Annette Brown, Ph.D. is an economist and organizational leader with more than 25 years of experience in the field of international development, including multiple positions at executive and senior management levels. Her research and program experience spans most development sectors, including economic growth, democracy and governance, and global health. Brown has worked in more than thirty countries and advised government policy makers in all regions of the world. She has been a director on two non-profit boards and member of international advisory groups.

She was most recently the Chief Strategy and Evidence Officer at FHI 360 and a member of the executive team. She led the Strategy, Innovation, and Evidence Office, which had responsibility for company-level functions including strategy development and realization of FHI 360's strategic ambition, innovation structures and programs, corporate measurement for impact and performance, organizational evaluation, and evidence review and use. Earlier Brown served as FHI 360's Principal Economist. She was also the founder and Editor-in-Chief for the R&E Search for Evidence blog. During this time, she also taught as a Lecturer at the University of Chicago's Harris School of Public Policy.

Prior to joining FHI 360, Brown established and headed the Washington, DC office of the International Initiative for Impact Evaluation (3ie) and served on 3ie's executive team. Earlier in her career, she served as a Director at Chemonics International and as the Center Director for International Activities at the Urban Institute. She was an Assistant Professor of Economics at Western Michigan University, and she has held research positions at the World Bank and the Stockholm Institute of Transition Economics. Her publications include dozens of journal articles, book chapters, and public reports, and she is an accomplished public speaker, including as a video series host, invited panelist and lecturer, and conference and seminar presenter. She earned her Ph.D. in economics and Master's in Russian and East European Studies from the University of Michigan where she was a National Science Foundation Fellow.