JOHN CLARKE
STRATEGIC RISK ADVISOR
GLOBAL RISK & RESILIENCE INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS GLOBAL TRAVEL SECURITY, & HUMANITARIAN CAUSES
John Clarke is a former U.S. diplomat with 20 years of experience in global affairs, risk, investment and trade, and
resilience. He has provided advisory support on worldwide risk, disaster preparedness, crisis management, and
international cooperation in Americas, Africa, and Middle East. At the State Department, John arranged logistics and
supported multiple Congressional, private sector, and academic trips to Latin America. Following his departure from
the Department of State, he has organized two trade missions to Colombia on behalf of U.S. Chamber of Commerce
Board Members and a trip for journalists from well-respected outlets to visit Colombia. In 2015 he coordinated a
business investment conference hosted by (EY) Ernst & Young and the U.S. Embassy in Havana and a subsequent
trade mission to Cuba. In addition to work with the federal government, John has worked in the private sector leading
teams that provide advisory support and strategic insights to Fortune 500 firms, including Amazon, Apple, Walt Disney,
the Gates Foundation, Google, Merck & Co. (MSD), Meta, the NFL, as well as U.S. Members of Congress, USAID, and
HMG (His Majesty’s Government). He is a former Board Member and member of the Advisory Council of Black
Professionals in International Affairs and the Caribbean Workforce Committee for the State of Maryland.
In 2017, he began work with a California-based firm supporting Silicon Valley technology firms. In that role, he led a
multilingual team that supported strategic operations centers in both the US and overseas to provide real-time actionable
analysis at large events, including the NFL Super Bowl. Throughout his career, John has maintained relationships
with local authorities globally, U.S. and EU embassies, stakeholders, and experts to provide white glove services
to corporate clients. At International SOS, he managed a team of 32 professionals who supported global evacuations
and furnished assessments and predictive analyses for the Fortune 500. Throughout his career, he has supported global
travel security, risk management, and crisis management for both private and public sector firms. Most recently he
was a lead advisor for a $600M USAID portfolio advancing agriculture, economic development, energy trade,
investment, and finance, throughout the Americas on crisis resilience, preparedness and security providing strategic
insights and analysis to the business stakeholders and USG counterparts. In this role Clarke advised projects and
proposals throughout the Caribbean, including in Grenada, Guyana, Haiti, Jamaica (proposals), Saint Lucia, Suriname,
Trinidad and Tobago, and the littoral Caribbean coasts of Colombia, Guatemala, and Honduras.
Committed to community engagement and working with stakeholders to build wealth and skills in traditionally excluded
communities, he has worldwide experience in this realm. In Colombia, he created and led a volunteer program for
U.S. Embassy employees and expatriates to teach English and technology skills to youth internally displaced by the
Colombian Civil War. Working as a Community Relations Advisor for the Mayor of Washington, he reviewed over $3
million USD worth of grants to reduce gang violence and support youth development programs. He has also consulted
on several projects concerning business investment, skills, and training in the Caribbean that received funding from the
Inter-American Development Bank and the World Bank. He currently advises on a fractional basis a 65-acre school and
farm in Northern Haiti that provides food and education to 250 children and employment to 40 local residents.
John currently resides between the NYC metro area and Kingston, Jamaica. He has strong family ties to St. Elizabeth,
Jamaica. He has a BA in Economics from Morehouse College and an MA in International Economics from
Johns Hopkins University. He speaks Spanish, French, Italian, Haitian Creole, and Portuguese.