Hello! I'm Elena.

Welcome to elenafowlkes.com.

I created this site as a place to share some of the ideas, questions, and lessons that have shaped my work over the years.

My career has largely been spent at the intersection of government, tax policy, operations, leadership, and public service. I’m a lawyer by training, a former government executive and taxpayer advocate, an educator, and now a consultant working with public-sector and mission-driven organizations.

Along the way, I’ve become increasingly interested in a broader question: How do we make institutions work better for the people who depend on them and the people who work inside them?

That question can lead in a lot of directions. Sometimes it means improving a process that has become unnecessarily complicated. Sometimes it means thinking differently about leadership, technology, organizational structure, or customer experience. Sometimes it means stepping back and asking whether a policy is actually producing the result we intended.

You’ll likely see posts about tax administration and policy, government modernization, organizational effectiveness, leadership, change, and the future of public service. I’ll also occasionally write about teaching, career lessons, and other ideas that I find worth exploring.

I’m also a part of PDS Group LLC, where much of this thinking gets translated into actual client work. At PDS, we help governments and other organizations evaluate how they operate, solve difficult problems, improve systems and processes, and prepare for what comes next.

Thanks for stopping by.

— Elena