Jessica Grounds

Jessica N. Grounds has devoted her life to empowering women to become leaders in business and politics and is an internationally recognized thought-leader in women’s leadership. She has developed innovative mentoring programs in her various roles and published cutting-edge research on women’s leadership. Jessica’s latest research with FTI Consulting, #MeToo At Work, The Enthusiasm Gap, and Culture At Work, reveals important insights about gender dynamics in the workplace, receiving wide media coverage including by Bloomberg & Fast Company.

Jessica is the Co-Founder of Mine The Gap, a company that equips leaders, industries, and organizations with the strategy and tools needed to create and sustain inclusive work environments. Mine The Gap advises and works with major companies, organizations, and government agencies including Amazon, National Geographic, Facebook, United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), PG&E, and Georgetown University, along with influential women’s organizations in the United States and globally. In her work over the years, she has garnered significant private sector investment from companies including: Walmart, Lockheed Martin, Deloitte, and Google.

She is the Co-Founder and former Executive Director of Running Start, a national organization that trains young women to run for elected office. Jessica has extensive experience internationally working with the U.S. Department of State and international NGO’s, routinely lecturing around the world about the importance of advancing women’s equality and the barriers to women’s leadership.

Jessica has received recognition for her work in a variety of oulets including being honored this year by Pepperdine University as an Outstanding Alumni Woman in Leadership, she was named a top “40 Under 40” recipient by the American Association of Political Consultants, and Marie Claire recognized her in their article: The New Guard: America’s 50 Most Influential Women. Jessica and her work have been profiled in Bloomberg, Fast Company, Roll Call, The Hill, NPR, ELLE, Mercury Times, Glamour, National Journal, Washington Post, Politico, Georgetown Business Magazine, Marie Claire, The Muse, Sage publications, and Forbes.

Jessica holds a Masters in Leadership from the McDonough School of Business at Georgetown University, a graduate certificate in Women, Policy, and Political Leadership from the Women & Politics Institute at American University, and graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science from Pepperdine University. After sixteen years living and working in Washington, DC, she recently relocated to her hometown San Diego, California.