ooden - 2006 Black Engineer of the YearLinda G

Chapter 20 Linda Gooden 2006 Black Engineer of the Year

THEFOLLOWINGARTICLE, WRITTENBY ROGER WITHERSPOON, WAS FIRSTPUBLISHEDIN US BLACK ENGINEER & IT, CONFERENCE ISSUE 2006.

In 2005, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) needed a hand in a hurry. There were more than 600,000 general aviation pilots crisscrossing the skies to thousands of commercial and private landing fields across North America, and monitoring them in increasingly crowded skies was difficult.

Pilots filed flight plans through 58 FAA call centers, which in turn provided weather data and other information, but these centers had limited capabilities and difficulty coordinating with each other. The FAA knew the system needed to be replaced. Enter Linda Gooden, the founding president of Lockheed Martin Information Technology. She believed the FAA needed a fully integrated network of 20 centers, each carrying a redundant capability so that any one system could moniter a flight from origin to destination anywhere in the nation. The flight plans are automated, and if someone doesn’t close out a flight plan—signaling that the plane arrived at its destination—the system alerts the nearest agencies. It was not surprising that the FAA awarded Gooden’s group the $1.9-billion contract. Under her leadership, Lockheed’s IT division has become the world’s leader in government information technology systems, with 14,000 employees in 70 domestic sites and 18 foreign countries, and more than $2.2 billion in revenues. What is surprising is that this company did not exist until 1994, when Gooden and four colleagues developed a business plan for a new venture within Lockheed.

Gooden knew from her research that the federal government intended to automate its massive infrastructure. A company with the right approach to automating federal office functions could grab a lot of future business.

Her initial request to Lockheed was small; she needed $200,000 in seed money and 57 employees to pursue outsourcing contracts with a target return of $11 million at the end of the first year. The company staked her new group to $600,000, and the new venture brought in $24 million in 12 months. It is the largest and fastest growing business unit in Lockheed’s information sector.

Gooden’s team has modernized the Social Security system, ensuring that the nation’s elderly receive their benefits; digitized the FBI’s fingerprint database, so millions of prints can be searched in minutes; automated the Navy’s payroll system, so all personnel get paid, wherever they are in the world; developed the communications infrastructure for the 25,000 employees at the Pentagon; and eliminated mountains of paperwork by making the patent application process electronic. “She is, first and foremost, one of the most driven executives I have ever encountered in my professional life,” said Michael Camardo, Lockheed’ s executive vice president for Information and Technology Services.

Part of that drive comes from growing up on the south side of Youngstown, Ohio, in the midst of America’s steel manufacturing heartland during a period of transition. “It was a place,” Gooden recalled, “where a person with a sixth grade education could get a good job with a decent wage and raise a middle class family. “But when I was in high school in the 1970s, the steel mills started to shut down, and a lot of people lost their way of life. By the time I graduated, half the steel mills were gone, and a lot of people didn’t have the opportunity to change their lives, and they lost their homes. It pointed out to me that people really needed an education so they would have a choice in life.” She made her choice when she entered Youngstown State University and saw the installation of a new IBM 360 computer.

“When I saw that,” said Gooden, “I decided that was what I wanted to do in life. I was mesmerized by the size of the machine. It took up six normal-sized rooms, though the computing power you have on your wrist today is probably greater than they had in those early machines. But it was clear to me that that was the direction the nation was moving in, and that’s where I wanted to be. The heavy industries were going down, and this computer was offering a bright new future.” Gooden received a degree in computer technology from Youngstown in 1977 and went to work writing software for General Dynamics. Three years later, Martin Marietta offered her a job developing the software for the Peacekeeper Missile. Then she was offered a chance to switch from military to business software, and develop and install a corporate-wide payment and personnel system in the company’s Washington-area headquarters. “I found it more challenging to deliver a human resource system than to deliver software that supported missile systems,” Gooden said, “because you have to deal with people and personalities and likes and different understandings about the way things work. You have to get them to agree on a common set of requirements, and then develop a system that can be used by people with different needs and styles.” That experience set the stage for the rest of her corporate life. Gooden began looking outside of the company for potential clients, and in 1988, she won a contract to modernize the Social Security Administration.

Social Security wanted to update its system in stages, which is more difficult than building a completely integrated system all at once. Gooden conceived of development architecture that was robust enough to allow for the integration of distinct modules as they were later developed. “I take a lot of pride in saying that we build the systems that make America a better place to live,” she said. “I was home for my grandmother’s funeral, and both of my elderly aunts were there. Social Security checks are what they have to live on; that’s their only form of income. We write the software that makes that happen. It’s important to me when I do work for Social Security that I know I am doing something for my aunts.” Gooden realized that there was a potential market for Lockheed’s IT services throughout the federal government,

and she held the planning session that launched Lockheed’s information service. Three years later, Gooden sought and received permission to consolidate all information technology into her business area and create the extensive information services company that dominates government today. Some of that work has been personally difficult. “We work in a safe industry, in nice offices,” she said, “but 9/11 reframed our thinking about those people who are out there every day, working to support this nation. “We had 400 people working in the Pentagon when the airplane hit the building. It took until about nine that evening to account for all of the employees. We had a team of people who walked from the Pentagon to our offices with the customers and worked all night so the Pentagon could be live the next morning. Those guys went into the Pentagon while it was burning and brought up those computers. You can’t buy that kind of commitment.” Gooden has also shown commitment to getting more young people interested in technology. “The digital divide is real,” Gooden said, “and as the country becomes more and more diverse, the problem is not just for us as African Americans. It’s a problem for the nation, as far as where the next generation of computer engineers and scientists is coming from.” She is doing her part, working as the company’s representative to both Morgan State and Hampton Universities, and she serves on the boards of the University of Maryland James Clark School of Engineering, the Prince George’s Community College Foundation, the Maryland Business Roundtable for Education, and the Boy Scouts of America. With Gooden as a guide, the youth who come her way could not have a better introduction into the world of tomorrow.