Who we are
Sarah Foxe
GCG Consortium · Member record
Australia
Tab 01 · Profile
Profile
Sarah Foxe is Director, EPMO & Strategy, Planning and Performance at the NSW Reconstruction Authority, with 20+ years' international development experience across 18 countries in the Pacific, South-East Asia, South Asia and Africa. She has lived and worked in-country in the Philippines and Timor-Leste, and led program design, monitoring and evaluation, and grants management at Baptist World Aid Australia, Opportunity International and the City of Sydney. She is a Winston Churchill Fellow and holds an MBA with Excellence from UNSW's AGSM.
At the NSW Reconstruction Authority (formerly Resilience NSW), Sarah has held two roles since February 2023. As Director Program Coordination and Evaluation she designed and coordinated disaster recovery programs with agencies and communities, built the organisation's first Monitoring & Evaluation team, and secured $100m in community recovery funding for the Central West region through NSW Treasury and the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA). As Director EPMO & Strategy, Planning and Performance, since February 2024, she has created the NSW RA's first Strategic Framework through a participatory approach engaging 20+ government and partner agencies, now approved by the Advisory Board; managed the rapid transfer of $400M in community grants programs in six weeks, coordinating eight teams through legal, data and financial complexities; and redesigned how programs are governed and approved.
Sarah previously spent close to a decade at the City of Sydney, where as Head of Program Management Office she led governance across 350+ capital, corporate and strategic projects worth $300M a year, introducing the organisation's first Power BI dashboard and conducting a human-centred design governance review with 70+ stakeholders. As Head of Grants & Sponsorship she managed a $16M+ grants program across 500 partnerships, ran the City's first comprehensive policy review using program logic methodology with 60 stakeholders, developed its first Evaluation and Learning Framework, and implemented the Smarty Grants system, processing 1,700+ applications a year.
Earlier in her career, Sarah managed international development partnerships and programs at Baptist World Aid Australia across the Pacific, South-East Asia, South Asia and Africa, overseeing a team responsible for 40 partnerships and 62 projects, establishing the organisation's first Disaster Management Partnership, and building the evaluation systems used to measure program results. As South Asia Program Coordinator she managed partnerships across India, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh, strengthening local NGO capacity and coordinating DFAT-funded development initiatives. Before that, as Social Impact Consultant for Opportunity International in the Philippines and East Timor, she established the first client impact monitoring system for one of the Philippines' largest microfinance providers, tracking outcomes for more than 200,000 clients, and developed training to scale the Client Impact Assessment methodology across Opportunity International's network of partners in 18 countries.
Sarah holds a Master of Business Administration with Excellence from UNSW Business School (AGSM), a Master of Social Development with Distinction from UNSW, and a Bachelor of Business and Bachelor of Arts with Distinction from UTS. She is a 2026 Winston Churchill Fellow, researching leadership approaches for the transition from emergency response to sustained, complex disaster recovery, and a graduate of the NSW Leadership Academy's Executive Excellence Program (2025). She serves as an Advisory Board Member for the School of Project Management at the University of Sydney, and has previously served as a Non-Executive Board Member for The EVE Project and for The Salvation Army's international development programs.
Tab 02 · Areas of expertise
Areas of expertise
- International development 20+ years' experience across 18 countries in the Pacific, South-East Asia, South Asia and Africa; lived and worked in-country in the Philippines and Timor-Leste.
- Program design & delivery Designed and delivered programs at the NSW Reconstruction Authority, Baptist World Aid Australia and Opportunity International, including the NSW RA's first Strategic Framework and Baptist World Aid's first Disaster Management Partnership.
- Monitoring, evaluation, accountability & learning (MEAL) Built the NSW Reconstruction Authority's first Monitoring & Evaluation team, established evaluation systems at Baptist World Aid Australia, and created the first client impact monitoring system for a major Philippines microfinance provider, tracking outcomes for 200,000+ clients.
- Program governance & assurance Led governance across 350+ capital, corporate and strategic projects as Head of PMO at the City of Sydney, and redesigned program governance and approval processes as Director EPMO & Strategy at the NSW Reconstruction Authority.
- Grants & funding management Coordinated the rapid transfer of $400M in community grants programs at the NSW Reconstruction Authority, managed a $16M+ grants program across 500 partnerships at the City of Sydney, and secured $100m in recovery funding through NSW Treasury and NEMA.
- Strategic partnerships & stakeholder engagement Managed 40 partnerships and 62 projects at Baptist World Aid Australia, engaged 20+ government and partner agencies on the NSW RA Strategic Framework, and ran a human-centred design governance review with 70+ stakeholders at the City of Sydney.
Tab 03 · Consortium delivery