Fabrice Pothier
European security is no longer a background condition for business strategy – it has become a primary variable in board-level decisions about investment, supply chains, and market access. Most organisations carry geopolitical exposure they cannot yet map: to shifting NATO commitments, to the long-term arc of the Russia-Ukraine war, and to a transatlantic relationship under structural strain. The analytical frameworks that served risk functions in a stable order are no longer adequate.
Fabrice Pothier – CEO of Rasmussen Global and former NATO Director of Policy Planning – helps boards and senior leaders translate European security dynamics and geopolitical risk into strategic decisions they can act on.
Full Profile
Why organisations work with Fabrice Pothier
- He helped architect NATO policy from the inside – including the Readiness Action Plan and Smart Defence – which means he reads alliance decisions not as headlines but as the output of processes he built and operated within.
- As current pro-bono advisor to President Zelenskyy on Ukraine’s long-term security guarantees, he brings live, first-hand insight into the most consequential European security negotiation of the past decade.
- Through Rasmussen Global, he advises multinational businesses and sovereign governments in parallel – giving him an unusually precise map of where geopolitical risk meets commercial and operational exposure.
- He co-founded the Transatlantic Commission on Election Integrity – working alongside Joe Biden, Michael Chertoff, and Anders Fogh Rasmussen – giving him demonstrable authority on the intersection of democratic stability, technology, and political risk.
- He publishes strategic analysis through the IISS and is regularly featured in the Financial Times, Wall Street Journal, and Politico Europe – his public work is tested against the institutions that sophisticated senior audiences use as benchmarks.
Biography highlights
- CEO of Rasmussen Global, the political consultancy founded by former NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen; advises multinational businesses and sovereign governments on geopolitics, European policy, and strategic risk
- Former NATO Director of Policy Planning (2010-2016) under two successive Secretary Generals; credited with the Readiness Action Plan, the Defence Capacity Building Initiative, and Smart Defence, and with drafting Secretary General speeches for the Munich Security Conference and articles for Foreign Affairs
- Founding Director of Carnegie Europe, the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace’s Brussels centre, which became one of Europe’s leading foreign policy think-tanks
- Consulting Senior Fellow for Defence Policy and Strategy at the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS); regular contributor to the IISS journal Survival
- Co-founded the Transatlantic Commission on Election Integrity alongside Anders Fogh Rasmussen, Michael Chertoff, and Joe Biden
- Pro-bono advisor to President Zelenskyy on Ukraine’s security guarantees and Euro-Atlantic integration; central to the Kyiv Security Compact, endorsed by G7 and formalised as the Ukraine Compact at the 2024 NATO Summit in Washington
- Testified before the UK Parliament Foreign Affairs Committee; featured in Financial Times, Wall Street Journal, Politico Europe, and Washington Post; advisory board member, LSE Ideas Transatlantic Programme
Biography
Fabrice Pothier spent six years at the centre of NATO’s policy architecture as Director of Policy Planning, serving under both Anders Fogh Rasmussen and Jens Stoltenberg. The Readiness Action Plan, the Defence Capacity Building Initiative, and Smart Defence all bear his influence. He also drafted landmark speeches and articles for the Secretary General at the Munich Security Conference and in Foreign Affairs – a role that placed him at the intersection of alliance strategy and its public communication.
That operational depth sets him apart from analysts who study alliance dynamics from the outside. He worked on the policy levers directly – advising successive Secretary Generals through NATO’s response to the Libya crisis, the 2014 Ukraine crisis, and a period of fundamental re-evaluation of European security. When he discusses how NATO makes decisions, he is describing a process he ran.
Since 2015, he has led Rasmussen Global – the advisory firm founded by Anders Fogh Rasmussen – becoming CEO in 2022. He currently serves as pro-bono advisor to President Zelenskyy on Ukraine’s long-term security guarantees and Euro-Atlantic integration. That role made him central to the Kyiv Security Compact, which became the foundation of a G7 joint declaration at the 2023 Vilnius Summit and was formalised as the Ukraine Compact at the 2024 NATO Summit in Washington. He also co-founded the Transatlantic Commission on Election Integrity alongside Anders Fogh Rasmussen, Michael Chertoff, and Joe Biden.
Before NATO, he founded Carnegie Europe, establishing it as one of Europe’s leading foreign policy think-tanks. He holds a Consulting Senior Fellowship at the IISS, publishes in Survival, and is regularly featured in the Financial Times, Wall Street Journal, and Politico Europe. He has testified before the UK Parliament Foreign Affairs Committee and holds an advisory board position at the LSE Ideas Transatlantic Programme.
Key speaking topics
- European security and defence architecture
- NATO strategy and transatlantic relations
- Geopolitical risk and corporate strategy
- The Russia-Ukraine war and Euro-Atlantic integration
- Election integrity, disinformation, and democratic resilience
- Scenario planning for geopolitical disruption
- EU politics and the reshaping of the European order
Ideal for
- Boards and C-suites of multinationals with European or transatlantic market exposure
- Chief Risk Officers, Chief Strategy Officers, and public affairs leaders in global organisations
- Government, defence, and public policy conferences on European security and alliance strategy
- Financial and professional services firms with exposure to geopolitical risk
Audience outcomes
- A working understanding of NATO’s decision-making architecture and how alliance dynamics translate into business and political risk
- Clarity on the trajectory of the Russia-Ukraine war and its medium-term implications for European security and market conditions
- A framework for distinguishing high-signal geopolitical risk from noise when making strategic investment or operational decisions
- Context on the structural state of transatlantic relations and how shifts in US-European alignment affect organisations operating across both
- Practical insight into the threat landscape around election interference and disinformation, and what democratic resilience means for organisations operating in politically volatile environments
Talks
This talk gives senior audiences a clear-eyed account of how Europe’s security architecture is being rebuilt – and what the implications are for organisations with exposure to the continent.
Key takeaways:
- How NATO’s internal decision-making actually works, and what current alliance dynamics signal about commitments over the next five years
- The key fault lines in European security – and how to read them as strategic variables rather than background news
- What a more autonomous European defence posture means for political and commercial risk across the continent
Drawing on direct advisory experience with the Office of the President of Ukraine and his involvement in the Kyiv Security Compact, this talk provides a first-hand account of how the war is being navigated at the highest levels – and what it means for the order that follows.
Key takeaways:
- The realistic scenarios for how the Russia-Ukraine war concludes – and which variables to watch
- How security guarantee frameworks such as the Kyiv Security Compact and Ukraine Compact reshape European commitments
- The longer-term implications for European unity, US engagement, and political risk across the region
This talk addresses the practical challenge facing boards that carry geopolitical exposure but lack the frameworks to act on it – translating security dynamics into decisions about investment, supply chains, and market presence.
Key takeaways:
- How to map an organisation’s geopolitical exposure with precision, beyond generic risk registers
- The decision-making tools that governments and advisory firms use to navigate high-uncertainty environments
- How to structure board-level conversations about geopolitical risk so they produce actionable conclusions