Gayane Mkrtchyan
CSO Depo Expert
Biography
A committed development professional with twenty years of experience in developing and implementing strategies for socially excluded groups, such as rural women and youth, migrant families, young people living in combated areas for reducing poverty and apathy among vulnerable people. Extensive experience in the area grant and program management. Good knowledge of agriculture, agribusiness and rural development problems and strategies. Important aspects of work include developing democratic strategies for local civil society capacity building, conflict transformation and development, volunteer and informal education, social justice through community work, citizen journalism, tolerance and antidiscrimination methodologies incorporated into youth work.
Distinguished skills in designing and managing large-scale grants programs, such as Civil Society Organizations Development Program, Resource Centers for Community Development and Migration and Returnee Resource Centers, YouthBank and other programs. The Program Management work includes the coordination of the complete program cycle, from design, planning, budgeting, to implementation steps, such as development of Request for Proposals, Selection procedures and committees, transparent and comprehensive decision making processes, pre-award due diligence, grant monitoring (for programmatic and financial aspects) combined with mentoring to enhance the impact of projects. Familiar with numerous Grants Management electronic systems. Good skills in developing reports, case-studies, and presentations, which focus on the impact and the change produced through strategies.
For more than ten years, an active member of FAO’s Regional Office for Europe’s Working Party on Women and the Family in Rural Development program. As part of which, has taken many trainings on how to incorporate gender empowerment policies into existing development programs, such as women and microcredit, women and natural resource management, women and politics, women and community development, etc. Helped to edit the Russian translation of the Socio Economic and Gender Analysis handbook and develop case studies from the region.
Board Member of YouthBank International Networks (currently forming a strategy) which includes membership from 22 countries. Effective co-worker in multi-partner and multi-cultural settings, sensitive to diverse opinions, cultures and approaches. Experience working with large donor funding to small funds, maintains effectiveness in service implementation and reporting. Strong public speaker. Other strengths include a design and management of tolerance building strategies with focus on public diplomacy as a conflict transformation methodology.
You can find Gayane Mkrtchyan's online video courses here (in Armenian):
Capacity Building and Organizational Development Experience
• Grant and program management
• Rural development
• Volunteer and informal education
• Conflict transformation and development
• Tolerance and antidiscrimination
Previous Clients
• Eurasia Partnership Foundation
• United States Department of Agriculture