Wassel describes FirstNet Authority CEO post as ‘dream job’

Joe Wassel just started his job as FirstNet Authority CEO, and he plans to hit the ground running, embracing the organization’s tradition of outreach to public-safety and first-responder personnel to inform the decision-making process.

That particularly will be the case during the next four months, Wassel said.

“I plan on leading this effort by being out and with first responders and stakeholders—the first hundred days will be critical,” Wassel said during an interview with IWCE’s Urgent Communications. “I’ve told the board that I’ll let them have 30-day assessments. I’ll have observations; I’ll have ideas. And by the end of the hundred-day plan, hopefully I will have established a very well informed vision for moving forward—kind of answering the question, ‘What’s next?’

“We know what happened. We understood what could be when we were working on the legislation and doing the state [visits during the opt-out period]. I’m now going to spend the next hundred days understanding what is, with an eye on what’s next.”

These early days as FirstNet Authority CEO promise to be extremely busy, but Wassel said he welcomes the opportunity.

“Engagement is my super power,” he said. “Quite frankly, being out and about and connecting with people really is going to help inform us.”

Wassel’s first day on the job was Monday, but his interest in the organization responsible for building, maintaining and enhancing the nationwide public-safety broadband network (NPSBN) was sparked about a decade ago while overseeing communications systems for the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD).

During the early days of the FirstNet Authority, Takai—a member of the original FirstNet Authority board and CIO for the DoD at the time—and TJ Kennedy—one of the first employees of the FirstNet Authority—approached Wassel with a couple of questions that led him to monitor the evolution of NPSBN closely.

“They asked two questions: ‘Does DoD have any first responders?’ and “Does DoD care about FirstNet?’” Wassel said. “From those questions asked by TJ Kennedy and Teri Takai was borne a new understanding of public safety and the Department of Defense.

“I became the champion for public-safety communications for those warfighters that are also first responders.”

And there a lot of military people who fit into that category. The DoD has more than 150,000 fire, police and EMS personnel protecting more than 3.2 million people housed on more than 6,000 military installations worldwide, according to Wassel.

Of course, many of these installations are in the United States, and emergency responses in those areas often require communications and coordination between military responders and local public-safety agencies. This reality resulted Wassel traveling to many U.S. states throughout 2017, when FirstNet state plans were developed and ultimately adopted by all governors, allowing contractor AT&T to build the NPSBN throughout the nation.

“I criss-crossed the country when they were trying to get the state plans adopted by each one of the states,” Wassel said. “Most of the states have military installations in them, and it mattered what federal first responders were thinking about the possibility of this network.

“I’ve been at it for a while, so this [FirstNet CEO post] is a dream giveback job for me. I’m thrilled to be here and glad to continue my support of first responders.”

During his 34-year career, Wassel has served in a variety of DoD posts overseeing technology and communications, working for four secretaries of defense. In fact, he was at the Pentagon on 9/11 and escorted then-Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld to the site of the crashed plane that day.

It was an experience that Wassel said helps drive his pursuit of improved secure communications and information sharing between first-responder agencies with a sense of urgency.

“I was there on 9/11—the day before, the day of, and the day after—and I question myself every day [by asking]: ‘If we had shared and partnered on the 10^th the way we shared and partnered on the 12^th, could we have avoided the 11th?’” Wassel said.

“So, I don’t want to lose an opportunity to share information, to partner and get in front of things. I don’t waste to waste a minute, an hour, or a day doing that.”

Most recently, Wassel was executive for the Cyberspace Operations Directorate in the Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA), and he believes it is important to focus on cybersecurity as the FirstNet system evolves.

“It’s absolutely vital; we’ve got to have a network that’s resilient against all hazards,” Wassel said. “But cybersecurity—without a doubt—is really the soft underbelly not only of public safety, but of the nation.”

But Wassel stressed that operational practicalities also must be considered as solutions are considered for FirstNet and other critical communications systems, each of which try to maximize functional utility and interoperability while minimizing security risks.

“It is a yin and yang; it is trying to find that appropriate balance,” Wassel said. “If you have too much security, you’ve got a self-denial of service. If you don’t have enough, you’re going to have a bad guy’s denial of service.

“You’ve got to find that sweet spot—that risk-management space—between both of those extremes. That’s the leadership challenge that we face every single day.”

It is challenge that is important to meet, according to Wassel.

“We have to be at our best when things are at their worst,” he said. “That is a very, very high calling, and I’m just excited to be part of it. This is a dream job for me.”