Adefoluke Shemsu

Meet Ade

What did you do before joining McChrystal Group?

My background spans technology startups (fintech and AI), social impact orgs, and various advisory and management consulting roles. In each role, I applied my data and technology skills to operational and strategic problems, enriching what we delivered to customers, clients, and other stakeholders, and accelerating how we did it through the processes and technologies underlying our delivery model. Through these experiences, I’ve integrated numerous perspectives on cross-functionality and operational excellence, with technology as the core amplifier striving for impact at scale.

Why did you join McChrystal Group?

I joined McChrystal Group because of a recurring observation: a lack of structural readiness consistently hinders transformative change, which creates downstream gaps that stifle future innovation. As organizations seek durability against technological, political, and even regulatory disruption, I can imagine no better group to work with to help organizations build scalable resilience than McChrystal Group.

What are your favorite books (besides Team of Teams!)?

A favorite of mine that pulls the thread of what Team of Teams could accomplish, especially for the federal government, is called Four Battlegrounds: Power in the Age of AI. In the book, Paul Scharre frames the great powers competition for AI as a battleground of compute, data, talent, and institutions. His conclusion was pretty sobering: we have the data, and the compute, and know what to do with it; what we need is institutional adaptation and capacity, and to acquire and retain the talent to scale those capabilities.