James Slezak
Strategy
James leads business strategy and sustainability at Purpose. He is responsible for scaling the impact and reach of Purpose’s work, including the funding, corporate structure, and growth of the organization.
On sustainability, his work is motivated by the belief that for the movement to be successful, its ambition must go beyond regulating existing business activities—it must rebuild major sectors of the economy.
His engagement with the field goes back to school days, where instead of rock stars, his room was decorated with pictures of prototype electric cars. Since then, James has led major projects on sustainability, technology and economic development for McKinsey & Company, including developing green stimulus proposals for the Australian Prime Minister and former US Vice President Al Gore, developing strategy for the ONE Campaign against global poverty in Washington DC, and leading the Russian national carbon efficiency project in Moscow. He took part in the landmark 1997 Kyoto climate change conference, as well as the more recent UN climate talks in Copenhagen. During the 2004 US presidential elections, James directed online strategy for a campaign opposing Bush administration foreign policy that raised millions of dollars in small online donations.
An Australian native, James’s background is in the natural sciences. He attended the University of Sydney and holds a PhD in Physics (experimental) from Cornell University, where he discovered a new relationship between the geometry and quantum mechanics of high temperature superconductors. He also worked on development economics and game theory before realizing he’d rather spend more time outside of labs. He is a fellow at Australia’s Center for Policy Development and has hosted weekly shows on community radio stations in Sydney and New York City. His technical work has been published in the world’s leading peer-reviewed journals, including Science and Nature.
Twitter: @jslez
