Jonta Williams is an operations and program management leader with more than 15 years of experience across international development, strategic planning, and government service. As Director of Operations & Planning at What Works Cities, she leads the design and execution of systems that strengthen performance, planning, and collaboration as the initiative expands across the Americas.

Prior to joining WWC, Jonta served as a senior advisor with USAID in Ethiopia and Sierra Leone, where she provided operational support for multi-million-dollar development programs and guided programmatic transitions in complex environments. Under the Obama Administration, she served as Deputy Coordinator for USAID’s Africa Ebola Unit, helping to manage the U.S. government’s response and recovery strategy during the 2014 West Africa Ebola crisis. She also served as White House Liaison at the U.S. Department of Agriculture and as Director for Boards & Commissions in the Presidential Personnel Office at the White House.

Jonta began her career in information technology, spending a decade at IBM as a developer and project manager. She holds a B.A. in Mathematics from the University of Maryland Baltimore County and an M.S. in Industrial Engineering/Operations Research from Columbia University.