Katra Sambili is an international development expert with sixteen years multi-sectoral experience in public policy, leadership development, institution building and strategic communications. She currently serves as the Special Assistant to the Chief Executive Officer of the African Union Development Agency-NEPAD (AUDA-NEPAD). In 2021 she founded My Early Bird Africa – a Parent Partner organization that advocates for the integration of Family-Centered Care as a critical intervention in the advancement of neonatal health in Africa. For this work Ms. Sambili was recognized among Kenya’s Top 40 under 40 Women. For two and a half years, Ms. Sambili held the position of Senior Director in the Executive Office of His Excellency President Kenyatta and contributed to the successful delivery of strategic national projects in collaboration with multi-disciplinary teams in Government, Private and Development sectors. Prior to this, her immediate assignment was as an Adaptive Leadership Coach for Harvard Kennedy School Executive Education on its Transforming Leadership for 21st Century Africa.
Over the past one and a half decades she has worked with various funds and programs of the United Nations including UN Women, UNDP and UNICEF. In 2008 she worked with the Kofi-Annan led African Union – Panel of Eminent African Personalities (AU-PEAP) which mediated the 2007-2008 Post Election Crisis and restored peace in Kenya. In 2009 Ms. Sambili was one of two Africans selected to join the inaugural International Youth Corps of the prestigious “Realizing The Dream” Foundation established by Martin Luther King III in honor of his father’s vision- “I Have A Dream”. The following year, while serving at the UN Millennium Campaign, Ms. Sambili effectively designed and implemented communication strategies for 17 Sub-Saharan African Countries leveraging the 2010 FIFA World Cup being held in Africa for the first time. In 2016 Ms. Sambili served as a Legacy and Communications Consultant in the Executive Office of the Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon at the United Nations headquarters in New York.
Ms. Sambili has extensive public sector experience having served as the founding Head of Secretariat of Kenya’s National Council on the Administration of Justice (NCAJ) and worked to transform Kenya’s justice sector in other capacities between 2011 and 2015. She is an Edward S. Mason Fellow and Master of Public Administration graduate of Harvard Kennedy School of Government and also holds a Master of Science in International Development from the School of Public Policy in University of Birmingham, UK and a Bachelor of Arts Degree in International Relations from United States International University-Africa.