Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
Key Takeaways Former CIA officer Emily McCarthy helped develop the GORUCK rucksack after her Special Forces husband showed her his military-issued version.
She obsessed over quality by testing gear in extreme conditions for years, refusing to rush cheaper products to market like competitors.
McCarthy recruited intelligence assets by understanding what motivated people, and she uses that same approach to earn trust with customers, partners, and her team.
Emily McCarthy spent years working overseas as a CIA case officer. While she was stationed in West Africa, her husband, Jason McCarthy, a former U.S. Army Special Forces officer, came to visit. He’d done tours in Afghanistan and Iraq carrying heavy rucksacks through hostile terrain, so the environment immediately caught his attention.
He told her she needed a rucksack and pulled out one of his military-issued packs. Built for extreme conditions, it had thoughtful compartments and a clamshell design originally meant for medical use. “It was the best bag I’d ever seen,” she recalls thinking.
That moment became the foundation of GORUCK. The idea wasn’t to reinvent military gear, but to keep what worked in the most demanding environments and strip it down so it could function just as well in everyday life.
At its core, GORUCK reflects how McCarthy learned to think as a CIA officer recruiting assets. You almost never have perfect information and progress comes slow, sticking with the grind long after the novelty wears off.
“If you think you’re going to be James Bond every second, you’re going to be disappointed,” she says.
Here’s how she applied what she learned at the agency to building her company.
... continue reading