About Us

Hugh Evans (Co-Founder & Chief Executive Officer)
Hugh Evans' passion for poverty eradication was sparked at the age of 14 whilst on a World Vision trip in the Philippines. Living with his host family in a Manila Slum, Hugh was struck by the injustice of a world in which birthplace determines your life prospects. Following a trip to South Africa in 2002 as World Vision's inaugural Youth Ambassador, Hugh co-founded the Oaktree Foundation; Australia's first youth run aid organization. Since 2003, Oaktree has helped fund development projects providing educational opportunities to over 40,000 young people in developing countries around the world. Oaktree's success under Hugh's guidance as Director led to Hugh being named Young Australian of the Year (2004) and Junior Chamber International Person of the World (2005).

Hugh then began working to grow the Make Poverty History campaign in Australia, helping run the 2006 Make Poverty History Concert and the 2007 Make Poverty History Roadtrip. The impact of these campaigns were later credited with playing a key role in the Government's decision to increase its committed foreign aid budget from 0.3% of Gross National Income by 2015 to 0.5% of Gross National Income by 2015, resulting in an additional $4.3 billion per annum invested in the world's poorest.

In 2008, with grants from the United Nations Millennium Campaign and AusAID, Hugh continued to build his impact in the aid and development sector, co-founding the Global Poverty Project.

Simon Moss (Co-Founder & Chief Operations Officer)

Simon is a campaigning and community education expert. He has contributed on developments issues at some of the world’s leading conferences including the G20, the World Economic Forum and the Clinton Global Initiative. He consults regularly for business, government and non-profits on social enterprise and community building and authored a chapter on the future of communities in the 2009 book, ‘The Future by Us’.

Simon was previously the Chief Operations Officer of aid and development agency the Oaktree Foundation. He holds a Bachelor of Arts and a Master of Development Studies, both with First Class Honours, from The University of Melbourne.

Wei Soo (Chief Financial Officer)

Wei comes from a background in tax consulting and tax litigation and is admitted to practice as a barrister and solicitor in the Supreme Court of Victoria, Australia. He has worked at PriceWaterhouseCoopers and has considerable experience in social justice related causes, having held senior positions within the Oaktree Foundation.

Wei holds a Bachelor of Commerce (Finance) and a Bachelor of Laws from Murdoch University.

Jane Atkinson (Director of Global Communications)

Jane has been a communications advisor for over 35 years. She specialises in developing and managing communications strategy and has been involved in international and national communications projects.  She has worked alongside Chairmen, Chief Executives and was media adviser to the late Diana, Princess of Wales.
As well as being an Associate of Project Associates, Jane is Founder of Jane Atkinson Consultancy and advises a range of clients including individuals, companies, and charities. The companies Jane has advised include Avis Europe, Johnny Walker, Nike and Barclays.

Jane has held a number of senior positions both in-house and in consultancy and was formerly a Director at Bell Pottinger. She has advised clients on all aspects of public relations. These include working with marketing teams to integrate public relations with other marketing disciplines through to public affairs and media relations. Jane has worked with public and private companies, NGOs and charities, and private individuals. She has held a number of trustee and charity board positions including: Trustee of the Covent Garden Prostate Cancer Research Trust, Member of the development board of the British Red Cross, member of the board of Forum UK and member of the development committee of the Alzheimers Research Trust.

Michael Sheldrick (Global Policy and Campaigns)

An accomplished campaigner, commentator and speaker, Michael has been advocating on issues of extreme poverty since high school. He has previously worked on high impact campaigns with Make Poverty History and The Oaktree Foundation, helping to secure the largest ever increase in Australian aid.

Gaining a deep understanding of political science, international relations and law from his studies at The University of Western Australia, Michael currently serves as Global Policy and Advocacy Manager. In this role, Michael coordinates The End of Polio campaign, which has helped mobilise more than $100 million in support of polio eradication efforts. A committed Rotarian, having taught undergraduate politics and served as a Fellow with the Tony Blair Faith Foundation, Michael has been recognised as one of The Sunday Timesâ?? 50 Best and Brightest Western Australians, as well as a finalist in the Western Australian of the Year and Young Australian of the Year Awards.

Lauren O'Connor (The End of Polio Communications Officer)

Lauren combines her passions for writing and tackling injustice into her role as Global Communications Coordinator for The End of Polio campaign. A self-confessed “polio nerd” since working with the polio team at the World Health Organization, she has a Master of International Relations with First Class Honours, a Graduate Diploma in Politics and a Bachelor of Journalism – all from La Trobe University.

Lindsay Hadley (Chief Development Officer)

Lindsay is no stranger to the global community. She has spent years of her life living in various international locations including the USA, Russia and China and has travelled to over 30 countries. Lindsay has a degree in Sociology with an emphasis in International Development from the University of Utah. As the Executive Director of Child Rescue Association of North America, Lindsay spearheaded several national public awareness campaigns and helped the organization gain the support of captains of industry, international corporations, and national artists and celebrities. As a long-term member of Rotary, she received a Rotary International Service Recognition Award in 2009.

At the Global Poverty Project, Lindsay was an Executive Producer of The End of Polio Concert in 2011 in Perth Australia that helped leverage $118 Million dollars toward polio eradication, and an Executive Producer of the 2012 Global Citizen Festival in Central Park NYC, where $1.3 Billion in commitments to the world’s poor were pledged.

Mitch Hansen (Global Communications Officer) 

Bringing years of grassroots campaigning experience to Global Poverty Project's global operations, Mitch finished his MA in 2009 studying how discursive structures for social media products and formed and how they inform consumer use of the products. After returning to New York from graduate school, Mitch resumed working in political campaigning with state and regional social justice and environmental organizations. In January 2012, Mitch started at Global Poverty Project and is currently the Global Communications Officer, specializing in grassroots engagement.

Abi Hiscock (Global Impact Manager) 

Abi Hiscock joins us from Charities Aid Foundationvand is an expert in capacity building charities for impact. She specialised in developing philanthropy strategy, designing and delivering grant programmes to maximise social impact. She is also experienced at using a number of impact measurement methodologies to best extract the difference a charitable intervention makes, both quantitatively and qualitatively.

Abi has designed and run strategic grant programmes for CAF, wealthy individuals, global foundations and companies. She has developed theories of change, measurement frameworks and metrics that work and has assessed many charitable organisations & capacity to deliver impact effectively. Responsible for an evaluation of Charities Aid Foundation's 30 years of grantmaking, she also contributed to the development of the first edition of Jargon Buster, which aims to define common grantmaking terminology. It has since been accepted as the gold standard by a wide range of UK grantmakers.

Abi has supported GPP avidly since 2009.