Profile: Hart Rossman

Some people’s career paths advance in a straight line. Hart Rossman, Vice President and Chief Technology Officer of Cybersecurity Services and Solutions for Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC), has a career that seems to be growing in ever-widening circles.

Rossman is a local boy. He grew up in Columbia, Md., and was part of the very first College Park Scholars program at the University of Maryland, graduating with a degree in communication. While in college he took an internship at SAIC, a FORTUNE 500 scientific, engineering, and technology applications company, and has been there ever since, helping the company translate its “exquisite” technology into mission-oriented solutions.

Rossman started with the company as a software developer for distance learning. But the guys down the hall were doing “cybersecurity stuff, which sounded very cloak-and-dagger,” says Rossman, and he quickly joined their group. Rossman and the cybersecurity industry grew up together. Today his responsibilities encompass everything from hard-core systems engineering to governance risk and compliance. “I have a real hunger for knowledge,” says Rossman. “I thought I’d be doing this job for a few years and then grow out of it. But every organization has a security or privacy requirement, so I’ve gotten to work across all kinds of industries from the U.S. government to finance to energy to health care. It has been a really amazing opportunity. I’ve gained insight that’s applicable across verticals.”

With all that industry-specific knowledge under his belt, Rossman began looking for an MBA program to develop his business skills. But he knew he didn’t want a narrowly focused MBA—he wanted something with a broader perspective: “a little worldly, a little larger.” When he was invited to apply for SAIC’s custom MBA program with the Smith School, he got the perspective he was looking for in a program tailored for his company’s particular needs.

During his time in the program, that perspective was broadened further than he had imagined. “I got to thinking about problems across the supply chain—that’s the biggest system I can think of to apply security to. how do you do global supply chain risk management?” Rossman asked himself.

So now Rossman is taking on another growing industry—the security of the cyber supply chain. He has partnered with Smith faculty Thomas Corsi, Michelle E. Smith Professor of Logistics, and Sandor Boyson, research professor, co-directors of the Center for Supply Chain Research, to explore issues related to cyber supply chain assurance and is now a senior research fellow with the center. He is the author of white papers and co-author of a new book, “X-SCM: The New Science of Extreme Supply Chain Management.”

For more information about the Smith School’s custom programs, contact Greg Hanifee, assistant dean of executive programs, ghanifee@rhsmith.umd.edu.