James “Kent” Stiegler

Acting Principal Deputy Director

Kent Stiegler has been with the Department of State since 1990. Prior to serving as Acting Principal Deputy Director, he has been the Managing Director for Operations for the Bureau of Overseas Buildings Operations since September 2019.

A career member of the Senior Foreign Service, with the rank of Minister-Counselor, Kent’s most recent overseas assignment was as the management counselor for the U.S. Mission in Athens, Greece, from 2016 to 2019. He has also served tours as Management Counselor for the U.S. Embassy in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia; Deputy Director of the Frankfurt Regional Service Center; Management Counselor at the U.S. Embassy in Oslo, Norway; Financial Management Officer and Human Resources Officer at the U.S. Embassy in Colombo, Sri Lanka; as well as General Services Officer assignments in Paris, Bern and N’Djamena.  In Washington, he worked as a course manager and instructor at the Foreign Service Institute, and on detail for a year to the U.S. House of Representatives as a Pearson Fellow.

Born and raised in Cincinnati, Ohio, Kent served six years in U.S. Army before joining the State Department. He holds a bachelor’s degree in nuclear engineering from the U.S. Military Academy at West Point and a master’s degree in business administration from Boston University.