Karen Bilton Butterfield  brings in a rich blend of experience in both nonprofit and business sectors to the Foundation for African Empowerment (FAE)  Board of Directors. Born in Durham, United Kingdom, Ms. Butterfield has been involved in education, employment and marketing campaigns in the public and nonprofit sectors and worked as a consultant in the private sector.

In recent years, she moved abroad to work for the British Embassy as Project Manager of the ‘GREAT Britain’ Campaign. Led from No.10/cabinet office, the campaign is a cross-Government initiative to promote the United Kingdom as a world-class destination for trade, investment, education and tourism by harnessing the best that Britain has to offer under a single brand and promoting the United Kingdoms’s strengths to the rest of the world. In June 2014, Ms. Butterfield took up post as Project Director for Overseas Business Network at the British Chamber of Commerce (BCC) in Indonesia. The global initiative was a partnership between UK Trade & Investment (UKTI), the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) and the BCC. The initiative supported British companies in seeking to do business in 41 high-growth markets with the aim of anchoring growth for the British economy and significantly uplifting HM Government’s ‘Export campaign’. Under Ms. Butterfield’s Leadership, Indonesia was one of the best performing markets globally and one of the first markets to achieve the ‘Accreditation’ from the British Chambers of Commerce (UK). During her time overseas, she has led high profile events involving international celebrities and senior politicians, including the David Cameron, William Hague, Boris Johnson and Richard Graham (MP and Trade Envoy for Indonesia), Joko Widodo (Indonesian President),His Royal Highness Prince Andrew and leading heads of Industry from both the UK and Indonesia.

Before moving aboard, Ms. Butterfield was Chief Operating Officer for the Charity ‘Moving On’, where she led and developed all aspects of the business on behalf of the trustees. During her four years there she was successful in leading range of change projects (process, people, structure, and product) and she doubled the size of the business expanding services from Durham City to Durham County. She increased services/projects for both Moving On and ‘Collaborate Durham’ doubling reserves in just 2 years. She chaired the Durham and Easington Local Housing Needs Forum and was successful in achieving ‘Charity Partner of the year’ with 4 organizations including Sainsbury’s Supermarket.

Ms. Butterfield is a fellow of the Institute of Leadership and Management (MInstLM) Membership number: 123541 and holds a BA hons in Post Compulsory Education (2:1) ILM level 5 Diploma in Leadership & Management and a Certificate in Fundraising.

She joined the FAE  Board of Directors in 2016.