Meet Brian

Brian Abbe is the client service officer for Booz Allen’s Navy/Marine Corps business. He develops solutions and technologies in diverse areas such as information warfare; biometrics; anti-tamper; unmanned systems; air traffic control; position, navigation, and timing; augmented reality/virtual reality; and fabrication and prototyping to solve some of the Navy’s and Marine Corps’ hardest problems. Brian has grown and led integrated technical teams with expertise in cyber, digital, engineering, consulting, and analytics while leaning on the company’s long-standing reputation of knowing our clients’ mission.

Prior to his current role, Brian helped establish the company’s engineering practice and had a senior leadership role within our Army business. He also served as the communications, command and control, computers, intelligence surveillance, and reconnaissance (C4ISR) lead for Booz Allen’s Navy and Marine Corps business.

Prior to joining Booz Allen, Brian worked for NASA through the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California. While at JPL, he led many applied research projects in mobile satellite and wireless communications including the Advanced Communications Telecommunications Satellite experiments program where many of the technologies associated with satellite radio and satellite television were developed and made practical.

Brian has authored more than two dozen conference and journal articles in many different C4ISR disciplines. He holds a B.S. and an M.S. in electrical engineering, both from Rutgers University.

What has been your biggest accomplishment? Helping the Army mitigate the improvised explosive device (IED) problem. When the U.S. first went into Iraq, IEDs were killing and maiming soldiers at a rate of many dozens per week. Through my team’s work, we came up with several solutions that went to production and were fielded in these two countries that reduces this threat by more than 95 percent.

What makes you most passionate about your work at Booz Allen? It’s really two things. I want to give new and exciting opportunities to our teams through working some of our government clients’ hardest problems. As a senior leader, helping our people grow and learn and putting our teams into a position to succeed is one of the most important things I can do. The other aspect of my job I’m passionate about is working directly with our clients. I love sitting and listening to them talk about their mission and problems. The more that folks open up, the more I can help bring the full force of Booz Allen’s expertise to their problems.

How do you keep on top of the most up-to-date technology so you can deliver these solutions? As a leader, one of the most important things I can do is to keep up to date on technology. The easiest way? Bringing in junior, bright engineers, making teams out of them, actively working with them, and putting them into environments and positions to succeed.

What’s the most influential book you’ve read? One book that helped shape my career is a book about baseball, The Art of Hitting .300 by Charlie Lau. He was a hitting instructor for the Kansas City Royals whose most famous student was George Brett. In Brett’s scouting report, he was rated as an average ball player at best. But he became one of the top five third basemen to ever play the game and was inducted to the Baseball Hall of Fame. What resonated with me was that through hard work and proper preparation, you can accomplish anything. I think this is one of the basic work principles that I carry with me every day in everything I do. And I instill this principle in my children.

What’s your most prized possession? My most prized possession is my family: my wife, two children, and three dogs—all doodles. There’s never a dull (or quiet) moment in the Abbe household.