AWARDS

Transcription

AWARDS

FCW 01
3/21/08
4:37 PM
Page 1
MARCH 24, 2008 • VOLUME 22 NUMBER 6 • FCW.COM
THE 2008
FED
100
AWARDS
Honoring the doers
with vision
Starting on page 15
ALSO IN THIS ISSUE:
KELMAN: MAKE GOVERNMENT/INDUSTRY
PARTNERSHIPS WORK P. 62
SPREHE: THE WHITE HOUSE MUST SHOW
E-MAIL LEADERSHIP P. 64
FLIPSIDE: THE MARCH (GOVERNMENT MOVIE)
MADNESS BRACKET P. 74
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may not accurately represent exact configurations priced. Associated values represent HP published list price. 1. Certain Windows Vista product features require advanced or additional hardware. See http://www.microsoft.com/
windowsvista/getready/hardwarereqs.mspx and http://www.microsoft.com/windowsvista/getready/capable.mspx for details. Windows Vista Upgrade Advisor can help you determine which features of Windows Vista
will run on your computer. To download the tool, visit www.windowsvista.com/upgradeadvisor. 2. Intel’s numbering is not a measurement of higher performance. 3. Dual Core is a new technology designed to
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FCW 03
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A R O U N D U P O F T H E W E E K ’ S N E W S . R E A D T H E F U L L S T O R I E S O N L I N E AT W W W. F C W. C O M / D O W N LO A D .
BUZZ OF THE WEEK
GSA: Between Alliant and a hard place
y the time you read
this — and even as it is
written late Friday —
it may be out of date.
The situation surrounding
the General Services Administration’s $50 billion Alliant governmentwide acquisition contract appears to be evolving
quickly, and it’s being carefully
watched inside and outside
government.
First, a quick history. GSA
officials awarded Alliant contracts to 29 companies and later added another, bringing the
total to 30.
In early October, a group of
companies that did not make
the contract joined a lawsuit
filed by a failed bidder in federal claims court in September.
Earlier this month, the
court’s judge determined in a
sternly worded ruling that GSA
had not performed due diligence in its assessment of the
bid proposals, and he put Alliant on hold.
The big question is what
could happen next to resolve
the Alliant quagmire.
Most observers suggest that
GSA has few options, and few
of them are good ones. An important consideration is that
this is a court case, so any resolution must be approved by
the judge.
Most observers suggest that
these are among GSA’s options:
■ Appease the protesters. GSA
could work out an agreement
JUPITER IMAGES
B
FEDERAL COMPUTER WEEK
with the eight protesting vendors and award them Alliant
contracts. The risk is that other losing companies might
then follow suit with their own
lawsuits.
■ Recompete Alliant. The
do-over option seems the least
likely because most vendors
would probably want to recover
the costs so far associated with
their bids. That’s money GSA
doesn’t really have right now.
Appease everybody. GSA
could award contracts to everybody and let the competition
begin among task orders. That
might make vendors happy, but
will agencies be happy?
■ The neutral third-party option. GSA could bring in a neutral third party to conduct a
new, independent assessment.
The risk is that GSA would no
■
T H E
B U Z Z
longer have control over its
own contract.
Regardless of the option
GSA selects, agency officials not
only need to convince all of the
parties it is the right direction
— they also have to convince a
judge.
All of that means there are
likely a few more chapters yet
to be written in the Book of
Alliant. ■
C O N T E N D E R S
#2 YouTube intelligence
relatively risk-free options for in-
the IG recruit and hire people with
vesting for their retirement. Howev-
those skills. Competing for talent
The intelligence community keeps
er, some participants have been be-
that’s in short supply has forced the
surprising us with its innovative use
having like day traders, shifting
IG to seek innovative approaches it
of social-networking technologies to
money in and out of funds to capital-
hopes the private sector might have
share intelligence information. Its
ize on a volatile stock market or
to offer.
latest innovation is iVideo, a YouTube
avoid its punishing effects. But
knockoff that the community uses to
enough of that, says the Federal Re-
share training videos and intelli-
tirement Thrift Investment Board. It’s
gence reports. For a community that
taking steps to prevent innocent
Rod Beckstrom, a Silicon Valley
has relied heavily on text-based in-
savers from having to pay soaring
entrepreneur and founder of
telligence reports, this is a big leap.
transaction costs, including brokers’
twiki.net, was picked as the first
fees, because of the folly of the few.
director of a new National Cyber
#5 A new cyber fed
Security Center at the Homeland
#4 The hunt for
good employees
The shortage of acquisition employees
has grown so acute
that the Defense
Department’s Office of Inspector
#3 Feds as day traders
General is solicit-
The Thrift Savings Plan was created
acquisition talent
to give federal employees several
coordinator to help
ing bids for an
Security Department. Beckstrom,
who will be coordinating efforts to protect
federal networks from
cyberattacks, has
an unusual resume for a fed.
He wrote a bestselling book about
decentralized organizations titled “The
Starfish and the
Spider.” ■
MARCH 24, 2008
3
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SITEMAP03.24.08
V O L U M E
2 2 ,
N U M B E R
6
AGENCY INDEX
Army 68
F E A T U R E S
CIA 12
Congress 8, 9, 12
15
16
Doers with vision
DHS 12
FCW highlights the work of four visionaries
DOD 10, 16, 66
honored as Federal 100 award winners
DOT 20
DISA 16
EPA 9, 20, 70
FEMA 8
24 The 2008 Federal 100
awards
GSA 12, 68
Industry 10, 18, 62
This year’s 100 award winners were willing to —
Lt. Gen.
Charles Croom
GAO 9, 22, 66
International 12, 62
IRS 22
and did — make positive changes in the
Labor 70
information technology community
NARA 64
Navy 18
NRC 72
OMB 70, 72
OPM 12, 66
N E W S
8
New plan for disaster action
inspires hope
Framework outlines roles for
authorities in responding to
large-scale incidents
20
9
EPA may have lost data in
hasty library closures
10
DOD refines architecture
strategy
12
News briefs
C O M M E N T
60
Editorial: Seeking the
bright lights
62
Can we talk?
Daniel
Mintz
By Steve Kelman
64
The president’s legacy
By J. Timothy Sprehe
64
COVER PHOTO/ZAID HAMID
SSA 70
State 72
State & local 8, 66
USAID 72
VA 66
White House 64
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The system is available now
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payroll processing system
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Officials must decide
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FCW 08 09
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Newsbriefing
Disaster action plan inspires hope
better incorporates procedures of the National Incident Management System, the
government’s unified approach to handling
disasters. Definitions in the new framework
are more consistent with NIMS.
officials say they are confident that the
Ken Murphy, president of the National
framework is an improvement over the Emergency Management Association,
2004 plan, which critics
which represents state
say was too complicated
emergency management
and did not focus enough
directors, said he views the
on the role of nonfederal
framework as an evolution
organizations in disaster
of the 2004 plan.
response.
Murphy said Hurricane
The new document is
Katrina “validated the simbroader in scope, partly
ple fact that when you write
because of lessons learned
a plan at any level of govfrom using the earlier plan
ernment — from the lowDennis Schrader
and the response to hurest level to the highest level
ricanes Katrina and Rita,
— there is a guideline, and
DHS officials said. It was released in draft it’s there for us to train and learn from it and
form two months ago, and lawmakers, non- use it and then adjust it and make it better.”
governmental organizations and state-levTraining for the new response plan is
el emergency managers have welcomed it already under way, and FEMA officials said
as a step forward.
they will conduct national exercises to eval“I was at the state level when the orig- uate the plan’s effectiveness and agencies’
inal 2004 document was released, and it preparedness.
was very bulky, hard to read,” said Dennis
Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.),
Schrader, deputy administrator of the Fed- chairman of the Homeland Security Comeral Emergency Management Agency’s Na- mittee, said he was pleased that FEMA oftional Preparedness Directorate. “It really ficials had listened to lawmakers and emerdidn’t explain my role or what the state gency management associations when they
and locals were supposed to do. It was very drafted the new document.
federal-centric.”
“FEMA needs to move forward quickly
Schrader said the new 80-page docu- with operational planning, and all levels of
ment is the first plan for which FEMA has government need to exercise this new plan,”
codified the role of state and local agen- Thompson said. “Unfortunately, the day
cies as first responders.
will come when the [National Response
“We wanted something that was very Framework] will need to be put into action.
easy to read, particularly at the executive lev- It is crucial that we kick the tires and work
el, and we wanted something that was much out all the kinks before that day arrives.”
easier to work with,” Schrader said. “What
Murphy, who also serves as Oregon’s dithis really talks about is who needs to be rector of emergency management, said it
talking to who [and] when and how do you is important for states and local jurisdicget out in front of it by having pre-plans.” tions to begin training to use the frameDHS officials said the new document work and become involved in federal plan-
Framework outlines roles for authorities
in responding to large-scale incidents
BY BEN BAIN
he Bush administration has revised
its blueprint for dealing with natural and man-made disasters, with
a focus on gaps identified by state and local emergency managers and other stakeholders outside the federal government.
The National Response Framework, designed to replace the 2004 National Response Plan, became official March 22.
The framework includes instructions for
federal, state and local authorities; the private sector; and nongovernmental organizations. Homeland Security Department
T
FEMA defines roles
for responders
The Federal Emergency Management Agency
has released an 80-page National Response
Framework document that describes a unified
national plan for responding to disasters and
emergencies. The agency released additional
documents that define the roles of various organizations in a federally coordinated response
to incidents.
The roles span 23 areas of responsibility,
and they include:
Communications, cyber incidents.
■
Firefighting.
■
Public works.
■
Emergency management.
■
Mass care.
■
Long-term recovery.
— Ben Bain
8
MARCH 24, 2008
AP WIDEWORLD
■
FCW 08 09
3/21/08
ng
6:29 PM
Page 9
Download
Read Steve Kelman’s blog, “The Lectern,”
For more on the 2008 Federal 100
Look for more Fed 100 winners’ profiles
at www.fcw.com/blogs.
winners, visit www.fcw.com/download.
at www.fcw.com/download.
ning for disaster response.
“We always have asked Homeland Security and FEMA to engage us at the earliest
point that you possibly can,” Murphy said.
“We are going to have to use [the plans],
we are going to have to live with them, and
so we want to be part of the process of putting it together.”
In addition to working with professional associations such as NEMA, FEMA
officials said they also incorporated many
of the 5,700 comments they received on
the original plan during the feedback period last fall.
The American Red Cross was one
group that commented. The organization’s
750 chapters nationwide respond to 70,000
disasters a year, which is about 200 per day.
The framework does a better job of including nonfederal actors in the planning
process, said Peter Losi, vice president of
government operations in disaster services
at the American Red Cross.
“I think certainly the response would
be much better than on the old [plan] and
the other supporting systems,” Losi said.
“But I don’t think that we’ve solved everything yet.”
One issue that remains unresolved is getting communication and computer systems
at all levels of the government to communicate with one another. Losi said some
states that are used to dealing with natural
disasters have robust data management systems, while others lag behind.
“I could use a whole bunch more information technology people to help me
address these issues of how to communicate via computer systems, how to better
use what we have and connect things so
that on the computer side we have interoperability,” Murphy said.
Schrader agreed that interoperability is
the next milestone. “As you go through the
document and read the doctrine, the intention here is that we need to be working
collaboratively ahead of time with folks,
resolving some of those kinds of datainteroperability issues,” he said. ■
EPA may have lost data
in hasty library closures
if they threw out materials because EPA
never made an inventory of the materihe Environmental Protection als,” Stephenson said.
Agency moved too quickly in
OEI budget cuts could be partly to
closing some of its research li- blame for the possible losses, Stephenson
braries and may have lost some files as said. But when faced with a proposed fisa result, government auditors recently cal 2007 cut of $2 million, the agency
testified before a House panel.
chose to reduce the library network’s
EPA’s push to digitize its libraries led funding by 77 percent, compared with fisto the rushed closings,
cal 2006 funding, Stephensaid John Stephenson, dison said.
rector of natural reSean Moulton, director
“I don’t think of federal information
sources and environment
[EPA] ever
at the Government Acpolicy at OMB Watch, said
countability Office in tesEPA should have involved
had a good
timony March 13 before
librarians in its digitizaplan.”
the House Science and
tion process from the outTechnology Committee’s
set. Moulton said some of
S E A N M O U LT O N ,
Investigations and Overthe decisions that would
O M B W AT C H
sight Subcommittee.
make sense from a managMeanwhile, lawmaker’s point of view displeased
ers criticized the closings. “No library librarians.
should be closed until its holdings have
“I don’t think [EPA] ever had a good
been effectively catalogued, evaluated and plan or had it vetted by the librarians and
digitized,” said subcommittee Chairman the employees on this network nor the
Brad Miller (D-N.C.).
public,” Moulton said. “They just sort of
Molly O’Neill, the EPA’s assistant ad- charged ahead with closures. As a result,
ministrator for the Office of Environ- there definitely seems to have been a loss
mental Information (OEI) and chief in- of materials and services.”
formation officer, testified that most of
The library’s digitization began
the information should currently be ac- months before O’Neill joined the
cessible and that any lost files most like- agency. In December 2006, EPA placed
ly have redundant copies somewhere in a moratorium on further changes to the
the library network.
library system in the hopes that the dig“Where we had journals and copies in itization process would catch up. A
other locations, they were tagged for re- month later, EPA extended the break
cycling and offered up to other libraries.” indefinitely.
O’Neill said.
GAO wants that moratorium to conHowever, GAO disagreed, saying poor tinue until EPA releases a congressionalplanning left the location of the files un- ly requested plan for what should be
clear. “We don’t know if they’ve thrown done next. O’Neill said that plan is nearout materials. Ms. O’Neill doesn’t know ly completed. ■
BY WADE-HAHN CHAN
T
MARCH 24, 2008
9
FCW 10
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News
DOD refines architecture strategy
Business transformation office links EA
to Global Information Grid strategy
mentation plans, Wisnosky said.
“This is much more than academic. This
architecture is being used,” he said. “Where
we have responsibility at the OSD level, it’s
being used to guide our investments. Where
BY MICHAEL HARDY
years ago as a contractor, the department we have the right of review [of other comhad spent hundreds of millions of dollars ponents’ decisions], we can check there, eihe Defense Department’s Business on building architectures and the grade ther to point them in a better direction or
Mission Area has released a new they were getting was an
put the brakes on someenterprise architecture road map F,” Wisnosky said, referthing that doesn’t fit the arthat marks the culmination of more than ring to the Office of Manchitecture.”
a year of planning and revising. Implicit in agement and Budget’s
Richard Burk, former
the new framework is the assumption that score card. “My analysis,
chief architect and managthe perfect shouldn’t get in the way of the having done architectures
er of the federal enterprise
good.
for a couple of decades,
architecture program at
The road map incorporates a federated was that what they were
OMB and now a consultant
approach that does not require various trying to do was virtually
at ICF International, said
components within DOD to integrate their impossible.”
there is no practical way to
systems. Instead it relies on open standards
Wisnosky said he chose
create a useful architecture
and service-oriented architecture to facil- to limit his office’s efforts
for a large organization.
itate information sharing.
to those areas that the Of“You can get an overall
Dennis Wisnosky, chief architect and chief fice of the Secretary of Depicture of an agency using
technical officer for DOD’s Business Mission fense could reasonably adan [enterprise architecture]
Area, said the department is too large an or- dress. He identified some
of everything the agency
ganization to attempt to encompass all of its essential elements that the
does,” Burk said. “But when
activities in a single enterprise architecture. enterprise architecture
you get down to making it
D E N N I S W I S N O S K Y,
DOD must achieve business transformation should include, such as
operational, at that point
D E F E N S E D E PA R T M E N T
by breaking off manageable components of machine-to-machine mesyou really need to break it
an enterprise architecture rather than trying saging for service discovery.
down into segments, into lines of business.”
to cover everything at once, he said.
The goal of an enterprise architecture is
A segmented approach is part of OMB’s
“When I came here just about three to guide future acquisition and imple- federal enterprise architecture plan, Burk
said. In 2007, OMB required agencies to
identify at least one line of business and develop an architecture for that line of business, with approval from the manager in
charge of that business area.
Enterprise architecture depends on
sion Area in the Office of the Secregram at the Office of Management
Another architecture policy expert
the ability of systems to communitary of Defense.
and Budget, said the day that open
agreed that DOD’s new federated architeccate with each other, and that means
“I’m not in the prognostication
source systems will predominate is
ture strategy is the right approach. As large
the days of proprietary systems may
business, but it seems to me if comstill far from becoming reality. Agenorganizations go, DOD is one of the most
be coming to an end. Agencies conpanies that size are making those
cies still rely on legacy systems, and
complex, said Mike Tiemann, chief execusidering large investments in inforkinds of decisions to open the kithose legacy systems need to fit
tive officer of EA Werks, an enterprise armation technology today may forgo
mono and base what they do on
into enterprise architectures.
chitecture consulting firm.
systems that can’t easily coordinate
open source and open standards,
“What we have to deal with right
With “something as big as DOD, you
with others.
then industry is clearly going in that
now is what are those data and
have multiple layers within the organizaSun Microsystems, for example,
direction,” Wisnosky said.
business processes that we need to
tion,” Tiemann said. “Of all the federated
has made most of its products
However, Richard Burk, former
orchestrate across multiple agenorganizations in the government, DOD is
open-source, said Dennis Wisnosky,
chief architect and manager of the
cies,” Burk said. “
probably two or three layers deeper than
chief architect for the Business Misfederal enterprise architecture pro— Michael Hardy
any other.” ■
T
“THIS IS MUCH
MORE THAN
ACADEMIC. THIS
ARCHITECTURE IS
BEING USED.”
Mixed predictions about open source’s future
10
MARCH 24, 2008
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©2008 CDW Government, Inc.
6206 cdwg_FCW_3-24.indd 28
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Newsbriefing
iVideo: YouTube for the
intell community
What do you get when you replace
YouTube’s collection of embarrassing
drunken moments, off-key duets and presidential campaign ads with videos of CIA
training and intelligence reports?
You get iVideo, the director of national
intelligence’s latest bid to use social-networking tools to improve information sharing across the intelligence community.
Officials say they have high expectations for
iVideo, which has received hundreds of
postings.
The YouTube-like application joins a host
of online collaboration tools that the Office
of the Director of National Intelligence has
released in recent years. They include a photo-sharing application similar to Flickr and
a tool for bookmarking Web pages that is
similar to del.icio.us. In addition, the intelligence community does instant messaging
and blogging, and it shares intelligence information via Intellipedia, something like a
Wikipedia for the intelligence community.
— Ben Bain
More countries to join
DHS’ visa waiver program
The Homeland Security Department
signed agreements for visa waivers last
week with Slovakia, Hungary and Lithuania. The security agreements are part of
DHS’ effort to expand electronic travel
authorizations.
The agreements with the members of
the European Union mean those countries could be designated as visa waiver
program members later this year, allowing their citizens who meet certain requirements to travel to the United States
without visas.
Congress gave DHS authority last year
to strengthen security arrangements with
participants in its visa waiver program.
DHS has been working to reach agreements with members of the visa program.
Twenty-seven countries participate.
Participants will face new requirements,
including being part of a new electronic
travel authorization system that DHS expects to unveil later this year.
— Ben Bain
Lawmaker to DHS: Step it
up with fusion centers
The Homeland Security Department
risks losing support for additional funding if it doesn’t improve programs to
share information with state, local and
federal homeland security officials, the
chairwoman of the House subcommittee that oversees information sharing and
intelligence gathering said last week.
Rep. Jane Harman (D-Calif.), who
chairs the Homeland Security Committee’s subcommittee that deals with intelligence issues, said DHS’ Intelligence
and Analysis Office needs to improve its
understanding of the needs of state and
local authorities to achieve success with
its fusion center initiative.
Congress has designated DHS as the
lead agency for coordinating federal participation in fusion centers that are
owned and operated by state and local
governments.
“These reforms are critical, and as
chair of the House Homeland Security
Subcommittee on Intelligence, I am reluctant to support any new funding for
the department’s fusion center initiative
until DHS adopts them,” Harman said.
“I’m not convinced DHS gets the
point about state and local participation,”
she added.
Harman drew on criticisms from a
DHS-commissioned report released last
month by Centra Technologies, a consulting firm that examined progress being made with the initiative.
The report recommended ways DHS
could improve its relationships with state
and local authorities at the centers. Recommendations in the report included identifying an employee or group of employees who would serve as focal point for all
inquiries from state and local authorities.
Harman said she hoped the report
marked the beginning of a relationship
between DHS and state and local authorities that will establish baseline capabilities for fusion centers and a clearly defined role for DHS in the centers.
— Ben Bain
House committee advances telework legislation
Legislation that would
force federal agencies to
MARCH 24, 2008
sultation with the Office of
report to Congress rating
The Telework Improve-
Personnel Management, to
agencies on their telework
practices.
expand their telework pro-
ments Act of 2007 would
create a telework policy to
grams and establish
require agencies to let
guide and assist federal
governmentwide rules for
authorized employees tele-
agencies.
telecommuting is on its
work for at least 20 per-
way to the House floor.
cent of each two-week
required to appoint a tele-
mittee approved a bill with
The House Oversight
work period. It would also
work managing officer, and
provisions similar to those
and Government Reform
require the General Serv-
the comptroller general
in the House legislation.
Committee approved the
ices Administration, in con-
would submit an annual
Each agency would be
In November, the Senate Homeland Security and
Governmental Affairs Com-
— Ben Bain
AP WIDEWORLD
12
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FCW 15
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Page 15
THE 2008 FEDERAL 100
Doers with vision
T
his is the 19th year for Federal Computer Week’s Federal 100 awards program.
That means members of
the 2008 Fed 100 class join
1,800 previous winners who have been recognized for their work.
Each year, the list of winners has a personality of its own. Some years, the Fed
100 awards present an opportunity to recognize remarkable work that comes out of
tragedy, calamity or disaster. In 2002, for
example, government and industry responses to the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11,
2001, largely determined the winners. And
the 2006 awards recognized good work
done in response to Hurricane Katrina.
The past year, however, was not defined
by any particular event. We are thankful
for that. Yet, in some ways, it can be more
difficult to go above and beyond in our
day-to-day lives than in response to a crisis. It is also particularly challenging to be
a leader in a government moving toward
transition.
This year’s Fed 100 winners comprise a
fascinating group. They are not only lead-
ers but also doers. They are people who
have refined strategic outlooks, but they
are also adept tacticians. The 2008 Federal
100 award list is interesting because it covers such a wide gamut of people and positions. Top leaders of the community —
from government and industry — are represented along with people who are on the
front lines.
If a common thread runs through the
2008 list, it is people who were willing not
only to change but also to embrace
change. We all acknowledge that the pace
of change keeps getting faster, and many
benefits come from that faster pace as
agencies become more agile and are able
to share more. But it can be difficult for an
organization the size of most government
agencies — let alone the entire government — to keep up with that pace. Many
of the people profiled in the following
pages represent a special breed of visionaries — people who see how to get things
done.
Christopher J. Dorobek
Editor-in-Chief
MARCH 24, 2008
15
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Page 16
FEDERAL 100 VISIONARIES
Croom:
Acquisition done better, faster, cheaper
The general shows others the way to transform a broken acquisition process
he Defense Information Systems
BY SEAN GALLAGHER
“Just think about that,” Garing said.
Agency has not been the same
“There was no [research and development]
since Lt. Gen. Charles Croom took command in 2005. Croom inifor us in that program because somebody [had] already done it.”
tiated a fundamental transformation of the way DISA acquires informaTwo other DISA programs exemplify Croom’s philosophy: the Detion technology, something few thought possible.
fense Knowledge Online (DKO) Web portal and the Net-Centric EnCroom led DISA through the first steps of that transformation by
terprise Services (NCES) collaboration tools program. By adopting
championing an ABC philosophy of acquisition: Adopt before you
the Army Knowledge Online portal as the basis for DKO, DISA was
buy, and buy before you create.
able to bring its capabilities to service members quickly. By the end
Croom’s philosophy emphasizes meeting emerging needs by
of 2007, the portal had 2 million users.
looking first for solutions already at hand in the Defense DepartDKO could not have succeeded without Croom’s personal leaderment and, failing that, looking for readily available commercial alship, Boutelle said. The portal required a leader who was willing to
ternatives. Creating technology from scratch should be a last resort.
terminate projects that had ardent supporters. “It takes a lot of en“He used that philosophy almost the entire time he’s been at
ergy,” Boutelle said. “He came to me and said, ‘We need to do this.
DISA,” said Lt. Gen. Steven Boutelle, a former Army chief informaIt’s the right thing to do. But the only way it’ll happen is if we intion officer who is now vice president of worldwide government sovest a lot of three-star time on it personally.’ “
lutions at Cisco Systems.
When DOD solutions weren’t available to adopt or adapt, Croom
Croom recalled having a meeting shortly after he arrived at DISA
looked for commercial alternatives. By selecting two commercial
with John Garing, DISA’s CIO and director of strategic planning and
managed services offerings under NCES, DISA was able to meet a
information. They brainstormed about what could be done to
need quickly and potentially lower its cost by establishing a twochange the way DISA conducted its business, especially the way it
button, pay-per-use business model in which the two selected venacquired IT.
dors competed. DOD customers click a button on their computer
“We were looking at getting speed into our acquisition process,”
screens to choose the service they want to use.
Croom said. “There were certain attributes that we had to address if
Croom’s greatest legacy “is getting DISA into a mind-set that
we wanted to get warfighting capabilities out there sooner, and
the commercial side has great value and should be brought in, and
speed was clearly the No. 1 issue. We all knew that this process that
we should not create,” Boutelle said.
we’re encumbered with — from the beginning of requirements to the
To get DISA to that point was not easy, Boutelle added. “You
end of certification and delivery — was just taking too long.”
have to take an organization that’s very large and very bureaucratic
One place where Croom’s adopt-first strategy took hold was the
and refocus” it, he said. Croom “has been a great part of that refoNet-Enabled Command Capability program designed to acquire a
cusing on commercial technologies.”
network-centric command-and-control system. Rather than build a
Boutelle said Croom’s credentials as an engineer and his personnew system from scratch, the agency issued a call for existing solual leadership were essential to overcoming organizational barriers
tions and received more than 130 responses, from which officials
to change at the agency. “You do not want to go nose-to-nose with
selected components for the NECC.
Charlie Croom.” ■
T
MARCH 24, 2008
ZAID HAMID
16
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Page 17
“We all knew that
this process that
we’re encumbered
with…was just
taking too long.”
Lt. Gen. Charles Croom,
Defense Information Systems Agency
MARCH 24, 2008
17
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Page 18
“It’s important
to talk with them.
Government IT
is the holy grail.”
Eric Schmidt, Google
18
M O N T H D AY, 2 0 0 8
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Schmidt:
E-government expertise on tap
Google’s CEO is always ready to share his insights with federal officials
ric Schmidt and Karen Evans are
B Y M A T T H E W W E I G E LT
us,” as the government develsomething akin to the 21st cenops strategies for making
tury version of pen pals — they have regular e-mail exgreater use of the Web.
changes. Yes, Schmidt runs a megabusiness that spans the breadth
More departments and agencies are taking advantage of Google’s
of the Internet, yet the chief executive officer and chairman of
software-as-a-service offerings, through which Google provides the
Google makes time to communicate with Evans, administrator for inback-end support for an agency’s Web-based applications, including
formation technology and e-government at the Office of Managedevelopment, maintenance and management of the software.
ment and Budget.
For example, the Navy and Google have worked out a deal for the
“She’s a customer,” Schmidt said in an interview with Federal
service to use Google Apps for its Maritime Domain Awareness proComputer Week. However, clearly Schmidt does not talk to all of
gram. The Navy licensed Google Apps Premier Edition for 5,000 users
Google’s customers.
for two years.
Schmidt said he is intrigued by the challenges facing government
Maritime Domain Awareness aims to pool information from
agencies and their leaders. The government’s IT leaders are trying to
multiple sources about ships, cargo, people, environmental data
change the world, particularly how the government operates interand other factors Navy commanders need to consider when maknally and interacts with the public, said Schmidt, who was named
ing decisions about potential threats at sea. This type of inforGoogle chairman and CEO in 2001. “It’s important to talk with
mation is needed for traditional military operations or during
them,” Schmidt said. “Government IT is the holy grail.”
humanitarian or disaster responses.
Schmidt and Google have contributed to federal IT and e-governGoogle Apps will enable the Navy to better coordinate humaniment initiatives on a variety of levels, and federal e-government oftarian assistance and disaster-response activities in working with
ficials say they appreciate Schmidt’s responsiveness and personal
nontraditional partners, such as foreign governments and noncommitment.
governmental organizations such as the Red Cross and the World
“He reads my e-mails and writes back to me,” Evans said.
Food Program.
“There’s never been a time when I’ve asked [him] a question that he
The awareness program will also benefit from a project to intehasn’t responded.”
grate Google Apps with a large-scale, grid-computing implementaSchmidt’s involvement goes beyond e-mail exchanges. In Febrution of Google Earth Enterprise, the company’s 3-D visualization
ary, Schmidt sat down with members of the President’s Management
software.
Council and more than 100 leaders from various federal interagency
David Wennergren, deputy chief information officer at the Decouncils, including the CIO Council.
fense Department, said the era of building systems is passing and a
One official who attended the session said Schmidt urged them
new era in which agencies buy Web services will take its place.
to continue efforts to achieve their e-government goals. IT innova“It’s really about the data,” Wennergren said. “You don’t have to
tors should lead and bring the rest of the government with them, he
build a new system. You have to go to services.”
said.
As government shifts its acquisition practices, Google says it
Government IT is among Google’s major challenges because
wants to provide the services that government needs.
of its scale, Schmidt said. “I think it’s a huge opportunity for
“We’re all about solving people’s problems,” Schmidt said. ■
GETTY IMAGES
E
MARCH 24, 2008
19
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Page 20
Mintz:
Turning conflict into consensus
A CIO exercises the fine art of politics to gain support for a key initiative
ransportation Department
BY MARY MOSQUERA
CIO, but Mintz spent a significant
agencies were holdouts on
amount of time meeting with senior
the Bush administration’s governmentwide eRulemaking
leaders. He sat down regularly with agencies’ legal officers to
Initiative until Daniel Mintz, the department’s chief informadiscuss issues.
tion officer, persuaded senior managers to get onboard.
“The issues didn’t become any easier,” Mintz said. “But
Mintz overcame the agencies’ resistance by involving them
now we had a forum to discuss them and how to solve them.”
in the decision-making process, keeping them informed and
Mintz also made sure senior leaders were engaged directly
treating them with respect, said Thomas Barrett, DOT’s deputy
in discussions with the Environmental Protection Agency, the
secretary. “When key stakeholders are treated with respect
lead agency for the eRulemaking Initiative.
and kept informed, they are much more likely to support the
Mintz is an unusual political CIO, said Ed Meagher, deputy
resulting decisions.”
CIO at the Interior Department. Mintz is not overly impressed
In October, DOT began its transition to the shared Federal
with titles or positions, Meagher said. “He understands his
Docket Management System at Regulations.gov. Until then,
role and [shows] respect for the career folks.”
the department had a docket site for each of its component
As agencies transferred their rulemaking activities to a
agencies.
centralized docket system, it became clear that EPA was manThe eRulemaking effort provides a central Web site where
aging support activities and allowing staff members to focus
the public can comment on proposed agency regulations with- on actual rulemaking.
out having to find the docket sites for each agency. By Janu“By taking the support structure, say around eRulemaking,
ary, all major federal agencies were onboard.
and giving it to an organization that will specialize in that,
Interagency initiatives such as eRulemaking demand a
we can take people who were focused on the details and now
considerable time investment to sort out the governance isfocus on the mission,” Mintz said.
sues, Mintz said.
Mintz will use lessons learned from the eRulemaking expeInevitably, many people have a stake in those initiatives,
rience as a model for other IT activities such as Homeland
and they must be consulted. “Either through expediency or
Security Presidential Directive 12, the federal government’s
the need to get something done, people don’t always reach
secure identity verification program. The IT organization will
out to the right stakeholders or all the stakeholders to inhave a high profile in DOT.
volve them in a meaningful way,” he said.
“It is a compliment to Dan and his team that they have
The relationships between information technology manmade the IT organization a much more important part of the
agers and program owners become complicated when initiaoverall Department of Transportation community — a stratetives involve many people, he added.
gic member, not just a provider of IT infrastructure,” Barrett
DOT became involved in eRulemaking before Mintz became
said. ■
T
MARCH 24, 2008
RICK STEELE
20
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4:54 PM
Page 21
“When key
stakeholders are
treated with respect
and kept informed,
they are much
more likely to
support the resulting
decisions.”
Daniel Mintz, Transportation Department
FCW 22 23
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4:55 PM
Page 22
“I think our role is
to build a relationship
where we’re viewed as a
value-added service to
federal agencies.”
David Powner,
Government Accountability Office
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4:56 PM
Page 23
Powner:
A model of constructive oversight
This GAO official believes no one benefits from a ‘gotcha’ audit
avid Powner isn’t a gotcha
BY RICHARD
auditor. He believes in
bringing an enlightened perspective to the agencies whose
programs he scrutinizes.
“I think our role is to build a relationship where we’re viewed
as a value-added service to federal agencies,” said Powner, director
of information technology management issues at the Government
Accountability Office, the investigative arm of Congress. “You build
credibility, and they look at you more as being helpful instead of
in a ‘gotcha’ audit mode.”
An example is GAO’s relationship with officials at the Internal
Revenue Service, which is engaged in a complex business systems
modernization program. “We have a very open relationship [with
IRS officials], and they seek our advice maybe a bit more than
other agencies,” Powner said.
The IRS’ effort to replace its aging tax-processing systems appears to be on the right track after years of costly failures. Powner’s guidance has been integral to improving the program, said
Richard Spires, IRS deputy commissioner of operations support.
“Dave brings a valuable perspective to his role as auditor, providing realistic, solution-oriented guidance for improvement,”
Spires said. “His recommendations have served as the foundation
for maturing the IRS’ ability to meet the enormous challenge of
modernizing the core systems that support tax administration for
the nation.”
Under Powner’s counsel, the IRS added the IT modernization
program into its governance structure, enhancing the partnerships
between IT and internal customers.
Powner said he believes that proper governance is critical to
keeping IT projects on track. “We try to stress that not only do we
need to bolster program and project management rigor and expertise at agencies, but when you get key executives engaged in performing the right governance over a project, that makes a world of
difference, too,” he said.
Improving executive-level governance can ultimately help
MARC PISCOTTY/WPN
D
agencies deliver technology within
budget and on schedule, Powner
said. In that regard, he said he believes in earned value management, a performance management technique that measures a project’s progress against cost, schedule and technical baselines.
“There are some areas in the government where we’ve looked at
[agency IT programs] and pushed for more rigorous implementation of earned value, and it [has] really made a difference,” Powner said.
As GAO’s director of IT management issues, Powner’s audit portfolio covers programs valued at billions of dollars. Ultimately, his
job is to see that federal tax dollars are well spent and not wasted,
he said.
Powner carries out that job from GAO’s field office in Denver,
where he lives. Powner, who spends about two weeks each month
in Washington, said he doesn’t mind the frequent travel between
Denver and the capital. It gives him plenty of time to review GAO’s
voluminous reports and testimony. “You hop on a plane, and
you’ve got three hours of uninterrupted time to look at reports,”
he said.
Powner is in his second stint at GAO’s Colorado office. After
nine years with the agency in the 1990s during which he evaluated
modernization programs at the Air Force, National Weather Service
and Federal Aviation Administration, he took a job in the telecommunications industry in Denver. However, he decided in 2003 to
return to GAO.
“GAO is a tremendous place to work,” Powner said. “I look at
the portfolio of stuff I get to work on and how we get to make a
difference.”
Powner said the government’s biggest challenge is to improve
the quality of its workforce. “There are pockets of expertise at any
agency where you have very good folks who really know the technology — how to manage complex programs, how to oversee contractors and how to push contractors,” he said. “But then you see
a lot of programs where you don’t have the expertise.” ■
W. WA L K E R
MARCH 24, 2008
23
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4:53 PM
Page 24
The Federal 100 winners
Brig. Gen. George Allen
Marine Corps
Perryn Ashmore
General Services
Administration
Jason R. Baron
National Archives and Records
Administration
Paul Bartock
National Security Agency
Kenneth Heitkamp
Air Force Department
David Medeck
Internal Revenue Service
Patrice D’Eramo
Cisco Systems
Col. Barry Hensley
Joint Task Force-Global Network
Operations
Darlene Meskell
General Services Administration
Robert Dix
Juniper Networks
Neil Horikoshi
IBM
Martha Dorris
General Services
Administration
Warren Huffer
Energy Department
Gary Bass
OMB Watch
Col. Monte Dunard
Marine Corps
Cathy Beasley
General Services
Administration
Stephen Duncan
General Services
Administration
Shelly Bird
Microsoft
Mark Blevins
Perot Systems
Jack Braun
General Services
Administration
Gregory Brewer
SecureInfo
Frances Byrd
U.S. Postal Service
Joseph Campbell
Office of Personnel Management
Kevin Campbell
Pennsylvania Emergency
Management Agency
Robert Carey
Navy Department
Cecilia Coates
State Department
Paul Cofoni
CACI
Colleen Coggins
Interior Department
24
Lt. Gen. Charles Croom
Defense Information Systems
Agency
Kenneth Fagan
Agency
Lesley Field
Office of Management and
Budget
Maryantonett Flumian
University of Ottawa
Joyce France
Office of the Secretary of
Defense
Randy Garrett
Army Department
Chase Garwood
Homeland Security Department
Diana Gowen
Qwest Government Services
Floyd Groce
Navy Department
Paul Gwaltney
Nortel Government Solutions
David Hadsell
EDS
Robert Hanson
Sarasota County, Fla.
Steven Monteith
U.S. Postal Service
Rebecca Richards
Col. Eric Rolaf
Marine Corps
Ronald Rosenthal
Navy Department
Michael Jacobs
Navy Department
Doug Montgomery
National Institute of Standards
and Technology
Debra Ruh
TecAccess
Jerry Johnston
Donna Morea
Shyam Salona
Environmental Protection
Agency
CGI
REI Systems
Kenneth Mortensen
Justice Department
Eric Schmidt
Google
John Moses
Environmental Protection
Agency
Andy Schoenbach
Budget
Thomas Neff
Army Department
Gen. Norton Schwartz
U.S. Transportation Command
Steven Newburg-Rinn
SRA International
Adam Sedgewick
Senate Homeland Security and
Governmental Affairs Committee
Brig. Gen. Nickolas Justice
Army
Steven Kempf
Judith Kenny
Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention
Jeff Koch
Budget
Curt Kolcun
Microsoft
Peter Korn
Sun Microsystems
Arthur O’Connor
Transportation Department
Diane O’Connor
Army Department
Thomas O’Reilly
Justice Department
Kimberly Lane
Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention
Bajinder Paul
Treasury Department
James Leto
GTSI
George Pedersen
ManTech
Nancy Leveson
Massachusetts Institute of
Technology
William Pelgrin
New York State
Peter Levine
Senate Armed Services
Committee
Ryan Loving
General Dynamics Information
Technology
Sen. Susan Collins
(R-Maine)
Senate
Alan Harbitter
Frank Constantino
FBI
Lee Harvey
Army Department
Diann McCoy
Agency
Guy Copeland
Computer Sciences Corp.
Kip Hawley
Transportation Security
Administration
Elizabeth McGrath
Office of the Secretary
of Defense
MARCH 24, 2008
Daniel Mintz
Christian Rasmussen
National Geospatial-Intelligence
Agency
Kathy Perras
Dynamics Research Corp.
David Powner
Government Accountability
Office
Robert Shea
Budget
John Swart
Army Department
Don Tapscott
New Paradigm
Peter Tseronis
Education Department
Zachary Tumin
Harvard University’s Kennedy
School of Government
Teresa White
Agency
Steven Willett
Defense Intelligence Agency
Charles Prow
IBM
Jim Williams
Venkatapathi Puvvada
Unisys
Karen Wilson
Boeing
Stephen Quinn
National Institute of Standards
and Technology
Henry Wychorski
Volpe National Transportation
Systems Center
© 2007 Accenture. All rights reserved.
We know what it takes to be a Tiger.
According to our landmark research on leaders in 35
industries, high performers consistently excel at
translating information into business value, particularly
through the strategic use of IT. For an in-depth look
at our study of and experience with high performers,
visit accenture.com/research
FCW 26-40
3/19/08
11:58 AM
Page 26
Marine Corps
As chief information officer and director of command, control, communications and computers
for the Marine Corps, Brig. Gen. George Allen
moved aggressively to bring advanced networking
capabilities to all ranks in the Marine Corps.
Allen reorganized a chaotic procurement environment and was a leader in closing the digital
divide that existed in the Marines’ lowest ranks.
With their new connectivity gains, service
members at every level benefit from cost-effective,
lightweight, flexible equipment and better-trained
personnel, said Linton Wells, a distinguished research fellow who holds the Force Transformation
Chair at the National Defense University.
Allen “leverages any opportunity that comes
his way,” Wells said. “ ‘Not invented here’ is not
in his vocabulary.”
Perryn Ashmore
To understand the impact of Perryn Ashmore,
deputy chief information officer of the General
Services Administration’s Federal Acquisition
Service, just check the math.
GSA expected to pay $8 million for the development of an online contract management module, but Ashmore got the job done for $800,000,
said Casey Coleman, GSA’s CIO.
GSA clients use the module to submit and
view the status of invoices for the Alliant contract. The module provides real-time access to
information.
Ashmore can hold in-depth discussions with
information technology employees about their
projects and explain them to business program
executives, Coleman said. “It’s a rare skill.”
Jason R. Baron
National Archives and Records Administration
Jason R. Baron, director of litigation at the Na-
26
Perryn Ashmore
MARCH 24, 2008
tional Archives and Records Administration since
2000, brought a healthy skepticism to the discipline known as e-discovery.
Electronic records can play an important role
in developing a legal case, but Baron understands that technology has limits. In 2007,
Baron led an international research project to
demonstrate the limitations of keyword searching and evaluate alternative search methods.
“I’ve heard him speak on several occasions
to both legal and layperson audiences on
e-recordkeeping and e-discovery matters,” said
Barbara Simball, assistant general counsel for
legal services at the Government Accountability
Office. “He is both entertaining and highly
informative.”
Paul Bartock
National Security Agency
Paul Bartock, the National Security Agency’s
technical director for network operational vulnerabilities, brought an important perspective to
the Federal Desktop Core Configuration (FDCC)
initiative.
FDCC, an effort to secure systems governmentwide, was an important policy, but it
required more than good policy-writing
chops.
“Paul understands what constitutes a good
security baseline and what is usable in an operational environment,” said Tony Sager, chief of the
Vulnerability Analysis and Operations Group at
NSA’s Information Assurance Directorate. “He has
worked both sides of this and spends time in real
environments.”
Bartock would go to Defense Department
bases and find out what applications the standard baseline broke. He used that knowledge to
steer the Office of Management and Budget, the
National Institute of Standards and Technology
and others toward a usable core configuration for
federal agencies.
Jason R. Baron
Paul Bartock
Gary Bass
OMB Watch
Gary Bass, founder and executive director of OMB
Watch, took the unusual step of collaborating
with the Office of Management and Budget, the
focus of the group’s watchdog activities. The
partnership contributed to the creation of USAspending.gov, a searchable database of government contracts mandated by the Federal Funding
Accountability and Transparency Act of 2006.
OMB had expected to spend $60 million to
create the site from scratch. Instead, Bass persuaded his board of directors to share the software that runs OMB Watch’s FedSpending.org Web
site. That partnership arrangement cost the government about $600,000.
“OMB Watch could have said, ‘Figure it out on
your own,’” said Karen Evans, OMB’s administrator
for e-government and information technology.
Instead, it helped the government save taxpayer
dollars.
Cathy Beasley
General Services Administration (retired)
As contract officer for the General Services
Administration’s Alliant programs, Cathy Beasley
pulled together a team of contracting professionals who managed two multibillion-dollar
procurements.
GSA awarded a $50 billion Alliant contract in
July and a $15 billion companion contract, Alliant Small Business, in December.
David Drabkin, GSA’s deputy chief acquisition
officer and senior procurement executive, credits
Beasley for creating the agency’s first virtual
contracting team. Team members in Kansas
City, Mo.; Fort Worth, Texas; and San Diego
used videoconferencing, e-mail and the Web
to collaborate.
Beasley’s virtual team approach enabled GSA
“to keep the amount of travel down and still produce an excellent work product,” Drabkin said.
Gary Bass
Cathy Beasley
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Page 28
Shelly Bird
Microsoft
Shelly Bird, Microsoft Consulting Services’ chief
architect, did more than provide technical leadership for a governmentwide Federal Desktop Core
Configuration for Windows XP and Vista. Bird provided a reality check for federal and industry officials involved in that security project.
“Shelly provided some rationality on the
ground,” said Tim Grance, manager of the systems and network security group at the National
Institute of Standards and Technology. “She was
able to take policy concepts and settings and tell
us what the operational impact on the system
would be,” Grance said. Bird sorted out the necessary from the “nice to do.”
Networx Universal, successor to FTS 2001, is
the primary contract vehicle for agencies seeking
to purchase telecommunications and network
services. In shepherding the contract, Braun
took on requirements “every bit as complex as
the most high-tech weapons system that DOD
buys,” said David Drabkin, GSA’s deputy chief
acquisition officer and senior procurement
executive.
During the procurement process, Braun
worked with the requirements community, contract program managers and legal staff members
to clear obstacles and keep the contract moving,
Drabkin said. He also ensured that GSA created a
contract that can adapt to an evolving market.
Gregory Brewer
Mark Blevins
SecureInfo
Perot Systems
Gregory Brewer, a senior security consultant
Mark Blevins, senior vice president at Perot Systems, did what vendors are supposed to do but
often don’t accomplish: He took time to understand and meet his federal customer’s needs.
He led the development of a strategy for
EDUCATE — the Education Department Utility for
Communications, Application and Technology Environment — in which the department’s technology infrastructure is fully owned and operated by
contractors.
“He’s been able to build some connections
where sometimes federal agencies, when left to
their own devices, just take what’s already running and keep it going,” said Ross Santy, deputy
assistant secretary of the office of planning and
evaluation at Education.
for SecureInfo, made life easier for
defense security experts needing to certify
their systems.
He set out to streamline the process of certifying and accrediting the U.S. Pacific Air Forces’
information systems to comply with cybersecurity
standards. Then he turned PACAF’s methodology
into a model for all the military services.
“We are receiving calls from all the major
commands to cross-feed information,” said Clyde
Cummings, PACAF’s deputy chief of information
assurance.
The amount of time needed to certify PACAF
systems decreased by 40 percent. Cummings
credits Brewer for succeeding where previous attempts had failed. “It’s his personal drive and
initiative more than anything,” Cummings said.
Jack Braun
Frances Byrd
As contracting officer for Networx Universal, Jack
Braun handled one of the General Services Administration’s most complex procurement programs in recent memory.
U.S. Postal Service
Shelly Bird
28
MARCH 24, 2008
Mark Blevins
Last year’s postal-rate increase was more of an
issue for Frances Byrd than for most people.
Byrd, a sales and marketing program manager at
Jack Braun
the U.S. Postal Service, had to ensure that the
agency’s systems could support the change.
But that was only one milestone project in a
very busy year. She also oversaw a mail verification program designed to reduce fraud and mail
reclassifications for PostalOne, a Web-based service for business mailers.
Byrd managed scores of in-house and contract information technology professionals who
“rewrote a ton of code” that could be installed
only after midnight and on weekends, said
Robert Chen, a program manager at Nortel Government Solutions. “She’s always there with the
IT folks,” Chen said. “People can manage a program technically, but to do that and get along
with everybody and motivate everybody and to
make sure they do a good job, that is something
else.”
Joseph Campbell
Office of Personnel Management
Joseph Campbell, acting director of the Office of
Personnel Management’s Human Resources Line
of Business (HR LOB) initiative, brought just the
right mix of leadership and subject-matter expertise to rally support for OMB’s vision of modernized human resources operations.
Campbell, a 30-year veteran of federal service, established a collaborative approach to the
governmentwide HR LOB initiative by forming a
multiagency executive strategy committee and an
HR LOB group comprising senior-level officials
from 24 agencies.
Campbell’s leadership on HR LOB fostered “a
true sense of cooperation,” said Robert Baratta,
director of the human resources information service at the Veterans Affairs Department’s Office of
Human Resources Management. He brought “a
rare combination of knowledge, experience and
common sense to what could easily [have been]
a runaway activity with no clear picture of the final or end state,” Baratta said.
Frances Byrd
Joseph Campbell
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Kevin Campbell
Cecilia Coates
Colleen Coggins
Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency
State Department
Interior Department
Kevin Campbell, a radio telecommunications
specialist for Pennsylvania’s Emergency
Management Agency (PEMA), was a driving
force behind the transformation of an outdated
satellite warning system and rapid notification
network.
The initial modernization plan simply called
for installing new satellite terminals, but Campbell saw an opportunity to create a unified
emergency communications network.
His ability to communicate his message to
a variety of stakeholders helped make it happen, said Frank Weges, information technology
liaison to PEMA for the Governor’s Office of
Administration.
“When you include a diverse spectrum of
users, a person has to be able to communicate
in technical and nontechnical terms,” he said.
Cecilia Coates, the State Department’s acting director of program management and policy,
brought a level of efficiency and reliability to the
department’s global supply operations that it
previously lacked.
Coates had to overcome significant cultural
and budgetary restraints to replace the department’s paper-based logistics practices.
“There were enormous challenges in development, deployment and change management,
but Ceci persevered,” said Frank Coulter, executive assistant to the undersecretary for management, who worked closely with Coates for five
years.
“Thanks to her vision and leadership, what
was once opaque is now clear,” Coulter said. “We
can track actions and the movement of materials
throughout our global supply chain, and we now
have information and tools to effect even greater
improvements.”
Colleen Coggins understands the value of enterprise architecture and enjoys helping others understand its value. As chief architect at the Interior
Department, she developed Interior’s information
technology architecture plan, which is recognized
as one of the best in the federal government.
Coggins’ secret is a methodology for business
transformation, a set of guidelines that she created and followed to manage Interior’s transition
to an architecture-based infrastructure. Others
agencies, including the Treasury Department,
now use those guidelines.
“The methodology is recognized throughout
the federal government and by other countries’
governments as a best practice,” said Richard
Burk, former chief architect at the Office of Management and Budget. “She was always one of the
architects I looked to for ideas and leadership.”
Robert Carey
Navy Department
Senate
Robert Carey, chief information officer at the
Navy Department, has been a pioneer in moving
the service to the Web 2.0 world and a governmentwide leader as co-chairman of the CIO
Council’s Best Practices Committee.
Carey has the unique ability to anticipate
what the large issues will be well before they
develop, said David Wennergren, the Defense
Department’s deputy CIO.
A tour in Iraq gave Carey real-world
experience on the battlefield and positioned
him to drive technology innovations, Wennergren said.
Carey “brings an incredible range of experience to the job, having formerly been an acquisition person, an e-leader and a champion for
smart card work,” Wennergren said. “That experience in theater has given him a perspective of
what really works and what doesn’t.”
Kevin Campbell
30
Robert Carey
MARCH 24, 2008
Sen. Susan Collins
Paul Cofoni
CACI
Paul Cofoni’s name is not synonymous with CACI
the way Jack London’s was. But since being
named chief executive officer in July 2007 after
London stepped down, Cofoni ensured a smooth
transition for CACI’s customers and a continued
growth path for the company.
That’s no small feat considering the government market’s budget challenges. CACI’s revenue
climbed 19.8 percent to a record $1.13 billion in
the first half of the company’s 2008 fiscal year,
which ends June 30.
Cofoni joined CACI in 2005 as president of
U.S. operations.
“He’s been very effective with CACI,” said
Stan Soloway, president and CEO of the Professional Services Council. “He’s been a very
thoughtful and committed leader.”
Cecilia Coates
Paul Cofoni
Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine), ranking member of
the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs
Committee, sponsored the Accountability in Government Contracting Act of 2007, which would
increase competition in federal contracting,
make the process more transparent and reduce
waste, fraud and abuse.
Its provisions would impose further restrictions to curb the unnecessary use of no-bid
contracts, make procurement information publicly
available, encourage more rigorous competition
for federal contracts and promote accountability
by more closely linking payments to performance.
Stuart Bowen Jr., special inspector general
for Iraq reconstruction, testified before the committee that “Senator Collins’ bill will save taxpayer dollars…and address very directly the
problems that [we] have been experiencing
[with] contracting in Iraq.”
Colleen Coggins
Sen. Susan Collins
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Frank Constantino
Frank Constantino, a senior computer scientist at
the FBI, put three decades of experience to good
use this past year.
Constantino, who is responsible for developing the FBI’s enterprise architecture, helped the
bureau overcome numerous technical and institutional obstacles that were making it difficult to
develop a state-of-the-art case management system known as Sentinel. He was able to get Sentinel back on track partly because of his in-depth
knowledge of the agency and its systems.
Constantino’s dedication to the FBI and his
knowledge of the agency’s information systems
makes him invaluable, said Carlo Lucchesi, acting
program management executive in the bureau’s
Office of IT Policy and Planning.
Information Systems Agency, has led the agency
through the first steps of a business transformation by championing an ABC philosophy of acquisition: Adopt, Build, Create.
Croom’s adopt-first strategy can be seen in
the Net-Enabled Command Capability (NECC) program to acquire a net-centric command-and-control system. Rather than build a new system
from scratch, DISA issued a call for existing solutions and received more than 130 responses,
from which officials selected components for
NECC.
“Just think about that,” said John Garing,
DISA’s chief information officer and director of
strategic planning and information. “There was
no [research and development] for us in that
program because somebody [had] already
done it.”
Guy Copeland
Patrice D’Eramo
Cisco Systems
Guy Copeland, vice president of information infrastructure advisory programs at Computer Sciences Corp., had an urgent message about cybersecurity to deliver in 2007.
Working with the Partnership for Critical Infrastructure Security, a public/private organization
dedicated to securing infrastructure, Copeland
helped establish and lead a cross-industry cybersecurity working group to hammer home the importance of securing information systems.
Copeland is a leader in “sensitizing industry
sectors to the need to pay attention to this and
put resources to fixing the problem, because
we’re all at risk and we’re only as secure as the
weakest link,” said Gregory Garcia, the Homeland
Security Department’s assistant secretary for
cybersecurity and communications.
The Industry Advisory Council likes to help cultivate the next generation of federal information
technology sector leaders through its Voyagers
Program, which is why Patrice D’Eramo was such
a good fit.
D’Eramo, industry vice chairwoman of Voyagers, takes the idea of mentoring very seriously.
The program was already considered successful,
but she made it even better in 2007.
“Our challenge each year is to make the program even better,” said Darren Ash, chief information officer at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission who served as government chairman of
Voyagers.
D’Eramo, director of U.S. federal marketing at
Cisco Systems, was instrumental in strengthening
Voyagers’ mentor/protégé activity.
Robert Dix
Juniper Networks
Lt. Gen. Charles Croom, director of the Defense
Many people in government and industry are glad
FBI
Frank Constantino
Guy Copeland
Patrice D’Eramo
that Robert Dix left his job as a congressional
staffer three years ago to become vice president
of governmental affairs at Juniper Networks.
Congress may have lost a well-respected
staffer, but Dix has emerged as a liaison of sorts
between Congress and industry when it comes to
security issues.
In 2007, Dix was instrumental in getting the
private-sector critical infrastructure community
involved in a large, congressionally mandated
national counterterrorism exercise named TopOff
4, which tested the ability of key government
agencies to respond to a critical infrastructure
attack.
“Bob Dix is a patriot who believes deeply in
the critical role that our critical infrastructure
plays,” said Guy Copeland, vice president of information infrastructure advisory programs and
special assistant to the chief executive officer at
Martha Dorris
Martha Dorris, deputy associate administrator
of the General Services Administration’s Office
of Citizen Services and Communications, shows
no sign of resting on her laurels when it comes
to championing USA.gov, the government’s
Web portal, even as its audience continues to
grow.
Since January 2007, when GSA dropped the
hard-to-remember name FirstGov.gov and renamed it USA.gov, the number of visitors to the
site has increased 66 percent, and traffic volume
on the site increased from 133 million in 2006 to
220 million in 2007.
However, that success hasn’t slowed Dorris,
said Ed Blakely, associate administrator for the
Office of Citizen Services and Communications.
“She always carries a stack of USA.gov bumper
stickers,” Blakely said. “There’s not a car parked
at GSA that’s safe.”
Robert Dix
Martha Dorris
MACH 24, 2008
31
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Col. Monte Dunard
Kenneth Fagan
Maryantonett Flumian
Marine Corps
University of Ottawa
Col. Monte Dunard, director of the Marine Corps’
Center for Lessons Learned, led an effort that officials say is changing the way the Defense Department shares critical information via DOD’s
Global Information Grid.
The Joint Lessons Learned Information System resembles a structured blog that allows
warfighters worldwide to look up critical lessonslearned information from DOD and other government agencies and coalition partners.
Dunard “had a definite vision for this and
pushed the tool out there,” said Robert Carey,
the Navy’s chief information officer. “He persisted and led the charge at a time when many were
asking why we were bothering to spend money
on something like this.”
Dunard’s system is quickly replacing older lessons-learned information systems that are less
comprehensive.
Kenneth Fagan’s single-minded focus on military
combatants has earned him the respect of an important noncombatant in the Pentagon.
Fagan, chief of the Data Services Branch of
DISA’s Program Executive Office Global Information
Grid Enterprise Services (PEO-GES), led the development of a U.S. Strategic Command test project
that uses service-oriented architecture technology
to improve data sharing among warfighters.
The project was ahead of schedule and under
budget, but more important, it works — so well,
in fact, that Defense Secretary Robert Gates requested those capabilities on his personal desktop PC.
The capabilities move the Defense Department closer to achieving its net-centric strategy,
which is to provide warfighters with “timely,
trustworthy and understandable” information, regardless of where it is housed, said Rebecca Harris, director of the PEO-GES.
Maryantonett Flumian, executive-in-residence at
the University of Ottawa and former deputy minister of Service Canada, transformed Canada’s
program-centric model of government services
into one that focuses on people.
The one-stop network, Service Canada, bundles programs, services and benefits for the elderly, people with disabilities, working adults, employers, young people and families with children.
Consolidating 14 departments is expected to save
$3 billion in five years.
Jonathan Breul, executive director of the IBM
Center for the Business Government, said the
program is a model for re-engineering governments worldwide. Flumian’s achievement was realized without the force of legal imperative or
central government authority.
“It was by cajoling, arm-twisting, leadership
and vision,” Breul said. “She’s a tough lady who
took on the toughest assignment.”
Lesley Field
Joyce France
Stephen Duncan, deputy program manager for the
General Services Administration’s Homeland Security Presidential Directive 12 Managed Services
Office, relishes the technical nature of the directive’s security requirements and enjoys dealing
with customers.
Michael Butler, the office’s program manager,
said Duncan handles the workload well.
“Stephen says, ‘This is just good work,’ ” and
he believes it, Butler said.
As the office’s security officer, Duncan must
observe any changes to the Certificate Authorities for Public Key Infrastructure, and he must be
on call at any hour.
During the day, Duncan deals with HSPD-12
customers. The office supports 67 agencies and
more than 800,000 government employees, each
of whom must receive an HSPD-12 card.
Office of Management and Budget
Office of the Secretary of Defense
It’s easy to understand the importance of raising
the level of professionalism in the civilian acquisition workforce. But it takes a real sense of mission to delve into the nitty-gritty details needed
to make it happen.
Lesley Field, a policy analyst at the Office of
Management and Budget’s Office of Federal Procurement Policy, led a certification initiative to
standardize requirements for training and development. And that was just one project in an already busy year.
“Lesley’s dedicated leadership on acquisition
workforce, strategic-sourcing and accessibletechnology initiatives has, without question,
propelled these initiatives forward,” said Robert
Burton, OMB’s deputy administrator for federal
procurement policy.
Joyce France, director of the Defense Department’s Chief Information Officer Management
Services organization, is not one to sit around
and worry about the aging federal workforce. She
is doing something about it.
France has established the processes, cooperative relationships and disciplines for educational
initiatives such as Clinger-Cohen Competencies,
the Information Resources Management College
Curriculum and the DOD Information Assurance
Scholarship program.
“One of the major things for us…is to understand the strengths of 18- to 22-year-olds and
how those can be used in government service,”
said David Wennergren, DOD’s deputy CIO. “Joyce
has been the champion for the entire CIO Council
for that.”
Stephen Duncan
Col. Monte Dunard
32
MARCH 24, 2008
Stephen Duncan
Kenneth Fagan
Lesley Field
Joyce France
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FCW 26-40
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Randy Garrett
Army Department
Randy Garrett, senior science adviser to the Army
G2 and Army Intelligence and Security Command,
developed an intelligence-sharing capability to
support coalition operations.
Garrett created the Secure Enterprise
DataVault, a multilevel security system that supports the most demanding information-sharing
missions. He fashioned strategies, developed organizations and recruited funding to accelerate
the adoption of cross-domain security.
Garrett’s efforts brought the defense and intelligence communities together in a project that
supports coalition operations and missions involving multiple levels of government.
“There are thinkers and there are doers;
Randy is both,” said Suzanne Yoakum-Stover,
technical lead at the Army’s Intelligence Information Warfare Directorate.
Chase Garwood
Chase Garwood, acting chief information officer
of the U.S. Visitor and Immigrant Status Indicator Technology program, led efforts to expand
DHS’ foreign-traveler fingerprint collection program to 10 digital fingerprints.
Implementing this change is no minor task,
requiring upgraded technology at 295 air, sea
and land border ports, beginning with airports.
“Chase has been an asset to the program
since its inception in 2003 and has proven his
value, not only to US-VISIT but to the federal IT
community,” said US-VISIT Director Robert Mocny.
Although already a player in the federal
telecommunications arena, Qwest had not yet
gained a big win that would let it break out of
a niche market as a subcontractor to systems
integrators.
In 2007, Qwest earned two big wins on the
General Services Administration’s Networx Universal and Networx Enterprise telecommunications
contracts.
“I don’t think there are too many people in
the industry who could have pulled this off,” said
Warren Suss, president of Suss Consulting, a telecom consulting company. “Diana is one of the
most promising executives in the industry.”
Floyd Groce
Navy Department
Floyd Groce, co-chairman of the Defense Department Enterprise Software Initiative Working
David Hadsell
Group, silenced some skeptics by creating blanket
purchase agreements (BPAs) that make data-atrest encryption technology available across federal, state and local government.
Encryption is the best way to ensure data
protection for the Navy and all other government
agencies, said Robert Carey, the Navy’s chief information officer.
But some lawyers questioned whether BPAs
could be applied so broadly.
“He took the view that the glass was halffull,” Carey said. “That sounds simple, but it was
hard for him to work this. He had to come up
with a rock-solid, convincing position and a thorough understanding of opposing positions.”
The BPAs are considered a template for future
enterprise licensing contracts.
Federal contracting behemoths sometimes find
subcontracting with small businesses easier said
than done.
David Hadsell, a vice president and sales
leader at EDS’ U.S. Government and Public Sector,
focused last year on getting small businesses
into the EDS fold. His efforts paid off, leading to
Defense Department recognition for the company’s outreach to service-disabled, veteranowned small businesses.
“David is a huge advocate of partnerships
with small businesses,” said Dennis Stolkey, vice
president and general manager of EDS’ U.S. Government and Public Sector. Subcontracting with
small businesses isn’t charity work. The larger the
industrial base from which government can draw,
the more likely the government will get good
prices. And, as a group, small businesses often
are quicker to seize on technological innovations
than larger businesses.
Hadsell “really understands the value of those
relationships and how those companies enhance
the solutions we’re providing,” Stolkey added.
Diana Gowen
Randy Garrett
34
Qwest Government Services
Paul Gwaltney
Diana Gowen, a senior vice president at Qwest
and general manager of its government division,
put the telecommunications company on the map
this past year.
Chase Garwood
MARCH 24, 2008
Gwaltney provided program and technical
leadership to help the Nuclear Regulatory Commission go live in 2007 with a digital courtroom
system.
NRC’s Digital Data Management System
(DDMS) primarily supports the commission’s
Atomic Safety and Licensing Board Panel, which
reviews nuclear licensing applications.
However, Gwaltney’s role extended beyond
building DDMS. He also supported the system
during a hearing on the proposed Yucca Mountain
radioactive waste disposal facility.
“We’ve had both Paul and his senior managers
go out and support us,” said Dan Graser, information technology team leader for the licensing
panel. “It’s all very comforting to the customer.”
Paul Gwaltney, program manager at Nortel Government Solutions, is not someone who simply
develops a program and walks away.
Diana Gowen
Floyd Groce
EDS
Paul Gwaltney
David Hadsell
CSC and GSA:
The Par tnership Continues
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From providing integrated IT solutions worldwide to supporting new and
emerging technologies, CSC will play a leading role as an Alliant partner.
Our innovation and best practices will continue to help Federal Government
agencies streamline costs and better serve the public.
And as always, you can count on us — for exceptional IT solutions that
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Robert Hanson
Sarasota County, Fla.
Robert Hanson, in his dual role as chief information officer of Sarasota County and CIO of
Sarasota County Schools, made collaboration
work for the county as it deals with severe
budget shortfalls.
Hanson brings to his role a belief that collaboration among public-sector organizations is
the wave of the future.
In 2007, he led four major collaborative initiatives that enabled the county to increase
service levels while achieving a 50 percent reduction in its information technology staff —
without layoffs.
“Bob is a strategic thinker who is innovative, manages transition extremely well and has
never shown a fear of taking personal risk to
benefit the organization,” said Hank Schwan,
deputy CIO for Sarasota County.
Alan Harbitter
Information sharing is impossible if organizations fear that their data will end up in the
wrong place. Court records of juvenile offenders,
for example, shouldn’t be accessible by just
anybody.
Enter Alan Harbitter, chief technology officer at Nortel Government Solutions. As a member of the Global Security Working Group, a Justice Department-funded organization, Harbitter
took it upon himself to help craft an electronic
identity credentialing standard.
“He decided it was critical, and he wanted
to do it,” said Paul Wormeli, executive director
at the nonprofit IJIS Institute.
Harbitter came up with an Extensible Markup
Language specification that any state, local
or federal agency can use as a framework for
secure exchanges of personally identifiable
information.
Robert Hanson
36
Alan Harbitter
MACH 24, 2008
Without Harbitter’s contribution, “we’d still
be floundering around, trying to get agreement
on how to do this,” Wormeli said.
“He’s a leader who understands that transparency builds credibility.”
Kenneth Heitkamp
Lee Harvey
Air Force
Army Department
Kenneth Heitkamp, associate director of life cycle management in the Air Force Office of the
Chief of Warfighting Integration and Chief Information Officer, prefers to share the credit with
many people for improving the federal government’s desktop security. But most experts agree
that Heitkamp is a founding father of an effort
to create a Federal Desktop Core Configuration
for Microsoft Windows XP and Vista.
Heitkamp’s work inspired the Office of Management and Budget to expand the Air Force’s
work governmentwide.
“Ken forged the idea of doing this on a large
scale and saving money while improving security,” said Tim Grance, manager of NIST’s Systems and Network Security Group. “He provided
the leadership necessary to demonstrate this
could be done across the Air Force.”
Lee Harvey, deputy program executive officer for
Enterprise Information Systems, is responsible
for $700 million in annual obligations for medical, personnel, acquisition and other Defense
Department combat support systems.
Harvey distinguished himself in 2007 by
promoting better communication between industry and government.
“Lee Harvey exhibits an openness to industry and the ability to communicate government
needs to industry and industry solutions to government,” said Kevin Carroll, former program
executive officer for enterprise information
systems.
Carroll singled out Harvey’s efforts in successfully deploying a battlefield digital health
record system last year. “This system has drastically improved the medical care for injured soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan,” Carroll said.
Col. Barry Hensley
Joint Task Force-Global Network Operations
Kip Hawley
Transportation Security Administration
Kip Hawley, the Transportation Security Administration’s administrator and a believer in the
virtues of openness, has used Web collaboration
tools to improve communications in the agency
and with the public.
TSA’s IdeaFactory, an internal online forum
where employees can offer ideas for improving
the agency, has grabbed the attention of government executives and information technology
leaders.
“Kip has always been a forward-thinking,
creative and courageous leader,” said Jennifer
Dorn, president and chief executive officer of
the National Academy of Public Administration.
Lee Harvey
Kip Hawley
As director of operations of the U.S. Strategic
Command’s Joint Task Force-Global Network Operations, Col. Barry Hensley has been instrumental in transforming the JTF-GNO into an organization at the forefront of governmentwide
cybersecurity initiatives.
Hensley is a superb leader and adept at taking complicated issues, simplifying them, marketing them to a broad array of people and then
making things happen, said Lt. Gen. Charles
Croom, director of the Defense Information Systems Agency and commander of JTF-GNO.
“More than that, he has a keen ability to listen more than talk,” Croom said. “That’s the
only way to generate the teamwork you need for
this effort.”
Kenneth Heitkamp
Col. Barry Hensley
© 2008 Lockheed Martin Corporation
B E T W E E N T H E I D E A A N D T H E A C HI E V E M E N T,
T H E R E I S O N E IM P O R TA N T W O R D : H O W.
A N D I T I S T H E H O W T H AT M A K E S A L L T H E D I F F E R E N C E.
lockheedmartin.com/how
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Page 38
Neil Horikoshi
Michael Jacobs
IBM
Navy Department
Army
Thank Neil Horikoshi, director of global business
development at IBM, for helping ensure that the
government didn’t craft a unique, federal-only
standard for IPv6 implementations.
When the National Institute of Standards and
Technology released a proposed first-draft IPv6
federal standard in 2007, Horikoshi marshaled a
coordinated industry response.
Horikoshi wasn’t the only person to sound
the alarm about the daylight between commercial
IPv6 standards and NIST’s proposed profile, but
he “was the only one who was raising the issue
to the level of a policy discussion,” said Trey
Hodgkins, vice president of federal government
programs at the Information Technology Association of America.
Because of Horikoshi’s activism, NIST agreed
to harmonize its proposal with commercial standards. Horikoshi “really ratcheted up the level of
conversation,” Hodgkins said.
Michael Jacobs, the Navy’s chief technology officer, offered not only a vision but also the nittygritty details for implementing the Navy’s nextgeneration networking infrastructure.
Jacobs is responsible for coordinating all
Next-Generation Enterprise Network activities for
the Navy. He also is developing the scope, strategy and concept of operations for the future Naval
Networking Environment.
“Jacobs is leading a very small team of folks
to deliver what amounts to an aircraft carriersize amount of technology integration,” said
Robert Carey, the Navy’s chief information officer.
“Pound for pound, given the short amount of
time they’ve had to pull this together, it’s probably far more.”
Since July 2007, Brig. Gen. Nickolas Justice has
used his position as program executive officer for
command, control and communications–tactical
to push the Army to adopt open-source
technologies.
Justice first gained attention as an opensource aficionado during preparations for the Iraq
war, when he deployed the open-source Linux operating system for Blue Force Tracking. The technology improved commanders’ situational awareness and saved lives, Defense Department
officials say.
Justice also spearheaded the Army’s adoption
of an industry-standard systems engineering
process.
“The new process ensures that brigade combat teams are ready to deploy, supported while
they are deployed and reset after they return
from deployment,” said Mike Krieger, principal director at the Office of the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Information Management
and Technology.
Warren Huffer
Energy Department
Because of the efforts of Warren Huffer, director
of corporate information systems at the Energy
Department, the Integrated Management Navigation System has begun to pay off.
DOE created the program to standardize and
modernize the department’s business systems,
but the program suffered because of problems
with funding. Huffer helped put the program on
track.
“Bringing up these new systems, whether it
was off-the-shelf software or migrating to a system owned by another federal agency, required
change management in that particular business,
and getting people to focus on the new application rather than wishing for what was used in the
past,” said Michaela Brown, DOE’s team lead for
corporate management support.
Neil Horikoshi
38
Warren Huffer
MARCH 24, 2008
Jerry Johnston
Environmental Protection Agency
Jerry Johnston, geospatial information officer at
the Environmental Protection Agency, demonstrated last year how he could think outside the
box.
Johnston led a team that launched the Puget
Sound Information Challenge, a 36-hour open
call for suggestions about how to clean up Washington’s Puget Sound. Johnston then developed
various innovative schemes for setting up Really
Simple Syndication feeds and using Web harvesting to find related content.
The challenge netted 75 recommendations
from a government, industry and academic
sources.
“Jerry was able to demonstrate how [Web
2.0] technologies can be powerful in bringing
together place-based information throughout
government to solve problems,” said Molly
O’Neill, assistant administrator of EPA’s Office of
Environmental Information and chief information
officer.
Michael Jacobs
Jerry Johnston
Steven Kempf
Steven Kempf, former deputy associate commissioner of the Federal Acquisition Service’s
Integrated Technology Services organization,
brings discipline to each program on which he
works.
In 2007, Kempf’s efforts shone in reengineering the Homeland Security Presidential
Directive 12 managed services contract from
strategy to award.
John Johnson, assistant commissioner of
ITS, said Kempf exercised his skills to reshape a
program fraught with schedule delays, cost overruns and uncompetitive pricing. “He has a solid
background and plenty of experience to turn
around a challenged contract,” Johnson said.
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Judith Kenny
Curt Kolcun
Kimberly Lane
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
Microsoft
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
Judith Kenny, director of the Information Technology Services Office at the Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention, consolidated IT services
across the agency.
Kenny led the consolidation with the federal
government’s first designated civilian agency
high-performing organization under the Office of
Management and Budget’s competitive-sourcing
program.
Kenny “has been a pioneer in blending and
balancing aggressive IT service consolidation,
cost reduction, customer satisfaction, rigorous
performance measurement and accountability,”
said Jim Seligman, CDC’s chief information
officer.
The organization saved $46 million in 2007
while improving IT infrastructure services to
customers.
Curt Kolcun, a vice president of Microsoft’s federal division, became the go-to guy in 2007 for
United Services Organizations of Metropolitan
Washington, D.C., a nonprofit troop moraleboosting group.
“I’ll say we have a need for something, and
[he says,] ‘I’m on that,’ ” said Elaine Rogers, USOMetro president.
Some of Kolcun’s efforts were distributing
portable music players to troops and upgrading
the software and hardware in a USO-run computer room at the Baltimore/Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport. “That USO location is extremely important to us,” Rogers said.
Kolcun also spearheaded “Salute to Our
Troops,” a private performance of the New York
City Rockettes staged for U.S. troops. Microsoft
purchased an entire Rockettes performance Nov.
12 on behalf of the USO.
“This whole event spiraled, and this was Curt
personally doing it. It was his idea, totally,”
Rogers said.
When it comes to vaccine distribution, Kimberly
Lane, senior public health adviser at the Centers
for Disease Control and Prevention’s Coordinating
Center for Infectious Diseases, appreciates the
importance of good logistics.
As executive sponsor of the Vaccine Management Business Improvement Project (VMBIP),
Lane helped CDC re-engineer how it manages and
distributes supplies so it can respond to a public
health emergency.
“Through Kim Lane’s vision and leadership,
the VMBIP project has engaged over 70 staff
from federal and state immunization programs
to work on various components of the initiative,” said Rear Adm. Dr. Mitchell Cohen,
director of the Coordinating Center for Infectious
Diseases.
Jeff Koch
Jeff Koch, manager of the Office of Management
and Budget’s Internal Efficiency and Effectiveness
portfolio, didn’t try to force agencies to accept
the Bush administration’s e-government plans for
back-office services. Faced with resistance from
agency managers and lawmakers, Koch used
persuasive tactics.
He cleared roadblocks to ensure that initiatives such as E-Payroll and E-Travel could mature.
“Jeff has provided unwavering leadership for
the agencies with his management of the Internal Efficiency and Effectiveness E-Government
portfolio,” said Karen Evans, OMB’s administrator
for e-government and information technology.
“Jeff has ensured the milestones for each of the
initiatives are met, and any obstacles in the way
have been cleared.”
Agencies saved $508 million in 2007 from
initiatives in Koch’s portfolio.
Judith Kenny
40
Jeff Koch
MACH 24, 2008
Peter Korn
Sun Microsystems
Peter Korn understands how information technology can affect everyday lives.
As accessibility architect for Sun Microsystems, Korn led efforts to bridge the digital divide
for employees with disabilities.
Rex Lint, accessibility consultant and IT accessibility spokesman for the Information Technology Association of America, said Korn worked
to create interoperability standards for assistive
technology. Korn proposed standardized application programming interfaces (APIs) so that
whenever new versions of the Windows or Linux
operating systems come out, assistive technology
would continue working. Korn also created incentives for companies to use those APIs.
Curt Kolcun
Peter Korn
James Leto
GTSI
James Leto, chief executive officer at GTSI, gave
the federal information technology market a
good lesson last year in how to turn a business
around.
When GTSI appointed Leto as chief executive
officer in 2006, it was not the best of times for
the venerable reseller. Layoffs had sapped
morale, creditors were losing patience, and the
company faced the prospect of losing its NASDAQ
listing.
By the third quarter of 2007, the company
once again was profitable, based in part on a significant shift in business from product pitches to
professional services. GTSI officials also point to
a happier and more stable workforce.
The company’s recovery “was very difficult, if
not impossible to do,” said Olga Grkavac, executive vice president at the Information Technology
Association of America. “It will be a business
case study, for sure.”
Kimberly Lane
James Leto
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FCW 42-56
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Nancy Leveson
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Nancy Leveson, professor of aeronautics and astronautics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, has used her research and training to help
NASA and the Defense Department learn new ways
to mitigate design flaws when building and deploying systems that put property or lives at risk.
Leveson developed a hazard-analysis technique that helps engineers sort through numerous potential risks that include software, hardware, human operators, and organization or
cultural factors.
“She’s probably the foremost researcher into
systems-safety techniques for systems that contain software, which is about everything we build
today,” said Grady Lee, president of Safeware Engineering. The company uses safety analysis applications derived from Leveson’s research.
Peter Levine
Senate Armed Services Committee
Peter Levine, general counsel for the Senate Armed
Services Committee, was the architect of procurement reforms in the fiscal 2009 Defense Authorization bill, which the president signed into law.
“He is one of the most knowledgeable staff
members on procurement issues,” said Olga
Grkavac, executive vice president of the Information Technology Association of America. Lawmakers and staff in the House and Senate defer to
his expertise when dealing with acquisition-related proposals.
Levine has a profound effect on contractors
and government every year, and last year, he was
responsible for most of the far-reaching provisions that Congress enacted.
Care (MC4) organization at Fort Detrick, Md., led
an all-out effort to ensure that military units in
Iraq and elsewhere in Southwest Asia had the
latest technology for managing medical care.
Loving completed the mission of equipping
key medical treatment facilities in Southwest
Asia with MC4 systems, including the Air Force
Theater Hospital in Balad, Iraq. Loving outfitted
that hospital with 200 laptop PCs, handheld devices, servers and printers. He also spent time
showing many physicians and commanders how
to take full advantage of MC4 technology.
“Ryan is an outstanding leader,” said Army
Lt. Col. Edward Clayson, MC4 commander. “He led
the charge with his project management skills
and great attitude.”
tary of Defense for business transformation, has
been a quiet but effective champion of the use
of the process improvement method Lean Six
Sigma.
McGrath accelerated the use of Lean Six
Sigma across the Defense Department and is
now spearheading its use in overhauling the
government’s clearance/background investigation process.
“She’s adept at navigating large organizations, but she’s able to turn them with very subtle techniques,” said David Wennergren, DOD’s
deputy chief information officer. “She does it
without being a dominant personality and without antagonizing people, and they find themselves happy to agree with her.”
Diann McCoy
David Medeck
Internal Revenue Service
Diann McCoy, a component acquisition executive
at the Defense Information Systems Agency, had
to roll up her sleeves and get to work last year.
She oversaw and managed the agency’s
$3 billion information technology acquisition
program to support the Defense Department’s
network-centric vision. And she set up the organizational structure and procedures for overseeing more than 256 major IT programs.
McCoy provided essential leadership for two
mission-critical programs: a net-enabled command-and-control system that supports all services and agencies and a net-centric enterprise
services program that will serve as a foundation
for other business and support systems.
“Ms. McCoy’s strong leadership and her ability
to team and partner allowed us to move our large
acquisitions programs faster,” said Air Force Lt.
Gen. Charles Croom.
David Medeck, business modernization executive
for the Internal Revenue Service’s Wage and Investment Business Division, renewed confidence
that the agency could reverse setbacks that have
plagued its modernization efforts.
In 2007, Medeck oversaw the delivery of critical releases of a new taxpayer database, the Customer Account Data Engine. CADE will replace an
antiquated Master File system developed in the
Kennedy administration.
CADE suffered major setbacks in the past because of a lack of qualified business leadership
for information technology initiatives, said
Richard Spires, IRS deputy commissioner for operations support.
“Dave’s outstanding leadership and personal
commitment as the business executive in charge
of the CADE and [Account Management Services]
projects was essential to their successful deployment in 2007,” Spires said. “Dave has served as
the ideal business partner with the IT organization to help ensure the success of IRS’ large-scale
IT initiatives.”
Ryan Loving
Nancy Leveson
42
General Dynamics Information Technology
Elizabeth McGrath
Ryan Loving, operations manager of the Army’s
Medical Communications for Combat Casualty
Office of the Secretary of Defense
Peter Levine
MARCH 24, 2008
Elizabeth McGrath, principal deputy undersecre-
Ryan Loving
Diann McCoy
Elizabeth McGrath
David Medeck
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Darlene Meskell
Steven Monteith
Donna Morea
U.S. Postal Service
CGI
Darlene Meskell, the General Services Administration’s director of Intergovernmental Solutions,
has a knack for keeping chief information officers
on task and working together.
Since becoming director in January 2007,
Meskell has focused on creating new ways for
CIOs across federal, state and local government
to collaborate. She also has an international flair.
As managing director of the 5-Nations CIO Council, Meskell started a quarterly forum where CIOs
from five prominent English-speaking nations can
share ideas and find the best approaches to solving common problems.
Ken Cochrane, CIO of the Government of
Canada, said Meskell is interested in the council
and its members. “She has great knowledge and a
great personality, and these are the common
threads that make our 5-Nations CIO Council
work year after year,” Cochrane said.
Steven Monteith, executive director of human
capital enterprise at the U.S. Postal Service,
clearly is not afraid to tackle big projects. In
overseeing the upgrade of USPS’ human resources
system, he managed what is believed to be one
of the largest implementations of SAP software in
government.
The project required migrating more than
750,000 employees to the electronic systems in
less than a year. In the process, Monteith had to
overcome skepticism about the viability of the
project and resistance from various business organizations within USPS.
“He integrated the disparate business functions
into a cohesive unit that we could then apply
technology to,” said George Wright, vice president
of information technology operations at USPS.
Donna Morea, president of U.S. and India at CGI,
could easily have been recognized for the work
she’s done in her day job — helping agencies modernize their financial management systems.
But it’s Morea’s efforts outside the job that
distinguish her among members of the government information technology community, said
Olga Grkavac, executive vice president at the Information Technology Association of America.
Among other activities, Morea, chairwomanelect of the Northern Virginia Technology Council, recently wrapped up duties as chairwoman of
the 2007 Kidney Ball, a National Kidney Foundation benefit that raised a record $1.3 million.
She also serves on the board of directors for
Crossway Community, an organization that delivers educational and supportive services to lowincome, at-risk families.
“Senior executives like this — their jobs are
unbelievably stressful, so whenever they take the
time to get involved in other activities, it means
a lot,” Grkavac said.
Doug Montgomery
Daniel Mintz
Daniel Mintz, the Transportation Department’s
chief information officer, championed the governmentwide eRulemaking Initiative — and
persuaded senior DOT managers to get
onboard.
Mintz overcome resistance to the initiative
by involving business managers in the decisionmaking process and transition, said Thomas Barrett, DOT’s deputy secretary. “My experience is
that when key stakeholders are treated with respect and kept informed, they are much more
likely to support the resulting decisions,” Barrett
said.
In October, DOT began transitioning its
workload to the Federal Docket Management
System. Until then, the department’s agencies
maintained their own Web-based dockets for
rulemaking.
Darlene Meskell
44
Daniel Mintz
MARCH 24, 2008
Doug Montgomery, manager of the Internetworking Technologies Group at the National Institute
of Standards and Technology, helped write the
standard for the next-generation Internet protocol — IPv6.
The transition to IPv6 is a global project
that requires organizations to change their
network architecture and information technology hardware. When the federal government
sought to become an early adopter, Montgomery became its point man.
“He helped provide the structure necessary to
move the IPv6 initiative forward, making him an
invaluable asset to the larger global effort,” said
Carol Bales, senior policy analyst at the Office of
Management and Budget.
As a member of the CIO Council’s IPv6 Working Group, Montgomery also used his leadership
skills to convey the value of IPv6 to government,
industry and higher education.
Steven Monteith
Doug Montgomery
Kenneth Mortensen
Justice Department
Kenneth Mortensen, acting chief privacy and
civil liberties officer at the Justice Department,
provides governmentwide leadership on some of
today’s most sensitive issues.
He joined Justice in June 2007, having previously been deputy chief privacy officer at the
Homeland Security Department. Mortensen is cochairman of the CIO Council’s privacy committee.
“Ken is a very thoughtful voice in the government privacy community,” said Ari Schwartz, vice
president at the Center for Democracy and Technology. “He showed his ability to understand
complex and emerging privacy issues at DHS and
has taken that to a new level since” being at
Justice.
Donna Morea
Kenneth Mortensen
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John Moses
Steven Newburg-Rinn
Diane O’Connor
SRA International
Army Department
John Moses, eRulemaking program manager, led a
governmentwide initiative to bring the public
into the rulemaking process.
Moses was instrumental in developing the
backbone of Regulations.gov, the Federal Docket Management System. Last year, he revamped
the Web site’s interface and added expanded
search and usability features.
He also supervised the addition of 10 new
agencies to the site, which now handles 90 percent of federal rulemaking.
“Under John’s leadership, the federal government’s eRulemaking program experienced
enormous growth,” said Molly O’Neill, EPA’s
assistant administrator for the Office of Environmental Information and chief information
officer.
Steven Newburg-Rinn, director of information assurance strategic initiatives at SRA International,
was instrumental in creating a security management tool that eliminates hours of manual checks
and gives agencies a view of their information
security status.
The Automated Security Self-Evaluation and
Remediation Tracking tool became the basis of
the Office of Management and Budget’s Information Systems Security Line of Business, an initiative that helps agencies comply with the Federal
Information Security Management Act.
“As SRA’s director of information assurance
strategic initiatives, Steven has been a leader in
the field and a valuable resource to the association, our members and federal agencies on a wide
range of government policies and company compliance obligations,” said Alan Chvotkin, executive vice president and counsel at the Professional Services Council.
Diane O’Connor, deputy project manager of the
Logistics Modernization Program, impressed some
people in high places in 2007.
She played a major role in getting the program back on track, fixing problems identified by
the Government Accountability Office and bringing it into compliance with the Federal Financial
Management Improvement Act.
The secrets to O’Connor’s success are collegiality and communications, her colleagues say.
Her communications skills were so highly regarded that she was brought in to brief Defense Department Deputy Secretary Gordon England on
the program’s progress.
“Diane O’Connor’s contributions in turning
around the transformational Logistics Modernization Program have been truly exceptional,” said
Gary Winkler, program executive officer for enterprise information systems.
Thomas Neff
Army Department
Thomas Neff, deputy product manager for Joint
Automatic Identification Technology, provided
critical supply-support for ground commanders.
Working with a wide array of partners, he established a network of 3,300 radio frequency identification sites so that military commanders could
track materiel shipments.
“All of this took quite a bit of coordination
across the joint community,” said Lt. Col. Patrick
Burden, the JAIT program manager. “The program
office was engaged in this effort with the U.S.
Transportation Command, the [Office of the Secretary of Defense] and every military service,
right down to combatant commanders on the
ground.”
Neff oversees contracts worth $662 million,
installations in 39 countries, and the integration of data and processes for 24 systems and
applications.
John Moses
46
Thomas Neff
MARCH 24, 2008
Thomas O’Reilly
Arthur O’Connor
Justice Department
Thomas O’Reilly, senior policy adviser at the Justice Department’s Bureau of Justice Assistance,
played a central role in developing a national
system for reporting suspicious activity and disseminating information to local, state and federal law enforcement agencies.
A key component of the system is a network
of fusion centers that serve as hubs for sharing
data. O’Reilly persuaded officials at various levels
of government to accept functional and training
standards for the centers.
“His strength is his collaborative leadership
style,” said Domingo Herraiz, director of the Bureau of Justice Assistance. “He listens very well
and doesn’t waste a lot of words. He doesn’t try
to overwhelm or impress. He’s a real teamworkoriented person.”
Arthur O’Connor, the Federal Highway Administration’s senior transportation management engineer in New York City, proved adept at overcoming the political and technical challenges that
stood in the way of developing real-time incident
management capabilities.
The Joint Transportation Management Center’s
central video system now provides those collaboration and management capabilities for the New
York metropolitan area.
O’Connor “was successful at knocking down
the political as well as the technical challenges
and using the regional architecture and standards
as the baseline for collaboration and cooperation,” said James Chong, chief technology officer
at VidSys, which provides support for the center.
Steven Newburg-Rinn
Arthur O’Connor
Diane O’Connor
Thomas O’Reilly
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Bajinder Paul
While deputy chief information officer at the Housing and Urban Development Department, Bajinder
Paul created a Web portal to provide nationwide
access from one location to all types of housing
disaster assistance.
Paul also provided leadership for the National
Housing Locator initiative, a major component of
the federal government’s housing disaster response efforts. With each of those projects, Paul
met 100 percent of the cost and schedule milestones, said Lisa Schlosser, HUD’s CIO and Paul’s
former supervisor.
“Bajinder is an extraordinary and inspired
leader,” Schlosser said. “He takes the time to truly understand the needs of the business customers and always meets the mission requirements.” Paul is now CIO at the Office of the
Comptroller of the Currency.
George Pedersen
ManTech
Colleagues describe George Pedersen, chairman
and chief executive officer of ManTech International, as an adroit manager who is deeply engaged in running the company. His dedication to
ManTech and its success is unquestioned.
In 2003, the company acquired MSM Security
Services with the idea of bringing ManTech’s
technology expertise to the labor-intensive
world of security clearance investigations. MSM
struggled, even becoming a drag on ManTech’s
overall performance and a source of worry for its
shareholders.
Unable to come to terms with any other
buyers, Pedersen formed an independent company and acquired MSM for $3 million in early
2007 rather than see it continue to be a drag
on ManTech.
Meanwhile, his leadership has kept ManTech
at the top among the pure-play information tech-
Bajinder Paul
48
George Pedersen
MARCH 24, 2008
David Powner
nology providers in the government information
technology market.
Treasury Department
Government Accountability Office
William Pelgrin
New York state
William Pelgrin serves as director of New York
state’s Office of Cyber Security and Critical Infrastructure Coordination, but his influence is felt
nationally.
Pelgrin championed and is now chairman of
the Multi-State Information Sharing and Analysis Center, which gathers information on cybersecurity threats and promotes communications
among government agencies. The group has
participants from 50 states and the District of
Columbia.
Theresa Pardo, deputy director at the Center
for Technology in Government, said Pelgrin has
demonstrated a talent for creating trust among
people and organizations. “He creates an environment...that gets people questioning their
first reaction, which is not to share,” Pardo
said.
Kathy Perras
Dynamics Research Corp.
Kathy Perras, vice president of Dynamics Research Corp. and general manager of state and
local programs, has helped implement a gargantuan information technology project in Ohio to
protect the safety and well-being of foster-care
children. Perras leads a team that has nearly
completed implementing the first Web-based
statewide automated child information system
successfully developed in nearly a decade.
Perras has a passion for the health and human services IT marketplace, said Robert Stauffer, director of human services at Deloitte Consulting. State human services departments
generally resist IT project implementation, Stauffer noted, but Perras succeeded where the stakes
were highest — children’s lives.
William Pelgrin
Kathy Perras
David Powner, director of information technology
management issues at the Government Accountability Office, views GAO as a partner, not an adversary, in helping agencies use federal IT funding effectively.
Powner “has assisted agencies in keeping
their focus on results and achieving the intended
program outcomes,” said Karen Evans, administrator for e-government and IT at the Office of
Management and Budget.
“I work with David on several of the GAO
high-risk areas, including cybersecurity, and
[have] found David to be fair in his assessments
and willing to work with us in the executive
branch to achieve better results for the American
citizens,” Evans said.
Charles Prow
IBM
Charles Prow’s focus on outcomes helped drive an
effective team culture. As general manager of
IBM’s portfolio of business services for the Defense
Department, Prow leads an industry team that
supports DOD’s business transformation efforts.
Prow is responsible for more than 50 programs that combine research, software, hardware
and business consulting services. In 2007, Prow’s
team supported GoArmy Ed, a global online training program; AFSO21, which implements Lean Six
Sigma principles in the Air Force; the Navy’s enterprise resource planning program; and the Defense Information Systems Agency’s Net-Centric
Enterprise Services initiative.
“With experience on a multitude of consulting engagements in the public and private sectors, [Prow] is able to provide overall management to dozens of complex engagements
positively impacting DOD,” said Morgan Kinghorn, chief operating officer of the global public
sector at Grant Thornton.
David Powner
Charles Prow
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FCW 42-56
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Unisys
Venkatapathi Puvvada was just the person the
Industry Advisory Council needed last year. The
council required someone who recognized IAC’s
role in facilitating industry/government communications and who knew how to translate that
into solid programs. As chairman, Puvvada did
just that.
Puvvada worked with ACT leaders to ensure
their participation in IAC programs and oversaw
the expansion of IAC membership to record levels. As a volunteer, Puvvada demonstrated a
strong commitment to IAC, said Kenneth Allen,
executive director and chief operating officer at
ACT/IAC.
“He has invested as much time as any board
chair I’ve ever seen,” Allen said, noting that
Puvvada also has a day job as chief technology
officer at Unisys Public Sector.
“He understands the value of a true partnership
that allows the government to identify its strategic priorities that IAC uses for its programs,” said
Martha Dorris, president of the American Council
for Technology, of which IAC is part. Dorris is
deputy associate administrator of the General
Services Administration’s Office of Citizen Services and Communications.
Stephen Quinn
Stephen Quinn’s work in 2007 could make government desktop PCs safer.
Quinn, a senior computer scientist and manager of the security content program at the National Institute of Standards and Technology, was
instrumental in implementing the Office of Management and Budget’s mandatory secure desktop
configuration initiative, known as the Federal
Desktop Core Configuration (FDCC).
Quinn quickly assumed leadership of the project. He persuaded government and industry to
50
MARCH 24, 2008
Stephen Quinn
adopt Security Content Automation Protocol
standards, laying the groundwork for testing
FDCC at several information technology and software development companies. Quinn accomplished this by the OMB-mandated February
deadline.
“Mr. Quinn significantly increased the repeatability and reduced the effort of assessing
and monitoring FDCC settings, saving the federal
government a significant expense,” said Timothy
Grance, manager of the Systems and Network
Security Group at NIST.
Christian Rasmussen
National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency
Christian Rasmussen, knowledge management
officer for the National Geospatial-Intelligence
Agency, sees the value of Web 2.0 initiatives to
the intelligence community and the government
at large. He wants others to see that value,
too.
In the intelligence world, Rasmussen has championed the use of Intellipedia, a wiki for sharing
information on topics related to national security. Rasmussen also routinely talks to packed audiences inside and outside government about the
broader benefits of Web 2.0.
“There are a lot of people involved in making
this whole thing successful, but Chris brings to
the table such passion to make it work and helping people understand why these tools are important,” said Frank DiGiammarino, vice president of
strategic initiatives at the National Academy for
Public Administration. “He brings leadership,
passion and commitment to doing something
new and innovative that is changing the way the
government works.”
Rebecca Richards
Rebecca Richards, director of privacy compliance
at the Homeland Security Department, led DHS’
Christian Rasmussen
challenging effort to meet the privacy requirements of the E-Government and Privacy acts.
Colleagues praise Richards for improving the
department’s track record in filing Privacy Impact
Assessment notices for new and existing systems.
Her job is particularly complex because of the
large number of older systems from the more than
20 agencies that were consolidated to form DHS
in 2003.
“I think privacy impact assessments have
been the single most important tool for the DHS
privacy office, and Becky Richards has been a
real leader in having effective privacy impact assessments,” said Peter Swire, who worked in the
Clinton administration as chief counselor for privacy at the Office of Management and Budget
from 1999 to 2001 and is now a senior fellow at
the Center for American Progress.
Col. Eric Rolaf
Marine Corps
As commanding officer of the Marine Corps’ Network Operations and Security Center, Col. Eric Rolaf led a lean, mean team that improved the battle-readiness of Marine communications.
Rolaf’s team streamlined and tightened security of network operations and improved interoperability between the Marines and the other military services. He also oversaw key projects, such
as the Marine Corps’ transition to the Navy Marine Corps Intranet.
His work “sets the model for what the Navy is
and what it should be,” said Robert Carey, the
Navy’s chief information officer. Rolaf has saved
others large investments of money and time,
Carey said. “He successfully delivered models that
others can replicate, and the Navy has already
decided to adopt many of them.”
Rolaf acts as a crucial link between the Marine Corps and top leadership in the Strategic
Command, Carey said. “His technical acumen in
this space is second to none.”
Rebecca Richards
Col. Eric Rolaf
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FCW 42-56
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Ronald Rosenthal
Shyam Salona
Navy Department
REI Systems
As program manager for the Navy Enterprise Resource Planning Program (ERP), Ronald Rosenthal
had the odds against him.
The ERP program is one of the largest government technology initiatives since the implementation of the Navy Marine Corps
Intranet.
Given the amount of scrutiny the ERP program attracted from Congress, it might have been
difficult for lesser program managers to make
progress, said Robert Carey, the Navy’s chief information officer.
“Leading such a massive change management effort doesn’t win you many friends, but
[Rosenthal] successfully restructured the program, aligned all of the data and, at the same
time, managed to defuse the naysayers,” Carey
said.
In doing so, Rosenthal delivered on the
promise of ERP as the information backbone for
the Navy and Marine Corps.
Shyam Salona, executive vice president and chief
technology officer of REI Systems, has provided
critical support in launching USAspending.gov, a
public database about federal spending.
Because of various procurement and technical challenges, Salona’s Web design and development firm faced aggressive deadlines for loading, validating and testing the site’s data and
functionality. Working around the clock, REI
completed its work ahead of the project’s Jan. 1,
2008, deadline.
“They overcame the challenges in part because they acknowledged that there are 24 hours
in every day,” said Tim Young, the Office of Management and Budget’s deputy administrator for
e-government and information technology.
Debra Ruh
TecAccess
Debra Ruh, founder and president of TecAccess,
made her mark by providing information technology training and job placement for disabled veterans, including opportunities to work from their
homes or hospital beds.
With a telecommuting business model and
the use of assistive technology, Ruh frequently
hires disabled veterans for jobs that help federal
employees with disabilities. Her advocacy has
raised awareness of Section 508 accessibility requirements among federal agency leaders.
Ruh deserves recognition for “expanding opportunities to include people with disabilities in
the workforce and serve an expanding customer
base,” said Katherine McCary, a vice president at
SunTust Bank.
Ronald Rosenthal
52
Debra Ruh
MARCH 24, 2008
branch in the Budget Review Division at the Office of Management and Budget, devised a new
way to help OMB address an old question: Is
there a more efficient way to formulate the federal budget?
Schoenbach was a leader in creating the MAX
Federal Community, a secure wiki that budget officials use to collaborate and share information.
What began as a tool for the Budget Formulation
and Execution Line of Business has grown to include other executive issues, such as financial
management.
The MAX Federal Community will lead to new
ways to solve existing problems, said Tim Young,
OMB’s deputy administrator for e-government and
information technology. “Andy is having a positive impact not only on the IT community but
also on all communities of interest across the
federal government,” Young said.
Eric Schmidt
Google
Eric Schmidt, chairman of the board and chief executive officer at Google, helped inspire a new
way of thinking about software acquisition at the
Defense Department.
In 2007, Schmidt kept the company on the
cutting edge of software as a service, made Web
searches easier and kept open lines of communication with government officials, some of whom
credit Google with helping change the way they
manage software acquisition.
Schmidt has had a major influence on the
federal information technology community. He
sits down to discuss issues with IT officials. He
responds to their e-mail messages. “It’s his personal commitment” that is appreciated, said
David Wennergren, deputy chief information officer at the Defense Department.
U.S. Transportation Command
Andy Schoenbach
Andy Schoenbach, chief of the budget systems
Shyam Salona
Eric Schmidt
Gen. Norton Schwartz, commander of the U.S.
Transportation Command, has been a well-spoken
advocate for many of the Defense Department’s
transformation efforts.
With a portfolio that includes radio frequency identification and Automated Identification
Technology supply chain projects, Schwartz is responsible for coordinating many information
technology systems that feed data into those
projects.
“He’s been a hands-on leader and has been
visible and vocal everywhere about the need for
this,” said David Wennergren, DOD’s deputy
chief information officer. “It’s very easy for a
leader to rely on IT professionals to do this for
them, but he’s been the one out front advocating for this.”
That visibility is a major reason why business
management modernization has gained such momentum at DOD, Wennergren said.
Andy Schoenbach
© 2008 Terremark Worldwide, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
FCW 42-56
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Page 54
Adam Sedgewick
Senate Homeland Security and Governmental
Affairs Committee
Adam Sedgewick, a staffer for the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, helped put e-government back on the committee’s legislative agenda.
He pushed for reauthorization of the E-Government Act of 2002 and orchestrated a hearing to
examine the government’s progress in realizing the
vision spelled out in that landmark legislation.
Ari Schwartz, vice president of the Center for
Democracy and Technology, said Sedgewick has
demonstrated leadership on that and other highprofile issues.
Sedgewick “looks at issues based on their
substantive merit and is willing to work with
anyone in industry, advocacy and government
who can provide facts and answers to the important questions on issues of importance to the future of citizen engagement with government,”
Schwartz said.
Robert Shea
Peter Tseronis
“He relentlessly focused everyone on the desired outcome” and engaged all the participants
in creative problem-solving, Johnson added.
Education Department
John Swart
Army Department
John Swart, product director for the Army’s Technology Applications Office, understands how important his customers are. In 2007, he created a
contracting portal for the Joint Special Operations Command.
The Web application allows special operations
components to track their projects’ progress, including contracting status and funding.
Swart “has been consistently recognized for developing and delivering enabling technologies to
our special forces on the front lines of the global
war on terrorism,” said Gary Winkler, program executive officer for enterprise information systems.
Swart was deputy director of the technology
office, and his “incredible work ethic and exceptional performance” made him the logical choice
to replace its director when the director retired
recently, Winkler said.
Robert Shea, the Office of Management and Budget’s associate director of administration and
government performance, gave new meaning to
performance under pressure in 2007.
Shea oversaw the development of USAspending.gov, a public database of federal contracts,
grants and loans. Working under scrutiny from
congressional and watchdog organizations, Shea
created the database on a tight schedule.
“He worked with Congress to define the goals
and desired levels of functionality for the site,”
said Clay Johnson, OMB’s deputy director for
management. Shea also worked with the procurement and information technology communities to
create the database more quickly “and for millions of dollars less than most experts thought
possible,” Johnson said.
Adam Sedgewick
54
Robert Shea
MARCH 24, 2008
Don Tapscott
New Paradigm
Don Tapscott, chief executive officer at New Paradigm and co-author of “Wikinomics: How Mass
Collaboration Changes Everything,” has inspired
leaders at the Office of Management and Budget
and CIO Council to bring Web-based collaboration
technologies into the federal government.
Tapscott’s New Paradigm think tank is leading
Government 2.0, an extensive international, multidisciplinary investigation of how mass collaboration technologies can transform government and
democracy. OMB is participating in the project.
“Don is an inspiring and visionary force in
the whole Gov. 2.0 movement,”said Bruce McConnell, president of Government Futures, a Web
2.0 consulting company.
John Swart
Don Tapscott
Peter Tseronis, director of network services at the
Education Department, is known in the agency
for innovation and cost savings. But it’s his governmentwide work on the transition to the nextgeneration IP that inspired many of his peers.
Tseronis has become the face of IPv6 transition
in government during this past year by dint of volunteer leadership as a facilitator and coordinator.
Tseronis became chairman of the CIO Council’s IPv6 Working Group in 2007 “because he
wanted to help other agencies and leverage his
experience,” said Tim Young, deputy administrator for e-government and information technology
at the Office of Management and Budget.
“Pete is not someone who views IPv6 transition as a compliance exercise,” Young said. “He’s
using it as an opportunity to transform the way
federal agencies conduct business.”
Zachary Tumin
Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government
As executive director of the Leadership for a Networked World Program at Harvard University’s
Kennedy School of Government, Zachary Tumin
has developed a talent for transcending organizational differences.
Tumin’s work in 2007 focused on the crossboundary challenges confronting government
leaders. One example: a case study of the Maritime Domain Awareness initiative that involves
the Navy, Coast Guard, Transportation Department
and intelligence community.
David Wennergren, the Defense Department’s
deputy chief information officer, said Tumin was
able to extract best practices from the maritime
effort and create a case study with wide applicability. “He is able to work across all these cultural issues and organizational imperatives...glean
the knowledge that matters and translate it in a
way that others can benefit from it.”
Peter Tseronis
Zachary Tumin
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FCW 42-56
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Teresa White
Teresa White, chief of the Defense Information
Systems Agency’s Cross Domain Solutions program, created a much-needed solution for exchanging data between networks with different
security requirements. Better yet, she came up
with a way to implement that solution in less
than half the time anticipated.
The goal was to enable Defense Department
users to share data even if one system resides
on the Secret Internet Protocol Router Network
and another on the Unclassified but Sensitive
Internet Protocol Router Network. Historically,
the systems used to enable such exchanges
were disjointed, uncoordinated, ineffective and
inefficient.
In establishing the first Cross Domain Enterprise Service at a DISA computing services center
in Montgomery, Ala., White demonstrated that a
cost-effective and streamlined process could cut
implementation time from 228 days to fewer
than 90 days.
“Teresa made the process adaptable and
flexible,” said Fred Kopf, chief at DISA’s Computer Network Defense Division, “as well as
shortening it.”
Steven Willett
Defense Intelligence Agency
Steven Willett, a Defense Intelligence Agency
technical project manager, received an assignment that he thought at first would be easy: automating a manual intelligence briefing.
But after doing some research, Willett concluded that it was more complicated than he had
originally thought. His answer to the challenge
was to create a briefing application and dashboard using Web 2.0 collaboration tools and service-oriented architecture to combine information
from various sources.
“The application enables DIA seniors to
Teresa White
56
MARCH 24, 2008
Steven Willett
track resources around the world in real time,”
said Mike Bearden, DIA’s chief of special services. “Otherwise, this data would have to be
manually collected, prepared and presented at a
later time.”
“Steve developed a solution that has transitioned into an enterprise-class effort and is
the first service-oriented architecture presentation layer in the Defense Department’s intelligence information systems” inventory, Bearden said.
Jim Williams
Jim Williams has brought customer-minded vision
and business controls to the General Services Administration’s Federal Acquisition Service since
becoming commissioner in mid-2006.
“He’s a very strong advocate within GSA of
bringing the customers’ requirements into GSA
proper, and I think he’s made some difference in
making GSA more responsive to customers,” said
G. Martin Wagner, senior fellow at the IBM Center
for the Business of Government.
Wagner said Williams’ experience elsewhere in
government gives him insight into various agencies’ needs. Before coming to his GSA post,
Williams worked at the Homeland Security Department and Internal Revenue Service.
One of Williams’ interests as an organizational leader is business process improvement,
Wagner said. Williams is focused on Lean Six
Sigma, a process improvement methodology
that agencies can use to streamline business
operations.
Karen Wilson
Boeing
Holding a coalition of fiercely competitive businesses together for more than two years to fight
Congress is no easy task. But Karen Wilson, director of acquisition policy and industrial affairs at
Jim Williams
Boeing, managed that and more.
As industry chairwoman of the Specialty Metals Acquisition Reform Team (SMART Coalition),
she helped defeat a potentially crippling protectionist legislative measure in 2007.
Wilson helped Congress craft an exemption
for commercial products from a law that ordinarily requires specialty metals used in goods sold to
the Defense Department to be of U.S. origin or
from a list of qualifying countries.
“It wasn’t easy because there were efforts to
peel off” some members of the coalition through
measures that might have satisfied some of their
needs but not those of the entire coalition, said
Trey Hodgkins, vice president of federal government programs at the Information Technology
Association of America.
Henry Wychorski
Volpe National Transportation Systems Center
Henry Wychorski, a senior electrical engineer and
project manager at the Transportation Department’s Volpe National Transportation Systems
Center, demonstrated the value of good followthrough during deployment of the Maritime Security and Safety Information System.
First, he oversaw the deployment of the system, which provides an unclassified shared network that 31 countries use to track ship movements. Wychorski used existing technology to
create the system for less than $1 million.
Then Wychorski traveled wherever he was
needed to troubleshoot and support international
partners in their implementation of the system.
Wychorski’s work and leadership created
heightened worldwide maritime domain awareness, said Paul Brubaker, administrator of DOT’s
Research and Innovative Technology Administration. “This innovation has inspired unparalleled
international maritime cooperation and is critical
to efforts to combat terrorism, smuggling and
piracy,” Brubaker said.
Karen Wilson
Henry Wychorski
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FCW 58
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Page 58
2008 2008
Federal 100 Eagle Award
Judges Judges
Robert Burton
Robert Carey
Office of Federal Procurement Policy
Navy Department
Kevin Carroll
Teresa Carlson
Former Army Program Executive Office for
Enterprise Information Systems
Microsoft
Michael Carlton
David Drabkin
Health and Human Services Department
Frank DiGiammarino
Olga Grkavac
Information Technology
Association of America
National Academy of Public Administration
Karen Evans
Molly O’Neill
Jim Flyzik
The Flyzik Group
Alan Paller
SANS Institute
Mark Forman
KPMG
Patrick Schambach
Bruce McConnell
McConnell International
G. Martin Wagner
IBM Center for the Business
of Government
David Wennergren
Defense Department
Tim Young
Edward Meagher
Interior Department
Deirdre Murray
Sprint Nextel
Unisys and the Industry Advisory Council
Robert Suda
Transportation Department’s Volpe Center
Jim Williams
58
MARCH 24, 2008
© 2008 Lockheed Martin Corporation
BET WEEN PUBLIC SERVICES PROMISED AND PUBLIC SERVICES DELIV ERED,
THERE IS ONE IMPORTANT WORD : HOW.
AND IT IS THE HOW THAT MAK ES ALL THE DIFFERENCE.
lockheedmartin.com/how
FCW 60
3/20/08
3:44 PM
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Editorial
R I S I N G
S TA R
AWA R D S
Seeking the bright lights
J O H N K LO S S N E R
60
MARCH 24, 2008
his issue of Federal Computer Week honors
the 2008 Federal 100 award winners — 100
people who have defined our community
in the past year. At the same time, we are announcing a call for nominations for the 2008 Rising Star
awards, which recognize the incredible work done
by younger people in government and industry
helping agencies carry out their missions — the Fed-
T
rewards of a career in public service. Too often, government employees are the butt of jokes during political campaigns, an attitude captured perfectly by
the horrible but common punch line, “Good enough
for government work.” The Rising Star awards show
young feds — and people everywhere — the amazing work that is good enough for the government.
The Rising Star program is modeled on FCW’s
eral 100 award winners of the future, perhaps.
This program started three years ago when a group
of young people — the Young AFCEANs of AFCEA
International’s Bethesda, Md., chapter — came to us
saying there was a need for this kind of recognition.
We immediately agreed. And in the first two years of
the awards program, we have been able to recognize
77 remarkable people doing remarkable work.
Beyond simply honoring individual accomplishments, the goal of the Rising Star awards program is
to offer young people some insight into the value and
Federal 100 awards. Much like the Fed 100, the criteria for the Rising Stars are simple. Nominees must be
people in the government information technology
community who have made a difference in the past
12 months — give or take. We have not put age requirements on the program precisely because we understand and appreciate that the terms “young” and
“rising” are defined not by a specific number but
rather by an attitude. However, in general, the Fed
100 awards are for those who have risen, while Rising
Star awards are for those who are rising — and who
typically do not receive recognition elsewhere.
This year, we are expanding the program to two
other 1105 Government Information Group publications: Government Computer News and Washington Technology. We refer to this as 360-degree coverage because each publication will highlight the
Rising Stars in its coverage area: FCW for
policy/management; GCN for technology; and
Washington Technology for industry.
If you have a question about someone’s eligibility,
go ahead and nominate him or her. Use the nomination form to make the case for why the nominee deserves recognition.
Let the nominations begin. The deadline is Friday, May 2. You can find the form online at
www.fcw.com/risingstar.
— Christopher J. Dorobek,
[email protected]
www.att.com/gov/transform
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©2007-2008 AT&T Intellectual Property. All rights reserved. AT&T and the AT&T logo are trademarks of AT&T Intellectual Property.
FCW 62
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Comment
P R O C U R E M E N T
Can we talk?
A system being deployed in the United Kingdom
offers a glimpse of how a partnership can work
BY STEVE KELMAN
he theme of the first government/industry Executive
Leadership Conference I attended while in government
— in 1993 — was, “Can We Talk?” Those words represented a plaintive appeal for escape from the dysfunctional procurement environment of the 1980s. That was when the idea of
vendors and government customers cooperating to achieve better
T
results for the government was shunned in
The answer to this question turned out
favor of relationships that were arms-length
to be multifaceted, but let me illustrate with
— if not adversarial — out of fear that partone example. The underlying contract for
nership was a recipe for the exploitation of
this system divided the work into a numgovernment by rapacious contractors.
ber of tasks, each with requirements and
I recently spent a week in the United
priced on an incentive fee basis. The minKingdom working on a case we will be
istry specified the target price, and the
using in the classroom at
contractor was rewarded for
Harvard, a new tri-service
underruns from the target
human resources system that
and penalized for overruns.
has been introduced in
However, as so often hapRead Kelman’s blog, “The
Britain’s military. The system
pens, problems arose that
Lectern,” at
www.fcw.com/blogs.
has succeeded in replacing
affected the contractor’s abilolder service systems, is based
ity to meet the requirements
on commercial software, was delivered on
at the target price. When this occurs, the
time and on budget, and is saving taxpaygovernment and contractor often spend
ers considerable sums.
time arguing about who caused the probOne of its interesting features is the partlems. If they are determined to be the govnering relationship built up over a number
ernment’s fault, the contractor gets released
of years and at various levels between the
from the original target price, and if they
Ministry of Defence and the vendor, EDS.
are the contractor’s fault, the target price
One aspect of the case I explored in my instands and the contractor must absorb
terviews was how this kind of relationship
losses.
contributed to the project’s success.
What happened in this project? Accord-
Download
62
MARCH 24, 2008
ing to both sides, contractor and customer
agreed that the most important thing was
to keep the project’s schedule — and maintain its momentum — particularly because
skeptics who didn’t like the idea of a triservice system were hoping to see the project stall on its way to an early death.
Rather than argue about fault, the contractor agreed to continue working with no
assurance about what payment, if any, would
be made for the extra work. After the project was completed, customer and contractor sat down to go over all these incidents
and try, in as impartial a fashion as possible,
to make fair judgments about where the fault
for problems lay and how much the contractor would receive for the extra work. The
compensation seldom covered the contractor’s costs fully.
I find this a fascinating example. Now we
are again in an era when organizations such
as the Project on Government Oversight
believe that partnership is theft.
We need a dialogue including government, industry and other voices. I will try to
initiate such a discussion in my blog. Check
out www.fcw.com/blogs/thelectern. ■
Kelman ([email protected]) is a
professor of public management at Harvard
University’s Kennedy School of Government
and former administrator at the Office of
Federal Procurement Policy.
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3/18/08
1:24 PM
Page 1
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63
FCW 64
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11:43 AM
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Comment
E - M A I L
The president’s legacy
The White House has repeatedly tolerated
inadequate systems for keeping e-mail records
BY J. TIMOTHY SPREHE
he White House has been taking it on the chin recently
for its lack of an e-mail archiving system — as well it
should. We should be clear that, first of all, e-mail archiving is not e-mail records management. Notwithstanding industry
hype, e-mail archiving is storing messages with metadata. E-mail
T
records management means assigning
messages to a file plan folder and deciding
how long to keep messages and how to
dispose of them. E-mail records management also refers to the storage of those
e-mails.
With few exceptions, federal agencies
do a poor job of retaining and managing
e-mail that contains important evidence of
their business activities and transactions.
However, with the White House, we are
talking about presidential records and the
Presidential Records Act, a much more serious ballgame than your everyday federal
agency.
When the Bush administration
switched to Microsoft Exchange in 2002,
officials found that the Clinton administration’s records management system was
incompatible with Exchange. So they abandoned the system and never put anything
decent in its place.
Instead, the White House used the
journal function in Exchange to gather
e-mails, which a contractor then collect64
MARCH 24, 2008
ed, manually named and stored as Personal
Storage Table files on servers. This is not
e-mail records management; it’s half-baked
and inadequate e-mail archiving.
A new Electronic Communications
Records Management System was ready to
go in August 2006.
However, the White House chief information officer canned ECRMS and started developing still another system. The
CIO decided ECRMS could not properly
distinguish between presidential records
and nonrecord political e-mail.
History the loser
The latest system is unlikely to be completed before January 2009 so e-mail
messages for three-quarters of the Bush
administration will go unmanaged, and
history will be the loser.
We already know that this administration cannot distinguish between presidential records and political nonrecords because of the debacle that resulted from its
use of the Republican National Commit-
tee’s e-mail system. Millions of administration e-mails are missing because of that.
Throughout this circus of blunders, the
National Archives and Records Administration has kept knocking on the White
House door, patiently asking about presidential records and offering assistance.
For the most part, no one answered the
door or the letters or e-mails. When the
White House answered NARA, it was with
smiles, promises and little more.
What is most disconcerting from an
information technology standpoint is the
administration’s bland acceptance year
after year of pitifully inadequate information systems for handling presidential
e-mail records.
Equally disconcerting is the CIO’s
appalling failure to grasp the severity of the
situation and the crucial difference between
archiving and records management.
The situation seems open to only two
interpretations — either systematic, longrunning IT management incompetence or
a calculated effort to blur the historical
record.
No matter your political persuasion,
neither interpretation is flattering to the
president’s legacy. ■
Sprehe ([email protected]) is president
of Sprehe Information Management Associates in Washington.
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FCW 66
3/20/08
3:22 PM
Page 66
Management
26,000 move to RetireEZ
tractors — Hewitt and Associates, Integic OPM’s director. “The system will process
and Accenture — is the first phase of OPM’s their data, employment history, salary hisederal employees who are ready to Retirement Systems Modtory, military service and
retire will no longer wait months ernization project. The
anything that is needed
for their first pension payment or project will initially supfor employees to retire.”
wonder if their personnel file is complete port 26,000 employees.
Calculating retirement
and accurate.
When the implementation
benefits used to be done
Retirees at the Office of Personnel Man- is complete in 2009, it will
manually, often resulting
agement, General Services Administration, serve more than 2.7 milin missing data that caused
National Archives and Records Adminis- lion employees.
delays and other problems.
tration, and Railroad Retirement Board will
“The people in the
“Without all this inLINDA SPRINGER, OFFICE OF
be the first to use OPM’s new retirement group of four agencies
formation, we would
PERSONNEL MANAGEMENT
systems, which are expected to solve many will go to benefit officers
have to give the pension
problems retirees have had, OPM officials and begin the retirement
estimate a haircut so we
said.
process and make elections for retirement wouldn’t overpay,” Springer said. “Then we
RetireEZ, developed by OPM and its con- using this system,” said Linda Springer, would catch up [with the proper payment]
when we got all the data. That is ridiculous
in this day and age. We now can eliminate
From the pages of Federal Employees News Digest
interim payments.”
OPM manages 150,000 file drawers of
GAO: DOD must review
Texas) have asked the Government Accountability Ofemployee records in Boyers, Pa., where pafice for an audit of the intelligence community’s secuits reliance on contractors
per documents are annotated with handThe Defense Department might be overly dependent
rity clearance process to learn whether it can be acwritten notes and often incomplete,
on private contractors to support its war efforts,
celerated. Eshoo, chairwoman of the House
Springer said. Many agencies must clean
according to a new audit report. DOD should examPermanent Select Intelligence Subcommittee on Inteland match employee data before they can
ine whether it needs 196,000 government contracligence Community Management, heard from witnessbegin using the new systems.
tors in overseas combat theaters, officials from the
es March 12 who said the clearance process could be
OPM implemented the first part of the
Government Accountability Office testified March 11
improved.
system on time by offering it to employees
before a House Armed Services subcommittee.
who use GSA’s payroll processing system.
DOD’s obligations on service contracts rose from
VA experiments
The agency plans to add U.S. Postal Service
$85.1 billion in fiscal 1996 to more than $151 billion in
with videoconferencing
employees in the late spring or early sumVeterans in rural Montana who don’t live near a Veterfiscal 2006, a 78 percent increase. DOD has been
mer. OPM will make RetireEZ fully funcans Affairs Department facility have access to a exchallenged to provide effective management and
tional and include the rest of the executive,
perimental videoconferencing link to support VA efoversight of contractor support for deployed
judicial and legislative branches by Februforts to process their benefits. The test program is
forces, GAO said. Also, proof of savings remains
ary 2009, Springer said. The new systems
located in the Valley Veterans Service Center, a volunelusive. According to GAO, “although increased conare working as expected so far, she added.
teer-staffed grassroots organization in Hamilton,
tractor reliance for maintenance and other logistics
The American Federation of GovernMont., that assists vets in the region. Vets can schedactivities was justified by DOD based on the asment Employees hasn’t heard any comule videoconferencing time with VA regional office
sumption that there would be significant cost savplaints, either, said Terry Rosen, an AFGE
staff to discuss their benefits and claims.
ings, it is uncertain to what extent cost savings
labor relations specialist.
Federal Employees News Digest is an 1105 Govhave occurred or will occur.”
Employees using RetireEZ log on usernment Information Group newsletter about federal
ing a personal identification number and
government staffing, benefits and other manageLawmakers seek review of
password to manage their retirement acment and policy issues. For more, go to www.Federclearance procedures
counts. The Thrift Savings Plan will feed
alDaily.com.
Reps. Anna Eshoo (D-Calif.) and Silvestre Reyes (Dinformation directly into RetireEZ,
Springer said. ■
BY JASON MILLER
F
66
MARCH 24, 2008
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FCW 68 69
3/21/08
4:06 PM
Page 68
Procurement
GSA to go ahead with Alliant
Officials must decide specific remedy
after court rules in favor of protesters
B Y M A T T H E W W E I G E LT
he General Services Administration
plans to proceed with Alliant, a 10year, $50 billion information technology contract, despite a judge’s ruling
that upheld protests filed by eight losing
bidders.
“GSA remains committed to moving
forward with Alliant,” an agency spokesman said last week. “Alliant will be a key
tool for agencies to achieve their IT objectives in a streamlined, cost-effective manner for the next decade.”
However, the agency is still considering
T
its options for the contract’s long-term future. An announcement is due “very soon,”
a GSA spokesman said
With two other major governmentwide
IT contracts, Applications’N Support for
Widely-diverse End-user Requirements
(ANSWER) and Millenia, expiring in early 2009, agencies seeking a task order that
extends beyond a year may start looking
for other contract vehicles, said Mary
Whitley, former assistant commissioner
for customer relationship management
and sales at GSA’s former Federal Technology Service.
Whitley said one possibility might be
to extend Millenia and ANSWER to give
agencies additional options if the Alliant
controversy is not resolved quickly.
Federal Claims Court Judge Francis Allegra halted the Alliant contract March 3
by ruling in favor of eight bidding companies that had protested GSA’s awards to
30 companies. The decision was released
publicly March 5.
On March 6, Jim Williams, commissioner of GSA’s Federal Acquisition Service, said GSA had made no decision about
how it would proceed. However, he added,
the most extreme solutions — awarding
spots on the contract to all 62 bidders or
scrapping the program all together — were
not on the table.
“We are absolutely committed to Alliant,” Williams said, adding that he and
other agency officials were “very disap-
DEALING WITH PROTESTS: LESSONS LEARNED FROM ITES-2S
Kevin Carroll, former program executive officer
protestors would speed the process of get-
awardees protest the decision and start the
at the Army’s Enterprise Information Systems
ting the massive contract running before
process again.
Office, went through a round of protest battles
agencies start shopping around for other IT
for spots on the Army’s major information tech-
contracts to use.
nology contract, Information Technology En-
As the Army worked through protests of
ders who didn’t originally protest. Of the 62
abled Services-2S. The battles were similar to
the ITES-2S contract,
bidders, only eight were
the situation facing the General Services Admin-
Army officials added
included in the protest
istration with its protested Alliant contract.
provisions in the new
that went before the
deal, such as not being
claims court. Stanley
tract that the Army expected to be its primary
responsible for pro-
Associates, an original
IT procurement vehicle. After exhausting its
testers’ costs. In
protester, was added
options, the Army decided to allow the five
working out those
to the Alliant contract
losing bidders that successfully protested
deals, the Army met
Dec. 21.
ITES-2S to join the contract.
with the contract’s
As a result, the 24
awardees to make
losing companies that
ITES-2S was a $20 billion, nine-year con-
Carroll, now president of the consulting
sure they weren’t up-
that same approach to resolve the Alliant is-
set by the decision.
risks.
Awarding the contract to Alliant’s eight
MARCH 24, 2008
Kevin Carroll
“We really talked to everybody as we ne-
didn’t take part in the
process may be upset if
GSA adds the protesters to the contract, Car-
gotiated,” Carroll said. The Army wanted to
roll said. “If I was in GSA’s shoes, I’d have to
avoid being thrown into a loop by having
do all or none.”
ZAID HAMID
firm Kevin Carroll Group, said GSA could try
sues even though the approach comes with
68
However, Carroll pointed out the risks.
GSA could face more protests from losing bid-
FCW 68 69
3/20/08
6:15 PM
Page 69
pointed” in the court ruling. GSA officials performance in contracting. The agency
believed they had done a good job of ana- used a survey to gather that information,
lyzing the bids and selecting awardees, he but it relied on questions that were too gensaid.
eral, the judge wrote. In particular, GSA reThe bid protesters and Allegra dis- lied on performance information from Caagreed, saying that GSA didn’t pick the lyptus, a polling firm whose employees
winners fairly. The court sustained weren’t given enough guidance on how to
protests against GSA’s contract, which interpret responses from the bidders’ refGSA awarded originally in July to 29 com- erences or about whether they had enough
panies. However, the judge gave GSA the information about the bidders, according
option of brokering a deal with the to the opinion.
protesting companies and
The judge ruled
moving ahead with the
that the survey quescontract.
tions were too general.
The ruling prohibits
People who filled out
GSA from taking orders on
the survey forms were
the contract and suspends
asked to rate a comany activities related to it.
pany’s performance
The judge also ruled that
based on a five-point
GSA couldn’t rely on the
scale that ranged from
same methods it used in
“adverse” to “outthe past to determine
standing.” A single adwhich companies earn a
jective, coupled with
place on the contract in the
GSA’s technical rating
future.
system, could easily afThe agency’s award profect bidders’ chances of
cess was a major reason that
an award, the judge
Allegra sustained the
wrote.
JIM WILLIAMS,
protests. The judge ruled
Stanley Associates,
GENERAL SERVICES
that GSA didn’t apply the
one of the original proA D M I N I S T R AT I O N
same award criteria equally
testors, dropped its
to all 62 companies that bid
complaint against GSA
for a spot on the contract.
after agency officials acknowledged a slight
In the ruling, the Allegra wrote that mistake in its adjective-based rating sysGSA attached “talismanic significance to tem. Correcting the error boosted Stanley’s
technical calculations that suffer from score on the rating system, and GSA quickfalse precision” and failed to adequately ly made it the 30th contractor on Alliant,
weigh prices in its review of contractors’ according to the opinion.
bids. “Those compounding errors prejuMore important, GSA didn’t ensure that
diced the plaintiffs and oblige this court the polling information was relevant to the
to set aside the awards in question,” he bid evaluations and didn’t check the accuwrote.
racy of the survey’s sketchy information,
According to the ruling, GSA made a yet the agency still counted the informagood-faith effort to distinguish among the tion heavily in determining the awards, the
bidders, “yet, on a variety of planes, the opinion states.
agency’s effort came up well short, resultThe ruling also criticized GSA’s evaling in award decisions that were arbitrary, uation of pricing. Although GSA set up
capricious and otherwise contrary to law,” benchmarks related to price, it ultithe opinion states.
mately awarded spots on the contract to
A focus of the protesters’ complaint was some companies whose prices were
GSA’s use of information about their past among the highest. Agency officials said
STAN BAROUH
“WE ARE
ABSOLUTELY
COMMITTED
TO ALLIANT.”
the prices were fair and reasonable, even
though the most expensive winners listed prices twice as high as the lowest winning bidder and about 30 percent higher than an independent government cost
estimate.
“The agency’s inadequate treatment of
price, therefore, constitutes yet another reason why the award decisions here must be
set aside,” the judge ruled. ■
Judge in Alliant case
offers a cautionary
tale about statistics
Federal Claims Court Judge Francis Allegra, in a ruling on the General Services Administration’s Alliant
contract, wrote that GSA officials relied too much on
statistics that were “arbitrary, capricious and contrary to law” in awarding the contract.
The judge criticized GSA for not recognizing the
limitations of statistics. In awarding the Alliant contract, GSA used an adjective-based rating system
to determine the bidders’ rankings. One poorly chosen adjective could cost a company its chance to
be on the contract, he said.
Citing the book “Some Economic Factors in
Modern Life,” by Sir Josiah Charles Stamp, Allegra
wrote that the original sources of statistics on
which people rely are often unreliable. Stamp wrote
in a passage that the judge quotes in his opinion:
“‘Harold Cox tells a story of his life as a young
man....He quoted some statistics to a Judge, an
Englishman, and a very good fellow. [The Judge]
said, Cox, when you are bit older, you will not quote
statistics with that assurance. The Government [is]
very keen on amassing statistics — they collect
them, add them, raise them to the nth power, take
the cube root and prepare wonderful diagrams. But
what you must never forget is that every one of
those figures comes in the first instance from the
village watchman, who just puts down what he
damn pleases.’”
— Matthew Weigelt
MARCH 24, 2008
69
FCW 70
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11:38 AM
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Policy
3 agencies tout PMA’s value
OMB’s Johnson says score cards improved
agencies’ effectiveness in the past 7 years
BY JASON MILLER
arcus Peacock carries a laminated card in his pocket that lists 10
management goals of the Environmental Protection Agency for 2008. Peacock, EPA’s deputy administrator, uses those
bullet points to remind himself of what is
possible in his final nine months in office.
Those goals include developing a performance management division at EPA and
deploying an electronic dashboard system in
each region to track performance metrics.
Peacock has another long-shot goal for
EPA: to earn the President’s Quality Award
for a second straight year. No agency has
done that.
M
3 measures
of the President’s
Management Agenda
The Environmental Protection Agency, the Labor Department and the Social Security Administration have received green scores in all five performance categories
on the President’s Management Agenda. Here are some
of their improvements.
■
EPA increased its pollution control enforcement. Com-
panies spent $10.5 billion on that type of equipment in
2007, up from about $10.3 billion the year before.
■
Labor consolidated 30 information technology service
components and expects to save $3 million on network
SSA transformed its disability claims process by re-
placing a paper-based system with an online system.
— Jason Miller
70
MARCH 24, 2008
“WE’VE COME A
LONG WAY…
BECAUSE OF
WORK DONE BY
FEDERAL
EMPLOYEES.”
HENRIK G. DE GYOR
maintenance costs as a result.
■
ther implementing a human capital plan, Peacock said. The agency has had a workforce
plan since 2003, but it has gained a better understanding of where its skill gaps are and
what needs to be done to close them, he said.
Peacock, a former Office of Management
“We have about 12 skill sets or compeand Budget official, said EPA is within reach tencies that we will need in the near future,”
of its goals based on its progress on the Pres- Peacock said.“We’ve worked on four of them
ident’s Management Agenda.
and are starting on the other eight.”
EPA, the Social Security Administration
SSA’s final push for a green rating occurred
and the Labor Departwhen it awarded a contract to
ment were the only agenCarlson-Wagonlit Governcies that received green
ment Travel, one of the three
scores on the latest PMA
governmentwide e-travel sysscore card in all five mantems, said Mary Glenn-Croft,
agement
categories:
the agency’s deputy commise-government, human
sioner for budget, finance and
capital, competitive sourcmanagement.
ing, financial perform“We worked with OMB to
ance, and budget and perdevelop a migration plan,”
formance integration.
Glenn-Croft said.“That gave
OMB grades agencies
us a double jump — from
each quarter on their sucred to green. I don’t think any
cess in meeting goals in
agency has done that before.”
each category. Labor has
Glenn-Croft said the PMA
received green scores in all
is helping SSA prepare for the
five areas on nine of the
baby boom retirement wave
past 10 score cards.
that started in January. “We
“These three agencies
will be able to deal with this
today are quite advanced C L AY J O H N S O N , O F F I C E O F workload better because of
in their ability to be effec- M A N A G E M E N T A N D B U D G E T the PMA,” she said.“We have
tive,” said Clay Johnson,
improved productivity by at
OMB’s deputy director for management. least 2 percent a year since 2001.”
“We’ve come a long way in the last six to sevPatrick Pizzella, Labor’s assistant secreen years, and all of this is because of work tary for administration and management
done by federal employees.”
and chief information officer, pointed to a
Johnson showed the first score card from reduction in the number of performance
2001, which had mostly red scores, indicat- management systems departmentwide from
ing unsatisfactory. In contrast, the yellow and eight to one.
green ratings that dominate the most recent
“We have 6.3 percent fewer full-time emscore card indicate mixed results and suc- ployees than we did in 2001 and our discrecess. OMB said 82 percent of all scores are tionary budget is lower, but productivity is
yellow or green, up from 75 percent in 2006 up,” Pizzella said.“The key to this all was putand 15 percent in 2001. There are 17 red ting in place a human capital plan. Because
scores, but only two are for e-government. human capital runs through the other four
EPA earned its latest green score by fur- PMA areas, we had to get it right first.” ■
FCW 72
3/20/08
4:17 PM
Page 72
Policy
Agencies find keys to FISMA
Best practices include risk management
and automated security awareness tips
BY MARY MOSQUERA
very federal agency must comply
with the Federal Information Security Management Act, but there is
no one-size-fits-all compliance strategy, a
group of chief information security officers
recently told lawmakers.
The success stories of agencies that have
earned high FISMA ratings vary in their details, although they follow a similar pattern.
For example, the U.S. Agency for International Development secured support from
senior agency executives, implemented extensive training and asked agency managers
in charge of specific information systems to
be responsible for certifying and accrediting
those systems.
“This is an area where I believe we have
implemented one of the foundational tenets
of FISMA,” said Philip Heneghan, USAID’s
chief information security officer.“For each
system and network, USAID has identified
an executive who owns it, has responsibility
E
for it and is in the best position to make riskbased decisions regarding the system’s security controls.”
The CISOs spoke at a March 12 hearing
of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Subcommittee on Federal Financial Management, Government Information, Federal Services and International
Security.
Heneghan said automation is a major factor in USAID’s success. The agency centrally
manages its security infrastructure, which collects and analyzes security events and network
metrics from hundreds of remote security systems worldwide. It also automates much of
its training, Heneghan said. For example, USAID supplements its security awareness training with a Tip of the Day program, which
presents a security lesson and prompts users
to answer a question about that lesson before
they log into the agency’s network.
The State Department and USAID also
provide information security awareness
training as a shared services center under the
NRC takes steps to patch security strategy
Security at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission has been
cer and made progress in certifying and accrediting its
ineffective. In September, the commission’s inspector
systems, a process that it expects to complete in fiscal
general reported that the NRC failed
to certify and accredit most of its
2009, Ash said.
The NRC will test its systems
systems and did not test its contin-
contingency plans by the end of
gency plans. The NRC wants to
June, and it has linked that re-
change that, said Darren Ash, its
quirement to senior executives’
chief information officer.
performance reviews.
“Executive management at
The agency also plans to
have the State Department pro-
has taken responsibility for the
vide security awareness training
security of NRC’s information
to its employees under the Office
systems” and compliance with the Federal Informa-
of Management and Budget’s Information Systems
tion Security Management Act, Ash said.
Security Line of Business initiative.
The NRC has hired a chief information security offi-
72
MARCH 24, 2008
— Mary Mosquera
JUPITER IMAGES
the highest levels of the agency
Office of Management and Budget’s Information Systems Security Line of Business
initiative.
State improved its information security
standing in 2007 after receiving a failing
grade in 2006, according to a report that the
agency’s inspector general submitted to
OMB. The agency’s score for 2007 won’t be
known until OMB releases its FISMA report
next month.
State uses a layered approach to risk management through various operational,technical
and managerial security controls, said Susan
Swart, State’s chief information officer.
The department blocks 3.5 million spam
e-mail messages, intercepts 4,500 viruses and
detects more than 1 million anomalous external probes of its network each week, Swart
said.
State must familiarize its civil service, Foreign Service, local staff members and contractors worldwide with the department’s
security policies and procedures. It formed
a departmentwide information security
steering committee of system owners and
senior security managers to deal with security issues and to ensure that all employees
follow security policies and procedures, regardless of their location. The committee created integrated information security teams
of policy specialists, operational officials and
managers.
State also organized a 90-Day Push project last year to focus on two major information security requirements: conducting a systems and Web site inventory and testing
systems to certify and accredit them. The department conducted workshops based on
guidance from the National Institute of Standards and Technology for testing systems
security.
Another key to USAID and State’s FISMA compliance is their practice of automated scanning to detect security vulnerabilities. State’s vulnerability scanning tools
produce daily reports for system administrators to validate patch management, antivirus updates and configuration compliance, Swart said. ■
0324fcw_AdIndex
3/20/08
5:49 PM
Page 97
INDEX OF ADVERTISERS
Accenture
www.accenture.com/research . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .25
Amerian Systems
www.AmericanSystems.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
AT&T Government Solutions
www.att.com/gov/transform.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .61
Booz Allen Hamilton
www.bah.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .43
CA
www.ca.com/government . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .27
Canon
www.usa.canon.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .13
CDWG
www.CDWG.com/federal . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .11
CGI Federal
www.cgi.com/usfederal . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .41
CSC
www.csc.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .35
Dell
www.dell.com/Faster . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .76
Deltek
www.deltek.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .51
EDS
www.eds.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .33
Emtec
www.emtec.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .14
ESRI
www.esri.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .63
Hewlett Packard
www.hp.com/go/FEDmag12 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .2
IBM
www.ibm.com/do/ghcs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
(ISC)2
www.isc2.org . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .55
Lockheed Martin
www.lockheedmartin.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .37
www.lockheedmattin.com/how . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .59
Northrop Grumman
www.northropgrumman.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .47
PC Mall Gov
www.pcmallgov.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .5
Perot Systems
www.psgs.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .39
Qwest
www.quest.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .29
SAP
www.sap.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .45
Sprint
www.sprint.com/government . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .65
Sun Microsystems
www.sun.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .49
www.sun.com/federal . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .75
Terremark Worldwide
www.terremark.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .53
TIAA-CREF
www.tiaa-cref.org/tsp . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .7
Unisys
www.securityunleashed.com/FreeIT . . . . . . . . . . . . . .67
This index is provided as an additional service. The publisher does not assume
any liability for errors or omissions.
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73
3/20/08
11:39 AM
Page 74
SIDE
FLIP
FCW 74
G O V E R N M E N T
M O V I E S
March Madness
In the March 3 issue of Federal Computer Week, we offered a list of government-themed movies.
FCW is conducting its own March Madness bracket to determine the best of those movies, with
abundant thanks to Mark Reiter and Richard Sandomir, authors of “The Enlightened Bracketologist: The Final Four of Everything.”
Here is how it works. Below is the bracket as it stands now. Your vote determines the winners
that move on to the later rounds. We are leaving them up on the FCW Web site for about 36 hours
Download
Find a link to the FCW.com
poll and the FCW Insider blog,
www.fcw.com/blogs/editor,
where you can find regular
updates on the brackets.
so you have an opportunity to vote. Cast your vote at www.fcw.com/polls.
The initial competitions in the first round are reflected below.
Best government-themed movie
Dave (1992) 41%
The Bourne movies
Dave
The Jack Ryan movies
The American President (1995) 59%
Air Force One (1997) 73%
Crimson Tide (1995)
A.F. One
The Hunt for Red October (1990)
Murder at 1600 (1997) 27%
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939) 63%
The Silence of the Lambs (1991)
Mr. Smith
Charlie Wilson’s War (2007) 38%
No Way Out (1987)
Enemy of the State (1998)
War Games (1983)
Mars Attacks (1996)
Breach (2007)
The Good Shepherd (2006)
JFK (1992)
Nixon (1995)
Absolute Power (1996)
In the Line of Fire (1993)
74
MARCH 24, 2008
The X-Files: Fight The Future (1998)
Primary Colors (1998)
Wag the Dog (1997)
Manchurian Candidate (1962)
Citizen Kane (1941)
Dick (1999)
All the President’s Men (1975)
Apocalypse Now (1979)
Black Hawk Down (2001)
U.S. Marshals (1998)
The Fugitive (1993)
The other guys
Sun
True Consolidation.
Sun’s x64 systems offer an immediate 50% savings on data center
space, stacked up against comparable HP systems. Sun can also help
you consolidate and manage Solaris, Linux, and Windows.
Don’t get trapped by proprietary virtualization solutions.
Enterprise Class at Commodity Prices.
sun.com/federal
Who needs expensive, proprietary virtualization software when, hey, you can get it free with open source Solaris. © 2008 Sun Microsystems, Inc. All rights reserved. All logos and trademarks are property of their respective owners.
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Transcription

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