Harry Broadman

Why organisations work with Harry Broadman

• He has negotiated services trade for the United States inside NAFTA and the WTO, then operated those same markets from inside the World Bank and the private sector. Few speakers can carry one argument across all three vantage points.
• He served on CFIUS inside the White House and now advises companies on foreign investment review as a principal at WestExec Advisors, the geopolitical advisory firm. Leaders get a working read on how Washington actually screens cross-border deals.
• His emerging markets work spans more than 80 countries and includes book-length research on China and India in Africa, on Russia and the former Soviet Union, and on Chinese state ownership. The frameworks he uses on stage are his own.
• He writes a monthly business leadership column for Forbes and the national security column for the International Financial Law Review, so audiences meet a voice they may already read in named outlets.
• He chairs corporate boards and audit committees as an SEC-qualified financial expert and is a Board Leadership Fellow at the National Association of Corporate Directors, so he addresses directors as a peer who carries the same fiduciary exposure.

Biography highlights

• Principal at WestExec Advisors and Senior Economist at the RAND Corporation
• Former U.S. Assistant Trade Representative; led services negotiations for NAFTA and the WTO
• Former Chief of Staff, President’s Council of Economic Advisers; CFIUS member; OPIC board member
• Senior World Bank roles covering China, Russia, the Balkans, and Africa
• Author of Africa’s Silk Road, From Disintegration to Reintegration, and The State as Shareholder
• SEC-qualified financial expert who chairs corporate boards and audit committees; NACD Board Leadership Fellow; monthly Forbes columnist

Biography

Few people have negotiated U.S. trade policy, run capital and reform programmes inside the World Bank, and then advised boards on what those same rules mean for live investment decisions. That is the career Harry Broadman has built. As U.S. Assistant Trade Representative, he led the American negotiating position on services in both NAFTA and the WTO, the framework most multinationals still operate under.

He served as Chief of Staff to the President’s Council of Economic Advisers during the first Gulf War and the Savings and Loan crisis, sat on CFIUS, and was a board member at OPIC. From there, he moved into senior operational roles at the World Bank, working on the ground in China, Russia, the Balkans, and Africa. The research he produced in that period, including Africa’s Silk Road and The State as Shareholder, is still cited by people trying to understand how Chinese capital and state-owned firms behave abroad.

Today he is a principal at WestExec Advisors, the geopolitical advisory firm, and a senior economist at the RAND Corporation. He chairs corporate boards and audit committees as an SEC-qualified financial expert, writes a monthly Forbes column, and serves as national security columnist for the International Financial Law Review. His work concentrates on the boardroom problem behind every geopolitical headline: where to commit capital, how to read foreign investment review, and how to restructure supply chains when cheap globalisation is no longer the operating assumption.

For a leadership team trying to make a defensible call on China exposure, on a supply chain shift, or on a CFIUS-sensitive deal, his value is the rare combination of having negotiated the rules, supervised reform programmes that operationalised them, and now advising the corporate directors who live with the consequences.

Key speaking topics

• Geopolitical risk and the rules-based trading order
• Foreign investment review and CFIUS
• Emerging markets investment strategy
• China and India in the global economy
• Supply chain reconfiguration and trade policy
• Corporate governance under geopolitical pressure
• Sanctions, antitrust, and FCPA compliance for global firms

Ideal for

• Boards and investment committees facing China, Russia, or sanctions exposure
• Chief Strategy Officers and Heads of Corporate Development weighing cross-border deals
• General Counsel and Compliance leaders working through CFIUS, antitrust, or FCPA matters
• Institutional investors and private equity partners deploying into emerging markets

Audience outcomes

• A working view of how foreign investment review actually operates inside Washington
• A clearer read on where China and India are reshaping commercial geography, beyond headline narratives
• A practical lens for sequencing supply chain shifts under tariff and sanctions risk
• Direct exposure to a voice that has sat inside trade negotiation, multilateral finance, and corporate boards