Charlene Watson

Charlene is a director of global climate strategies at Climate Lead. She is dedicated to scaling up finance for equitable climate action and getting resources into the hands of those best placed to advance urgent solutions to protect climate and nature. She brings over a decade of multilateral climate change diplomacy, policy and finance expertise to the Global Climate Strategies team.

Prior to Climate Lead, most significantly as a senior research associate for climate finance at the think-tank ODI, Charlene led research shaping the evidence base underpinning the Paris Agreement’s finance architecture. Partnering with institutions around the world, Charlene led research on how the multilateral system can steer finance flows toward climate objectives. The Finance Working Group she founded, informed decisions on the Paris Agreement’s first Global Stocktake and New Collective Quantified Goal on climate finance. A trusted contributor, convener and communicator, Charlene has presented in forums including the OECD and UNFCCC, was a contributing author to the IPCC sixth assessment report, and sits on a number of advisory groups.