Tatjana Vukovic
Tatjana Vukovic is an accomplished economic development leader currently serving as Deputy Director of the Northern Nevada Development Agency. In this role, she oversees daily operations, business lead follow-up, and strategic partner engagement across Northern Nevada. She prepares detailed economic reports and presentations for regional stakeholders, including chambers of commerce and county officials, and provides tailored support to businesses navigating site selection, licensing, tax abatements, and workforce considerations. She also manages budgeting and marketing operations for the organization, ensuring alignment between financial stewardship and regional growth initiatives.
Prior to her current role, Tatjana served as Director of Special Projects and Business Development at the Nevada Governor's Office of Economic Development (GOED), where she played a central role in shaping state economic policy and administering business incentive programs. She oversaw Nevada’s tax abatement programs, supported Regional Development Authorities statewide, and contributed to strengthening Nevada’s entrepreneurial ecosystem, including rural business initiatives. During the COVID-19 pandemic, she led the administration of major federally funded relief efforts, including the Commercial Rental Assistance Grant Program (CRAG) and the Pandemic Emergency Technical Support (PETS) program, directing critical financial support to small businesses across the state. Her leadership during this period earned her the Mike Skaggs Award for Excellence in Economic Development.
Tatjana’s career in public service spans roles with the Nevada Department of Agriculture, the State of Nevada Department of Employment, Training, & Rehabilitation, and the Nevada Department of Taxation, where she specialized in economic research, workforce policy analysis, agricultural trade development, and statistical reporting. She holds a Master of Science in Economics from the University of Nevada, Reno and a Bachelor of Science in Economics from the University of Zagreb. Known for her analytical rigor and collaborative leadership style, Tatjana is deeply committed to solving complex problems for businesses and communities, guided by her core values of honesty, loyalty, and integrity.
• University of Nevada, Reno - MS
• Mike Skaggs Award for Excellence in Economic Development
• Certificate of Achievement - The Fund Raising School
• Twentieth Century Club of Nevada
What do you attribute your success to?
I would say family support and absolutely amazing mentors that I had the opportunity to work with during my career. When I was at UNR as a teaching assistant, I had an absolutely amazing group of people, teachers, and advisors. I had the best advisor at UNR. Then I started working at the Governor's Office of Economic Development, and my supervisor was an absolutely amazing person, sharing, training, helping me, guiding me. I think that is absolutely amazing for the career of a young person, or anybody.
What’s the best career advice you’ve ever received?
Don't take things personally, because nothing is personal. In a sense, it's a business, and just try to be the best in your field that you can. Don't ever stop learning about new things. I think that would be the best thing that I ever received from my mentor.
What advice would you give to young women entering your industry?
Make sure that you work on your own personal educational development. Stay strong. Understand what your goals are, and keep achieving them.
What are the biggest challenges or opportunities in your field right now?
The opportunities are that the state of Nevada is really, really great when it comes to business development and economic development. We currently have good, pro-business leadership, and having the tax structure that we do have, lots of taxes that we don't have, available workforce that we do have, and the business climate for businesses is absolutely amazing. We have absolutely amazing local governments that we work with who are pro-business oriented. One of the hurdles that businesses have is licensing, so having local government who can provide licensing within almost 7 days is absolutely amazing for economic development in our state. The hurdles, definitely, that we see specifically in rural areas of Nevada are infrastructure and housing. NNDA represents five rural counties, so having housing issues and not having enough housing development and infrastructure are potential issues that we face in rural Nevada. As a person seasoned in this environment, one challenge is communication with other organizations, because there are so many organizations. Getting that connection and having the time to connect, making sure that you are on top of everything, that you are involved in everything, that you know everything, that's potentially the really hard part, because you have to constantly be on the top of everything. But other than that, it's just absolutely amazing, and lots of organizations specifically in rural Nevada collaborate and work together, because when you have small resources, you have to count on collaboration and continuous work together.
What values are most important to you in your work and personal life?
The values that I cherish the most are honesty, loyalty, and speaking the truth. After that, everything is easy.
Locations
Northern Nevada Development Authority
Reno, NV 89521