Greg Garcia, the Army’s deputy chief information officer, is retiring after 38 years in government. Garcia announced in an email to staff, which Federal News Network obtained, that his last day is Feb. 27.

“This is a tough decision, yet one we’ll all have to make at some point in our careers,” Garcia wrote in his email. “For me, I will continue to work and will be spending more time with our family in Texas.”

Garcia became the Army’s deputy CIO in October 2018 and briefly served as acting CIO until November when the Army named Raj Iyer as its new top civilian technology executive.

“I am indebted to you all. You are all leaders and curators of our digital transformation effort to help our Army and DoD realize the needed modernization, readiness and reform capabilities to protect this great nation of ours in supporting the accomplishment of the critical objectives of our National Defense Strategy,” Garcia wrote. “Though these times are tough and challenging, you have endeavored and battled through always focused on people, mission and doing the best we could.”

During his time as the deputy CIO, Garcia focused on several priorities including completing and beginning the implementation of the Army’s data strategy. He said in June 2020 that by putting the service’s financial data in a big data platform under the category management initiative, the Army better understands more about $12 billion in spending. In 2019, the Army saved more than $1 billion through this effort. Garcia served as the Army’s chief data officer until the service named David Markowitz as its CDO in October.

He also helped oversee the Quantum Leap effort to reskill and upskill the Army’s IT workforce, and worked with the broader service offices to transition to applications to the cloud.

Under his purview as deputy CIO, Garcia managed Army IT policy compliance and coordinated the delivery of operational command, control, communications, computers and IT capabilities to support warfighters and business users.

Garcia began his career as a GS-5 trainee for the Air Force and served in an assortment of positions over the last three decades including as the CIO for the Army Corps of Engineers and the special advisor for cyber operations for the Air Force/A6.

He said between his father, his sister and himself, his family has served more than 100 years in DoD.

“I would have never imagined as a young kid entering civil service as a GS-5 trainee, the opportunity our Air Force and Army would offer me,” Garcia wrote. “I have worked in Texas, Arizona, Alabama, Ohio, Virginia and served in the Civilian Expeditionary Workforce in Iraq.”

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