Kevin Covert is Director of Strategic and Performance Planning at the U.S. Department of State, where he has served since January 2005. He coordinates a wide range of planning initiatives with USAID and the Office of the Director of U.S. Foreign Assistance and supervises the Department’s budget and performance integration activities. He received a Superior Honor Award in 2006 for establishing a community of practice in performance management and improving joint performance planning with USAID.

Prior to joining the Government, he worked for 13 years as an international development consultant on U.S. foreign assistance programs to promote economic growth in Central Europe, the former Soviet Union and the Middle East, including long-term field assignments in Moscow, Kyiv, and Cairo.  He managed projects to restructure and privatize state-owned companies in Ukraine, market and sell state-owned assets to private investors in Egypt, provide economic policy advice to the Government of Serbia, strengthen sustainable microfinance institutions in Georgia, promote public awareness of the causes of forest fires in the Russian Far East, and improve the competitiveness of small businesses in Kosovo.

Mr. Covert is an adjunct faculty member at the Foreign Service Institute, a certified Project Management Professional, and a member of the Board of Directors of the Society for International Development. He has a Master’s degree from Georgetown University and a B.A. from Cornell University. He speaks Russian, Ukrainian and French and lives in Maryland with his wife Lesya and sons Timothy and Daniel.