The posting for the job of director, Bureau of Engraving and Printing, following the announced retirement of Director Len Olijar, has been on the BEP website since July 7, but the job still appears to be vacant. In the interim, Charlene E. Williams is serving as acting director.

Williams is no stranger to the operations of the BEP. Her biography states that she has more than three decades of security printing experience beginning at the Washington, D.C., facility in 1988, where she was a systems accountant. She transferred to the Fort Worth, Texas, facility in 1990, where she ascended through senior leadership positions before being named the Western Facility’s deputy director, chief operating officer in 2016.

As acting director, she is responsible for strategic oversight of BEP’s operations, including the engraving and production operations of United States currency; currency technology, including currency design and security features; and facility project management, entailing among other things development of the new Washington, D.C., area facility in Beltsville, Maryland, and expansion of the Fort Worth facility. She manages more than 1,500 employees and contractors at facilities located in the two locations. The workforce includes employees who are members of 10 bargaining unions.

Williams is a member of the Fort Worth Executive Roundtable and the Federal Executive Board and served a three-year term appointment on the board of directors for the Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce. She is a graduate of Shepherd University in Shepherdstown, West Virginia, where she received a bachelor of science degree in business administration, with a concentration in computer science and a minor in accounting.

Even though the United States will have to wait a few more years to see a woman on its currency, the hierarchy of BEP leadership posted on the agency’s website indicates the two other top positions are also occupied by women.

The BEP’s deputy director and chief administrative officer is Patricia (Marty) Greiner. The recipient of a master of business administration degree from George Washington University, she oversees three associate directors — the chief financial officer, chief information officer, and associate director for management. Under their purview are budgeting, acquisition, human resources, diversity, inclusion, environmental health and safety, facilities management, information technology, strategic planning, and personnel and physical security.

BEP acting deputy director and chief operating officer is Yolanda Ward, who until recently was the associate director for manufacturing at the Washington, D.C., facility.

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