Following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, William McNulty founded White Stork, named after Ukraine’s national bird, as a critical aid initiative dedicated to bolstering Ukraine's ability to defend itself. McNulty leads the organization as its head of mission. White Stork has evacuated more than 37,000 women & children from besieged cities across Ukraine, and supplied more than 40,000 combat first-aid-kits to the military. For this humanitarian work, Russia publicly designated McNulty as a Foreign Combatant, marking him as a legitimate military target in Ukraine. 

McNulty is also the Founder of Team Rubicon Global and the Co-Founder of Team Rubicon, an NGO that deploys teams of military veterans in response to natural disasters. Under McNulty’s leadership, Team Rubicon grew from a group of four operators who traveled to Haiti in the wake of the devastating 2010 earthquake to a volunteer army of more than 150,000 members. For more than a decade, Team Rubicon has deployed on more than 500 operations, with a team that is 75-percent veteran, including international operations in Burma, Dominica, Greece, Nepal, South Sudan, and Pakistan. In eight years, McNulty helped raise more than $100M in donations and launched Team Rubicon branded charities in Australia, Canada, Norway, United Kingdom, and the United States.

A 2015 Presidential Leadership Scholar and recipient of numerous leadership and service awards, McNulty is exclusively represented by Leading Authorities speakers bureau. Captivating and inspiring, his presentations look at building purpose-driven cultures, finding productive ways to embrace and push past difficult moments or audacious goals, building and scaling a brand globally, and pursuing innovative methods to solve age-old problems.

Humble and genuine, McNulty shares his personal story of coping with the service void in his life after his Marine Corps enlistment ended, as well as how that void led to the idea for Team Rubicon. Realizing a symbiotic need for purpose and community within the veteran population — and a desperate need for skilled first responders in the aftermath of disaster — McNulty shares how he laid the groundwork for Team Rubicon and how he built consensus around his innovative new model. Pulling out specific lessons for each audience, he talks about implementing Team Rubicon domestically and globally, and inspires groups to build cultures of purpose, tackle problems that seem out of reach, and find new opportunities for injecting meaning and hope in the everyday.

Before founding Team Rubicon, McNulty served for eight years in the Marine Corps reserve in both the infantry and intelligence. He also worked for the Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence, the Defense Intelligence Agency, and the National Security Council’s Iraq Threat Finance Cell. He is a lifetime member of the Council on Foreign Relations.  

He is a recipient of: 2017 Honorary PhD in Humane Letters from the University of Kansas; 2016 Presidential Delegation to the Invictus Games; 2015 Heinz Award for the Human Condition; 2014 Purpose Economy 100; 2012 Grinnell College Young Social Innovator of the Year; and the 2010 Johns Hopkins University Government Service Alumni Award. He holds a B.A. in Economics and Communication Studies from the University of Kansas and an M.A. in Government from The Johns Hopkins University.

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