CIOs Push for Power

Agencies' top information technology executives will push for greater control over federal IT management in the coming year, the Treasury Department's chief information officer said at the Virtual Government conference Wednesday.

The Chief Information Officers Council will push for its own budget in the Clinton administration's fiscal 2000 budget proposal, Treasury CIO James Flyzik said. Flyzik, who is the vice chairman of the CIO Council, said the council would then be better able to promote governmentwide investments that allow agencies to spread the costs of new initiatives and avoid wasting money on redundant and duplicative projects.

"It's a smart thing to do," Flyzik said. He said that CIOs must take advantage of the opportunities the council provides. "The governmentwide CIO council can be whatever we want it to be."

Members of the CIO Council appeared before an audience of federal managers and executives at the Virtual Government conference in College Park, Md., which is sponsored by the Armed Forces Communications and Electronics Association, to discuss the CIOs' strategic plan for the coming year. They stressed cooperation among agencies as a key to improving IT management in the federal government.

Agriculture Department CIO Anne Reed, chairwoman of the council's interoperability committee, said the council will develop a governmentwide e-mail strategy this year. She said employees at different agencies and people outside the federal government who communicate with federal organizations have difficulty exchanging information because the numerous e-mail systems agencies use do not work well with each other. For example, a file attached to an e-mail on one system may be garbled on another system.

"It's one of the most frustrating things our customers deal with," Reed said.

The council will develop a governmentwide information architecture policy this year to improve communication and the exchange of data among agencies, Reed said. "We need to break down the information stovepipes," she said.

Kathy Adams, assistant deputy commissioner of the Social Security Administration for systems and chair of the CIO Council's year 2000 committee, said the council will be working with states, private firms and foreign countries to make sure all the computer systems the federal government interacts with work at the turn of the century. Foreign governments in particular may not be taking the problem seriously enough, "although we're not exactly comfortable where we are at this point" either, Adams said.

Several CIOs said agency managers should turn to industry to learn the best ways to use technology in their organizations.

Energy Department CIO Woody Hall said agencies can adopt best practices in capital planning from private firms. Gloria Parker, deputy CIO at the Education Department, said the council is studying how companies retain highly skilled IT employees, who are increasingly difficult to keep.

Flyzik also said that agencies should look to the private sector to take over IT functions if companies can perform services better and cheaper than agency employees.