Dr Griggs was in the aerospace industry over thirty years before starting First Place Business Solutions, LLC.  He spent over twenty years as a Program Manager and technical expert within the Lockheed Martin Skunk Works, Boeing Phantom Works, Northrop Grumman Advance Technology Design Center, and the Vought Aircraft Advanced Development Programs, as well as being associated with various other companies advanced design centers. He has led creative, innovative, design teams in all aspects of new product development and transitioning technology and innovation into production. Dr Griggs developed basic technology, created innovative concepts of products and services, developed prototypes, and created commercialization strategies. He has extensive experience in capturing business from idea generation, to customer identification, and proposal writing in business pursuits from as little as $50K to $200B. His visionary aptitude identifies opportunities and threats to business projecting up to 30 years in the future. Dr Griggs has made major contributions to developing and transitioning technologies in advanced military stealth aircraft and space technology with his breadth and depth of understanding of science and technology in addition to business strategy and entrepreneurial behaviors. He has participated in over 40 aircraft programs and transitioned disruptive and revolutionary technologies to the warfighter. In addition to his other duties, Dr. Griggs has reviewed thousands of innovative technologies developed by Small Business Innovative Research funded firms, and has coached those most promising to transition into production.

Dr Griggs has a BS, MS, and PhD in Engineering, an MBA in finance and strategy, a Master of Arts in Economics, and a post-doctorate in international business and entrepreneurship.  Dr. Griggs was an adjunct professor for the Professional MBA program at Oklahoma State University for ten years where he taught courses an participated in outreach programs in topics of: Business Strategy; Corporate Entrepreneurship; Growing a Business, Technology Commercialization, Entrepreneurship and Emerging Enterprises; Creativity Innovation, and Design for Competitive Advantage; and Independent Business Research Topics.