Adam Schwarz

About Adam

Mr. Schwarz is Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Asia Group Advisors, where he counsels senior executives on business opportunities in key Southeast Asian markets and how to effectively manage political, economic, and security risks. Based in Southeast Asia since 1987, Mr. Schwarz has a deep set of relationships with business, political and civil-society leaders across the region and is considered a leading global authority on Indonesia..
From 2001 to 2013, Mr. Schwarz worked for McKinsey & Company in Southeast Asia serving private-sector, public-sector and state-owned-enterprise clients in the energy, telecom, agribusiness, and financial sectors. He advised clients on issues ranging from strategy, corporate transformation, talent management, board governance, strategic communications, and regional economic integration. He was one of the global leaders of McKinsey’s Sustainability and Resource Productivity practice, supporting clients on issues related to green business opportunities, renewable energy, sustainability standards and climate change policy.
On the request of Indonesia’s President Yudhoyono in 2005, he led McKinsey’s year-long support to the Aceh Reconstruction Agency (BRR), an agency established to coordinate and manage reconstruction aid following the devastating Indian Ocean tsunami of late 2004, for which he was one of 12 Indonesians and foreigners given a “Hero of Aceh” award by the Indonesian Government for his contributions to Aceh’s reconstruction.
Mr. Schwarz has served as advisor to the U.S. State Department, Defense Department, the World Bank and the Comprehensive Partnership between Indonesia and the United States. He was one of two foreigners selected as members of the Chairman’s Advisory Committee at Indonesia’s National REDD+ Task Force. He is a member of the U.S. Council on Foreign Relations and the Board of Governors of the American Chamber of Commerce in Indonesia. He currently serves on the Board of Advisors for both the Jakarta-based Centre for Public Policy Transformation and the Washington, DC-based U.S.-Indonesia Society (USINDO). He is an Adjunct Senior Fellow at the Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS) in Singapore, where he lectures on political, economic and security issues across Southeast Asia.
Prior to joining McKinsey, Mr. Schwarz worked as correspondent and bureau chief in Indonesia, Hong Kong, Thailand, and Vietnam for the Far Eastern Economic Review, a weekly news magazine. He has written extensively on Indonesia and Southeast Asia, including A Nation in Waiting, a highly acclaimed work on contemporary Indonesian history. He was awarded a Luce Scholar fellowship from the Henry Luce Foundation, and was the 1997-98 recipient of the prestigious Edward R. Murrow Fellowship at the Council on Foreign Relations. Adam graduated from Duke University with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Economics. He holds an MBA degree in International Business from Columbia University, where he was awarded a University Fellowship for Professional Achievement.