Tilen started his career at one of the “Big4” companies, working on a broad range of tax services, including tax due diligences in M&As. He later became head of corporate taxation at a Slovene consulting firm where he expanded the business to high-end tax advisory, financial, and accounting services. He was elected to the Slovene National Assembly in 2014 where his role was mainly public finance-related. Subsequently, he was appointed the state secretary at the ministries of finance and labor with responsibilities pertaining to the tax system, anti-money laundering, labor market, and pension system. He successfully led the implementation of multiple law and operational initiatives. He returned to advisory services on the scale-up and restructuring of companies, and expert services on public finance with a special focus on the tax system.

Norman was the IMF’s regional tax administration advisor for South East Europe between January 2011 and May 2014. He remains active in the region as a short-term expert working for the IMF and the World Bank and he continues to cooperate with the CEF. This includes a very successful seminar on influencing taxpayer behavior, held in October 2014. To respond to the challenge whereby the tax administrations in the countries most affected by the economic crisis have suffered severe cutbacks in their budgets for training, we jointly also prepared a clear, thorough and targeted project proposal “Supporting Capacity Development of Tax Administrations in South East Europe Project” for funding of cooperation activities. The purpose of this project is to help moving countries closer to the very valuable templates for contemporary tax administration contained in the EU Fiscal Blueprints.

Steffen is a Danish career administrator with a wealth of experience across all tax administration and customs components of revenue administration. Following more than twenty years of employment in various staff and middle management positions, he has since 1994 held top management positions at both regional and central level, including at the Danish Ministry of Taxation as Deputy Permanent Secretary. Mr. Hansen has led a number of large-scale and complex development and reorganization projects, including merger of customs and tax agencies, streamlining of organization structures, and full implementation of a modern Compliance Risk Management system. He possesses a wealth of experience in cooperating with the European Commission, as well as familiarity with EU rules and regulations in customs and taxation, and with the EU customs and fiscal blueprints. Mr. Steffen Normann Hansen worked in the position of IMF Tax Administration Reform Advisor for South East Europe, based at the CEF. He helped SEE countries’ tax administrations deal with the challenges they faced in their attempts of achieving effective and efficient application of modern risk management approaches. Mr. Hansen is now working as in independent consultant on improving Customs and Tax organizations and procedures.

Noel's initial contacts with the CEF were as the Chief Executive of the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy (CIPFA) and then with a particular responsibility for its international development. Jointly we developed a professional training program for financial managers in western Balkans countries, which subsequently developed as an internal audit certification program and has extended its reach geographically. Noel is also a lecturer at the CEF internal audit related workshops.

Saša is an expert in the Slovenian public finance system and fiscal rules, with nearly 30 years of experience in monetary and fiscal policy management, international financial markets, and European institutions. She began her career on the Ljubljana Stock Exchange and continued at the Bank of Slovenia. Ms. Jazbec has held top-level positions in the government, including Director General of the Budget Directorate at the Ministry of Finance and the State Secretary in three governments. During her tenure, she promoted structural reforms needed to consolidate public finances and achieve Slovenia's economic independence. Ms. Jazbec strongly advocates for the efficient use of public money, results-oriented budgeting, and the long-term sustainability and transparency of public finances. Under her leadership, the budget team set up a website proracun.gov.si to monitor the state budget's daily updated revenues and expenditures, the history of public spending, and the projects co-financed from the budget. Ms. Jazbec is also an author of articles on public finance and a regular lecturer.

Andreja played a significant role as the National Aid Coordinator during Slovenia's pre-accession period, establishing the national system for external assistance management and negotiating arrangements with the European Commission. After Slovenia's accession to the EU, she continued her responsibilities as Head of the Managing Authority for Structural and Cohesion Funds, overseeing overall national coordination and financial management of EU funds. As the Supreme State Auditor at the Court of Audit of Slovenia, she introduced the first audits of EU budget expenditures in the country. During the financial crisis, Ms. Jerina worked as State Secretary for Development and EU Affairs, coordinating national anti-crisis measures, including the transition to results-based budgeting. She participated actively in the EU enlargement process and membership negotiations with candidate countries. She also served as an EU High-Level Advisor on Aid Coordination in Moldova. Ms. Jerina has been involved with the CEF from its early years, contributing as a lecturer and being a member of the CEF Management Board as a representative of the Slovenian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and later as the Chair of the CEF Advisory Board.

Branimir is an economist at the Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies, specializing in the Western Balkans region. Previously, he worked as an advisor to the Minister of Finance of North Macedonia, where he was involved in several important reforms, such as the tax reform, social protection system reform, and public financial management reform. Additionally, Mr. Jovanović worked as a researcher at the Central Bank of North Macedonia, actively participating in the monetary policy decision-making process. His current research interests cover a wide range of fields, including economic inequality, poverty, fiscal and monetary policy, taxation, social policies, financial crises, foreign direct investment, EU integration, and regional economic cooperation. Mr. Jovanović holds a PhD from the University of Rome "Tor Vergata" in Italy, as well as a Master's degree from Staffordshire University, UK.

Duncan has supported the CEF already in its establishment in 2001, when he was Budget and Treasury Advisor for Slovenia. Mr. Last was the IMF PFM Advisor for South East Europe until October 2016, having previously been based at IMF headquarters for 8 years. Prior to that he had been working in the field for 20 years covering various PFM topics, including PFM Advisor at the IMF AFRITAC East; Budget and Treasury Advisor in Slovenia (also covering various other SEE countries); Budget and IFMIS Advisor in Mali and Papua New Guinea; Debt Management Advisor in Papua New Guinea; and Debt Management Software designer at the Commonwealth Secretariat in the UK. After his retirement, Mr. Last remains closely associated with the CEF, supporting CEF learning initiatives especially in the area of PFM.

Paul is an editorial specialist at the World Bank‘s headquarters in Washington, D.C. Since 2008, he has helped dozens of government experts upgrade the effectiveness of their written communications in English, working with course participants from nearly all CEF member countries and several adjoining EU member states. Working on-site as a visiting expert at the CEF in 2012-2013 Mr. McClure tailored his curriculum to the needs of specific institutions – the central banks of Albania and Slovenia as well as Montenegro‘s finance ministry. Being resident in Ljubljana also gave him the chance to engage with some of the CEF‘s donor partners and peer institutions, and he contributed to the successful launch of the Strategic Planning and Budgeting program. Having returned to the World Bank, he continues to lecture at the CEF communications related learning initiatives.

Mojmir is a Jean Monnet professor at the Faculty of Economics, University of Ljubljana, Slovenia. He has more than 20 years of experience in designing and implementing the Slovenian government’s policy in international finance and EU accession. At the CEF, Mr. Mrak lectures and delivers workshops on Instruments for Pre-Accession Assistance. He also facilitated discussions on the inclusion of structural reforms and policy coordination of medium-term fiscal and economic planning for the CEF’s Building Capacities in Policy Design and Implementation (BCPDI) program. Within the BCPDI, he was an advisor for the EU funded Strategic Planning and Budgeting project; for the Fiscal Impact Assessment of Structural Reforms project, he chaired a working group and co-edited the project’s final publication.

Robin is an international consultant specializing in learning and capacity development. He has held several expert and management positions within the United Nations system, in the areas of capacity development and sustainable learning strategies. His first interaction with the CEF occurred through the Learn4Dev network, where he represented the International Training Centre of the International Labour Organization (ITC ILO) as the Head of Learning and Communication. Currently, Mr. Poppe provides consultancy services in capacity development, sustainable learning strategies, and change management to a diverse range of organizations, including international organizations, NGOs, European institutions, and trade unions. His educational background includes an MBA in Applied Communication with a specialization in lifelong learning. Notably, Mr. Poppe has contributed to the CEF team also by developing two laboratories focused on transformative change through contemporary art, and the exploration of sound, learning, and change.

Vincent is a managing director and co-founder of the Institute for Knowledge and Innovation Southeast Asia (IKI-SEA) in Thailand. He is also an internationally recognized professor and researcher, with substantial experience as a consultant, keynote speaker, and event manager. His expertise covers topics of collaboration, knowledge and innovation management, creativity, and organizational culture. He has published over 100 articles, papers and books on these topics. Mr. Ribiere uniquely combines the theory and practice of knowledge management and organizational learning, and has earned numerous awards in this area, including recent Knowledge Management Award 2022.

Gorana is a Head of the Unit for State Asset Management Strategic Planning Coordination, at the Ministry of Physical Planning, Construction and State Assets in Croatia, with more than 15 years of experience in public sector accounting and financial management. Her competencies are strategically located at the intersection between academia and top-level practice. Her work is focused on international and comparative public sector accounting and financial reporting, international public sector accounting standards setting and public sector financial management, with a particular emphasis on public sector asset management reforms domestically, regionally, and worldwide. Her research has been presented at various international conferences and published in scientific journals. She has hosted and participated in workshops, roundtables, and trainings on topics related to public sector accounting and public sector asset management. She has closely collaborated with CEF, supporting CEF learning initiatives in the area of PSFM.

Janez is a senior economic expert with more than 10 years hands-on experience in formulating and implementing economic and fiscal policies. At the CEF he is as affiliated expert supporting development and implementation of the Data and Analysis for Designing Policies thematic area. He led the Slovenian government's macroeconomic institute (IMAD) from 2000 to 2007. He was Vice-President of the ECOFIN's Economic Policy Committee and, in 2012, finance minister of Slovenia designing the policy of fiscal consolidation and banking crisis resolution. Today he is a partner in a private firm RE-FORMA, d.o.o., and a full professor of economic policy. Since 2013 he worked as an international consultant for the OECD and on a number of technical assistance projects.

Deon is an international expert on government finance statistics (GFS) and macroeconomic issues, with extensive experience at the IMF and Statistics Netherlands. In the region, he is engaged as a GFS advisor. He advises compilers in various national institutions on how to implement GFS data reporting, both for the IMF and the EU in compliance with the fiscal reporting requirements. Deon also collaborates with other international organisations such as the World Bank and Eurostat. He is collaborating with CEF on developing programs within the thematic areas 'Leadership for Managing Reforms' and 'Data and Analysis for Designing Polices'.