Executive Profile: Ed Glabus

There is a lot Ed Glabus can’t tell you about his work. As executive vice president and chief administrative officer at ManTech International, a company that provides innovative technologies to the Department of Defense and the intelligence community for mission-critical national security programs, Glabus is part of a unique and very, very close-mouthed industry.

ManTech, a Fortune 1000 company with 10,000 employees around the globe, is a heavy hitter in the highly competitive federal contracting industry that thrives around the nation’s capital. It has provided cyber security help to the FBI and technical and engineering support to Navy aircraft and weapons systems. The company’s client list includes most military and national security agencies you’ve heard of, and some you haven’t. Glabus’s team supports ManTech personnel through risk management, IT, security, real estate, and program execution and quality services across the U.S., but also in places as far-flung—and dangerous—as Afghanistan and Iraq.

So there is a lot Glabus can’t share about his work. One thing he can talk about, however, is his appreciation for the business education he is receiving at the Smith School.

Glabus describes his industry as “fast-paced and changing fast.” So Glabus, a former Army intelligence officer whose career included various command and staff tours in the U.S. and overseas, decided that it was time to add to his toolkit of skills.

“What I really needed to complement my military training was business training,” says Glabus. He is participating in the Smith School’s miniMBA2.0 certificate program. “I’m taking a variety of courses. They’re broad, delivered fast-paced, very valuable.”

Glabus wanted better ways to make priming and supplier management decisions. He says his classes were invaluable. “I was exposed to new techniques I hadn’t used in planning operations, new viewpoints that caused me to re-look at old challenges and come up with innovations,” says Glabus.

One of those innovations came from a class Glabus took with David Godes, professor of marketing, who was instrumental in helping Glabus identify a new tool for analyzing social media. This wasn’t uncharted territory for the company. ManTech has a successful track record in this arena, including the creation of a social networking tool called “A-Space,” known tongue-in-cheek as “Facebook for spies.” (A-Space is used by 16 different security and intelligence agencies to share information about terrorist activities and troop movements around the world). Godes introduced Glabus to NodeXL, a brand new tool under development with University of Maryland faculty that allows the study of social network structures in social media.

Mark Schlottach, ManTech’s vice president for program execution and quality, is now attending the Smith School’s miniMBA2.0 program on Glabus’s recommendation. Glabus sees this as an important investment, not just in individual career development but also in ManTech’s future.

“We know that we have to keep advancing our intellectual capital,” says Glabus. “Executive education programs are a key component in that effort to stay competitive.”

Learn more about the miniMBA2.0 certificate program by contacting MiniMBA@rhsmith.umd.edu.