Osama Malik, a principal with Booz Allen Hamilton, answered these questions and more on “Cloud Trends: What’s Ahead for Government”.

Regarding where cloud adoption is today, Malik says there’s a wide range of where agencies stand based on what sector of the government they’re in.

“We’ve got folks who are really out in front,” he said. “I call them the trailblazers, and they’re implementing modern, new architectures, partnering with startup companies and kind of doing things at the pace of the commercial world and really doing some new things.

“You’ve got another camp of folks who are, they’re watching, they’re kind of on the fence. They might be making some safe moves into the cloud, but they’re really kind of watching to see how things fold out and unravel.

“And then you’ve got some other pockets of the government where they’re server hugging, and they are really resistant to moving, and in some cases, for good reason. For other cases, it has to do with training and education, culture, those kinds of things, so it’s a pretty wide field.”

Malik said DoD is on the fence, noting its recent data center consolidation efforts and creating private cloud environments. Civilian agencies focused on citizen services, like the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, are “really pushing forward and leaning out,” according to Malik.

Malik also said for agencies like those in the intelligence community it’s more of a cultural shift. While they are making progress and have plans to accelerate more into the cloud in the years ahead, “we’re still seeing just a culture that is decades and decades old of really not sharing information, really protecting that, keeping it locked down to a device in a room,” he said.

GSA, particularly its 18F division, has done well moving to the cloud, according to Malik. “They’ve really been able to help speed up the process,” he said. “And they’re actually, I think, paving the way for government as well. So they’re going to be taking some of their really modern cloud architectures and solutions and turning around and open-sourcing that back out so other government agencies will actually be able to get the benefit of their investment.”

Ultimately, Malik feels the technology is available for cloud adoption “and it’s more about ‘how, whether, if, to what extent’ we can leverage the technology that’s out there,” he said. “So I think success, at an enterprise level, looks like an organization that is being deliberate about the actions that they’re taking.”

Guest

Osama Malik
Principal, Strategic Innovation Group
Booz Allen Hamilton

Osama Malik is a Booz Allen Hamilton Principal in the firm’s Strategic Innovation Group, leading the Digital Strategy and Management capabilities. Osama’s team drives Booz Allen services around strategies for emerging and disruptive technologies. Osama helps Booz Allen clients transform their enterprises by understanding the business/mission value and risks associated with new technologies and developing strategies and solutions to help align its people, processes and technology to realize the benefits of an open, agile enterprise.  His team specializes in developing strategies and implementing solutions for Fortune 500 customers, and Booz Allen’s federal government client base across civilian, defense and intelligence community agencies.  They perform assessments and diagnostics, develop strategies and roadmaps, establish and mature technology management practices, and align organizational structures and cultures to achieve business/mission objectives. Osama has worked with clients in both federal and commercial sectors and helped drive major transformation and modernization efforts.

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