparency and Anticorruption and on the Public Innovation Team of the National Planning Department. During the pandemic, Aura was a driving force behind many governmental initiatives aiming to foster the modernisation of the public sector, such as the Digital Citizen Folder, an initiative that seeks to help citizens get access to public information and government services. Aura also released the first handbook on the use of Blockchain in the public sector, which is currently being used to develop pilot programmes in 15 public entities.

Babu A has helped to establish and run numerous flagship projects within the Government of Andhra Pradesh that have served as an inspiration for innovations across India. He was CEO of Arogyasri, a flagship programme expanding access to healthcare, one of the first of its kind in India. He also streamlined many other government services, facilitating distribution of subsidised food and helping small farmers get access to fertilizers. From 2017-2019, Babu served as CEO of Real Time Governance Society, an e-governance initiative which aims to enable robust citizen engagement and efficient citizen-centric service delivery through a digital, data-driven approach.

As Management Secretary of the Ministry of Economy, Cristiano has set an agenda of progress, implementing significant regulatory changes in public procurement, funds transfer and strategic management. He previously served as Secretary of Modernisation and Strategic Management at the Federal Prosecutor’s Office and as Secretary of Logistics and Information Technology at the Ministry of Planning. He is currently leading projects in the Brazilian Digital Transformation Strategy, including a new public procurement platform (Compras.gov.br), a platform for funds transfer (Plataforma +Brasil) and a new electronic process platform (Super.br).

With over fifteen years of collective public sector service, Nagesh has been a progressive agile governance leader in the US Federal Government. Via his current role as the Chief Information Officer at the Bureau of Industry and Security at the US Department of Commerce, Nagesh and his team of change agents have helped the Bureau modernise and overcome years of legacy IT debt through an Agile DevSecOps cloud-smart methodology framework. Nagesh’s prior technical career leadership has also included supporting the digital technology response for the US Small Business Administration’s COVID-19 funding assistance. Through the agency’s monumental efforts with the Paycheck Protection Programme and the Economic Injury Disaster Loan endeavours, Nagesh helped the agency deploy $700+ Billion in emergency funding into the hands of entrepreneurs and small business owners, thus saving jobs and people’s livelihoods.

Jean-Yves is a leader in modernising Canada's regulatory environment. He has already made critical advancements in incorporating multistakeholder views throughout the regulatory process, especially around emerging technologies. Jean-Yves pushed for Canada's endorsement of the Agile Nations agreement to "demonstrate our commitment to creating a regulatory environment where innovation can flourish and our respective businesses can be more efficient and competitive globally." As President of the Treasury Board, he has overseen the release of regulatory review roadmaps aimed at helping modernise Canada’s regulatory system. The roadmaps evaluate outdated regulatory requirements and practices to reduce barriers to economic growth, competitiveness, and innovation and create a more agile regulatory system for all Canadians.

As Prime Minister, Ana has led agile governance through her political career. As Minister of Public Administration and Local Self-Government, she particularly worked on the reform of public administration through the introduction of E-government in Serbia, so that the state would become a true service for citizens. The introduction of E-government in Serbia also contributed to a more efficient and transparent administration and acted as a tool for a resolute and practical fight against corruption. Some of the most important projects Ana implemented during her mandate are the E-Baby project ("Baby, welcome to the world"), and the automatic data-exchange between public administration bodies. As President of the Council for Innovative Entrepreneurship and Information Technologies of the Serbian Government, through day-to-day consultations with IT industry from Serbia, start-ups and innovative companies, she developed a government action plan and led its fast implementation. Today, Serbia is a country with four Science and Technology Parks - in Belgrade, Nis, Novi Sad and Cacak - which all contribute to the growing ICT sector (reaching a share of 6% in GDP).

Mykhailo is one of the youngest ministers in Ukraine. With the team of the Ministry of Digital Transformation, he is helping to build a Ukrainian digital state. The main objectives of his work are: transferring 100% of public services online, providing 95% of Ukraine’s population with high-speed internet, increasing the digital literacy of Ukrainians and creating favourable conditions for E-business and IT development in the country. The core of the digital state is the Diia ecosystem, consisting of both a mobile app and web portal that provide public services online. Mykhailo was responsible for its launch and beta testing. Today, Diia’s products are actively used by 15 million Ukrainian citizens. Recently, Ukraine became the first country in the world to fully legalise digital ID in smartphones, and became the country with the world’s fastest business registration. Mykhailo's other projects include launching the special legal and tax regime for IT and creative industry entrepreneurs, Diia City, and introducing an e-Residency tool.

With a dual portfolio, Ohood is spearheading a transformative vision to accelerate government development and embed future foresight and readiness in Government. She champions work related to future preparedness and builds in agility to adapt to emerging trends, enhance competitiveness, and strengthen the UAE’s position. "Designing the Next 50" is an innovative and inclusive digital platform, engaging people across the nation to collectively shape the UAE’s next 50 years in sectors such as health, education, social development, economy, culture, the future and more. Ohood also oversees the UAE Prime Minister’s Office, where she continues to spur innovation and create a new generation of anticipatory, as well as on-demand, government services. She also chairs the Federal Authority for Government Human Resources, where she champions new models and tools of government work.

Ms. Sindisiwe Lydia Chikunga was appointed Deputy Minister of Transport on 5 August, 2021. She was Deputy Minister of Public Service and Administration from 30 May, 2019 to 5 August, 2021. As a member of Parliament, Ms Chikunga has served on the Correctional Services Portfolio Committee, Joint Budget Portfolio Committee, Housing Portfolio Committee, Auditor General and Joint Standing Committee on Defence and as a Chairperson of the Portfolio Committee on Police.

Ursula is a lawyer, an advocate for women and children’s rights and was the Managing Director of National Telecommunications Operator, Westel. She is the first female, and longest serving Minister for Communications in Ghana. She was the Managing Consultant with N.U. Consult, Legal, Governance and Gender Consultants and Chairperson for the Social Development Committee, which developed all social intervention policies and programmes for women, children, persons with disabilities and the elderly for the NPP manifesto 2016. She is a member of the Ghana Bar Association, International Federation of Women Lawyers (FIDA) and African Women Lawyers Association (AWLA). Ursula currently plays a pivotal role in the Ghana's COVID-19 response through the introduction and supervision of various technical solutions for social and health continuity management. She has also been at the helm of the collective work that led to a new cyber security act that increased Ghana’s ITU Cybersecurity Index score by over 50%. She is passionate about providing digital skills for the youth, especially girls, and is an avowed advocate for Women in Technology to narrow the gender digital divide.

Mr. Uzziel Ndagijimana is an economist, holding a PhD in Economics, with specialisation in International Trade. He was appointed Rwanda’s Minister of Finance and Economic Planning in 2018, previously serving as the Minister of State in charge of Economic Planning in the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning (MINECOFIN). Most recently, his Ministry has employed grass-roots leadership, making efforts to increase citizen participation in the national budget through the introduction of simplified booklets dubbed citizen guides. The guides provide, amongst other things, feedback to citizens on their ideas and contributions provided during the planning process through different community dialogues and platforms.

Amy has spent her career finding business solutions to development challenges and figuring out how markets can work for the public good. She is currently the Acting Director of the USAID Centre for Innovation and Impact (CII). Previously, Amy lived in Mumbai, India developing social enterprise models to provide clean water in slums; in Monrovia, Liberia applying business strategies to strengthen HIV services; and in Lima, Peru counselling microenterprises to reach new customers. At USAID’s CII, Amy leads an entrepreneurial team incubating new ideas, putting them into practice, and scaling them with diverse partnerships. In the last year, Amy’s team has partnered with companies to strengthen supply chains that deliver the COVID vaccine, mapped digital solutions in 20 countries that can respond to COVID needs, and helped catalyse a working capital fund to keep private clinics open across five sub-Saharan African countries despite COVID disruptions.

With the onset of the global pandemic, international organisations like the UN were faced with the challenge of ensuring the health and safety of personnel and partners whilst they stayed and delivered on the UN mandates globally. The potential need to evacuate personnel and partners around the world due to COVID-19 presented an unprecedented challenge, with borders closed and local health facilities filled beyond capacity. To this end, the UN appointed AnneMarie to lead the UN system-wide MEDEVAC Taskforce. Together with the team, AnneMarie worked with numerous private and public sector partners to leverage resources, expertise and medical and logistical capabilities. Based on the success of the establishment of this unique, unbureaucratic and critical MEDEVAC Mechanism, AnneMarie was asked to establish a UN system-wide mechanism to ensure that personnel and partners around the world have access to a COVID-19 vaccine, a challenge which is currently ongoing.

Image from: https://umoja.un.org/news/interview-ms-annemarie-van-den-berg-future-supply-chain-management-un

Hamad Al Mahmeed has shown strong leadership in improving the delivery of government services in Bahrain as the Undersecretary for Research and Projects at the Prime Minister’s Office. In 2018, HM King Hamad bin Isa Al-Khalifa awarded him with the National Service Medal of Honour of the First Degree. Hamad Al Mahmeed was appointed as the Head of the COVID-19 War Room, which was established to ensure a whole-of-government response. As Head of the War Room, Hamad Al Mahmeed has overseen the rapid introduction of innovative solutions like drive-through testing, establishing vaccination centres in shopping malls, exhibition halls into COVID clinics and transforming public transport buses into mobile testing and vaccination units. With Hamad at the helm, the War Room has managed to orchestrate a robust and world-leading response; Bahrain ranks among the top 10 countries globally in terms of vaccination coverage as well as in terms of the number of tests administered per capita.

Dr. Jaleela Sayed Jawad is the Chief Executive Officer of Primary Healthcare Centres at the Ministry of Health in Bahrain and the country's go-to expert for immunisation. She has formed a cornerstone of Bahrain’s testing strategy from the outset of the pandemic, leading a team that tests 2% of the nation's total population on a daily basis. Dr. Jaleela was involved in the establishment of 31 vaccination centres across the country. These centres, which she continues to run, have helped Bahrain see over 89.8% of its population vaccinated with at least one dose. Owing to her sustained hands-on approach, she continues to balance the day-to-day health needs of citizens and residents with evaluating the efficacy of the Kingdom of Bahrain’s national vaccination programme, as well as sharing knowledge with medics across the globe. Dr. Jaleela is part of the WHO’s Strategic Advisory Group of Experts on Immunisation.

Dr. Raine played a crucial part in setting up rolling reviews during the COVID-19 pandemic to ensure the UK was the first in the world to authorise the Pfizer/BioNTech and Oxford University/AstraZeneca vaccines. One of the key challenges in both the validation and development of new medical devices and software is having access to representative patient data, which cannot be freely or cheaply shared due to concerns for patient privacy. Using funding from the Regulators’ Pioneer Fund, Dr. Raine, as a part of the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency, aimed to address this challenge by developing a first-of-its-kind synthetic dataset that mimics real patient data with very high fidelity. This development will support bringing safe products to market sooner, enabling patients to benefit from the latest technical advances. Dr Raine’s work has helped improve patient safety and patient engagement and has helped establish the UK as a world-leading destination for life sciences and the development of new and cutting-edge innovation in medicines and medical devices.

Sidrotun’s collaboration with public, private, and academic institutions exemplifies the agility and adaptive approach necessary to co-produce new knowledge and practical recommendations for decision makers. She has been advocating for the importance of evidence-backed policies and providing high officials with advice and policy recommendations from a scientific perspective. She has exercised her leadership beyond her formal academic role to help advance an adaptive and agile agenda in the public arena. Her role has been instrumental as an affiliate from Indonesia who contributes to a pioneering study on the international COVID-19 response (CompCoRe): collaboratively conducted by 78 researchers from 23 countries led by Harvard and Cornell, to prepare ground-breaking policy formulation drawing upon different national experiences. She also takes part as a scientist, proactively educating the public on COVID-19 matters and demonstrates herself as a caring citizen who supports democratised and open knowledge. Her dedication in such work stems from her enduring concern about women leadership, food sustainability and health.

Barbara Helland is an Associate Director at the US Department of Energy and leads the initiative to develop and implement exascale computing, super-computing capabilities that will allow for breakthroughs in computer modelling and data analysis. During the US Government's COVID-19 response, Barbara led a team that brought industry, national labs, federal agencies and academic communities together to get the most advanced computing capabilities to the scientists at the frontline of the response.

Bilha Ndirangu is a tech leader and entrepreneur and has advised governments, NGOs and the private sector. She is the former CEO of Africa's Talking, one of Africa's major tech companies. She brings her entrepreneurial expertise to the African Leadership Academy, where she was recently appointed CEO. At the African Leadership Academy, Bilha works to support Africa's next generation of ethical leaders to address societal problems at their root cause.

As deputy head of Singapore's national space office, Chris Leck oversees space technology & industry development, strategy & policy, and international relations. He previously led future mobility efforts at the transport ministry, launching several initiatives to advance autonomous mobility and urban air mobility. Chris and his former colleagues in the transport domain have been trialling the application of autonomous vehicle technology, with the aim of bringing about transformational outcomes for cities like Singapore. In particular, by focusing on the deployment of the technology for public and shared transport and the logistics sector, they hope to improve the efficiency and sustainability of the larger mobility system. In his current role, Chris and his team are exploring how space technologies can be brought to bear on many of today’s pressing challenges, and are working to update Singapore’s domestic regime for space activities for the “New Space” era.

As a specialist in Digital Rights and Corporate Compliance, Jesús drives innovative approaches to digital rights and personal data protections. He has led several civic participation initiatives in Spain, including communication campaigns to foster public consultation on the draft for a Spanish Startup Law (2019) and on the European Commission's public consultation on EU Data Strategy.