Emmett Spurlock, MBA
Emmett Spurlock, MBA is the Chief Operations Officer, Chief Financial Officer, and Founding Board Member at ZC Institute, with over two decades of experience in strategic operations, military leadership, and transformational consulting.
Since July 2021, Emmett has served as the COO, CFO, and Cofounder of ZC Institute, an Atlanta-based high-tech R&D organization focused on next-generation energy and propulsion systems.He built the core operating structure and governance model to support early-stage growth, investor readiness, and regulatory compliance.He oversaw secure network architecture, vendor selection, and facilities acquisition, raised $65K in angel capital, and positioned the company for a $50M early-stage round.
Emmett brings 28 years of military leadership (both active and reserves) and experience across all specialties required to run an organization, including operations, planning, and logistics, with almost 5 years as a government contractor supporting DoD, National Defense, and Civil sectors, and nearly 10 years in commercial space.
Emmett is known for leading where others hesitate, bringing strategic clarity and operational traction when systems stall, teams fracture, or the stakes are too high to miss.His career spans high-growth startups, global consulting firms, and national defense operations with an emphasis on performance turnaround, structural alignment, and stakeholder trust.He maintains an active TS/SCI with CI Poly (DoD) clearance.
From October 2016 to February 2025, Emmett served as Strategic Advisor and Program Manager at Booz Allen Hamilton, where he was recruited to lead high-visibility government engagements and restore delivery confidence across challenged federal contracts. He served as senior advisor and program lead across the U.S. Navy, Marine Corps, FBI, Cyber Command, and international defense clients, delivering operational transformation, contract retention, and trusted stakeholder partnerships.
He oversaw programs with a total contract value exceeding $100M, personally managing $25M annual budgets across six active engagements, and led teams of up to 30 personnel within Booz Allen. He was responsible for the procurement and performance of six FBI contracts over a three-year period, contributing to contract retention and expansion totaling $20 million through operational leadership and fostering stakeholder trust.
Notably, he advised Saudi Arabia’s Joint Command (J6) as the sole U.S. advisor, supporting the military unification of the Army, Navy, and Air Force — a strategic transformation initiative driving joint force readiness, procurement strategy, and a shift to a meritocracy.
He also rewrote Navy contingency operations plans in collaboration with nine command stakeholders and led Marine Corps strategic planning exercises to develop warfighting scenarios. Emmett reduced contract pursuit costs by improving opportunity triage using Agile-lite sprints, driving a 4% increase in win-rate efficiency, and designing onboarding and mentorship programs for 200+ Booz Allen consultants.
In 2022, Emmett served as Chief Operations Officer at Combat Connect, establishing infrastructure and marketing strategy for this new nonprofit supporting veteran and first responder reintegration. Combat Connect is a faith-based, inclusive, non-profit charitable organization that provides services to current and veteran United States military, first responders, emergency services, and similar frontline fields, along with their immediate family.
He directed internal communications, public affairs, partnerships, inclusion strategy, and IT services. The organization’s mission is to educate, equip, and coach the nation’s heroes with the tools needed to achieve peace and prosperity using a holistic approach addressing mental, physical, and spiritual health, finances, and career development.
From 2014 to 2016, Emmett served as Faculty Member and Strategic Planner at the Joint Forces Staff College, National Defense University in Norfolk, Virginia. He taught, instructed, facilitated, and mentored 50 mid- to senior-level officers in collaboration techniques to meet national security strategic end states at regional, national, and international headquarters.He combined the newly recognized domain of cyberspace with traditional domains when conducting contingency, crisis action, and operation planning, and served as a guest lecturer for more than 450 other mid- to senior-level officers.
He designed and delivered instruction for 500+ military and civilian leaders from all armed services, with half of all top academic awards during training cycles earned by students in his cohort. He completed the Homeland Security Planners Course and Joint and Combined Warfighting School during this assignment.
Emmett’s extensive military career spanned from 1988 to 2016, serving 28 years as a U.S. Army Lieutenant Colonel in various executive leadership roles globally. He led complex, multi-domain military operations, training programs, and cross-functional initiatives across international theaters, embassy-level diplomacy, and national defense strategy.He served as Executive Officer and Chief of Staff for a 300-member Army unit (Forces Command Augmentation Unit), overseeing operations, HR, intelligence, logistics, planning, and resourcing across national and international missions.
Emmett represented a 4-star commander in high-level diplomatic meetings with U.S., Afghan, and Pakistani military leaders and foreign embassy officials across the Middle East. He managed $500K operational budgets for counterdrug task forces and led engineering missions to construct infrastructure along the U.S.-Mexico border. Throughout his military and commercial career, he has been trusted to lead when it matters most, developing new training curricula integrating cyber and multi-domain strategy into crisis response and operational planning frameworks.
Prior to his military service and consulting career, Emmett held senior program management positions in the private sector. From 1994 to 2003, he worked at major corporations including McDonald’s Corporation and AC Nielsen Corporation, where he led enterprise-wide technology deployments. At McDonald’s, he oversaw global hardware/software deployments for 10,000+ restaurants, spearheading a $30M+ POS certification program and directing the transition to Windows-based systems.
Emmett earned his Executive Education certificate from the General Management Program (GMP) at Harvard Business School Executive Education in 2019, where he was elected as class officer for GMP27.He earned his Master of Business Administration (MBA) in Finance from North Central College in 2013and his Bachelor of Science in Computer Science from Duke University.
His professional certifications include Certified Ethical Hacker (CEH) from BAH (2017), CompTIA Security+, Professional Certification in Online Education: Instruction and Instructional Design from University of Wisconsin-Madison (2015), and Lean Six Sigma from the U.S. Army (2007).
As a featured speaker, Emmett has presented at major conferences, including recently at the International Space Development Conference (ISDC), #ISDC2025 in Orlando, about nuclear fusion and its applications, where he discussed ZC Institute’s groundbreaking work in fusion technology and space propulsion. The company has signed the Washington Compact, an international instrument providing a framework for cooperation and responsible behavior among nations and commercial space actors, created by The Hague Institute for Global Justice.
Emmett serves on several boards and advisory positions, including Advisory Board Member of Operation Vanguard (January 2025 – Present) and Member of the National Association of Corporate Directors (May 2021 – Present). He has also volunteered with organizations, including Pitbull Containers as an Advisor (2015–2016), helping the startup pursue going public, and Habitat for Humanity (September-December 2017), where he helped refurbish a house for a veteran and her family.
Emmett resides in Fayetteville, Georgia, where he continues to lead ZC Institute’s mission to transform science fiction into reality while maintaining his commitment to veteran support and national security initiatives. His unique blend of military leadership, strategic consulting expertise, and entrepreneurial vision positions him at the forefront of revolutionary energy and space technology development.
Visit his LinkedIn profile, GulfTalent page, and ISDC Speaker page. Follow him on Facebook, Instagram, and X.