Matt is a co-founder of McKinsey’s Geopolitics practice and leader in McKinsey’s Strategy & Corporate Finance Practice. His work focuses on growth and innovation in strategic industries (e.g. defence, space, semiconductors, high tech, cybersecurity) with evolving global dynamics. The firm’s geopolitics practice helps companies, investors and governments strategically plan, accelerate growth and bolster resilience amidst geopolitical tensions. He previously co-led McKinsey’s negotiation initiatives, which focus on helping clients navigate high-stakes negotiations and McKinsey USG’s innovation services, which focus on advancing research and development in emerging technologies (e.g. biotech, quantum, hypersonic, next-generation semiconductors, autonomy).

Outside of McKinsey, Watters is a term member at the Council on Foreign Relations and on the Board of Directors for No One Left Behind (NOLB), a nonprofit focused on advocating for interpreters who worked with US Armed Forces. His work has led him to appear on The Problem with Jon Stewart and PBS: Story in the Public Square and his op-eds have been featured in The Wall Street Journal and The Hill. In 2017, he was recognized by Forbes as 30 under 30 in Law and Policy for his work on Ebola recovery in Sierra Leone. Watters is also a Green Beret with the US Army Reserves and was previously seconded to the US Mission to the United Nations as a deputy military advisor for the Peacekeeping Mission. He received a master’s degree in global governance and diplomacy as well as a master’s in business administration from Oxford University, where he was a Rhodes Scholar. He also studied at Columbia University’s School of International Affairs for the Hertog Global Strategy Initiative and majored in neuroscience at the University of Delaware.