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By Alyah Khan

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The post-Kundra era: Time for a new direction with the federal CIO?

Everybody knows by now that Federal CIO Vivek Kundra will be leaving his job in mid-August. Rumors abound about who will replace Kundra. But that speculation raises a larger question: How does the federal CIO position need to evolve in order to fulfill the Obama administration’s goals?

Undoubtedly, Kundra will leave a lasting mark on the post. He was appointed as the first federal CIO in 2009 and has gained significant praise for his initiatives for cloud computing, data center consolidation and improvements in IT program management.

Richard Spires, CIO at the Homeland Security Department and vice chairman of the Federal CIO Council, wrote about Kundra’s legacy in a recent blog entry on the CIO.gov website.

“Vivek joined the Obama administration with a vision of IT being a catalyst for the federal government to be much more open, participatory and collaborative,” Spires wrote in the June 21 entry. “Vivek has been a strong force for open government. He has changed the dialogue and viewpoint of agencies of the federal government – and we will not go back.”

Spires also used the entry to note that although the 25-point IT reform plan was driven by Kundra, it reflects the “collective views” of the federal CIO community. He wrote that the council will continue to execute the plan as scheduled.

Sources have said that Kundra is a visionary and what the administration should look for now is a federal CIO who can be an implementer. This makes sense given that the IT reform plan was only introduced last December and there are several milestones to accomplish.

Interestingly, Spires is being floated as possible candidate to succeed Kundra and he might be the kind of no-nonsense person needed to get things done. But, that’s all speculation now.

So while administration officials search for the next federal CIO, what qualities and experience do you think they should be looking for? And do you think the job itself must be redefined to ensure continued progress in federal IT?

Posted by Alyah Khan on Jul 01, 2011 at 8:54 AM



 

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Reader comments

Wed, Jul 6, 2011 Viriginia

I hope the new CIO is one with Enterprise Architecture (EA) credentials and Federal Service experience in his/her background. EA Credentials of a person grown from the bottom up with experience in Solution Architecture design, Operations and Support, Technology development/Insertion, and Acquisition Management. The EA community is quickly out growing capacity to fill requirements and not at a fast enough pace to keep up with the urgent need to understand and implement concept change management (CCM). The lack of trained professionals in the culture of Enterprise Architecture in key leadership positions have constrained integration, increased costs, and chained performance of IT/IM in the federal government. There are plenty of industrial organizations that are training people in discipline of EA where as the government's training pipeline is still being constructed and people have been elevated to positions of responsibility without the requisite skill sets. When you build a superstructure you hire an Architect who is trained in the ways and means to design and construct the building. Why not hire an industry trained and certified Enterprise Architect to with the ways and means to design and construct the multiple Enterprises in the federal government. A CIO without Enterprise Architecture training/experience is like a building Architect without foundation/structure training experience.

Tue, Jul 5, 2011

There are many benefits of eGov, most of which I must say involve cost saving: data center consolidation, lower maintenance costs, leverage technologies and configurations, combine government communities. The removal of the redundant and unnecessary, both online (poor websites for example) and on-premise (ex: hardware can be repurposed), are definitely important factors in these cost savings.

Tue, Jul 5, 2011 DC

The administration should hire a CIO that is business savvy, decisive and is a true visionary. The new CIO should not spend tax payers dollars like Vivek did on unnecessary eGov projects. The new CIO should be someone who has a sense of fiscal responsibility and who focuses on those things that are truly essential with the highest ROI and that will benefit the citizens. The CIO should also reevaluate the numerous websites within the federal government and shutdown most of them. Numerous federal websites are redundant or unnecessary. They are not truly serving the citizen, they are someone's pet project and claim to fame. Hopefully, the second time around will produce a far better choice than the first.

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