Director of DCSS John Dickson Retires from CIT

John Dickson, Ph.D., the Director of CIT’s Division of Computer System Services, retired from CIT on August 31, 2005 after a long and distinguished career at the National Institutes of Health. In an e-mail to all staff, Alan S. Graeff, NIH CIO and Director, CIT, thanked John for his dedication and exemplary leadership of the CIT Division of Computer System Services (DCSS), calling him “instrumental in successfully leading the division through very challenging times, including the recent consolidation effort and several A-76 studies.”

A Scientific Mind and a Consensus-Building Manager

John took over the position of Director, DCSS, in July 2000 when his predecessor, Perry Plexico, assumed the position of Deputy Director of CIT. John’s scientific background - he holds a bachelor’s degree in physics and a doctorate in physiology - and strong management experience made him an excellent leader for DCSS, as well as a valuable addition to the CIT management team.

Described by his former boss, Perry Plexico, as a low-key individual who preferred to build consensus for his decisions rather than foist them onto his staff, John’s scientific approach to management established him among CIT personnel as an objective and reflective thinker who could be depended upon to make decisions on the basis of solid facts and rational discussions with Division staff.

Starting at NIH

John began working at NIH in 1979, when he joined NINDS as a senior staff fellow in the Laboratory of Neuro-Otolaryngology. In 1981 he came aboard DCRT (CIT's predecessor) as a systems programmer on the DECsystem-10 scientific computing staff, which he once said was "the work I liked best." While John provided stewardship to NIH scientific computing throughout his career, from the DEC-10 to the Unix-based scientific supercomputer, to today's Beowulf-class cluster computing architectures (known at the NIH as Biowulf), he has specifically cited the development of the DEC-10 Poster program as an accomplishment that he is very proud of.

Over the Years

In 1984, John assumed the leadership of the Laboratory Systems Unit (LSU) of the Computer Center Branch in DCRT. LSU managed the DECsystem-10 computing platform that provided general purpose scientific computing support to NIH researchers. When the vendor announced the end-of-life of the DEC-10, John led the efforts to expand high performance scientific computing at NIH to a Unix supercomputing platform. In the late 1980s, this resulted in the procurement of the Convex supercomputer that became the first “Helix System” now known as helix.nih.gov.

After his successful work on behalf of the “Helix System,” John collaborated with Perry Plexico (then in the Computer Systems Laboratory) in the development of the Advanced Laboratory Workstation (ALW) system in the early 1990s. When the Computer Center Branch was reorganized and renamed the Computing Facilities Branch (CFB) in 1993, John was appointed head of the CFB High Performance Scientific Computing Section, the successor to the Laboratory Systems Unit. During the same time period, John led the CFB-wide CERTAN procurement as "trail boss” - a vital position since at the time CERTAN was one of the largest and most visible acquisitions in the federal government.

In the late 1990’s, following CIT’s reorganization into several Divisions, the Computing Facilities Branch was transformed into the Division of Computer System Services (DCSS) and in 1999 John was appointed Associate Director of DCSS. In that role he coordinated services provided by the mainframe, Unix and Windows branches until his appointment as Director of DCSS in July of 2000.

Throughout his career at NIH, John Dickson was also professionally active outside the NIH. For example, he was a longtime and active participant and later member of the Board of Directors of the Government Information Technology Executive Council (GITEC).

Plans for the Future

John and his wife Judy are building a house in Amherst, Massachusetts, and plan on moving up there in September ready to brave the snowy winters and help out with their first grandchild (expected in October!). John and his in-depth understanding of both the NIH scientific mission and the administrative programs and processes (plus his outstanding spreadsheet skills!) will be sorely missed here at NIH.