Suresh Balakrishnan

Suresh Balakrishnan is currently the Deputy CIO and assistant vice chancellor at the 13-institution University System of Maryland. Suresh chairs or is involved with several system-wide initiatives, including IT security, identity management, innovations in the educational use of technology, grid computing, disaster recovery, IT policies, metrics and peer benchmarking, leveraged software procurements, collaborative services, and others. Prior to joining the university, Suresh worked as a manager for two major consulting firms: Deloitte & Touche and Andersen Consulting. Suresh worked primarily with Fortune 500 companies, advising senior management on issues related to IT strategies and architecture as well as IT governance, ROI and accountability. Suresh also performed operations reviews and managed large system implementation projects for those clients. Suresh has had considerable experience with using commercial SDLC methodologies to implement systems. Suresh’s earlier experience includes co-developing an enterprise-wide data and applications architecture for Raychem Corporation, a Fortune 500 polymer manufacturer that has since been acquired by NCR Corporation. Suresh holds an MBA with concentrations in information systems and finance from the Anderson School at UCLA as well as a BS degree in Chemical Engineering. Suresh also serves as a member of the EDUCAUSE Security Task Force Risk Assessment Working Group.