Dr Phuntsho Choden has amassed over 25 years of professional experience in various sectors in Bhutan, including the public, academic, and private domains. Having a research and social-economics background, she is passionate about promoting evaluation culture in Bhutan and other countries in South Asia. Her recent research has explored culturally responsive evaluation, and this experience sparked a deep interest and sense of responsibility to improve Bhutan's evaluation system. She aims to contribute to developing local knowledge base literature and demystifying evaluation in South Asia.

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She began her career as a civil servant in Bhutan, perfecting her skills over a decade in the practical application of public finance and fiscal policies. Her exposure to a wide range of public policies furthered her academic work in teaching and research at Queensland University of Technology in Australia, the Royal Institute of Management, and the Gedu College of Business Studies under the Royal University of Bhutan (RUB).

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Phuntsho now works as an independent consultant, researcher, and evaluator and her expertise are in Development Economics, Business, Social Capital, and Human Capital. Phuntsho’s consulting experiences include planning, monitoring, and evaluation that span across women empowerment, children and young people, gender equity and inclusiveness, domestic violence, sexual and gender-based violence. In addition, Phuntsho also works in the areas of economics and finance.

 

Currently, she is the Chairperson of the Evaluation Association of Bhutan and has experience of instituting a Voluntary Organisation for Professional Evaluation (VOPE) and Young and Emerging Evaluator (YEE). Besides, she is a member of Governance Board of Community of Evaluators, South Asia.