Think. Do. Write.

Resume

Education

PhD
Political Economy of Development

 

Massachusetts Institute of Technology, February 2019

Fields of Practice: Political Economy of International Development, Governance and Finance of Infrastructure

Dissertation: Delivering Urban Projects: Contracting, voice, and anti-corruption in infrastructure

 

MCP (City Planning) &
MS Transportation Engineering

 

University of California at Berkeley, December 2008

Professional Report prepared for The Energy Foundation: Endure or Perish: Cycling Trends in the Face of BRT, A Case Study of Jinan, Shandong Province, PRC

 

SB Civil Engineering

 

Massachusetts Institute of Technology, June 2006

International Honors Program, Cities in the 21st Century Comparative Study Abroad, December 2005

Professional Experience

 

Sr. Advisor, Special Projects & Initiatives - Office of the President, June 2022-Present, New York, NY

  • Support the development and execution of NYCT's Strategic Operating Plan: Faster, Cleaner, Safer

  • Lead four cross-departmental working groups in the development of strategies to improve bus customer experience

  • Provide strategic advice on behavioral change; fare evasion, strategies, and payment (OMNY); employee engagement; market research; communication with customers; and additional topics of importance to the President

 

Ambassador, March 2021-June 2022, New York, NY

  • Primary writer of Untangling Conflict: An introspective guide for families in business (Penguin Random House India, July 2022), #1 on the Amazon India Business Bestseller list in October 2022. The book addresses governance forums for conflict prevention and resolution, articulation of "soft" (informal) rules and "hard" rules of business ownership, and family relationships with professional employees and partners

  • Supported CEO advisory for the leader of a large Indian conglomerate

 

Project Leader, December 2022-June 2022, New York, NY

  • Managed the global marketing campaign and team of 13 contributors for "Untangling Conflict: An introspective guide for families in business" (Penguin Random House, India, July 2022)

  • Conducted workshops for families in business on governance and conflict prevention

  • Led team in the development of training materials for newly elected government officials and their teams

Consultant, July 2019-November 2022, New York, NY

  • Supported a state government’s management of COVID-19 vaccine administration

  • Developed a 10-year strategy to improve educational outcomes in rural America for an international non-profit

  • Supported a state government’s COVID-19 response, including forecasting federal funding, assessing enablers for economic reopening, and developing a statewide emergency procurement strategy and cross-functional procedures

  • Diagnosed key areas for streamlining portfolio, category, and supplier management of a state’s $25B annual procurement spend

  • Analyzed implications of innovative gene therapy contracts on distribution models for a large biopharma company

  • Analyzed opportunities for cost reduction and streamlining of organizational design for a leading med tech company and an international NGO

 
 

Advisor to the Secretary, March 2017-April 2018, Bogotá, Colombia

  • Headed an interdisciplinary team of 180+ members from 18 government agencies in stakeholder engagement, recovery of public space, and implementation of priority bus lanes for an 11 km corridor, benefiting 386,000 passengers per day

  • Produced public message content, coordinated traffic/transit study approval, and oversaw infrastructure design for seven new “trunk lines” for the TransMilenio BRT system, which will serve over 1.5 million passengers daily

  • Represented the Secretary of Mobility in congressional “political control” project hearing for TransMilenio BRT infrastructure

    *Contrato de prestación de servicios con papel de trabajo de asesor

 
 

Project Leader and Senior Consultant, February 2009-May 2013, São Paulo, Brazil

  • Executed a $1.2M USD Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) master-planning project (institutional design, finance, infrastructure, and operations) in Asunción, Paraguay and managed a 35+ member multinational consulting team

  • Directed an interdisciplinary team in the preparation of a $200 million USD Public Private Partnership contract (design, build, finance, operate, and maintain) for the Macrobús BRT system in Guadalajara, Mexico

  • Trained public sector transportation leaders in transit system management and developed and implemented a performance monitoring system for the Macrobús BRT system

  • Supervised demand modeling, operational analysis, and design teams in Buenos Aires, Argentina; Vitória, Brazil; and Pachuca, Mexico

  • Authored commercial proposals for projects financed by the World Bank, IABD, EBP (Brazil), and state governments (Mexico, Brazil)

World Resources Institute
(formerly EMBARQ/
CTS Mexico)

 

Mobility and Urban Development Visiting Researcher, May-August 2008, Mexico City, Mexico

  • Developed Transit Oriented Development (TOD) indicators monitoring and evaluating TOD sites in Mexico City and co-authored a TOD “How To” Manual

  • Directed the data collection and analysis of land use, urban environment quality, and travel surveys for five areas in Mexico City

 
 

Mobility and Urban Development Visiting Researcher, May-August 2006, Washington D.C.

  • Devised macro-level indicators for monitoring and evaluating the urban pedestrian environment

  • Presented a global data collection proposal to Bank staff

 
 

Facilities Intern, May-August 2005, Chicago IL

  • Authored the CTA “Bus Facilities Handbook,” a design manual for bus infrastructure

  • Proposed a contraflow busway conceptual design to CTA executives

 

Structural Engineering & Transportation Intern, May-August 2004, New York, NY

  • Conducted structural load “take-downs” for the Fulton Street Transit Center, opened in 2014

  • Created a linear referencing system for Lower Manhattan street infrastructure

 
 

Civil Engineering Intern, May-August 2003, Araxá, Brazil

  • Inspected ongoing construction of a nickel niobium refining plant

 

Research & Instruction Experience

 

Ethnographer, September 2016-January 2019, Bogotá, Colombia

  • Conducted inductive, ethnographic research in Bogotá, Colombia on infrastructure implementation, with a concentration on multi-stakeholder organizational coordination and informal norms, public sector contracting, social management of project stakeholders, and effects of anti-corruption measures on organizational behavior and project outcomes

  • Interviewed and used qualitative analytical tools to unpack the perspectives of over 30 infrastructure stakeholders

 
 

Instructor and Researcher, September 2013-May 2015, September 2015-August 2016, Cambridge, MA

  • Created and taught a new undergraduate seminar and internship program focused on technologies intended to solve problems of basic needs in developing countries. Received a 7.0 of maximum possible 7.0 instructor rating on student course evaluation

  • Developed curriculum and co-produced an edX course (Massive Open Online Course – MOOC) based on CITE’s experience with technology evaluation and contributions to the USAID Higher Education Solutions Network

  • Synthesized experimental, multi-disciplinary product evaluation methodologies into a comprehensive evaluation framework

  • Implemented a data sharing platform for the five-department research team

  • Authored CITE thought leadership blog article on ethics in development engineering

  • Drafted a proposal for a new interdisciplinary undergraduate minor focused on technologies for use in the developing world

 

Graduate Student Tutor, August 2015-January 2017, Cambridge, MA

  • Mentored undergraduate women, with direct responsibility for the well-being of 25 students per semester

  • Developed community within McCormick Hall through hosting small gatherings and organizing house-wide events

  • Supported students through referrals to campus resources (e.g. student support services, medical and mental health providers), mediating conflict, and responding to personal and campus-wide emergencies

 
 

Graduate Researcher, January 2007-December 2008, Berkeley, CA / Jinan, PRC

  • Designed data collection protocol for three city-wide transportation studies and co-organized a survey program, including managing 120 students from Shandong University in Jinan, PRC

  • Analyzed bicycle and e-bike travel patterns through origin-destination matrix construction and statistical measures

  • Advocated for the continued development of bicycle-friendly infrastructure alongside new BRT systems, based on primary data collection and analysis, with government officials from Shandong Province

  • Advised government officials on how to implement Transit-Oriented Development in Jinan, PRC

 
 

Graduate Researcher, August 2006-December 2006, Berkeley, CA

  • Defined quantitative and qualitative indicators to produce a Transit-Oriented Development (TOD) benchmarking “How-to Guide” for the U.S. Federal Transit Administration

 

Selected Presentations & Publications

“Drivers of Infrastructure Project Outcomes: Governance and Institutional Elements of Transportation Sector Projects in Bogotá, Colombia”

Engineering Project Organization Conference, 2016
Transportation Research Board Annual Meeting and Engineering, 2017

 

“Cycling Trends and Fate in the Face of BRT: Case Study of Jinan, Shandong Province, People’s Republic of China”

Transportation Research Record, Journal of the Transportation Research Board No. 2139, 2010

“Critical Infrastructure Continuity: Survivors in the volatile Mexican context”

American Association of Geographers Annual Meeting, 2015
American Collegiate Schools of Planning Annual Conference, 2015

 

“Manual de Desarrollo Orientado a Transporte Sustentable”
(Transit Oriented Development Manual)

Centro de Transporte Sustentable Mexico (now WRI), 2009

“Five Common Problems with Human Resources for New Mobility”

Latin American Association of Integrated Systems and BRT Conference, 2014

 

“Walk Urban: Demand, constraints, and measurement of the urban pedestrian environment”

With Peter Roberts. The World Bank Group Transport Papers: Transport Sector Board TP-18, 2008

“Novel Course Development”

USAID Higher Education Solutions Network TechCon, 2014

 

“Scaling Down to Lift Up: Financing Urban Walking Infrastructure”

CODATU Conference Proceedings, 2008

Academic Honors

 

Graduate

  • U.S. Department of Transportation Eisenhower Fellowship (5 years)

  • Engineering Project Organization Conference Ph.D. Best Poster Award

  • Women’s Transportation Seminar Ann Hershfang Scholarship and Helene M. Overly Scholarships

  • MIT International Science & Technology Initiative - Mexico Grantee

  • Eno Leadership Fellow

  • U.C. Berkeley William V. Power Award

Undergraduate

  • MIT Tau Beta Pi and Chi Epsilon Engineering Honor Societies

  • Society of Women Engineers Student Leadership Award

  • General Electric Women’s Network Scholarship

  • Robert Byrd Scholarship

Skills

Professional Certifications

AICP Certified Planner
Engineer-In-Training (NEECS)
BCG Business Essentials
MIT Teaching Certificate
America Speaks Meeting Facilitator
IP3 PPP Skills & Competency Development

Computer

Alteryx, NVivo, Scrivener, TransCAD, Arc Map/GIS, Microsoft Office

Languages

English
Spanish
Portuguese (Brazilian)

International Work Experience

Mexico, Brazil, Colombia, China, Paraguay, Argentina, Peru, Thailand