Our People

• Paul Nankivell - Managing Director
  Paul is the chairman and managing director of PDP Australia. Paul has over 25 years international project experience, undertaking a wide range of economic development, public policy and regulatory reform projects. He combines a successful track record in economic policy strategy studies and public management reform with project management and implementation skills. Paul has been instrumental in leading public finance and civil and administrative reforms, and supporting the decentralisation process, with a particular focus on local government aspects. Fundamental to the pursuit of results-focused public management is his strong focus on change management and increasing technical capacities of counterpart staff.
  
  Between 2000 and 2004, Paul played a key role in the New South Wales State Government local government reform through his leadership as Mayor of Quirindi Council. He enhanced the management of the council using best value/best practice principles and local government leadership to transform the local government area to the fastest growing regional council in the state and to become a major beneficiary of local government reform.
  
  Paul has a Master of Economics from the University of New England (Australia) and a Bachelor of Agricultural Science from the University of Adelaide (Australia). He is a member of the Institute of Public Administration of Australia, the International Economics and Finance Society, Australian Business Economists, and the Australian Institute of Company Directors.
  

   

  
  
• Peter Nelson - Operations Director
  Peter is responsible for oversight of PDP’s operations from the companies Head Office in Sydney. He has expertise in a broad spectrum of development assistance, covering work in 51 countries on project management, policy analysis, business development, restructuring, public enterprise reform, SME development, financial management and governance.
  
  Peter has both private and public sector experience, running major companies as well as working with multilaterals (such as World Bank, ADB, UNDP and EU) and bilateral agencies (such as AusAID, Danida and JICA). He is a highly accomplished project manager and team leader, having played a leading role in the implementation and successful execution of a wide variety of projects, including as head of the EU’s largest project in China where he was founder and financier of the China-EU Chamber of Commerce. Prior to joining PDP’s Head Office, Peter worked with the company in a consulting capacity.
  
  Peter completed a BEc and MSc at Sydney University before studying higher qualifications as an Australian Fellow Chartered Accountant. He has also obtained a PhD (HC) from the London College of Applied Science for work on “Present day accounting” as well as studying Law at the University of London.
  

    

  
  
• Robin Boumphrey - Associate Director
  Robin is responsible for oversight of PDP’s operations in the Philippines and South East Asia region. He has exceptional expertise in the design and implementation of reform and institution building programs as well as extensive experience in the supervision of technical assistance and delivery of quality outcomes to meet client expectations. Robin’s skills and experience are demonstrated most prominently through his 30 years in senior strategic direction and management roles in the ADB.
  
  Robin has a Master of Arts in Economics from the Simon Fraser University (Canada) and a Bachelor of Arts (Hons) in Economics and Sociology from Durham University (UK). He maintains a professional affiliation with the Society for International Development and the International Society for Economics and Finance.
  
  

    

  
  
• Darrell Freund - Senior Finance and Governance Specialist
  Darrell has 15 years experience in the fields of financial and economic management, public management and administration, public sector reform, change management, capacity building and good governance arrangements for local, state and national governments in the United States, Pacific, Asia and sub-Saharan Africa. He has provided consulting services to multilaterals such as the World Bank and ADB and bilaterals like AusAID and DfID in 15 countries, and he has successfully served as team leader on a variety of projects. He is experienced in developing management and strategic improvement and development plans for various municipal, state and national governments and advising on the re-design and re-engineering of public financial, economic and human resource management. This has involved the provision of advice in relation to ministry functional and diagnostic reviews, budget formulation and implementation, budget execution processes and systems, human resource planning and design, and preparation of related manuals and implementation tools including training programs for intergovernmental financial management and municipal and local council financial management. He has provided financial and economic management reform advice in post-conflict and transitional countries including Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Solomon Islands, Mongolia and Bangladesh.
  
  Darrell has a Master of Public Administration from Columbia University (USA) and a Bachelor of Political Science from Pennsylvania State University (USA).
  
  

    

  
  
• Lesleigh Henning - Public Finance Specialist
  Les has over 25 years professional experience as a public finance specialist, with 10 years international consulting practice. He has provided high-level policy advice to both Australian and international governments in Asia, the Pacific, the Middle East and South Africa. Les has taken a lead advisory role in relation to public finance issues, particularly with regards to budgetary and public expenditure management policy and practices. His recent undertakings have focused on the review and recommendation of reforms in budget preparation, implementation, reporting and monitoring and the shift to performance-based program budgets, together with corresponding organisational changes. He has also undertaken a number of functional and expenditure reviews with the purpose of improving overall expenditure allocations and returns across all levels of government.
  
  Les was previously a senior executive in the Australian public service, working in the Queensland Office of the Cabinet, Queensland Treasury and Australian Department of Finance. He played a key role in the design and implementation of wide-ranging reforms, including comprehensive reform of the public financial management system with a focus on performance management, and imparted policy advice to Cabinet on industry and financial and budgetary issues. He also held responsibility for analysis and preparation of budgets for numerous state departments.
  
  Les holds a Master of Political Economy and a Bachelor of Economics from the University of Queensland (Australia).

    

  
  
• John Mellors - Public Management and Finance Specialist
  John is a public sector management and finance specialist with a distinguished record of over 30 years professional experience. He has worked at centre of government level in Australia, Asia, the Pacific, Africa, the Middle East and Europe with responsibility for organisation review and development, economic analysis and public expenditure management, governance arrangements for government business enterprises and statutory authorities, and commercialisation and contracting of government activities. He has extensive experience in the design and review of development projects in these areas.
  
  John has an honours degree in Economics and Accounting from the University of Bristol (UK) and is a member of the Economic Society of Australia. He has been awarded an Australian Centenary Medal for service to Australian society through public service leadership.

    

  
  
• Mary Venner - Public Financial Management Specialist
  Ms Mary Venner has over 20 years experience as a Public Financial Management Specialist and has led the delivery of public finance and economic reform programs across Asia. She has extensive experience both in the preparation of medium term expenditure frameworks (MTEF), and leading public expenditure reviews, particularly in the education sector.
  
  Ms Venner recently completed work on the World Bank’s Public Expenditure Review in Afghanistan, where she was responsible for preparing a chapter on expenditure policy and resourcing of the Education Sector. Previous to this, she worked as Budget Advisor to the Ministry of Education in Afghanistan, preparing the annual program based budget including development of medium term expenditure estimates for the education sector to support the National Education Strategic Plan. In the Philippines, Mary led a PDP team under PEGR’s Embedding and Consolidating Fiscal Management Reform. In this role, Mary supported the Philippines Department of Budget Management in the development and implementation of a methodology for cost estimates for Major Final Output (MFOs) in partnership with 20 national government departments, including the Department of Education.
  
  Ms Venner was based in Kosovo between 2000 and 2002 and worked on a variety of projects for the Ministry of Education, including preparing a Public Expenditure Review for the Education Sector on behalf of the World Bank. Ms Venner has 15 years experience with the Australian government focusing on policy development on a wide range of issues, including education. She also post graduate qualifications in Development Studies and Applied Economics.
  

    

  
  
• Paulette Quang - Senior Public Finance Specialist
  Paulette is a senior executive with over twenty years experience in the provision of public policy, budget and financial advice in Australia and the Asia-Pacific region.
  
  Paulette has provided technical assistance and advice on budget preparation through to implementation of corporate planning. This encompasses involvement in all aspects of the performance planning cycle and performance improvement processes within public sector agencies (central and line agencies), to ensure delivery of quality outputs and outcomes. She has acted as senior executive in two central agencies, the Departments of the Prime Minister and Cabinet and Finance and Administration, playing an important coordination role in the implementation of tax reforms and in the budget process, and undertaking financial performance monitoring and financial reviews of a large number of government agencies.
  
  Paulette has more than fifteen years of international experience conducting trade negotiations and managing institutional mechanisms, particularly with China, leading joint working groups on wool, iron and steel, non-ferrous metal and transport and communications. She has developed commercial relations with Hong Kong and Taiwan, and led many delegations from Australia to China as well as receiving and facilitating overseas delegations to Australia.
  
  As a key member of PDP’s corporate team, Paulette provides technical advice in relation to public finance management on a range of projects.
  
  Paulette holds a Bachelor of Economics from the University of Tasmania (Australia). She has also completed the Program for Senior Executives in Government at the Harvard John F Kennedy School of Government, as well as the Australian Government Executive Program.
  

    

  
  
• Dean Wallace - Senior Public Finance Specialist
  Dean is a highly accomplished public finance specialist, with over 40 years experience in the public sector, including in Asia, the Pacific and the Middle East. His work has covered all areas of public finance management, with a particular focus on budget analysis and policy. Dean has hands-on experience of budget formulation processes in many post-conflict and transitional countries, including Afghanistan and Iraq. He has provided advice on financial matters and contributed to financial management improvements at both the national and provincial level.
  
  Dean has Bachelor of Economics from the University of Adelaide (Australia) and is a Certified Practicing Accountant.

    

  
  
• William Harris - Civil Service Reform Specialist
  Bill is a public sector reform specialist with over 40 years experience in the Australian public service and in international assignments for the World Bank, AusAID and ADB, as well as governments in the Asia-Pacific region. Bill has worked as a leader or senior adviser on public sector reform projects in Indonesia, Solomon Islands, Nepal, Timor-Leste and Mongolia. These assignments have involved the provision of high-level mentoring and advisory assistance on matters including machinery of government and civil and public administration reform strategy and priority actions, establishment structure and budget-driven public administration reforms.
  
  Bill’s pre-eminent career work in the Australian public service included 23 years at a senior policy level during a period of repeated public sector reform. Bill oversaw the Office Structures Review, a comprehensive reform of the Australian public service, before becoming chief executive responsible for implementing self-government in the Australian Capital Territory, involving the development and implementation of the first ACT budget. For seven years thereafter, he acted as the main change agent for the ACT administration, with overall responsibility for public administration, budget and personnel reforms. His skills as an employment policies specialist are exemplified in his oversight of service-wide reorganisation of the Australian public service and advice imparted on employment policy and recruitment processes and practices.
  
  Bill has a Bachelor of Arts in Economics/Government from the University of Sydney (Australia).

    

  
  
• Natasha Papathanasiou - Public Policy Management Specialist
  Natasha is a staff consultant and senior member of PDP’s head office team. She is responsible for overseeing business development activities for PDP including writing and coordinating expressions of interest, technical proposals and project design documents. She also provides management, and monitoring and evaluation for a range of short and long-term projects across the Pacific, Asia, Europe, Middle East and Africa.
  
  Natasha has conducted a number of organizational reviews across Asia for government and regional bodies such as the ASEAN Secretariat. Natasha has also worked as a policy advisor for both state and federal government in Australia.
  
  Natasha has a Master of International Studies (With Merit) and a Bachelor of Arts (Government and Social Anthropology), from the University of Sydney, Australia.

    

  
  
• Pascal Rigaldies - Senior Project Manager
  Pascal has joined PDP Australia as Senior Project Manager at the beginning of 2011.
  
  He has over 15 years project management experience in the international development sector. While working in Asia, Africa and Latin America, he led teams, designed and implemented various international projects funded by the World Bank, AusAID, the European Commission and other bilateral donors. He also worked in senior advisory roles for governments in complex cross-cultural environments.
  
  Pascal has a Master of Business Administration.
  
  He is also responsible for ensuring the maintenance of the ISO 9001:2008 standards across PDP Australia operations.

    

  
  
• Lorena von Jonquières - International Project Manager
  Ms Lorena von Jonquières is a senior project manager with extensive experience in the international development industry. She has a Master in Project Management and a Master in Applied Economics, obtained after her Engineering Degree. A citizen of Paraguay, her international career took her to Brazil, Germany, Spain, and Australia, giving her deep understanding of cultural backgrounds and languages.
  
  Having worked at major European and Australian developing consulting companies, Ms von Jonquieres has implemented projects as a project and contract manager for the EU, the World Bank and Asian Development Bank in 5 continents. Her core areas of focus are Public Financial Management, Civil Service & Administration Reform and Economic Policy.

    

  
  
• Madeline Baker - Project Coordinator
  Madeline was educated at the University of New South Wales, studying in Social Science and Policy Making. In 2009 she completed a Masters of International Law and International Relations. Whilst studying, Madeline worked as the Assistant Editor for the Australian Journal of Human Rights.  
  
  At PDP Australia, Madeline acts as the Project Coordinator, assisting on project management in all spheres. She also works in the Business Development division, implementing country and donor research and delivering proposals.  
  
  Madeline is passionate about international development and engaging with other cultures.

    

  
  
• Margaret Yang - Accountant
  Jun (Margaret) Yang has over 20 years experience in the international import and export business and in the finance and accounting area. She qualified as an Electrical Engineer in China and was the branch General Manager of the state owned Electrical Import & Export Corp. (Head office in Beijing). While working for the corporation she developed business markets in many Asian countries and Australia before migrating to Australia in 1998.  
  
  Margaret has a Bachelor degree in Engineering from Tianjin University, China and has undertaken further education in international business and the finance area in both China and Australia.  She has been the accountant at PDP since 2008. Reporting to the Operations Director, she handles the General Ledger, Payroll, BAS report, end of year financial accounts and project accounts for the ADB projects and other clients.