US board

Adrian Poffley (Director/President)

Adrian joined the World Bank in Washington DC in 2003. Before this, he spent 14 years in the UK voluntary sector, including as Finance Director of Sightsavers International, and Chief Accountant of Voluntary Service Overseas.

He has been Honorary Treasurer of the International Agency for the Prevention of Blindness since 2004, and previously served for eight years on the board of the Refugee Council in the same role. He is a fellow of the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants and author of ‘Income to Impact, the Financial Stewardship of Not-for-Profit and Public Sector Organizations’.

Ann-Marie Walsh (Director/Vice President)

Ann-Marie has been living and working in New York since 2005. In 2000, she joined Enterprise Ireland and was assigned to New York as Senior Vice President for the US government sector. She is currently Director of Government Relations for Advanced Innovations, a global supply chain company.

Ann-Marie has received a master of arts and a master of science in international business, and holds executive training awards from Babson College in Boston and the International Management Development Institute in Lausanne, Switzerland. In 2011, she was named by the Irish Echo as one of New York’s ‘Women of Influence’.

Simon Bush (Director)

Simon’s work includes monitoring Sightsavers projects, advocating for changes to policy, and developing approaches to social inclusion and inclusive education. He also has manages the relationships with Sightsavers’ public-private partnerships.

Simon is Chair of the NGDO NTD Network, a group of NGOs working on neglected tropical diseases. He has lived and worked in Africa and the Middle East since 1983. After working for the British Council across Africa, he joined Sightsavers in 1999 as regional director for West Africa and is now based in Accra, Ghana.

Geordie Woods (Director)

Geordie is experienced in working in Africa in the field of public health and communication. He most recently worked as the Media Officer for Johns Hopkins Center for Communications Programs in Ghana. He first came to West Africa as a Peace Corps volunteer, where he served in both Guinea and Ghana.

He has worked as behaviour change and communication consultant for Sightsavers and the World Health Organization, carrying out research and developing communication strategies in various West African countries. He is currently completing his masters in public health at Tulane University.

Mike Straney (Director)

Mike was formerly Director of Major Giving at Sightsavers, leading an international team who built and stewarded relationships with major individual donors, trusts and corporate partners, and managed Sightsavers’ events portfolio. He worked across a number of fundraising markets, with a focus on the UK, the US and the Middle East. He played a role in organisational management as a member of Sightsavers’ management team.

Prior to joining Sightsavers in 2013, Mike worked for Breast Cancer Campaign and Marie Curie.

Bill Kendall (Director)

Bill was appointed Honorary Treasurer of Sightsavers’ board in 2016. He is an international investment banker with nearly 30 years of corporate finance experience at Morgan Grenfell, Lehman Brothers and Vollman Brothers, which he founded in 2002 and where he is currently the Managing Director.

A chartered accountant, Bill qualified with Price Waterhouse. He chairs the Sightsavers investment committee and is a member of the audit, governance and remuneration committees. He is also Honorary Treasurer of Sightsavers in the UK.