Eric Smith

Eric Smith became the Defense Logistics Agency’s chief of staff on May 9, 2021. As the Chief of Staff he leads all Headquarters operations and directly supports six Major Subordinate Commands’ actions in strategic planning, enterprise integration, organizational governance, strategic communications, legislative affairs, small business programs, equal opportunity and installation management. He supports eleven major DLA installations worldwide, as well as 27 distribution depots, 100 disposition facilities and 642 Defense Fuel Support Points.

Prior to this position he was the deputy commander of the Defense Logistics Agency Energy, a major subordinate command of DLA at Fort Belvoir, Virginia. As the deputy commander, he was responsible for enabling mission readiness by providing globally resilient energy solutions to the Warfighter and Whole of Government.

In his previous position, Smith served as the Department of Energy’s deputy director for Minority Programs and Business Operations in the Office of Economic Impact and Diversity. Prior to this position, Smith served as the National Nuclear Security Administration’s acting associate administrator for Emergency Operations and the deputy associate administrator for Emergency Management and Preparedness.

A former Army logistics management colonel and DLA alumnus, Smith served as executive officer to the DLA Director in 2007 and staff director for DLA's Logistics Operations Center in 2006.

Smith became a member of the Senior Executive Service in 2007 when he was selected to join the Federal Emergency Management Agency as the member charged with envisioning, creating, and leading the post-Katrina mandated transformation of domestic disaster logistics. With FEMA, he successfully served simultaneously as FEMA’s disaster logistics national program executive, executive lead coordinator for Emergency Support Function #7, and the executive lead of the FEMA National Response Coordination Center’s Resource Support Section.

During his seven years of leadership with the Department of Homeland Security, Smith implemented an effective and collaborative national and interagency all hazards operations support concept. He instituted a comprehensive “whole community” public and private sector resource planning and operations support capability to respond to catastrophic disasters, other national emergencies, and special events.

Smith earned a Master’s degree in National Security Strategy from the National War College in Washington, D.C.; a Master’s degree in Business Administration from Saint Ambrose University in Davenport, Iowa; and a Bachelor’s degree in Political Science from the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga.