Our Team

Kate Burnett

CEO & Client Success Lead

Kate Burnett is the CEO of Locally Led™ and heads up business operations and the Client Success team.  As a seasoned, international development professional with a professional services background, she thrives amidst diversity and in growth environments. Kate, a dual national, services clients in both the USA and Sub-Saharan Africa, splitting her time & efforts between these 2 continents. Kate is an admitted attorney in the State of Florida, the District of Columbia & U.S. Southern Federal District and has been practicing for 26 years. She’s also certified by UC Berkley Law School in sustainable capitalism & ESG related laws – a rapidly evolving & hugely relevant area of interest for both for-profit and non-profit sectors.

Prior to joining Locally Led™, Kate set up, managed & successfully led the first in-house global Legal function at Population Services International, a USA-based international NGO and social enterprise network with operations in 45 countries. Prior to that she built, grew & led the first in-house Legal, Contract & Compliance function at BroadReach Healthcare, a global healthcare technology, data analytics & international development organization – based in South Africa & Washington, DC, USA. Before moving into the international development sector, Kate honed her in-house legal operations skills in the commercial sector, serving as the first in-house Legal & Contracts Manager at Engel & Völkers, USA (Florida & California), the leading European luxury real-estate franchise group; she successful supported the company’s first and difficult franchise break-through & expansion into the USA market.   Before her in-house legal career, Kate spent 10 years in private practice at law firms in Florida, USA, focusing on corporate commercial, property, insurance, class actions, toxic torts & products liability matters.  And she began her legal career in the international arena providing in-house contracting expertise to large independent power producers in Hong Kong & Indonesia.

Kate hails from London, grew up in Bahrain & Hong Kong, studied in South Africa and the USA & considers herself a true global citizen. She’s an avid Springbok rugby fan & loves to keep aligned by practising yoga!

Diane Ritson

Head of Learning and Marketplace for Locally Led™

Diane Ritson is the Head of Learning and Marketplace for Locally Led™. Diane is a seasoned entrepreneur and businesswomen with a degree in industrial psychology, who started her career in 1981 in the field of Human Resources Management.  She spent 18 years with ISCOR – a large, Sub-Saharan Africa mining and manufacturing organisation, leading the full HR Management function and holding the role of HR Director for ISCOR’s 10 African subsidiaries. Diane went on to obtain an advanced diploma in HR Strategy from the University of Cape Town’s business school, was promoted to HR Strategist and led the organization’s design and implementation of large-scale, HR strategies.

In the 1990’s during the emergence of the HIV-AIDS epidemic, Diane became a passionate champion and thought-leader for innovative HIV and AIDS management strategies in the African workplace.  She started her own company, honed her strategic skills and developed one of the first successful approaches for HIV and AIDS response for businesses in South Africa. Her company’s “know your status” campaigns were hugely successful and adopted by large multi-nationals across the African continent. Diane spoke publicly about the importance of HIV and AIDS awareness and management techniques at numerous seminars, on mulita-media channels and also lectured on the topic at the University of Cape Town’s business school.

In 2010 Diane transitioned from her corporate career to the not-for-profit sector. She took a leadership role with a South African NGO developing a community engagement process/social compact for the South African Department of Health in the Eastern Cape Province. Whilst in this role, the era of corporate social investment/responsibility unfolded and Diane was struck by the need for more strategic and sustainable approaches to donor-funded projects. Rising to the challenge, Diane assisted many other African NGO’s to re-position themselves for longer-term Strategic Corporate Social Investment opportunities. Diane later took on the role of interim Foundation Manager overseeing South Africa’s Old Mutual Foundation’s nation-wide charitable investments and currently consults with both African NGO’s and Foundations on strategy and sustainability.

Yvonne Habulembe

Partner

Yvonne Habulembe, MBA; BBA with over 23 years’ experience in the international development sector. Specifically, over 18 years with USAID and 4 years with an international non-governmental organisation; a local non-governmental organisation and consulting work.  Ms. Habulembe is a strong business development professional and an experienced Specialist in contracting and grants fields; procurement, internal controls, cost share set up and monitoring, negotiation, analytical skills, government and technical assistance. Her expertise includes new business bid reviews and proposal development, interpreting donor rules and regulations and primary point of contact for contractual discussions and negotiations with donors/partners.  Expertise in local capacity building of local partners.  Ms Habulembe’s expertise ranges with working in South Africa, Lesotho, Swaziland, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Namibia, Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania