Jessica Lehman is a consultant with the Department of Defense, where she works with military units on the civil-military relations in Afghanistan.  She recently returned from working in Afghanistan, where she worked on counterinsurgency and stabilization projects.  She was a Provincial Stabilization Director for Zabul province, where she managed community-driven stabilization projects for USAID.  Prior to that, she served as a counterinsurgency advisor to the Marines for the Department to Defense, deploying to Helmand, Afghanistan.   She has previously worked on counter-radicalization and counterinsurgency projects for the Department of Homeland Security as a Strategy and Policy Consultant for BAE.   Ms. Lehman has support civil society development and local community development with her work at National Endowment for Democracy (NED).  She has held positions focusing on development in Africa with the Africa Center for Strategic Studies at National Defense University, and for CARE in Ghana.   She also served as a Peace Corps volunteer in Senegal where she advised small business owners on business concepts. 

Ms. Lehman is a staff member of Young Professionals in Foreign Policy and a member of Women in International Security.  She is a graduate of the College of William and Mary and The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, Tufts University.