Board Director • CEO • Federal Appointee
Rasheid Karl Scarlett
Rasheid Karl Scarlett is a board director, CEO, and federal appointee serving on the FirstNet Authority Board. Directors and executives are now answerable for AI they cannot see inside. He helps them govern it with clarity, security, and care.
Board Leadership
Governance at the highest level.
Three active board seats spanning federal public safety, K-8 education, and enterprise advisory. Each role carries fiduciary responsibility, strategic oversight, and a commitment to serving the public good.
FirstNet Authority
Board Member • Finance & Investment Committee • Programs & Future Planning Committee
Appointed by the U.S. Secretary of Commerce. Serving on two board committees overseeing the nationwide public safety broadband network that connects first responders across all 56 states and territories.
Legends Charter School
Board Chair
Leading governance for a K-8 public charter school in Prince George's County, Maryland. Hosted Maryland Governor Wes Moore for a day-of-service visit to the campus.
Forbes Business Council
Member
Invitation-only council for senior business leaders. Contributing perspectives on AI governance, technology strategy, and executive leadership through published articles on Forbes.com.
Insights
Thinking on what matters.
Do Everything With Love: What It Actually Means in Technology
Do everything with love is not sentiment. It is excellence and care, and the discipline of building technology with people instead of for them.
Read Article →What Boards Get Wrong About AI Oversight
Most boards treat AI as a technology question. It is a governance question. The three plain questions every director should ask about AI oversight.
Read Article →Cybersecurity Is a Fiduciary Duty, Not an IT Line Item
A data breach is a governance failure, not just an IT failure. Why cybersecurity oversight is now a core fiduciary duty of the board.
Read Article →Quantum Is Coming. Here Is What I Am Telling Boards.
A quantum computer that breaks today's encryption does not exist yet. That is exactly why boards need to act now. The threat is harvest now, decrypt later.
Read Article →Critical Infrastructure in the AI Age
AI is being added to the systems people depend on most. The real question is not how capable it is, but how safe it is when it fails.
Read Article →Public Safety Technology: Built for the Worst Moment
Public safety technology is held to the wrong standard. It must work in the worst moment, when everything else fails.
Read Article →Group Economics: Why Income Is Not Wealth
Closing the wealth gap is treated as an individual project. It is structural. Income is not wealth. The missing layer is ownership, pooled and shared.
Read Article →Executive Leadership
Building and scaling enterprises.
NetAesthetics
Founder & CEO • Since 2005
AI implementation and IT consulting firm serving federal government agencies, media companies, and enterprise clients. Teams operating across the United States and internationally. More than two decades of delivering secure, mission-critical technology.
Great Dwellings
Founder & Former CEO • Exited January 2025
Built and scaled a technology-enabled hospitality company from concept to over $1 million per month in revenue. Operations spanning the United States, Colombia, and the Philippines. Managed cross-border teams, regulatory compliance, proprietary technology development, and dynamic pricing systems.
Areas of Expertise
Where technology meets governance.
Twenty-five years of building, securing, and governing the systems that organizations depend on.
AI Governance & Oversight
- AI Governance & Ethics
- Enterprise AI Implementation
Cybersecurity & Critical Infrastructure
- Cybersecurity Oversight
- Critical Infrastructure
- Public Safety Technology
- RF & Satellite Communications
- Cloud & Network Architecture
Human-Centered Technology Leadership
- Building With People, Not For Them
- Digital Transformation
- International Operations
Published Work
In print and on the record.
Selected articles, interviews, and commentary across national media. From public safety technology to hospitality innovation to executive leadership.
Speaking
For your most important room.
From boardrooms to conference stages. Delivering clarity on AI governance, cybersecurity oversight, and what it means to lead with both technical depth and human conviction.
AI Governance for Boards
How directors can exercise meaningful oversight of AI adoption without becoming technologists. A framework for asking the right questions, reading the right signals, and setting the right boundaries.
Cybersecurity as Fiduciary Duty
Why cybersecurity belongs in the boardroom, not just the server room. A practical guide for directors navigating the intersection of risk, regulation, and reputation.
Critical Infrastructure in the AI Age
Lessons from the frontlines of public safety technology. How the systems that protect millions of first responders are evolving, and what every organization can learn from that standard.
Do Everything With Love
A leadership philosophy built on excellence, not emotion. How operating with care and precision creates organizations that endure.
In the Press
Recognition and appearances.
About
Who is Rasheid Scarlett?
"Excellence is not a feeling. It is a decision you make before the work begins."
Rasheid Karl Scarlett is a board director, CEO, and federal appointee with over twenty-five years of experience in mission-critical telecommunications and technology infrastructure.
He was appointed to the FirstNet Authority Board by the U.S. Secretary of Commerce in October 2024, where he serves on the Finance and Investment Committee and the Programs and Future Planning Committee. He chairs the board of Legends Charter School and serves as CEO of NetAesthetics, an AI implementation and IT consulting firm he founded in 2005.
As founder and CEO of Great Dwellings, he built a technology-enabled hospitality company from concept to over $1 million per month in revenue, with operations spanning the United States, Colombia, and the Philippines. He exited the company in January 2025.
Prior to founding his companies, he served as Network Architect at Verizon and AT&T, and as consultant at Accenture and KPMG, where he delivered infrastructure solutions for clients including VeriSign, Google, and Comcast. He began his career deploying secure networks to U.S. Government facilities worldwide.
He holds an MBA from the University of Maryland and a BS in Computer Science from Wheaton College. He is currently pursuing the NACD Directorship Certification.
He is a member of the Forbes Business Council, and has served with Empowering Males of Color, Youth For Tomorrow, BUILD, and the VRMA DEI Committee. He is a former Board Member of Kindred Communities (2017–2019), a nonprofit focused on educational opportunity and community programming, where he supported strategic planning, fundraising and donor relations, and program evaluation. In 2013 he founded SmarterVote, a civic technology platform designed to increase voter engagement.
His guiding philosophy: Do everything with love.
Why I do this work
I grew up on the move, across many parts of the country. My start was closer to hardship than to boardrooms.
That distance shaped how I work. I learned early that excellence is a decision, not a circumstance. I build and govern technology with care because I know what is at stake when systems fail the people who depend on them.
Frequently Asked Questions
Plain answers to common questions.
Who is Rasheid Scarlett?
Rasheid Karl Scarlett is a board director, CEO, and federal appointee. He was appointed by the U.S. Secretary of Commerce to the FirstNet Authority Board, which oversees a $47 billion nationwide public safety broadband network serving 6.1 million first responders. He is CEO of NetAesthetics, an AI implementation consulting firm, and Board Chair of Legends Charter School. He is a Forbes Business Council member with over 25 years of experience in mission-critical telecommunications and technology infrastructure.
What boards does Rasheid Scarlett serve on?
Rasheid Scarlett serves on the FirstNet Authority Board (Finance and Investment Committee, Programs and Future Planning Committee), is Board Chair of Legends Charter School (K-8, 893 students in Prince George's County, Maryland), and is a member of the Forbes Business Council.
What is Rasheid Scarlett's expertise?
Rasheid Scarlett's expertise spans AI governance and ethics, cybersecurity oversight, critical infrastructure, public safety technology, enterprise AI implementation, digital transformation, RF and satellite communications, cloud and network architecture, and international operations. He has more than two decades of experience delivering secure, mission-critical technology.
Is Rasheid Scarlett available for speaking engagements?
Yes. Rasheid Scarlett delivers keynotes, executive briefings, board workshops, and panel discussions on AI governance for boards, cybersecurity as fiduciary duty, critical infrastructure in the AI age, and leadership philosophy. Contact rasheid@rasheid.com for availability.
What is Rasheid Scarlett's three-question framework for AI oversight?
In his article What Boards Get Wrong About AI Oversight, Rasheid Scarlett argues that strong AI oversight comes down to three plain questions, asked persistently and answered specifically: Who is accountable? What could go wrong, and for whom? How would we know? The questions require no technical fluency, only the willingness to keep asking until the answers stop being vague.
What is Rasheid Scarlett's leadership philosophy?
Do everything with love. In his work it means two specific things: excellence and care. Excellence is the decision to get it right before anyone is watching. Care means building technology with people instead of for them, and never forgetting that on the other side of every system is a human being who needs it to work. He writes that the systems people depend on most have to be trustworthy, and trustworthy is something you build with people, not for them.
What does Rasheid Scarlett write about?
Rasheid Scarlett publishes Insights articles at rasheid.com on AI governance, cybersecurity, critical infrastructure, public safety technology, group economics, and human-centered technology leadership. Pieces include What Boards Get Wrong About AI Oversight, Critical Infrastructure in the AI Age, and Group Economics: Why Income Is Not Wealth. He has also written for Forbes on business strategy and digital transformation.
FirstNet Authority Board • Forbes Business Council • Featured in The Washington Post