Page 68 - FCW, November/December 2019
P. 68

Rising Stars
ELLEN NADEAU
Deputy Manager, Privacy Framework, National Institute of Standards and Technology
The National Institute of Standards and Technology’s Cybersecurity Framework was finalized in 2018
to broad acclaim, and the agency wanted to repeat that success by doing the same for privacy standards. The schedule laid out by to develop
a new Privacy Framework was relentless.
Officials tapped Ellen Nadeau, who had come to NIST from the National Science Foundation’s Scholarship for Service program,
to carry out a diverse set of duties related to the document’s creation. In addition to a role in drafting the framework, she helped schedule meetings and stakeholder events,
set up roundtables and workshops, dove into budget issues and took on a range of other tasks.
Despite her relatively short tenure in the federal government, Nadeau consistently impressed her colleagues with her impeccable preparation and confident presentations. According to NIST officials, she was frequently praised by stakeholders for providing timely context and helping to keep the project on track.
“I think it’s her energy and
enthusiasm...coupled with a real maturity of judgment,” said Naomi Leftkovitz, a senior privacy policy adviser at NIST. “I don’t think anyone would even be aware of her comparative youth.”
During the intensive, year-
long commitment to the Privacy Framework, Nadeau also achieved performance goals under the NIST Privacy Engineering Program and pitched in on other projects, including working on privacy standards for
the International Organization for Standardization.
the command to synchronize cyber efforts and track and analyze situational awareness data, by migrating it to a more resilient and accessible platform and codifying the related operating procedures.
Pawlak, who is nine years into his federal IT career, has been influential in cyber operations, including critical infrastructure assessments, at two strategic seaports and has helped migrate 15 logistics information systems to the cloud.
He also created a resilient database that tracks and archives response actions and event characteristics to improve coordination and reduce duplicative efforts. With that database, he helped lead his team
in providing continuous logistics support to forces during the Turbo Challenge training exercise in 2019.
Air Force Maj. Benjamin Rich, branch chief for the Cyber Operations Center, called Pawlak a studious, likable and humble team player who subtly commands respect. “When he opens his mouth, everybody listens because you know he’s going to say something smart,” Rich said.
66 November/December 2019 FCW.COM
LT. JASON A. PAWLAK
Cyber Battle Captain, U.S. Transportation Command
Navy Lt. Jason Pawlak has been in his current role for less than a year but is already effecting change at the U.S. Transportation Command’s Global Operations Center.
As a cyber battle captain, he is responsible for ensuring situational awareness, advising the commander of complex threats and preparing two 42-member cyber protection teams to protect mission-critical assets and resources from network viruses, ransomware and distributed denial- of-service attacks.
So far, he has modernized the master station log, which allows


































































































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