ABOUT
Our talented team of speakers and authors continue to collaborate and provide the most evocative book series for military personnel in transition in our time. All work at assisting you, before, during and after your military transition, often speaking around the country regarding you and this tremendous cause.
Jay Hicks
Author & Principle
Jay Hicks is an author, instructor and consultant, with over 30 years of business and government planning and leadership. He advises commercial and federal organizations on the planning, development, and leadership of Project Management Organizations, delivering viability and value.
With a special kinship for military personnel, Jay provides guidance on successful civilian career transition. He is the co-founder of Gr8MilitaryPM, where advocating the value of hiring military personnel is the key focus.
After a distinguished Army career as a tanker, information technologist and logistician, Jay developed and ran multiple project management organizations and programs for Lockheed Martin, L3 Communications, BAE and Jacobs Technology at US Central Command and US Special Operations Command. He frequently speaks and advocates for service members at project management symposiums and military transition programs, sharing his passion for successful career transition.
Dr. Ray A. Letteer
Author
Dr. Ray Letteer is currently the Chief, Cybersecurity Division, C4 Department, and the Marine Corps Senior Information Security Official at Headquarters, US Marine Corps, and has over 30 years of experience in computer security, information systems security, information assurance, and cybersecurity. He has a master of science in network security and a doctor of science in information assurance.
Through the course of his 20-year military career he served first in the intelligence field as an analyst and linguist, with assignments world-wide, including an 8-year tour in Berlin from 1982-1990. He became involved in the budding cybersecurity field after being assigned as the comm-computer officer while in Berlin and receiving training in Operational INFOSEC from NSA. He was one of the first military instructors in cybersecurity, teaching a variety of government and military students for the National Cryptologic School for which he received a Joint Meritorious Service medal.
Since retiring from the Air Force, Letteer worked in Government contracting as a cybersecurity expert supporting various DoD and civil agencies. While supporting DISA, he developed and managed the production of all CD-ROM based courses covering managerial aspects and operational implementation of Information Assurance (IA), including the “CyberProtect” training CD, which won 2 gold medals and best of show at the 1999 International Multimedia EMMA Awards and a silver medal at the 1999 National NewMedia Invision Awards.
Letteer took his current assignment with the Marine Corps in 2003, where he was selected as one of the Federal Top 100 in IT in 2005. He is also an adjunct professor for Capital Technology University in their cybersecurity doctoral program.
Sandy Lawrence
Author
Sandy has been a visionary in the Information Systems sector for close to three decades. She has worked in the Big 4, owned her own software utility company, a trainer, and has been a contractor providing expertise in Project, Program, Portfolio, and Strategy Management at both USCENTCOM and USSOCOM. Her comprehensive business and product management expertise, combined with a highly intuitive sensitivity to organizational and strategic dynamics, has been evidenced in both start-up and structured corporations.
As a true Thought Leader, Sandy supports her teams with solid values of honesty, integrity and a no nonsense approach to getting things done. Sandy is passionate about helping clients build effective strategies, efficient management and exceptional execution through the right mix of process, discipline and rigor.
As an advocate of mentoring, training, and knowledge sharing, Sandy works with companies and programs to articulate their goals and vision, transforming them into actionable results, measurable benefits and success.
Jack L. Tilley, 12th SMA
Author
Jack L. Tilley, 12th Sergeant Major of the Army, (Retired) is a highly-decorated military veteran and businessman. He served for almost 37 years in the United States Army, culminating in his appointment in 2000 as the 12th Sergeant Major of the Army, a post he held until his retirement on January 15, 2004. He was the last Vietnam War veteran to serve in that position.
His first assignment was to the Republic of Vietnam with A Troop, 1st Squadron, 4th Cavalry Regiment as a vehicle crewman. Upon completion of his 1-year deployment he was assigned as a drill instructor at Fort Benning, Georgia until his enlistment expired; Tilley left the active duty Army for two years and served in the Reserve Component before enlisting again in the Active Component in September 1971.
He held a variety of important positions culminating in his assignment as the Sergeant Major of the Army. He previously held the senior enlisted position as Senior Enlisted Leader of the United States Central Command at MacDill Air Force Base, Florida. Other assignments he held as Command Sergeant Major were 1st Battalion, 10th Cavalry, Fort Knox, 194th Armored Brigade, 1st Armored Division, Bad Kreuznach, Germany, and United States Army Space and Missile Defense Command, Arlington, Virginia.
Tilley held every key leadership position including tank commander, section leader, drill sergeant, platoon sergeant, senior instructor, operations sergeant and first sergeant. His military education includes the First Sergeants Course and the Sergeants Major Academy. He is a graduate of the basic airborne course, drill sergeant school and the master gunner's course