Retired Major General Stephen Clark

Retired Major General, United States Air Force

Stephen recently retired from the Air Force after 32 years of dedicated service. He now serves on the Board of Directors of the Jack and Jill Late Stage Cancer Foundation (JAJF.org) treating the families not the cancer, as well as Education Services of America (ESA), dba EdSouth/Services, a non-profit financial holding company focused on expanding educational opportunities and financial literacy. Stephen also owns his own consulting company (Stephen Clark Consulting LLC) focused on corporate leadership, crisis leadership, strategic planning, national security and public speaking.

Prior to his retirement Stephen was the Director of Programs for the United States Air Force overseeing the development, justification, and consolidation of the Air Forces five year financial plan totaling over $750B in resources and manpower. Previously, he served as the Director of Plans, Programs, Requirements, and Manpower for the United States Special Operations Command where he oversaw the development and consolidation of the Special Operations five year plan integrating the plans of USSOCOM’s five component commands. Stephen also served as the Deputy Commanding General of the Joint Special Operations Command where he helped lead global operations in support of regional commanders. Stephen has commanded at the Squadron, Group and Wing level. During his command of the 27th Special Operations Wing he was responsible for over 4000 Airmen, Civilians and their families, $15B worth of infrastructure and aircraft, a multi year construction program worth $1.5B, the operations of a military base, airfield, training range, and the execution of over 5000 combat hours. He has accumulated years of deployments to combat operations in Bosnia, Somalia, Haiti, Afghanistan and Iraq and participating in some of the nations most time sensitive operations.

Clark earned his bachelor’s degree in Political Science from the University of Tennessee, Masters in Public Administration from Troy State, Masters in National Security from the Naval War College, and was a Defense Fellow at Harvards Weatherhead Center for International Relations. Stephen is a command pilot with over 3300 hours primarily in the AC-130H/U gunship. Stephen is a member of the National Association of Corporate Directors and the Great Falls Rotary Club. He is an avid cyclist, skier, and enjoys fly fishing. Stephen and his wife Cynthia have two grown daughters Shelby and Sydney, and reside in Herndon, Virginia.

Dave Kennedy

IANS Faculty

Dave is the Founder and Owner of TrustedSec, an information security consulting firm, and Binary Defense, a Managed Security Service Provider (MSSP) that detects attackers early to prevent large-scale invasions. In addition to creating several widely popular open-source tools, including 'The Social-Engineer Toolkit' (SET), PenTesters Framework (PTF), and Artillery. David has also released security advisories, including zero-days, with a focus on security research.

Prior to his work in the private sector, Dave served in the United States Marine Corps (USMC), focusing on cyber warfare and forensics analysis activities, including two tours to Iraq. He also served on the board of directors for (ISC)2, which is one of the largest security collectives and offers certifications such as the CISSP.

Steven Martano

The Caldwell Partners, Consultant, Cyber Security Practice

Steven Martano is a consultant in Caldwell Partners’ Cyber Security Practice. He recruits across the information security function, including CISOs, CSOs, cyber advisory board members, and cyber leaders in professional services.

Steven spent seven years at Russell Reynolds Associates, where he helped build the Cyber Security and Supply Chain functional practices, serving as a member of the global Corporate Officers practice.

Earlier in his career, Steven worked at Sikorsky Aircraft (then part of United Technologies Corporation), where he led operations and financial planning for multi-billion contracts for the U.S military and key international customers in the Middle East, Asia and South America.

In addition to his professional career, Steven serves as an editor and featured writer at Beyond the Box Score, SB Nation’s baseball analytics platform, and is a contributing columnist to FanGraphs’ The Hardball Times. He holds a BA from The Catholic University of America and a master’s degree in economics & finance from Trinity College.

Michael Piacente

Co-Founder & Managing Partner, Hitch Partners

Michael is the co-founder and Managing Partner for Hitch Partners. Michael brings over 23 years of combined Cloud and IT practitioner and executive search experience. Michael leads a focused portfolio of search projects focused in the CISO space with a particular emphasis on Engineering and Product oriented Security leaders (Security Engineering and DevSecOps). Prior to starting Hitch Partners, Michael was the Founder and Managing Technology Partner for CVPartners which focused on CIO and Head of IT search projects.. Prior to his executive search life, Michael was a leader in the managed cloud operations space; first as an early member of the SiteSmith (now AboveNet) and then as a co-founder of OpSource (now Dimension Data). Michael began his career with MTI, one of the pioneers in the managed storage space. He is a native of Maryland, he lives in San Francisco and holds a B.S. Degree from the University of Delaware.