Why every company now needs a Chief Geopolitical Officer

Last week, the UK Cabinet Office released its first ever Chronic Risks Analysis: a comprehensive risk forecast for UK businesses and policy leaders. The systemic risks it identified span security, technology and, notably, geopolitics. Within the report, for the first time, a major G7 economy has explicitly told its business and policy community that international instability and the fracturing of the “old international order” are risks that all – not just large – companies must now actively plan for.

This unprecedented guidance aligns with the World Economic Forum's own Global Risks Report. The 20th edition revealed a leadership community concerned by an increasingly fractured global landscape, where escalating geopolitical, environmental, societal and technological challenges threatened stability and progress. Its 2025 launch has proven prescient, with the year already seeing an escalation on a number of geopolitical fronts – trade wars, cyber conflict and even kinetic strikes.

When both governments and international institutions are explicitly warning businesses about geopolitical risks, traditional corporate approaches to navigating international relations are no longer sufficient. The solution isn't merely better government relations or enhanced risk management; it's the emergence of an entirely new C-suite role: the Chief Geopolitical Officer (CGO).

The old paradigm of risk management operated on a foundational assumption: a stable, rules-based international system where business could operate within predictable and investible frameworks. However, both the Geopolitical Risk with Trade (GPRT) index has surged by approximately 30% from 2020 to 2024 compared to the previous two decades, and the Global Supply Chain Pressure Index (GSCPI) has nearly tripled during the same period.

Consequently, Chief Risk Officers focused on financial and operational issues, and government affairs departments handling compliance and lobbying, are being outpaced by today's geopolitically charged environment. These risks span the spectrum, from policy fragmentation and digital threats to financial warfare. Issues once peripheral to business strategy now pose major financial, competitive and existential risks including:

Restructuring in the light of geopolitical upheaval is a corporate trend gathering pace. McKinsey, Russell Reynolds and others report that leading companies are appointing senior government affairs roles, setting up geopolitical intelligence units and, in a post-Trump election bump among Fortune 500 companies, hiring executives directly for their diplomatic and geopolitical expertise. 

While the CGO title is new and rare, the function isn’t. Meta’s Vice President of Global Affairs – held until recently by former British Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg – is a role that has existed for over 10 years in the company. His experience was sought as the tech giant needed to navigate the intricate web of EU privacy regulations, US content moderation demands, and other challenges of entering complex markets.

This is a pattern seen with other specialized executive roles: the Chief Sustainability Officer (CSO) emerged as environmental concerns became material business risks, while the Chief Information Security Officer (CISO) evolved from IT departments as cyberthreats reached boardroom priority. Like these predecessors, the CGO represents the elevation of what was once a peripheral concern to an existential business imperative requiring dedicated C-suite leadership.

The CGO is not an elevated government affairs director; it is a strategic position integrating sophisticated geopolitical intelligence directly into core business decision-making. This role transcends traditional lobbying, focusing instead on proactive navigation of the global political landscape, including:

It is not simply about navigating risk, but also maximizing opportunity – the upside can be very real. Positioning for geopolitical change can capture shifting trade corridors, new areas of organic growth, or opportunities to realign global operations to improve cost or capital efficiency.

For example, while other Western car manufacturers found themselves shut out of China, Tesla's Gigafactory Shanghai became their highest-capacity vehicle production facility worldwide, accounting for over 40% of their global deliveries. Similarly, Apple's diversification of its supply chain to India enabled a 50% year-over-year increase in iPhone production and billions in new revenue.

For companies ready to proactively address geopolitical risk, a structured framework is essential:

As the world becomes increasingly multipolar and fragmented, this role will transition from a novel concept to an essential component of the C-suite. Companies that proactively integrate sophisticated geopolitical intelligence into their strategic DNA can not only survive but thrive. In an era where a single calculation can impact decades of value creation or lead to decades of growth, the Chief Geopolitical Officer will not be a luxury – but a necessity.

This article is also published on The World Economic Forum. illuminem Voices is a democratic space presenting the thoughts and opinions of leading Sustainability & Energy writers, their opinions do not necessarily represent those of illuminem.