About Wild Card Strategy
How It All Began
Jim McComb founded Wild Card Strategy in Southern California in 2011, following his retirement as a senior strategic management executive at Bank of America. He named the new consultancy after a process he developed in 2007 while SVP of Strategic Planning at Countrywide. That process enabled the planning team to forecast plausible wild card opportunities and threats that wouldn’t appear on the company’s radar screen during a typical SWOT analysis. Jim referred to the forecasting process and the approach to preparing for, and managing, the plausible wild cards as “a wild card strategy.” This seemed like the perfect name
for a new consultancy focused on Next Generation strategic planning.
In the early days, Wild Card Strategy served financial institutions, non-profits such as the Salvation Army and the Red Cross, and one of the largest churches in Southern California. A few years later, the firm expanded its client base to include city governments and special taxing districts that managed everything from public cemeteries to libraries and municipal services like wastewater management and fire protection.
In 2021, Wild Card Strategy relocated to Kingsport, Tennessee where it serves businesses, non-profits, and churches throughout the Appalachian region. The firm is also active in community organizations including United Way and the Kingsport Chamber of Commerce.
Meet Our Founder
Jim McComb is a seasoned strategist with Fortune 100 leadership experience in Strategic Planning, Finance, Marketing, Strategy, and Risk Management, and is a nationally recognized authority on strategic management and positioning for certain success in a volatile environment. As both a senior executive and a management consultant, he has been crafting and executing business strategy for more than 40 years.
Jim has served as the global President of the Association for Strategic Planning (now renamed the International Association for Strategy Professionals) and was selected for their Hall of Fame in 2009. While a partner in the Centre for Strategic Management (then the world’s largest dedicated strategic planning consultancy) he was one of the first 25 people in the world to be certified a Strategic Management Professional (SMP).
He has keynoted business summits throughout the US, and in Canada, Europe, Asia, and South America. His forthcoming book, Certain Success in an Uncertain World: How to Survive & Thrive in a Disruptive Future, will be published later this year.
The CEO of a $22 billion corporate credit union once wrote Jim a performance review that contained only four words: You Make A Difference. Today, his clients echo that sentiment.
Values That Drive Our Work
Integrity
Client-centricity
Innovation
Excellence
Collaboration