The Defense Innovation Unit (DIU) appointed combat veteran Liz Young McNally to serve as the new deputy director for commercial operations, the organization announced Monday.
In her new role, McNally will lead DIU’s collaboration with the commercial tech sector and investment community, including “enhancing portfolio company scaling support and related Department partnerships, as well as the defense innovation on-ramp, talent, and investment capabilities resident in National Security Innovation Network (NSIN) and National Security Innovation Capital (NSIC),” DIU said.
McNally’s appointment is aligned with the defense agency’s new strategy, DIU 3.0. The new strategy — unveiled earlier this year by Director Doug Beck — aims at quickening and ramping up the Department of Defense’s (DoD) adoption of commercial tech to deliver what he called “strategic effect.”
“Liz’s expertise and dual fluency across the commercial and military sectors, combining deep experience with both operating businesses and investors as well as downrange in uniform, and on top of her hands-on experience with inspiring service-and purpose-oriented talent, represent an incredible asset to our mission of delivering real change to the DoD at speed and scale,” Beck said in a statement.
Additionally, the defense agency stated that McNally’s hiring “also reinforces the focus for a coordinated demand signal from the DoD to the commercial technology sector and providing easier physical, digital and procedural on-ramps to the DoD.”
Prior to joining DIU, McNally was co-CEO of Schmidt Futures, a charitable venture that connects people with various skills for public benefit, according to the organization’s website. She was also a partner at the at the global management consulting firm McKinsey & Company.
Earlier in her career, McNally was a Military Police officer in the U.S. Army. Her service included two year-long tours in Iraq, where she served on the senior staff of General David Petraeus, former director of the Central Intelligence Agency.
“I am thrilled to join DIU at such a critical moment, not just to join such an innovative organization, but more importantly to help strengthen our national security innovation ecosystem and our country’s national defense,” McNally said.
