Jessica Christy McWade is president of McWade Group and a frequent public speaker, facilitator, columnist and photojournalist. 
Ms. McWade was previously Vice President, Corporate Affairs & Communications for Raytheon; Director, Corporate Communications for Textron; and Director, Corporate Affairs for BankBoston.  In these positions, she was responsible for budgets up to $50 million, staffs of 75+ employees, and foundations with annual philanthropy up to $20 million.  Ms. McWade also served as a Deputy Press Secretary to Boston Mayor Kevin White and photographer to Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis.

She is a doctoral student in The George Washington University Executive Leadership Development Program as well as a member of the Simmons College faculty, where she teaches speech, dialogue and debate.

She is past president of the World Affairs Council of Boston.  In this capacity, she personally presented the Council’s annual Christian A. Herter Award to heads of state for Argentina, Ireland and Mexico as well as the Secretary-General of the United Nations.  She is a member of The Council on Foreign Relations and The Harvard Club and serves on the boards of the Greater Boston Food Bank and Creative Economy Council.  She is listed in “Who’s Who in America” and “Who’s Who among American Women.” Earlier in her career, Ms. McWade was named one of Boston’s “Ten Outstanding Young Leaders” (TOYL).

Ms. McWade was appointed a Fellow to the Salzburg Seminar (Austria), served as a British-American Fellow (Northern Ireland) and is an alumna of the LEADBoston program.  She is a participant in the annual Renaissance Weekend over New Year’s in Charleston, South Carolina as well as the Socrates Seminar at the Aspen Institute.

She is a Commander (Retired) in the U.S. Naval Reserve.  Ms. McWade participated in Presidential-level assignments commemorating the 50th anniversaries of Pearl Harbor and Anzio, where she was assigned to the U.S. Embassy in Rome.  She also supported VE-Day 50th anniversary events at Buckingham Palace in London.  She served on numerous NATO exercise staffs throughout Europe, in the North Pole and northern Greenland and at NATO headquarters in Brussels.  She also participated in the historic 1990 U.S. Navy goodwill visit to Vladivostok, Soviet Union.  She served on the staff of the Secretary of Defense for the 1996 U.S.-Australian Summit in Sydney and as a naval liaison to the 1984 World’s Fair in New Orleans.  Ms. McWade was awarded the Navy Commendation Medal, twice received the Navy Achievement Medal as well as the Navy’s “Twice a Citizen” Award.  She is also a pistol marksman.

Ms. McWade was graduated from Boston University (B.S., Journalism), New York University (M.B.A.) and Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government (M.P.A.).  She also attended The Stockholm School of Economics under an International Management Program Fellowship.  She was also graduated from BankBoston’s Loan Officer Development Program and served there as an international commercial banker.

She has studied Shakespeare at St. John’s College in Santa Fe, writing at the University of Iowa’s Writers’ Workshop and University of Wisconsin’s Writers’ Institute, speech pathology at Massachusetts General Hospital and creativity at Omega Institute.

Additional Background

McWade Group provides strategic planning, brand strategy, messaging, writing and creative services for corporate, government, university and non-profit clients.  Ms. McWade is also a professional facilitator, workshop instructor and leadership coach.  She has developed brand strategy and messaging systems for over 70 organizations, launched scores of new products, undertaken numerous international marketing initiatives and created many successful change management, employee communications, public affairs and community affairs campaigns.  Her work with Simmons College helped that institution earn nine medals (including four golds) from the Council for the Advancement and Support of Education (CASE).

Ms. McWade has helped launch a dozen start-up companies.  In that capacity, she developed original web-based productions, interactive newsletters, and sound and musical programming.  For example, she created original web shows, such as “The TeleBusters” and “The True Adventures of Sam Stone, IT PI” using proprietary characters to animate and differentiate client brands.  She also created the “Digital Time Capsule” promotion for MIT Sloan School.

Her corporate initiatives include creation of the $6 billion BankBoston Credit Initiative, which The New York Times called “marketing genius.” The Credit Initiative generated 3,000 new bank customers and won the International Association of Business Communicators “Silver Quill Award” for Top National Campaigns.  She was responsible for title sponsorship of the BankBoston Celebrity Series and the BankBoston Harborlights Pavilion; exhibitions at the Paris Air Show and Farnborough (London) Air Show; sponsorship roles with IndyCar Racing, the Indy 500, Boston Celtics, New England Patriots, IMAX Films, Tall Ships events, World Cup Soccer, PGA golf tournaments, and the Olympic Games; numerous school partnerships; philanthropic initiatives such as the restoration of the American Bald Eagle to Massachusetts and the “Home Court Advantage” playground revitalization program that won a “Bell Ringer Award” for Community Initiatives; and creation of the BankBoston Sports Network that provided sports programming to nearly 100 radio stations.

As a photojournalist, Ms. McWade has shot wildlife in South Africa and events such as the Aki-basho Grand Sumo Championships in Tokyo, a weeklong bullfighting feria in Madrid, the Caribbean World Series in San Juan, and sled-dog racing, Scottish Highlander Games and vintage baseball in New England.  Her most recent photo-essays on sumo wrestling and mountain running appeared on the WBUR-FM (NPR) “Only a Game” show website.
She’s studied flower arranging (ikebana) and the Japanese tea ceremony in Tokyo.  She survived High-Speed Performance Racing School at the Mid-Ohio Race Track, an arrested “tailhook” landing aboard the aircraft carrier USS George Washington, and safaris in several game reserves in South Africa’s Zulu Kingdom.

Ms. McWade is an active mountain biker, an avid reader and a budding wine enthusiast.  She has also traveled to 40 countries on six continents – so far!

Back to Top