Jennifer C. Walsh joined the CISA faculty in July 2025 on a detail assignment from the Office of the Secretary of War. Immediately prior she served as the Department of Defense Performance Improvement Officer and Director of Administration and Management (PIO/DA&M), a role that included oversight of the management operations for Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) organizations and the Pentagon reservation, service as the OSD Chief Information Officer, and the Director for DoD Presidential Transition Support 2024-2025. She joined the Department through the OPM Presidential Management Intern program as a career civil servant and was appointed to the Senior Executive Service in 2011.
She has served the majority of her defense career in the Office of the Under Secretary for Policy working on issues of consequence to U.S. defense and security interests, bilateral and multilateral relationships, military capabilities, international order and treaty compliance, and organizational and management effectiveness. Specific offices include: Homeland Defense and Hemispheric Affairs, Countering Weapons of Mass Destruction, Middle East, Afghanistan/Pakistan/Central Asia, Russia/Ukraine/Eurasia, Plans, Support to Public Diplomacy, Strategy, European and NATO Policy, Asia-Pacific Policy, Technology Security Policy & Counter Proliferation, the Defense Technology Security Administration (DTSA); and Policy Chair on the faculty of the National War College.
Her executive leadership assignments include PIO/DA&M, Director for DoD Presidential Transition Support; Performing the Duties of the Deputy Under Secretary for Policy (Jan-April 2021); Acting Assistant Secretary of Defense for Homeland Defense and Global Security Affairs (April 2021-March 2022); and Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for Homeland Defense and Hemispheric Affairs (September 2020 (under a different organizational name) – September 2023.
Prior to joining the Department, Ms. Walsh served as J. William Fulbright Scholar to Sweden and worked as a policy analyst for the Southern Governors’ Association in Washington, D.C. She earned master’s degrees from the National War College at National Defense University and the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs at The University of Texas at Austin, and a bachelor’s degree from the Louisiana Scholars College at Northwestern State University.