Managing Partner and Principal Consultant 

An internationally-recognized expert in security, privacy, cloud computing and identity management Dan Blum develops Security Architects Partners’ business partnerships, creates content, and leads consulting engagements. Formerly, he was a Golden Quill award-winning VP and Distinguished Analyst at Gartner and one of the founding partners of Burton Group. As a Principal Consultant at Security Architects Partners and formerly at Gartner, he has led or contributed to projects such as:

  • Identity and access management (IAM) projects for a large retail company, and for a division of a large software company including gap assessment, recommendations, and a full roadmap with cost and resource estimates
  • Risk management, security policy frameworks, and security assessments for a financial securities exchange
  • Secure cloud interconnect, zero trust, and network segmentation architecture for a global asset management company
  • Agile risk management framework development for a major IT services and technology company
  • Identity-as-a-Service (IDaaS) readiness assessment and strategic roadmap for an engineering services company
  • Enterprise DLP strategy, architecture, and roadmap for a midwestern US manufacturer
  • SAP data encryption strategy for a public electric power utility
  • Blockchain identity workshop and strategy planning for three financial services companies
  • IAM recommendations and deep dive Enterprise Authorization architecture for a non-governmental organization (NGO)
  • Various data protection projects for a global private education company including data-at-rest encryption, enterprise key management, and cloud security
  • Data residency, privacy, and cloud encryption, cloud access security broker (CASB), and data protection recommendations for a global pharmaceutical
  • Privileged access management (PAM) assessment and control reviews for a global private education company and a large European bank
  • Full security assessments, recommendations, and roadmap for a large U.S. health care network and top 20 research university

Dan Blum is the author of the book Rational Cybersecurity for the Business which is due out in May, 2020. Previously honored as a Privacy by Design Ambassador, he has authored 2 books, written for numerous publications and participated in standards groups such as FAIR Institute, ISACA, IDPro, ISSA, Kantara Initiative, Open Identity Consortium, Cloud Security Alliance, OASIS and others.  
  beckett

Principal Consultant

Dan Beckett is a member of Security Architects Partners’ extended team with over 27 years of experience in IT, Privacy, Information Security and Identity Management. As a domain expert, he has published various methodologies, white papers and articles for clients, industry associations, and trade publications. Mr. Beckett has also served as adjunct professor at Michigan State University, teaching and developing the security architecture curriculum for the Department of Telecommunications.

Mr. Beckett’s time in industry has encompassed a wide gamut of experience, including web and application development, operations support, systems integration and implementation, program and policy development, strategic consulting, and training. He has led some of the largest Identity Management and Security consulting projects in North America and Europe, spanning Public Sector, Financial Services, Life Sciences, Health Care, Higher Education, Insurance and Manufacturing. Recent selected client assignments include:

  • Security Strategy & Program Assessments for the largest commodities exchange in North America, a major credit card issuer, several major manufacturers, the largest healthcare system in the State of New York, the largest long term acute care health provider in the US, and several public sector clients including US State, US Federal, and Canadian Federal agencies.
  • Security Technology and Reference Architectures for several public sector clients, the largest Canadian energy producer, and the largest commodities exchange in North America.
  • IAM Strategy & Architecture projects for a variety of top 100 financial services institutions, a variety of US Federal and Canadian Federal agencies, and several manufacturers including defense industry and pharmaceuticals.
  • Privacy Policy & Governance Strategy for the super-national public sector entity sanctioned under the U.N.

 

 

  doug simmons

 

Principal Consultant

Doug Simmons brings more than 25 years of experience in IT security, risk management and identity and access management (IAM). He focuses on IT security, risk management and IAM.  Doug holds a double major in Computer Science and Business Administration.

 Doug has performed hundreds of engagements for large enterprise clients in multiple vertical industries including financial services, health care, higher education, federal and state government, manufacturing, aerospace, energy, utilities and critical infrastructure.

Core competency areas for these engagements include risk management, security governance, security assessments, identity lifecycle provision and workflow process automation, authentication, access management, PKI, role engineering, federated identity management, cloud security, mobile device security, data protection and privacy and network security zoning architectures and physical/logical convergence.
 

Corporate Transformation and Risk Management Expert

Adi Agrawal is a member of Security Architects Partners’ extended team.  With over 25 years of experience in Systems Engineering, Information Security, Technology & Enterprise Risk Management and Business Assurance, Mr. Agrawal’s time in the industry included C-suite and enterprise leadership roles in corporate transformation, risk management and all aspects of information technology management.

Mr. Agrawal helps management teams and company boards  frame, deliver and monitor information risks; he applies learning, synthesized from global experiences in strategic planning, risk management, mergers and acquisitions, business launch, value extraction, regulatory approvals, realtime high throughput business critical operations and systems & process engineering; including technical, enterprise and change leadership within startups, private and public companies. As a practitioner and thought leader at the confluence of risk management, information technology risk and security matters, he has presented frameworks, methods and success factors at several global risk management and information security conferences.

Illustrative needs that Mr. Agrawal can address for you include:

Transformation, Repair & Rehabilitation:  Firm wide or focused transformation efforts to identify, plan, deliver and demonstrate firm resilience including all aspects of information risk management;  assist companies in enhancing enterprise wide governance, risk and internal controls capabilities; prepare companies for compliance with regulatory mandates and industry standards (Sarbanes-Oxley Act, Dodd Frank Act, GDPR; SOC, ISO, ISAE among others); help firms’ board committees, CIOs and CISOs assess, prioritize, roadmap and monitor maturation plans of information and cyber security capabilities

Capability Development and Business Expansion: Help leaders design, implement and operationalize information, technology and enterprise risk management programs to profile and manage firm-wide technology, information, operational, financial and strategic risks; assess the technology, risk and security landscape for mergers, acquisitions, divestitures and provide insights and assumption assurance to deal teams to help with integration planning and valuation impact

Information Security and Systems & Process Engineering: Assist companies (re) engineer processes and programs to assure, develop/ enhance, demonstrate and maintain target capability levels for the management of information risks; establish risk informed levels of target state and help build the tools, methods and instruments to create a “machine” environment for resilient operations
  chris haddad

Principal Consultant and Application Subject Matter Expert

Chris Haddad helps our clients connect business strategy with technology modernization to build consensus across executive leadership, corporate boards, or program practitioners. He is known as a trusted advisor, mentor, contributor, and leader who accelerates project approval, influences decisions, and manages successful client relationships. Mr. Haddad is a software and services pioneer whose entrepreneurial spirit, business acumen, and technology leadership crafted multiple successful startups and transformed Enterprise IT teams. His experience and knowledge spans from hands-on development and architecture trench work to executive strategist and industry thought leader. Because his trail-blazing work is ahead of the curve, industry analysts, journalists, and conference event organizers frequently quote Chris, reference his works, and invite him to speak at conference events.

During his tenure at Burton Group and Gartner, Mr. Haddad was Managing Vice President of the Application Platform and Data Management research teams. He distinguished himself covering Service Oriented Architecture (SOA), Cloud Architecture, Cloud Application Design Patterns, and Platform as a Service (PaaS). He also launched Burton Group’s Data Management Strategies research service and the Application Platform Strategies consulting practice, which both generated accretive earnings in year one.
  

Principal Consultant

David Lello works with Security Architects Partners’ extended team as an Enterprise Architect with more than 20 years experience across the business and technology landscape, including information security and financial systems. He’s successfully delivered more than 70 consulting engagements across all industries. David has been most successful in the definition and execution of Identity and Access Management as well as Information Security Governance. His success stems from a unique focus on economic balance and business alignment with IT. David has worked extensively with Process Engineering, Program Management, Change Management, Risk Management, Policy and Implementation. Creating lasting solutions by working with major software providers, he has developed successful models that not only meet the customer’s operational needs, but drive their strategic intent. Throughout his career David has been involved in various dynamic projects, including several very large banking related implementations.
  richard menear

Principal Consultant, Risk Management

Richard Menear works with Security Architects Partners’ extended team. He has worked in the Financial Services industry for 26 years and in Risk Management for 13 years. He is a methodical leader, specializing in Operational Risk Management since its inception, and has impressively held senior positions in four of the top UK banks. He’s successfully delivered more than 50 consulting engagements across all industries for large organizations. In these engagements, Richard proactively identified and managed all aspects of Operational Risk; established standardized/advanced risk management frameworks. Richard has driven and facilitated annual Operational Risk assessments globally. His methodology is typically to undertake analysis of audit findings, external events or operational losses; establish the root cause; and record/monitor implementation of improvement actions.