About

Our founder and CEO, Dr. Josh Barrett is a retired Marine Corps Chief Warrant Officer who brings a rare combination of over 30 years of operational excellence and groundbreaking academic research to insider risk management (IRM).

Dr. Josh Barrett, DSL, stands at the unique intersection of frontline operational experience and evidence-based research. A combination that defines Dolos Imperative’s approach to insider risk management. His career trajectory from Special Warfare specialist to intelligence operative and senior enterprise risk management leader to academic researcher has equipped him with an unparalleled understanding of how insider risks manifest, evolve to insider threats, and can be systematically prevented.

From the Front Lines to the Boardroom

Josh began his 25 year Department of Defense career, first as a Special Warfare operator in both the U.S. Navy and the U.S. Marine Corps, and later as a Senior Counterintelligence Special Agent/Human Intelligence Case Officer. Operating globally at tactical, operational, strategic, clandestine, and covert levels, he completed eight combat tours and participated in some of the most significant operations of the modern era, including the USS Cole rescue operation, the Jessica Lynch rescue mission, and the Captain Phillips rescue mission.

After retiring from the Marine Corps, Josh served as the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) Branch Chief responsible for oversight of all U.S. Double Agent Operations, managing some of the nation’s most sensitive counterintelligence activities. In this role, he provided executive briefings to the President of the United States, the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI), Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI), House Armed Services Committee (HASC), and Senate Armed Services Committee (SASC) on the strategic impact and effectiveness of DoD Double Agent Operations against the nation’s greatest adversaries.

Building Enterprise Programs Across Sectors

Transitioning to the private and financial sectors, Josh brought his operational expertise to organizational IRM at the highest levels. As Senior Manager for Symantec Corporation’s Insider Threat/Global Investigations program, he developed comprehensive frameworks for detecting and mitigating insider risks across global operations.

At the Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond/National IT, Josh served as Senior Advisor/Senior Manager to the Enterprise Insider Risk Management Office, where he provided strategic briefings to the Chair of the Federal Reserve and the Federal Reserve Board of Governors on the current state of enterprise-wide insider risk management initiatives and investigations.

Most recently, as Senior Manager for Charles Schwab’s Insider Risk Program Management Office, Josh helped mature the enterprise-wide insider risk capabilities, implementing advanced data analytics, developing comprehensive use case libraries for User and Entity Behavioral Analytics (UEBA), and creating organization-wide training materials that balanced security effectiveness with privacy protection.

Research That Changes the Field

What truly distinguishes Josh is his commitment to understanding why insider risk programs succeed or fail. His doctoral research in partnership with a prominent organization identified critical gaps in IRM training for organizational leaders and developed evidence-based solutions to address them. Through systematic analysis of leadership capabilities across multiple organizational levels, he discovered that while leaders possessed intuitive security awareness, they lacked formal frameworks and specialized competencies needed for effective insider threat prevention.

His research revealed that current training approaches, which fragment insider risk concepts across compliance domains rather than treating it as a distinct discipline, create significant organizational vulnerabilities. The study demonstrated that most organizational leaders believed insider threats posed greater risks than external threats yet lacked systematic frameworks for addressing these concerns. Most significantly, leaders overwhelmingly requested role-specific, interactive training tailored to their unique operational contexts rather than generic, one-size-fits-all approaches.

From this research, Josh developed a comprehensive five-pillar implementation framework that transforms generic awareness programs into role-specific, interactive training solutions. His work demonstrates that organizations can substantially strengthen their security posture by establishing IRM as a standalone professional discipline with customized training content, systematic behavioral recognition protocols, and clear leadership accountability structures.

Academic Foundation

Josh earned his Bachelor of Arts in Intelligence Studies from American Military University, his Master of Professional Studies in Homeland Security (International Focus) from The Pennsylvania State University, and his Doctor of Strategic Leadership (DSL) from Liberty University’s School of Business, where he also completed an Executive Certificate in Strategic Leadership.

Professional Recognition

• Certified Information Privacy Professional – United States (CIPP-US) | Certificate #000415014I
• Global Counter-Insider Threat Professional (GCITP) | Conferred August 17, 2023

The Dolos Imperative

Josh founded Dolos Imperative to bridge the critical gap he identified through decades of operational experience and rigorous academic research: organizations desperately need IRM training solutions that treat human factors as seriously as technical controls. His approach transforms insider risk from a checkbox compliance exercise into a strategic leadership competency that equips leaders with the behavioral awareness, decision-making frameworks, and ethical stewardship needed to prevent insider threats proactively.

The result is a firm that doesn’t just consult, it transforms how organizations understand, prepare for, and prevent insider risks. Drawing on Josh’s unique combination of operational experience, enterprise program leadership, and doctoral-level research, Dolos Imperative delivers solutions that are operationally validated, research-backed, and proven across sectors.