Ask the CIO Podcasts

• Benefits.gov still riding the E-Government Act wave 20 years later

  Mangala Kuppa, the director of business application services in Labor’s CIO’s office, said the agency hopes to continue to develop the portal using chatbots and other technologies to better serve citizens.

  Ask the CIO

  July 31, 2023
• USDA leaning harder into software-as-a-service to satisfy mission needs

  Gary Washington, the chief information officer at the Agriculture Department, said within its multi-cloud environment, they are constantly looking to maximize its value, improve customer experience and continue to be flexible with business needs.

  Ask the CIO

  July 20, 2023
• Data science is driving major changes to the Bureau of Fiscal Service’s operating model

  Justin Marsico, the Treasury Department’s Bureau of the Fiscal Service’s chief data officer, said a pilot program turned into a full-fledged training effort is helping to further instill the culture of data across the bureau.

  Ask the CIO

  July 17, 2023
• Navy tech bridges connecting small businesses with its needs

  Robert Smith, the director of Department of the Navy’s Small Business Innovative Research (SBIR) and Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) programs, said the goal is to accelerate new or better capabilities to the sailor and marine.

  Ask the CIO

  July 07, 2023
• Congress, Biden administration continue push to reduce security clearance timeline

  OPM and DCSA are making policy and technology changes are part of the implementation of the Trusted Workforce 2.0.

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  June 30, 2023
• For VA, moving to zero trust is simple concept to understand, but tough to implement

  Kurt DelBene, the assistant secretary for information and technology and chief information officer at the Veterans Affairs Department, said the agency is working on several parallel goals including getting to 100% use of multi-factor authentication.

  Ask the CIO

  June 15, 2023
• IRS’s Smith: Be pro-digitization, not anti status-quo when driving innovation

  Harrison Smith, the director of the Enterprise Digitization Office at the IRS, said the tax agency is preparing for the influx of new funding by identifying small, but impactful modernization projects.

  Ask the CIO

  June 12, 2023
• How Farmers.gov really launched USDA’s next generation of cloud services

  Casey Cook, the cloud architecture branch chief for the Agriculture Department, said seven mission areas are taking advantage of more than 300 APIs to make data sharing among new and legacy systems easier.

  Ask the CIO

  June 05, 2023
• Air Force’s Knausenberger puts biggest obstacles to digital transformation in rearview mirror

  Lauren Knausenberger, the outgoing chief information officer of the Air Force, said if requested funding for fiscal 2024 comes through as hoped for, several transformation initiatives will get a much needed boost.

  Ask the CIO

  May 22, 2023
• DLA accelerates move away from COBOL warehouse system

  The Defense Logistics Agency has rolled out its cloud-based Warehouse Management System to 12 sites so far and will reach 70 by the end of fiscal 2023.

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  May 11, 2023
• GSA’s Symphony tool is music to vendors, agency customers’ ears

  Tiffany Hixson, the assistant commissioner for the Office of Professional Services and Human Capital Categories in the General Services Administration’s Federal Acquisition Service, said spending in 2023 is on track to grow at a significant pace across the entire professional services category.

  Ask the CIO

  May 01, 2023
• TMF leaders say investments must keep pace with growing technical debt challenge

  Clare Martorana, the federal chief information officer chairwoman of the Technology Modernization Fund Board, and Raylene Yung, the executive director of the Technology Modernization Fund, say they are giving lawmakers more details and briefings about the progress and impact of the investments.

  Ask the CIO

  April 24, 2023
• RPA reducing the burden on DHS contracting officers

  The Homeland Security Department’s procurement shop was busier than ever last year, spending almost $24 billion on about 60,000 transactions.

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  April 17, 2023
• USCIS, Millennium Challenge Corporation putting workforces at the front of their zero trust journey

  Shane Barney, the chief information security officer at USCIS, and Miguel Adams, the Millennium Challenge Corporation’s CISO, both say the need to educate and train the business customers on zero trust is important to their agency’s success.

  Ask the CIO

  April 07, 2023