In a new video series, “Breaking Through for Mission Advantage,” federal and industry leaders share their insights on how the strategic shift to integrated, software-defined IT platforms helped or will help agencies achieve greater mission outcomes.

The Defense Logistics Agency, under the guidance of Chief Information Officer Adarryl Roberts, is spearheading a digital business transformation initiative to streamline efficiency across its supply chain operations. This initiative includes various projects designed to leverage technology to improve the distribution, disposition and supply of critical materials ranging from subsistence goods to construction equipment. By embracing automation and developing a citizen developer program, the DLA enables operational innovations, directly impacting the speed and efficiency of its services.

Similarly, the Navy’s integration of a software-defined approach into its combat systems, highlighted by Cindy DeCarlo, director of global government education and national security at Cisco, signifies a shift toward more agile and secure defense operations. The approach facilitates quick adaptation to mission requirements and ensures enhanced security by consistently enforcing advanced security controls across the infrastructure.

Furthermore, the IRS’s technological overhaul, as shared by Kaschit Pandya, acting chief information security officer, illustrates the transformative power of IT investments in public service delivery. Modernization efforts have led to significant improvements in taxpayer services, including faster refunds, reduced call wait times, and heightened cybersecurity measures, showcasing the tangible benefits of embracing digital transformation.

At the General Services Administration, Ann Lewis, director of technology transformation services, highlighted the complexities of infrastructure modernization, including the importance of making hard choices about system features and functionalities during the modernization process. She advocated for a platform approach to overcome the siloed nature of government systems, stressing that it enables better scalability, simplifies user experiences and ultimately leads to more sustainable system costs.

In the DOD, Rob Vietmeyer, chief software officer, and Dave McKeown, deputy CIO, talked about software’s transformative power and cybersecurity modernization. Vietmeyer focused on the agility and operational efficiency gained through cloud computing, illustrating the department’s push toward rapid deployment capabilities and a more innovative operational approach. McKeown outlined key initiatives in cloud adoption, DevSecOps and zero trust architecture to combat advanced threats and ensure system resilience. 

The strategic shift toward integrated, software-defined platforms is not just about enhancing operational efficiency; it represents a fundamental rethinking of how federal agencies operate in the digital age, ensuring they remain agile, secure and capable of meeting the nation’s needs.

Other participants in the video series include:

• Mary Martinez, Senior Director of Sales, Federal Civilian, Cisco
• Karlie Wilson, Director, DOD, Cisco
• David Raffetto, Director of Sales, DOD, Cisco
• Kevin Manwiller, Operations Director, DOD, Cisco

This video series was produced by Scoop News Group, for FedScoop and sponsored by Cisco.

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The series, “Accelerating the Mission with AI and Security,” produced by Scoop News Group for FedScoop and underwritten by Google for Government, invited leaders to share where they hope to see the most significant return on investment for AI implementation in the coming year.

Artificial intelligence to meet core mission needs

Workforce augmentation was a highly discussed use case for AI implementation in the series.

FEMA’s Office of the Chief Financial Officer is one agency that has been strategically working on a generative AI tool to improve mission efficiency.

Christopher Kraft, Assistant Administrator, Financial Systems for FEMA’s OCFO shared that his office is developing a proprietary generative AI tool – owned and operated by FEMA and DHS – to generate draft responses to budget requests that his team can review for accuracy.

The Department of Labor CISO Paul Blahusch discussed how his agency is leaning into AI with a dedicated AI office inside the Office of the CIO to help develop and implement tools and techniques to streamline workflows, which can translate into cost avoidance and improved programs. He referred to three AI implementation areas his agency is focusing on, including cybersecurity, back-office support, and assisting constituents in accessing services more quickly.

For agencies like the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, using AI as an augmented assistant has been developing even further over the past three years, according to CISO Jamie Holcombe, providing each examiner with an augmented intelligence system next to them.

“So, during its searches, it can bring up not just one thing but a myriad of things that pertain to the uniqueness of that patent application or trademark registration. So, you really have to think that the examiners don’t want one thing, they want a plethora of things to say, ‘yes,’ it is unique and novel, or ‘no, it’s not,’” Holcombe explains. “AI and generative AI has helped in that regard because each examiner has a customized version that just applies to them.”

Many leaders see generative AI as a way to improve standard workflow procedures. Department of Commerce CIO Andre Mendes, said that for tasks that are incredibly onerous, his department is looking at how AI can be used to break through some of the clutter.

“In HR processes, for example, position descriptions are not really that exciting, but at the end of the day, consume an enormous amount of people and time and resources, and where we can, I think, leverage AI to dramatically improve and optimize those environments,” he explained.

Improved security for federal data

Agencies like U.S. Citizen and Immigration Services (USCIS) are far along in their cloud migration strategies, which means that data security strategies must now shift to account for an explosion of digital resources.

“All the immigration data that has to be cataloged and identified and tagged is a monstrous task. And frankly, there is no easy button to push when you’re talking about the volume and scale of data that we have, and the amount of change that it goes through on even a daily basis,” shared USCIS CISO Shane Barney.

“We have, from a cybersecurity perspective, in my plans I am building, what we’re referring to as a security integration platform, which is an open source-based platform, and it has a whole AI/machine learning piece built into it based on open-source principles and practices, as well as some software platforms that will be integrated into the security program. And more on the threat hunting side of things where we’re looking for those abnormal changes in the environment that could indicate a breach.”

His agency leadership is waiting on further White House guidance on AI implementation but is working on foundational principles that can help the organization move forward with implementation plans quickly, referring to an open cybersecurity schema framework USCIS has been working on.

“I see it as the future. It’s the way we have to handle it; the future of cybersecurity is data,” said Barney.

This sentiment was echoed by other leaders who want to improve how they manage, store and analyze data to strengthen their agency’s security posture. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) CISO Robert Wood said that his agency is building a security data lake to minimize data silos.

According to Wood, generative AI models could play a more significant role in empowering the government workforce to ask plain language questions to get actionable insights from data if properly structured and react more quickly to security threats and vulnerabilities.

Other participants who shared their insights in this series included:

• David Shive, CIO, U.S. General Services Administration
• Guy Cavallo, CIO, Office of Personnel Management
• Dr. Kelly Fletcher, CIO, Bureau of Information Resource Management, Department of State
• Josh Lehman, Director, Office of Business and Customer Assurance, U.S. Food and Drug Administration
• Russell Marsh, Director, Cybersecurity Operations, National Nuclear Security Administration

This video series was produced by Scoop News Group, for FedScoop, and sponsored in part by Google for Government.

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A new video campaign featuring federal government agency leaders and Leidos executives highlights the steps agencies are taking to modernize their operations by embracing as-a-service models.

As-a-service models allow agencies to consume IT resources and services on demand without investing in and maintaining their own infrastructure. This can free up agency resources to focus on mission-critical initiatives, such as improving service delivery and citizen engagement.

Lexy Guenther, chief technologist at Leidos, discussed how Leidos enables NASA’s mission through effective IT services using an “as-a-service model.” Leidos provides, secures, manages and maintains essential IT services for over 60,000 end-users at NASA, allowing the agency to focus on mission-critical operations.

“We are a big proponent of using managed services; we’ve been using them for years at HRSA,” said Adriane Burton, the CIO of the Health Resources and Services Administration. She explained how adopting managed and cloud services enhances mission delivery in HRSA and how they have used shared services, cloud services and in-house solutions to meet IT needs. Using managed services and cloud platforms, especially platform-as-a-service has enabled HSA to deploy applications more quickly.

Mittal Desai, CIO of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, elaborated on FERC’s use of managed services, particularly for security, financial systems and back-office operations. “Receiving real-time security was also a benefit. And the rise of workplace flexibility, especially in the post-pandemic era, has highlighted the importance of mobility and mobile services. Accessing services independently from any location at any time has become crucial. The adoption of as-a-service models significantly contributed to supporting these objectives and enhancing the overall customer experience for our user base,” said Desai.

Federal Emergency Management Agency CTO Ted Okada shared insights into how FEMA prioritizes a “people-first” approach in enhancing disaster response efforts. He emphasized the importance of focusing on the needs of disaster survivors and nurturing a diverse and empathetic workforce. Okada also recognized the importance of new technologies, including AI, low-code and no-code solutions, which can improve disaster response efforts and aid workforce efficiency.

Deputy CIO Winston Beauchamp of the Department of the Air Force discussed the advantages of adopting an as-a-service model, particularly for IT helpdesk services. The Air Force’s geographically dispersed bases have traditionally relied on on-site support for IT issues. However, embracing an as-a-service approach has allowed them to automate tier one and tier zero helpdesk services, significantly reducing the need for on-site support.

As the federal government modernizes its IT systems and services, as-a-service models will likely play an increasingly important role in helping agencies achieve their modernization goals, improve their security posture, reduce IT costs and better focus on mission-critical tasks.

Hear more from the other participants in the video series, including:

• Karyn Runstrom, Acting CIO, Defense Logistics Agency
• Dave Lewis, SVP, Maritime, Leidos
• Seth Abrams, VP and CTO, Homeland Security Solutions, Leidos
• Steve Wallace, CTO, Defense Information Systems Agency  
• Jamie Wolff, CIO, National Nuclear Security Administration
• Simchah Suveyke-Bogin, Chief CX Officer, USDA

This video series was produced by Scoop News Group for FedScoop and sponsored by Leidos.

The post How agencies are staying agile and competitive using modern service delivery appeared first on FedScoop.

In a recent video campaign, produced by FedScoop and underwritten by Broadcom, government agency leaders highlight the ways they are to navigating modernization initiatives to carry out their missions.  

Challenges of data management and accessibility

One of the most pressing challenges for government agencies is dealing with the exponential growth of data and the difficulties in storing, organizing and analyzing the information.

Office of Personnel Management CIO Guy Cavallo said that the timing of the cloud is perfect, as the explosion of data will be “unending.” He shared how OPM has done much work in the last year developing user requirement groups to segment who can see what data from a particular agency—helping with their long-term data management strategy.

Agencies are actively working to make data more accessible to a broader range of stakeholders, including policymakers, researchers and the general public. However, ensuring data accessibility without compromising security remains a balancing act. Lauren Knausenberger, Former CIO for the Department of Air Force, explained how they maximize data for their missions without causing security or governance concerns.

She said, “We want to make the data accessible to as many people [as possible], but at some point, it becomes a very challenging governance concern to think through who should have access to this data.” Like Cavallo, Kanusenberger explained the importance of micro-segmentation in securing their data, enabling decision advantage and shortening the kill chain moving data worldwide.

Dynamic data movement across cloud environments

Interviewees also explored how their migration to multi-could environments, coupled with the explosion of data, has changed their strategies for implementing solutions that facilitate their data’s free and secure movement.

Justin Fanelli, technical director for PEO digital and enterprise services at the Department of the Navy, said their goal is to “move data from anywhere to anywhere—a friction-free place. Fanelli explained how they’re prioritizing the functionality of their cloud-based activities—Operation Flank Speed is an example of successful implementation, where data can be accessed smoothly across various devices and domains, leading to improved user experiences.

State Department CIO Kelly Fletcher said they must be more “intentional about what data is stored and where data is processed.” She said that while the department operates in its own and commercial cloud environments, they also have computing capabilities at the edge. To make informed decisions and understand patterns, data must be aggregated from different sources. She also highlighted the significance of their network modernization initiative, which facilitates direct access to various data sources, moving away from centralizing all data in one location.

Opportunities for modernization efforts

Although there are many moving pieces, the rapidly evolving landscape of technology also presents opportunities for agencies as they seek to adapt to innovations. According to Broadcom CEO Hock Tan, federal agencies have two significant opportunities. First, policymakers should provide agencies with maximum flexibility in using modernization investments, as a one-size-fits-all approach may hinder optimal modernization where it’s most needed. Second, agency and commercial CIOs need to maintain their focus on innovation-enabling capabilities. Multi-cloud strategies, like the one facilitated by Broadcom’s VMware acquisition, offer the tools and flexibility necessary for a successful modernization roadmap.

He said the merger of the two companies would allow more investment in IT solutions that provide greater flexibility to modernize applications, manage software and services, and secure data across clouds. Tan said this will “give federal agencies the tools to control their destiny” in multi-cloud environments, all while “increasing choice and reducing risk.”

The state of relations between agencies and technology partners continues to evolve and grow stronger. “Our relationships with our technology partners are very important to modernizing our network,” said USPS CIO and Executive VP Pritha Mehra.

“Our partners are directly assisting us to upskill our workforce and infuse modern ways of thinking through professional services contracts. They are working with our teams to provide workshops, sandbox opportunities, training sessions and other activities to make our employees better-informed leaders, better technology strategists and highly skilled technologists,” added Mehra.

Other government leaders who shared their experiences include:

• Gundeep Ahluwalia, CIO, Department of Labor
• Adam Bromwich, CTO, Symantec Division, Broadcom
• Barbara Cooper-Jones, SVP and CIO, Ginnie Mae, HUD
• Melinda Rogers, CIO and Deputy Assistant Attorney General for Information Resource Management, DOJ

This video series was produced by Scoop News Group, for FedScoop and sponsored by Broadcom.

The post Tackling broader IT modernization strategies appeared first on FedScoop.

Network modernization involves implementing new technologies and practices that help improve network performance, reliability and security. A new video campaign featuring federal and state government agency leaders highlights the steps agencies are taking to modernize the network infrastructure that supports mission-critical applications, making them more scalable and secure.

George Duchak, CIO for the Defense Logistics Agency—which manages eight different supply chains with operations across the U.S. and over 20 countries—gave insight into DLA’s first significant IT modernization effort in 25 years. He highlights their strategic push to the cloud, implementing a zero-trust architecture and purchasing fiber and bandwidth to extend to their more austere locations.

“We’ve taken steps to upgrade our bandwidth over the past few years, we’ve gone from one gigabit per second to three, and now we’re at 10 gigabits per second. Additionally, because we are concerned about resiliency, we have path diversity. So, we have multiple paths for this. So another key shift for security reasons was the adoption of application delivery controllers, advanced application firewalls and intrusion prevention systems,” said Duchak.

Optimizing infrastructure for robust networks is a challenging task, particularly for states. With limited budgets and competing priorities, state governments often struggle to allocate the necessary resources to implement modern capabilities.

However, North Dakota’s CTO Duane Schell shared how his state managed networking costs by adding more value to the capacities they procure. He describes overcoming procurement challenges by improving how they frame contract language to include target goals. This adds transparency in the bidding process for vendors about what they currently have and are trying to achieve — for example, in areas such as a cloud and zero trust security.

“A level of transparency is key to helping ensure that our partners can put together and write proposals that are going to achieve the right value on the other side,” said Schell.

And as agencies rely more on technology to provide essential services, building greater security measures into the network is increasingly important. Ramesh Menon, CTO of the Defense Intelligence Agency, shared his insights on what strategies to implement greater security.

“We need to understand the concept of data fabrics and cross-domain policies; how do we share APIs? How is it going to be shared? How are our applications orchestrated to leverage this new architectural evolution? So, while we become more secure and make sure we are resilient with the cybersecurity regulations, we need to make sure that we look in terms of value, not just as a control to improve security but as an enabler to accelerate the value for our mission partners and mission owners from an application standpoint too,” he said.

Assistant Secretary for Technology, Security and Operations & COO, Massachusetts Sean Hughes said that the state enhanced its threat hunting analysis, allowing them to centralize the management of all associated threat data to include endpoint and network data. Hughes explained that as they continue to ingest data into their security, incident and event management platform, they can identify deviations and threats they may face.

“The key for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts is managing the environment with a common platform for security and networking, where we can leverage an economy of scale and deploy standardized rules protecting all remote endpoints,” he explained.

By adopting modern networking solutions, federal and state government agencies can ensure their networks are optimized for the cloud and multi-cloud computing environment, providing greater flexibility, scalability and security.

 Other participants who shared their experiences in the video series include:

• Sharon Woods, Executive Director, Cloud Computing Program Office, DISA
• Kenneth Harrison, Division Chief, Telecommunications Office, Census Bureau
• Colten O’Malley, Deputy Commander, US Army Command and Control Support Agency
• Steve Nichols, Former CTO, Georgia
• Jason Hebbe, CTO Pennsylvania
• Chris Rein, CTO, New Jersey

This video series was produced by Scoop News Group for FedScoop and StateScoop and sponsored by Comcast Business.

The post How agencies are delivering future-ready network performance appeared first on FedScoop.

But as they speed up their adoption of zero-trust security, they still face challenges with legacy applications and architectural gaps; compliance requirements; or financial and operational concerns. It’s not necessarily about adopting new technologies or products but rather an overall strategy that should be programmatically mapped according to each agency’s unique use-case requirements and capabilities.

That is evident according to federal leaders from nearly a dozen agencies who joined FedScoop to talk about their success thus far and the challenges as they implement zero trust. The interview series, Federal Zero Trust: Moving from Aspiration to Transformation, underwritten by Forcepoint, provided a platform for leaders to share their experiences.

“Taking the federal government in this significant shift towards the zero-trust paradigm is not a singular project; it’s not one thing; it’s a fundamental change to how we’re approaching federal agencies, their data and their security evolve. Our goal is to raise the baseline over the next few years, and everybody is starting in a different place with different parts of that journey,” says Mitch Herckis, director of federal cybersecurity in the Office of the CIO at OMB.

He explains that one of the biggest challenges is the “decades of technical debt that have been ignored” and how that manifests itself when agencies are unable to implement security measures. “It’s so important for us to think of this as a cohesive strategy in line with their broader IT development strategy, and how they’re thinking about not just their cybersecurity [budget] as a whole, and how they strategically invest that, but also how they’re investing in their overall IT modernization.”

The Department of Defense, meanwhile, recognizes that its security efforts set an example for the entire federal government. David McKeown, senior information security officer and deputy CIO at DOD, says, “we have an aggressive schedule. We want to be in alignment with the federal mandates called out in EO 14028 and the corresponding NSM-8, which is also going to cover zero trust for national security systems. We want to implement zero trust throughout the whole [department] by the end of FY27. We will stay in alignment in the near term with the three-year goal for the capabilities that are being called out there, but our zero-trust plan that we have right now is very well defined; we’re hoping to share that with the rest of the federal government.”

Although the DOD has a robust plan for traditional admin-type and command and control networks, they still have work to do on the weapon system and critical infrastructure front.

At the U.S. Navy, CISO Tony Plater details how they’re planning to implement zero trust principles across multiple networks, domains and functional silos. He also talks about working directly with the DOD Portfolio Management Office, so they don’t duplicate efforts and ensure greater synergy.

Plater shares his insights on the Navy’s move to Flank Speed, a single enterprise cloud environment for daily work. “Flank Speed is our core platform for extending our zero-trust architecture across the Navy enterprise….and we see it as meeting or fully integrating into the eventual zero-trust ecosystem requirements. Today, Navy users can access Flank Speed sources without using a VPN to connect to government networks. So that’s a big step forward for us,” he says.

Another agency that leveraged the cloud was the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. CISO Shane Barney explains the agility of being 95% cloud-based and highlights how “[USCIS] started its zero trust journey many years ago, primarily because we were in the cloud; we recognized the value of cloud. And we recognize what we could do with the cloud, which would later become more known as zero trust; we just called it good cyber hygiene.”

He also discusses the importance of investing in security automation early. “Don’t make that one of the last things you do,” he says. “Make it the first thing you do because it’s much easier to add in the pieces of the puzzles as you go into that automation platform than it is to retrofit it in.”

Leaders understand the capabilities necessary to move forward in their journey, and each agency has different priorities to unify approaches across the pillars of zero trust to transform.

As Department of Labor CISO Paul Blahusch put it, “Zero trust is revolutionary, not evolutionary. It will take resources, technology, people and professional services.”

Other participants who shared their experiences in the video series include:

• Steven Hernandez, CISO, Department of Education
• Chezian Sivagnanam, Chief Enterprise Architect, National Science Foundation
• Stephen Haselhorst, Zero Trust Program Manager, FDIC
• Amy Hamilton, Senior Cybersecurity Advisor for Policy and Programs, Department of Energy

This video series was produced by Scoop News Group for FedScoop and sponsored by Forcepoint.

The post How agencies are moving zero trust from aspiration to transformation appeared first on FedScoop.

In a new, 12-part video interview series from FedScoop, federal CIOs and CISOs discuss strategies for reducing password-related data breaches and cyberthreats. The series, Zero trust begins with smarter password protection, was underwritten by Keeper Security and filmed between October 2021 and March 2022, and touches on several security issues,  including:

How the White House cybersecurity executive order reshaped IT strategies

Several leaders interviewed highlighted how the executive order accelerated their cybersecurity timeline and reinforced existing efforts.

Don Watson, CISO for the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office, says the agency was already implementing zero-trust architecture, cloud security and supply chain risk management —and improving investigative and remediation activities. He stresses that cybersecurity was a top priority before the EO was published, and the agency’s focus was on “efforts to stabilize and secure our legacy products while delivering modernized secure products.”

U.S. Department of Commerce CIO Andre Mendes echoes similar efforts and says the EO gave “additional impetus to pursue zero-trust solutions that were already deployed at some bureaus and that were in consideration at others.”

A key takeaway from leaders was that security strategies need to lay the foundation of cybersecurity with zero trust while adopting policies that will secure technology and shape the behaviors of both IT and non-IT users.

Remote work and identity and multifactor authentication

Although telework policies and the IT systems to support them have been in place for many federal agencies, the pandemic forced nearly all employees to work remotely. That pushed agencies to rethink the future of work and how they could better secure remote networks.

The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency realized it would eventually need to adopt a hybrid work model across many locations, says CIO Robert Costello. “CISA is taking a different approach to ensure they’re constantly identifying who’s accessing systems and data, and also tightly integrating identity management and credentialing systems as we roll out some of our new expanded offerings here for our user base,” he says.

Mittal Desai, CIO for the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, explains that remote work made the agency reevaluate its security governance processes. It also explored more effective ways to use multi-factor authentication and monitor the access privileges of users on its networks.

Leaders agree that integrating identity and multi-factor authentication solutions was a cybersecurity best practice to reduce vulnerabilities.

Moving toward human-centric cybersecurity

Ensuring that security is easy to adopt and user-friendly can help agencies equip employees to deal with the growing threat of phishing attacks.

Robert Roser, Idaho National Laboratory CISO, says that while zero trust and the use of multi-factor authentication are critical to improving security, his organization is also tackling the culture around security with its employees. As part of the Energy Department, the lab regularly organizes spoof phishing campaigns and takes steps to think outside the traditional password approach.

“Cybersecurity is built around people consistently doing the right things. We spend a lot of our time educating and training our workforce to make good decisions concerning security,” says Consumer Financial Protection Bureau CIO Chris Chilbert. He highlights how the agency provides annual awareness training and conducts targeted training based on the employee’s role.

The future of passwords

In the end, organizations need to adopt a more modern approach to authenticating users, using a combination of unique passwords and multi-factor authentication, so that agencies can create greater efficiency, streamline access and carry out missions more effectively, says Darren Guccione, CEO of Keeper Security.

“Today, [organizations] are authenticating [users on up to] 150 applications on average; each one of those applications requires unique strong credentials,” he explains. “The only way to do that effectively is through an enterprise password-management solution. There is no other way to do this effectively because you’re talking about a parameter for an attack that is exponentially larger than it was two years ago.”

Other participants in the video series include:

• George Duchak, CIO, Defense Logistics Agency
• Jonathan Feibus, CISO, and Deputy Director, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission
• Melinda Rogers, CIO, Department of Justice
• Rob Hankinson, Acting Director of Office Information Technology Infrastructure, U.S. Department of State
• Tristan Yancey, VP of Public Sector, Keeper Security

This video series was produced by Scoop News Group for FedScoop and sponsored by Keeper Security.

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In a recent video series, FedScoop talked with chief information officers, chief data officers and other key IT leaders across federal agencies to discuss their agencies’ initiatives and strategies to build a data driven government. The video series, underwritten by Dell Technologies and Intel, aired between October and December 2021.

Here’s what they said:

Leverage data for better decision making

Customs and Border Protection’s Sonny Bhagowalia shared that his agency is working to create standards and infrastructure to improve how the CBP utilizes data lakes. That includes efforts to harness data and improve AI tools and machine learning models to improve mission outcomes.

“We conduct 40 billion data exchanges daily across 300,000 endpoints… [The CBP] processes hundreds of millions of import cargo entries every day, 1.2 million passengers a day in the age of COVID…and we have about 200 plus systems running,” says Bhagowalia, assistant commissioner for the Office of Information and Technology and CIO for CBP.

And the Department of Homeland Security is investing more in how it collects data and uses it in the field to help employees better perform their missions as well.

DHS Chief Data Officer Mike Horton shares how cloud at the edge is more critical today to help the department coordinate across its mission activities. For example, helping FEMA out in the field and getting data to Border Patrol agents at the Southwest border.

“Our goal is to do two things; collect data from that edge and then use it and collaborate, analyze and get the data back out to those operators,” Horton explains.

Improve collaboration across agencies

NASA Chief Data Officer Ron Thompson and Katie Olson, acting director for the Defense Department’s Defense Digital Service, both describe the value of building strong foundations around data sharing as a key part of improving how their agencies collaborate on shared mission priorities.

According to Olson, “DDS worked with the Defense Health Agency — it’s joint Pathology Center — to digitize the world’s largest collection of human tissue samples, about 55 million slides and open the door to incredible potential for the future of research into rare diseases and cancer, etc.”

Giving the chief data officer a seat at the table

This perspective on data strategies, data sharing and mission activities is why it is important to give CDOs “a seat at the table as part of strategic planning activities with their CIO and with the agencies be in and how that data will support the agency and enable those decision makings,” says Maria Roat, U.S. deputy federal CIO for the Executive Office of the President.

Roat says that as her office continues to support data maturity initiatives across the federal government, she sees how those agencies which place more value on the role the CDO helps are able move “further along the ladder than others.”

Building on lessons learned from the pandemic

The last two years have definitely helped agency leaders learn the value of cloud, data and modernization initiatives.

Katherine Dawes, acting evaluation officer for the Environmental Protection Agency, explains, “even once that pandemic has receded, once we’re looking at that in the rearview mirror, the strategies and the tools that we’ve developed as part of all remote workforce are still going to be there and we will be able to take advantage of that in new and important ways. Particularly in service of support and committee science.”

John Garrett, senior director for federal civilian agencies at Dell Technologies, describes how many of Dell’s partners — especially among civilian agencies — worked quickly to enable a 100% remote workforce. The first investments were focused around infrastructure and workforce transformation initiatives. Now more agencies are focused on building applications and the data center to support it.

Darren Pulsipher, chief solution architect for the public sector at Intel, adds that though there’s been an uptick in dependency on cloud from the past, this year there also have been several major cloud outages from all the primary cloud service providers.

“Making sure that you have a multi-cloud strategy is extremely important. If you rely on just one video conferencing solution, and they have an outage, then you’re down. And if it’s a critical meeting, then you need to have backup, you need to have alternatives to do that,” he stresses.

Other participants in the video series include:

• Courtney Winship, Deputy Chief Data Officer, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services
• Dave Zvenyach, Director, Technology Transformation Services, U.S. General Services Administration
• Gulam Shakir, Deputy Chief Data Officer, National Archives and Records Administration
• Ron Bewtra, Chief Technology Officer, Department of Justice

This video series was produced by FedScoop and sponsored by Dell Technologies and Intel.

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In a recent video interview series, produced by Scoop News Group, we invited agency and industry leaders to share how they are taking steps to embrace this hybrid cloud operating approach.

The series, Hybrid Cloud Transformation in Government, sponsored by Hewlett Packard Enterprises, was filmed between September and October, 2021.

The merits of bringing cloud capabilities to data and applications hosted on-prem

Sheena Burrell, deputy CIO for the National Archives and Records Administration says that while “allowing a cloud-based resources to work on data that stored on prem, without the need to move the data back and forth…decreases cost,” security concerns also need to be considered in deciding how to build the cloud interface.

The Small Business Administration is also weighing the benefits of hybrid cloud for their cybersecurity initiatives, CTO Sanjay Gupta says that cloud is enabling the agency to modernize their cybersecurity tools and meet requirements from the recent cybersecurity executive order.

And according to Brian Falvey, vice president for GreenLake Cloud Services at Hewlett Packard Enterprises, organizations across the public sector are all facing their own challenges around refactoring certain applications into the cloud, especially when it comes to costs, meeting regulatory mandates and security. That’s partly why HPE developed GreenLake — so that agencies can “take advantage of the benefits, the elasticity, and so forth that come with the experience of being in public cloud” for data stored on premise or in a private cloud.

How adopting cloud capabilities is making a difference for mission services

Burrell shares that NARA began to move to its data to the cloud to address performance and scaling issues with large data sets. They adopted a pay-as-you-go model to take advantage of cloud resources and lower costs.

Now, she says, NARA is working with the Veterans Administration to digitizing those records. 

“When they’re digitizing those records, they’re putting it in the cloud, but we have another one premise application that we use to provide those records back to military veterans. So this means that we have a totally on prem solution for the application. But our data is in the cloud,” says Burrell

States like New Jersey are also leaning into a hybrid cloud approach, says CTO Christopher Rein.

“New Jersey, just within the past three to four months [has] embarked on a journey of taking a large mainframe that supports our executive branch and we move that to a mainframe-as-a-service, cloud operating environment. That’s going to allow us to take some of the folks that have been doing base level operating system, hardware and software support and shift some of their skill sets to more operating a direct citizen focused service,” he shares.

John Evans, chief technology adviser at World Wide Technology adds that the evidence points to be advantages of cloud-as-a-service vs traditional cloud computing, especially when it comes to making real-time decisions. 

For example, “getting access to medical records as quickly as possible could make a difference in many scenarios. And this fast access to data or systems is definitely not limited to healthcare. There are a lot of examples that I think we could cite across law enforcement, defense, etc. where data is needed as quickly as possible to make real-time decisions.” 

In the end, it all comes down to strategic planning says Kimberly Bailey, CIO for the City of Memphis. She shares how her office coordinated a capacity and redundancy study to look at all applications being used across the city to determine what belongs in the cloud.

“Knowing all of what’s in our environment is very important. And as we decide what makes most sense, that will work. So we will be doing this over the next year to making sure that things are on point.”

Hear more from the executives:

• Brian Falvey, VP, GreenLake Cloud Services, Hewlett Packard Enterprises
• Christopher Rein, CTO, State of New Jersey
• John Evans, Chief Technology Adviser, World Wide Technology
• Kimberly Bailey, CIO, City of Memphis
• Sanjay Gupta, CTO, Small Business Administration
• Sheena Burrell, Deputy CIO, National Archives and Records Administration

This video series was produced by Scoop News Group and sponsored by Hewlett Packard Enterprise.

The post Federal and state leaders laud the benefits of a hybrid cloud approach appeared first on FedScoop.

During the crisis, agencies were forced to accelerate key technology deployments to meet unexpected demands for online services and to improve secure remote work connections for employees, said IT leaders interviewed in a video series on preparing a future-ready government.

“Where we were five years ago, from a technology perspective, is quite different than where we are today,” shared Francisco Salguero, CIO for the Federal Communications Commission. “This crisis required us to move at such a rapid pace, for everyone, that it really showed how IT can keep up with the need of that type of pace and speed,” he said.

“What I see for the future is the appetite will be there, more so than in the past, to actually move forward with the modernization efforts we need overall,” he added.

In addition to advancing cloud strategies, the pandemic forced many leaders to confront traditional ways of working in their organizations that have hampered modernization initiatives.

The video series, produced by FedScoop and StateScoop, and underwritten by Google Cloud, features interviews with a dozen federal, state and industry IT leaders about their efforts to digitize services and move securely to the cloud.

Lessons learned during the COVID-19 pandemic

Several of the leaders interviewed discussed how weaknesses in their systems and processes were brought to the surface during the pandemic.

Jamie Holcombe, CIO for the U.S. Patent and Trade Office, described the crisis as an extraordinary scaling exercise. He and others discovered their vendor contracts didn’t provide them flexibility to expand to their cloud server capacity to meet their needs. Holcombe said that because scaling is an enabler for other modernization initiatives — like moving legacy applications to the cloud — the pandemic became an opportunity to reassess vendor contracts.

The crisis also forced many government leaders to confront weakness in the work culture. Lauren Knausenberger, the U.S. Air Force’s Deputy CIO, described how a common roadblock to modernization occurs from looking at technology as a backend function rather than a mission enabler. That perspective changed to some extent, when the pandemic forced everyone to work from home.

“A lot of it has come down to people realizing what they didn’t have before, and how that really drives future requirements. [Previously] there wasn’t a whole lot of appetite for adoption of [cloud projects] among people in the Pentagon,” she said. “We have this situation where the playing field has been completely leveled, and everyone has to work at least part of their time outside the bounds. Everyone can see that frustration [for] this new way of working.”

The need for greater agility was another key take-away for IT leaders.

“Government workers have become more agile in the short term, [but] I think the long-term agilities are only going to come with a focused effort,” said Shannon Sullivan, director of federal at Google Cloud. “The way the US has approached acquisition and delivery of systems have given vertical solutions. [However] the circumstances we’re experiencing right now are going to really change the way they approach and how their mission is delivered.”

AI-assisted technologies will make an impact

Though many IT leaders discuss the merits of artificial intelligence, the pandemic underlined the need to implement changes now, especially among state and local agencies.

Jennifer Ricker, acting assistant secretary at the Illinois Department of Innovation and Technology discussed how the pandemic triggered overwhelming demands on the state’s unemployment insurance system. The state turned to chatbots to help answer basic questions on their employment security website, and which could be trained to add questions and learn what people need.

“Previously we had primarily been an operation with a lot of offices and walk-in traffic from residents. We had to close those offices and prevent individuals from coming in face-to-face, handing them paper, and all the questions that come around about unemployment insurance,” she said.

Los Angeles CIO Ted Ross similarly expanded L.A.’s use of chatbots across several city services to help answer residents questions on permits, utility payments and traffic tickets.

The goal, he said is to streamline processes wherever possible and eliminate some of the physical touches. By connecting with people more on their smartphones and through social media, the city is looking to change the nature of how citizens engage with government.

“It’s really important to have platforms in place before a crisis, as opposed to waiting until a crisis, then trying to figure out procurement and how to build and develop something. We need to be ready for something to happen. We can’t simply respond to react to that,” he said.

What “future-ready” means for government

These executives expressed varying ideas on future developments — improve citizen services, bring agility to the mission or access a skilled workforce outside of geographic boundaries.

Allowing people to work from anywhere can provide a greater competition for talent, said Josh Marcuse, head of global strategic business executives at Google Cloud.

“The real promise of virtualization is not that we can have more online meetings, it’s actually that we are able to draw on this deep talent pool, regardless of where in the world people happen to be born, or happen to live,” he said.

By simultaneously improving infrastructure with modern capabilities like AI, ML and data science, while bolstering the skilled workforce needed to manage these systems government can greatly improve their mission.

Other participants in the video series include:

• Guy Cavallo, (at the time) Deputy CIO, SBA
• Ervan Rodgers, CIO, Ohio
• Gen. Matt Easley, Director, Army Artificial Intelligence, Army Futures Command
• Mike Madsen, Deputy Director, Defense Innovation Unit
• Roy Varghese, CIO, National Marine Fisheries Service, NOAA

This video series was produced by FedScoop and StateScoop and sponsored by Google Cloud.

The post Agency IT chiefs see ways to improve mission services in pandemic appeared first on FedScoop.