Jeff Zients

Advisory board and corporate executive board

Zients was the chief operating officer (1996–1998), chief executive officer (1998–2000), and chairman (2001–2004) of the Advisory Board Company and former chairman (2000–2001) of the Corporate Executive Board.[13] Zients and David G. Bradley took each of the companies public through initial public offerings that made both men multimillionaires.[14]

Portfolio Logic

Zients founded and was the managing partner of Portfolio Logic LLC, an investment firm primarily focused on health care and business services.[13] He was a member of the board of directors of XM Satellite Radio until its 2008 merger, and a board member at Sirius XM Radio until his Senate confirmation.[10][15] Zients also sat on the boards of Revolution Health Group and Timbuk2 Designs.[16]

Baseball

In 2005, Zients formed a group with Colin Powell and Fred Malek, among others, to compete for the purchase of the Washington Nationals.[17][18] The group planned for Malek to be the managing partner for the first three years, after which Zients would take over.[18] The group was unsuccessful; the team was purchased by a group led by Ted Lerner.[13]

Office of Management and Budget

In 2009, President Barack Obama appointed Zients to the new position of United States chief performance officer and deputy director for management (DDM) of the Office of Management and Budget.[19][20] It was Zients's first governmental experience.[21]

According to Obama, his assignment was to help "streamline processes, cut costs, and find best practices throughout" the U.S. government.[20] His nomination was approved by the Senate in June 2009.[22][23] As DDM, Zients established and chaired the President's Management Council.[24]

Zients was the acting director of OMB from July 2010 to November 2010, and again from January 2012 to April 2013.[25][26][27]

Healthcare.gov

Following the error-plagued launch of healthcare.gov on October 1, 2013, Obama and White House chief of staff Denis McDonough asked Zients to take charge of fixing the website.[28][29][30][31] While leading the "tech surge" to do that, Zients also had an ownership position in PSA Healthcare. The position of the White House was that Zients's stake in PSA Healthcare, a pediatric home health business, was not a conflict of interest.[28]

National Economic Council

From 2014 to 2017, Zients was an assistant to the president for economic policy and director of the National Economic Council (NEC).[25] Zients also chaired the President's Management Advisory Board.[32] The Wall Street Journal called Zients "a kind of ambassador to the business community",[10] and lobbying groups such as the Business Roundtable and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce praised Zients as someone who heard them out.

At the NEC, Zients worked with the Department of Labor to finalize the fiduciary rule, also known as the conflict of interest rule. It required financial advisers to provide advice in their clients' best interest. The rule was strongly criticized by Wall Street leaders and business groups and was struck down by a federal appeals court in 2018.[33][34]

In 2015, while NEC director, Zients described the Trans-Pacific Partnership as "a massive tax cut for American businesses".[35]

Facebook

Zients joined Facebook's board of directors in 2018, following the Cambridge Analytica scandal.[36] While on Facebook's board, Zients chaired the Audit and Risk Oversight Committee.[37][38] According to Facebook, he declined to seek re-election in 2020 "to devote more time to his business and other professional interests".[39] Zients was paid $100,000 in cash and roughly $300,000 in stock in exchange for his work on Facebook's audit committee.[38] As of December 2020, Zients had reportedly sold all of his holdings of Facebook stock.[38] In December 2024, Facebook shareholders sought sanctions against Zients in relation to the Cambridge Analytica scandal. He was accused of deleting emails from his personal account that were relevant to the 2018 shareholder lawsuit, in violation of a litigation hold.[40] The following month, vice chancellor of Delaware Chancery Court denied sanctions against Zients stating that Zients' messages were "less pertinent" having joined the board after the Cambridge Analytica scandal.[41]

Cranemere

Zients was the CEO of the Wall Street investment firm Cranemere, an investment firm owned by Vincent Mai, for which he earned a combined salary and bonus of $1.6 million.[34][42] As of December 2020, Zients was on leave from his position as chief executive officer of Cranemere.[34]

In addition, Zients was an investor in the D.C.-based bagel deli startup Call Your Mother.[43]