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Betty Mast is acting chief information officer (CIO) for the nation’s “eyes and ears in space,” the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO, Chantilly, VA). Mast, a systems engineer, is a Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) officer assigned to the NRO.
The NRO is a hybrid organization jointly staffed by members of the CIA, the armed forces and Department of Defense civilian personnel. It develops and operates innovative space reconnaissance systems and conducts activities related to intelligence for national security.
Secret missions
The public didn’t know the NRO existed until 1992, when its status was declassified. Specific NRO satellite capabilities, numbers and names are still secret.
The secrecy of the organization’s missions means that Mast can’t say much about what she does. She can say her job is to be sure the U.S. is making the most effective use of its IT resources, which range from complex government-developed apps to the Microsoft office suite and standard programming platforms and languages like Java, Oracle and SQL.
“I take care of everything from our business needs, like human resources and financial management, all the way to the needs to accomplish our missions,” Mast says.
Team of sixty
Since July 2007 Mast has led a team of about sixty IT pros. “Many of the assignments in the CIA are team-focused and team-oriented,” she notes.
Her daily routine involves strategic decision-making, tactical decisions and personnel issues. Mast likes to have an open-door policy with her team.
“There are a lot of things going on across the community. I’m in constant communication, face-to-face or by electronic means, making sure that my peers and engineers across the NRO have the information they need to accomplish the mission,” she says.
A CIA career
Mast has been with the CIA since she graduated from Francis Marion University (Florence, SC) in 1987 with a degree in math and physics. She was recruited for the CIA by a family friend who worked there. Her parents strongly supported her decision to join.
“I think the biggest driver was that I was interested in the nation, eager and excited about contributing to the mission and making a difference,” Mast says.
Mast was born in Alabama. Her father is a systems engineer and contractor for General Electric, so the family lived in a number of states including New York, South Dakota and Virginia.
Her dad was a “‘techie guy,’ and thought I should go into a technical field,” she says. “He spent time helping me see the joys of math and physics.”
On-the-job training
Immediately after joining the CIA Mast was plunged into on-the-job training for systems engineering duties. She also took courses on continually evolving intelligence community processes and cycles.
“Systems engineering can be computer-based or not,” she says. “Because of my math and physics background I’m a generalist. You have to understand all aspects of the system and know how to integrate them.”
All her jobs have been in the systems engineering field except for a couple of years when she was a plans officer, learning how to achieve congressional budget justification for the agency’s developing programs. She wound up as a lead plans officer. “The more experience I got, the more responsibility I got,” she says.
Change is the new norm
Mast enjoys the mix between technical and personnel management and mentoring younger CIA officers. She enjoys the variety of her work, which has ranged from the future of technology, to specific applications to the mission of the NRO. After 9/11 there was a demand to accomplish missions at a greater speed, she notes. There have also been changes in the way the intelligence community shares information, which have required upgrades in the IT arena.
“Change is the new norm,” she says, and adjusting to change is her biggest challenge. “Stay focused on the mission and task at hand, and all the distractions that have a tendency to drive you crazy will take care of themselves,” she believes.
Fostering diversity
The agency fosters diversity among its employees, Mast says. “I’ve always been given the opportunity to be an equal contributing member of any team.” The number of women in technical roles at the CIA has grown tremendously during the last five to ten years, she notes.
The agency was very supportive as she raised her two children. Her husband is also a systems engineer for the CIA, and they shared parenting responsibilities. “We applied organizational techniques at home,” she says with a smile. Her children, now grown up, recall that they could always count on a schedule to be posted on the refrigerator.
Outside of work, Mast enjoys making pottery, and she volunteers as a wedding coordinator at her church.
Take time for fun
Mast knows it’s important to balance her professional and personal lives, and she advises others to seriously evaluate whether they enjoy their work. “You have to have a little bit of fun,” she says.
“This is an environment that can be draining. You have to have time to decompress, or you’ll lose your mind.”
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