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Contact the Global Partnership Initiative

Contact the Global Partnership Initiative
Email: Partnerships@State.gov
Phone:
(202) 647-2200
Fax:
(202) 647-7631


Mail:
Global Partnership Initiative
Harry S Truman Building, US Department of State
2201 C Street NW Suite 6817
Washington, DC 20520


Kris M. Balderston
Deputy Special Representative for Global Partnerships
BalderstonKM@state.gov

Kris Balderston serves as the Managing Director of the Global Partnership Initiative and the Deputy Special Representative for Global Partnerships in the Office of the Secretary of State. Prior to his role at the U.S. Department of State, Kris was Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton’s first Legislative Director in January 2001 before serving as her Deputy Chief of Staff from 2002 to 2009.

Kris began his career with the National Governors' Association and then ran the Massachusetts State Office for Governor Michael Dukakis from 1987-1991. He became Senior Policy Advisor to Majority Leader George Mitchell at the US Senate Democratic Policy Committee from 1991 to 1993. From 1993 to 1995, he served as the Deputy Chief of Staff at the U.S. Department of Labor under Secretary of Labor Robert Reich. Kris served in the White House from 1995 to 2001, as Special Assistant for Cabinet Affairs to President William Jefferson Clinton and then later as the Deputy Assistant to the President and the Deputy Secretary to the Cabinet.

Kris holds his BA in Political Science from LeMoyne College and his MA in Government from Georgetown University.


Gloria Cabe
Senior Advisor
CabeGC@state.gov

Gloria Cabe serves as Senior Advisor at the Global Partnership Initiative in the Office of the Secretary of State, focusing on democratic governance and human rights issues. Prior to this role, she worked at James Lee Witt Associates, a crisis and emergency management consulting firm, where she provided guidance and support for several of the firm’s clients as Managing Director of International affairs in numerous countries including the Maldives, Budapest, Albania, Greece, Trinidad, Tobago, and tsunami affected countries in south and southeast Asia. Under her management, the International Practice grew significantly, with the practice opening an office in Beijing, China, in 2008 and entering into many partnership agreements around the world, from Australia, to Norway to Greece.

Prior to joining James Lee Witt Associates, Gloria's previous private sector experience included serving as President of Emerging Market Strategies, Vice President and COO of the Corporate Council on Africa, and Vice President of The Ridley Group, all based in Washington, D.C. Gloria has over 20 years experience in public service as a senior advisor to the highest level executives at the state, federal and international levels of government, including as Counselor to the Chairman and Board of Directors of the Export-Import Bank of the United States. While serving 10 years as a member of the House of Representatives in the Arkansas State Legislature, Gloria provided leadership in many areas and served as Floor Whip for Governor Bill Clinton; and in 1991, Gloria became the Chief of Staff for Governor Clinton, where she shepherded the most successful legislative program in the Governor's 13 year tenure.


Anna A. Farber
Global Partnerships Liaison
Presidential Management Fellow

Anna A. Farber is a 2009 Presidential Management Fellow with the Global Partnership Initiative, focusing on energy security and global climate change issues. She formerly worked for the investment bank Morgan Stanley in New York and London where she managed a global citizenship education program for the Morgan Stanley International Foundation in partnership with UNICEF. Anna has previously worked at the Department of State in the office of the Under Secretary for Arms Control and International Security. She completed her Master of Arts in Law and Diplomacy from the Fletcher School at Tufts University, with a focus on international security and natural resource/environmental policy.

Andrea Görög
Special Assistant to Ambassador Bagley
GorogA@state.gov


Ben Gupta
Global Partnerships Program Coordinator
GuptaBK@state.gov
Benjamin serves as a Program Coordinator in the Office of the Secretary of State’s Global Partnership Initiative, focusing on the Department’s efforts for the Shanghai Expo. He has previously served as a legal assistant to the international database company InfoGroup Inc. at their legal office in Washington, DC. In 2007, Benjamin served as a staff assistant to Congressman Rahm Emanuel. He is a cum laude graduate of Boston University where he received his honors in economics. Benjamin is currently a pursuing his Juris Doctorate and Masters in Business Administration at George Washington University.



Robert R. Haynie
Global Partnerships Liaison
HaynieRR@state.gov

Robert Haynie is a Senior Consultant with Booz Allen Hamilton's Diplomacy and International Development practice. He is on a full-time assignment with the U.S. Department of State's Global Partnership Initiative, focusing on global health issues and managing the Department’s database of public-private partnerships. Robert has experience with the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) working within the Global Development Alliance office building public-private alliances and implementing economic growth projects in Serbia. He also lived in Jordan for a year under USAID's Emerging Markets Development Advisors Program focused on small business promotion. Robert graduated from Georgetown University's MBA program and obtained an honors certificate in International Business Diplomacy from the School of Foreign Service. Prior to graduate school, Robert lived in China for three years working with Microsoft Corporation focusing on regional support services and process integration.





Robert Tice Lalka
Global Partnerships Liaison
Presidential Management Fellow
LalkaRT@state.gov
Robert Tice Lalka serves as Global Partnerships Liaison for the Global Partnership Initiative in the Office of the Secretary of State, focusing on partnership initiatives with faith-based communities, entrepreneurship and economic development, and promoting educational opportunity, as outlined in the President’s A New Beginning speech in Cairo. He previously worked at the United Nations' Geneva office; the World Bank's headquarters in Washington, D.C., and AmeriCorps in New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina. He is a cum laude graduate of Yale University, where he received honors in both English and history, and he holds his master's degree with a concentration in global public policy from Duke University.


G. Kevin Saba
Regional Director
SabaGK@state.gov

Kevin Saba serves as Regional Director for Global Partnerships, focusing on economic recovery and growth issues. He has over 20 years of private sector experience serving in various leadership capacities as well as having gained experience in start-ups, and "turnarounds" of ongoing concerns. His most recent experience in the private sector included service as President of Managed Care USA and President of Nations' Care, a subsidiary of the Orion Capital Companies. Kevin's public private partnering experience includes being recruited by the State of Connecticut to create and implement a strategic plan to reduce a $7 billion unfunded liability that had accumulated over the period of 1945 through 1995. Approximately two years later, the liability had been reduced to less than $1 billion and a plan was in place to finance and administer the remaining unfunded liability. The initiative was recognized by a Connecticut think tank as the "most significant government success in 20 years."

Kevin joined the Department of State in 2002 and was involved in the start-up of the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC). He then joined the MCC as its first Managing Director of Threshold Country Programs and served for approximately two years in this capacity, successfully overseeing the start-up of a number of threshold programs. Kevin was accredited in June 2008 by the Overseas Development Institute (United Kingdom's leading think tank on international development) and the International Business Leaders Forum (internationally recognized leader in cross-sector partnerships) as a professional broker of multi-sector partnerships. In addition to his public and private service he has enjoyed teaching college courses in business and has a Masters Degree in Business Administration from the University of Hartford.


Jim Thompson
Regional Director
ThompsonJF2@state.gov

Jim Thompson serves as Regional Director for Global Partnerships, focusing on food security and water security issues. Jim served as the Acting Director of the U.S. Department of State’s Global Partnership Center and is the former Acting Director of the U.S. Agency for International Development's (USAID's) Global Development Alliance, which is the Agency's business model for the replicable use of public-private alliances. He was responsible for overall management and strategy of the activity and managed major corporate partner relationships for the Agency. Jim has over 17 years of Government experience, previously serving at USAID as a Food for Peace Officer and a Program Officer in the Europe and Eurasia bureau. He also was a Contracting Officer at USAID and at the U.S. Department of Energy and has used his acquisition and assistance experience to create new public-private partnership models.

Jim has taught management courses throughout Africa, Latin America and Europe for the USAID, and he was also responsible for developing the alliance builder training program delivered by GDA both in Washington and at USAID missions globally. Jim is a frequent speaker on public-private partnerships and practitioner building numerous alliances. Jim was a Rotary Ambassadorial scholar to New Zealand in 1990 and completed his Master of Arts in Political Studies at the University of Auckland, New Zealand.

"I think it's a real opportunity for us if we can figure how best to better coordinate and facilitate the private sector and the not-for-profit and religious community of the United States on behalf of humanitarian and commercial efforts." 
- Secretary of State Hillary Clinton