Joe Casola is a Principal at ghSMART. He advises private equity investors, hedge fund managers, and Fortune 500 companies on their most pressing leadership and organizational challenges, including executive talent assessment and selection, leadership team effectiveness, and executive coaching.
Prior to ghSMART, Joe worked in corporate strategy at Capital One, where he helped the CEO develop the company’s annual strategy and communicate it to the Board of Directors. He also led recruiting efforts, training programs, and the development of colleagues.
Previously, he was at McKinsey & Company as a management consultant, where he served private equity and corporate clients on M&A, strategy, and organizational transformation projects across industries. Beyond project work, he was a faculty member for internal trainings, a top-rated people leader, and the Mid Atlantic Office recruiting ambassador. Before McKinsey, he worked at Alyeska Investment Group, a long/short market neutral equity hedge fund, where he was an equity investor in their consumer & retail group with stints in industrials, healthcare, and technology. He started his career at Deloitte Consulting.
Joe has an MBA from The University of Chicago Booth School of Business, where he graduated Beta Gamma Sigma with honors distinction. He co-chaired the Investment Management Group and the Hedge Fund Group and served as a Portfolio Manager for the Student Management Investment Fund (SMIF). He won the Ross Investment Competition and ran the Chicago Booth Investment Management Conference.
Joe has undergraduate degrees in Mathematics and Chemistry from Virginia Tech, where he graduated Phi Beta Kappa with summa cum laude distinction. While at Virginia Tech, he conducted original mathematics and chemistry lab research, was a teaching assistant for Differential Equations, and co-founded a non-profit that used an innovative funding strategy to help supply renewable energy to rural villages.
Joe lives in Virginia with his wife and family. He enjoys spending time outdoors and cheering for DC area and Virginia Tech sports teams, especially the Hokie wrestling program.
