NIP Chair - Vice Admiral (Ret) Bob Sharp
Vice Admiral (Ret) Bob Sharp assumed duties as Chair and Chief Executive Officer of NIP in Dec 2022, but was officially voted into office in October 2023. He served as a Naval Intelligence Officer for over 34 years, and as a leader within the Navy’s Information Warfare community since its inception. He has decades of leadership experience in the Intelligence, Defense, and National Security arenas. In his last assignment on active duty, he served as the Director of the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, one of our nation’s premier intelligence agencies, from February 2019 until June 2022. He retired in August 2022 and is currently the CEO of B Sharp – Global Solutions, doing a combination of consulting, advisory, and fellowship work focused on helping people who are trying to make the world a better place succeed.
I hope you all had a wonderful winter holiday season and managed to carve out some quality time with family and friends—there’s nothing more important in life! Although I enjoyed winter, I have to say I’m extremely happy to see spring announcing itself with some milder brisk mornings and warmer afternoons filled with sunshine.
Once again, it’s been quite a busy year for NIP and for Naval Intelligence professionals across the globe. It’s been about two years since I joined the NIP leadership team, and I’m really pleased at the progress the collective is making to continually improve our professional organization and experience. I’m also excited to see what we will accomplish in 2025!
Although the summer somehow flew by, you’ll notice from this newsletter, that the Naval Intelligence Professionals still managed quite a bit of activity and continue to make progress in all our focus areas.
As you’ll notice from this newsletter, the Naval Intelligence Professionals have been continuing our journey on course and on pace. We continue to make progress in all our focus areas.
I hope you all had a wonderful winter holiday season and had quality time with loved ones. It’s hard to believe that the vernal equinox is already upon us, but we’ve certainly been experiencing it in all its glory here in the national capital region.
It’s been quite a busy year for NIP and for Naval Intelligence Professionals across the globe. I’m not sure how we fit all our activities into a single year, and it looks as though 2024 will be even busier—and more exciting.
Your NIP and leadership team have had a very busy year and we are working hard toward making 2023 even better. As we continue to emerge from the disruptions from COVID, I am very hopeful and confident that together we will accomplish great things, not just for our community, but also for the Navy and the nation. With our national leadership focused more than ever on strategic competition in every domain, the Navy is front and center, and we in the NIP are a key part of that.
This is my first update for the members of the Naval Intelligence Professionals. I am happy to be able to contribute to an organization that represents the good of the Naval Intelligence Community as a whole. As I have told the NIP Board, Tony and the team have made great progress in modernizing NIP and increasing its value to its members and the Information Warfare Community as a whole. My job is to keep that momentum going and bring value to our members.
We are very pleased to pass the NIP Chairman’s role to Lynn Wright. Lynn was elected along with new Board members during our fall meeting in October. A career civilian intelligence professional, Lynn has a great passion for Naval Intelligence, one that comes from the experience - and the highs and lows - of three decades of exceptionally dedicated work in our profession.
It's great to see summer weather and the return of "social" activities. The many benefits of "virtual" communications are real, but they can never fully replace the need for personal contact.
