Ask The Cio

Eric Jeanmaire, the former division chief for Identity, Records and National Security Delivery in U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service and now the CEO of Finality, said moving E-Verify to the cloud made surviving the government shutdown not only possible, but a success.

Like legacy technology systems, agency chief information officers are struggling to modernize their own roles. Federal technology executives and their private sector counterparts still face an uphill battle to shed the long-held viewpoint that they are back-office, cost centers. A new survey of public and private sector CIOs indicated the modernization of their role isn’t happening as fast as many would expect, and technology executives feel the way others judge their value remains stuck in the 1990s. LaVerne Council, the national managing principal for enterprise technology strategy and innovation practice at Grant Thornton, and Todd Tucker, the general manager and vice president of the TBM Council, talked more about this challenge on Ask the CIO with Federal News Network Executive Editor Jason Miller.

Gordon Bitko, the chief information officer of the FBI, said the bureau is relaying on a combination of tools, training and shared services to better manage data.

Eddie Hartwig, the deputy administrator of the U.S. Digital Service, said the goal is to train 250 contracting officers under the Digital IT Acquisition Professional Program (DITAP).

The General Services Administration will host an industry day on April 18 to detail initial thoughts around a new contract writing system. Crystal Philcox, the assistant commissioner for Enterprise Strategy Management at GSA's FAS, among others joined Federal News Network's Jason Miller for Ask the CIO.

Michelle Jacobs, the director of DLA’s hosting office, said the agency is using commercial cloud services to host more than 60 percent of its applications and wants to move toward a software-as-a-service model. Jacobs joined Federal News Network's Jason Miller on Ask the CIO.

Vince Urias, a distinguished member of the technical staff at Sandia National Laboratories, said the HADES program creates a fake environment where cyber defenders can lure hackers and better understand their techniques.

Suzi Connor, the chief information officer at CDC, said a new three-pronged approach will change the way the agency manages and uses technology. Connor joined Federal News Network's Jason Miller on this week's episode of Ask the CIO.

Whether or not the Section 809 panel’s recommendation to exempt the Defense Department from the Clinger-Cohen Act makes sense or goes too far, the congressionally-mandated group hit upon a bigger issue to be solved for every agency: The way Congress provides funding for agencies to buy technology is frozen in time. Former Office of Management and Budget and Defense Department IT executives weighed in on why the frustrations over IT management boiled over in the Section 809 panel report, on this week's Ask the CIO with host Jason Miller.

Max Everett, the Energy Department’s chief information officer, said about one-third to one-half of the department still needs to move their email to the cloud.

Raghav Vajjhala, the chief information officer of the FTC, said a new blanket purchase agreement with four vendors will help the agency take a low risk approach to IT modernization.

Contracting officers are getting some much needed help to make sure solicitations include language to guarantee accessibility for people with disabilities. Section 508 requires agencies to buy technology products and services that are compliant with accessibility standards. Where no human could review the tens of thousands of requests for proposals (RFPs) that come out every year to make sure they include the correct Section 508 clauses, computers can.Marina Fox, who leads the DotGov Domain Services in Office of Governmentwide Policy at the General Services Administration, joined Jason Miller on Ask the CIO this week to discuss.

Margie Graves, the deputy chief information officer of the government at the Office of Management and Budget, said the administration is trying to identify innovative approaches for recruiting and training IT workers.

Lt. Gen. Bruce Crawford, the Army’s chief information officer, said the service’s new artificial intelligence task force will focus on tasks ranging from automating cybersecurity to identity management.

Josh Moses, the former Office of Management and Budget’s chief of the cyber and national security branch in the office of Federal CIO, said agencies are in better shape to defend against cyber attacks because of a combination of policy, people and programs.

Artificial intelligence and the cyber workforce will be front and center when the House Oversight and Government Reform Subcommittee on IT comes back for the 116th Congress. Both Reps. Will Hurd (R-Texas) and Robin Kelly (D-Ill.), currently the chairman and ranking member of the subcommittee, respectively, said they want to see progress across the government in both of these areas. House Information Technology subcommittee Chairman Rep. Will Hurd, R-Texas, talks with Rep. Robin Kelly, D-Ill. on Capitol Hill in Washington, March 18, 2015, before the start of the subcommittee's hearing on Cybersecurity. While it’s still unclear what the shape of the committee and subcommittees will look like and whether Hurd and Kelly will switch roles both say they plan to remain involved in federal IT and management issues. They spoke with Federal News Network Executive Editor Jason Miller on Ask the CIO.

Glenn Davidson, the former executive director of enterprise services at the Commerce, said after three years the agency is seeing better services and cost avoidance from consolidating IT, acquisition and HR services. He joined Federal News Network's Jason Miller on Ask the CIO.

Jothi Dugar, the NIH’s clinical center’s chief information security officer, said she is using the agency’s Diversity of Science effort to increase the number of women in cybersecurity.

The General Services Administration is creating new special item numbers under its IT schedule to make it easier for agencies to buy mobile computing services.

The Air Force is the second military service to restructure its chief information officer’s role by moving it to a higher level in the organization. The service named Undersecretary Matt Donovan as its new CIO to go along with his current role as the chief management officer. And while there is more to finalize around the Air Force’s restructuring efforts, Bill Marion, the Air Force’s deputy CIO, said the work continues to modernize its network and systems. Hear more on Ask the CIO with host Jason Miller.