Kurt Shickman is the Executive Director of the Global Cool Cities Alliance (GCCA). Prior to joining GCCA, Kurt was the Director of Research for the Energy Future Coalition and the United Nations Foundation’s Energy and Climate team. His work involved building broad and diverse coalitions of stakeholders around key clean energy and climate change policies at the local, state, and federal levels with a particular emphasis on dramatically scaling up the deployment of energy efficiency in existing residential and commercial buildings. Kurt received his Masters degree from the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. He has also worked in management consulting and corporate finance for several multinational firms including Royal Ahold, MCI Worldcom, and Federal Realty Investment Trust.