Dr. Rachel Gillum leads at the intersection of technology governance, national security, and global policy. As Vice President of Ethical & Humane Use of Technology at Salesforce, she oversees a global team of professionals responsible for responsible AI policy, platform safety, and policy enforcement across Salesforce's 70,000+ employees and millions of customers worldwide. Reporting directly to the Chief Ethical & Humane Use Officer, Rachel established Salesforce's Ethical Use policy practice from the ground up, defining its strategic vision and scaling operations across the company's acquisitions and product lines, including Slack. She manages the company's Ethical Use Advisory Council, which includes international experts from the United Nations, Freedom House, and leading academic institutions.

Rachel's work bridges Silicon Valley innovation with hard-edged geopolitical realities. She serves as a Commissioner on the Atlantic Council's GeoTech Commission on Artificial Intelligence, where she engages bipartisan policymakers, industry executives, and technology leaders on AI's strategic and economic implications for U.S. global competitiveness. She previously served as a Commissioner on the U.S. Chamber of Commerce's bipartisan AI Commission on Competition, Inclusion and Innovation, co-chaired by former Representatives John Delaney and Mike Ferguson. Her advisory roles include CareMessage's Technical Advisory Board (advising on AI and data strategy for equitable healthcare delivery), the Institute for Security and Technology's Trust & Safety Advisory Group (focused on platform risk and emerging threats), and TechStars (mentoring startups on responsible technology development).

Before joining Salesforce, Rachel served as Senior Director of the Silicon Valley Office at RiceHadleyGatesManuel LLC, managing the firm's technology and venture capital portfolio alongside former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, former National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley, and former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates. In this role, she advised CEOs and senior executives from Fortune 50 companies to early-stage startups on strategic challenges spanning geopolitics, regulatory risk, and market expansion. Her career includes intelligence and security roles in the U.S. government, where she worked as an analyst assessing threats and policy implications in complex international environments.

Rachel's academic work examines how technology and policy intersect with democratic institutions and social inequality. She is an affiliated scholar at Stanford University's Immigration Policy Lab and the author of Muslims in a Post-9/11 America: A Survey of Attitudes and Beliefs and Their Implications for U.S. National Security Policy, which analyzes how government counterterrorism and surveillance policies can alienate integrated Muslim communities and undermine national security objectives. She chairs the American Political Science Association's Task Force on AI and Race and has published research on AI governance, bias, and enforcement frameworks in both academic and practitioner contexts. Her work has been featured in Forbes, The Washington Post, Essence, and other outlets.

Rachel holds a PhD and MA in Political Science from Stanford University and a BA from the University of Washington. She is a Term Member at the Council on Foreign Relations, a nonresident fellow at the Atlantic Council, and an advisor to Sterling Road venture fund. She co-founded Truman National Security Project's diversity initiative to support underrepresented minorities in international security and serves on the Advisory Committee for Duke University's Ralph Bunche Summer Institute, which builds pathways to graduate education in Political Science for underrepresented students.