Kyle Potaniec

International Program Specialist @USDA Foreign Agricultural Service (FAS)

Washington, DC, US

Analyst for the Food for Progress international food assistance development program. Responsibilities-Manage and conduct administrative, financial, strategic, and monitoring oversight for complex multi-year projects across a $100M portfolio -Collaborate and liaise with foreign governments, implementing partners, international organizations, universities, private sector stakeholders, and civil society -Serve as a technical expert across multiple countries, value chains, and technical themes for international development projects largely focused on climate-smart agriculture-Provide briefings on technical portfolio and programming to US and foreign government officials-Analyze a multitude of qualitative and quantitative metrics to identify priority countries for future program operations including regular rapid assessments to get up to speed on the country context-Design ~$20M country specific projects based on intensive research and field investigation to address root issues in agricultural systems-Lead author of the annual $200M program Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO) including many large overhauls and small tweaks to create a better procurement process-Serve an integral role in all strategic planning conversations to better position the program for future internal and external growth -Acted as a writer and the final editor on all country program guidance documents to \"one-voice\" a team of 10 writers and clarify messaging for concision and intentionality -Managed long-term program learning agenda revision to evolve monitoring and evaluation questions and programmatic design -Overhauled communications materials for improved marketing and efficiency in responding to internal government inquiries and congressional reporting -Write briefing memos for principals while coordinating input from multiple agency offices

Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS)

Master of Arts (M.A.), International Affairs

Austin College

Bachelor of Arts (B.A.), Political Science