Janet Hale

or Janet Hale, a top priority in 2002 was an ambitious project to implement a departmentwide financial management system that would update, streamline and consolidate accounting across a group of agencies not used to working closely together.

That experience will stand her in good stead as the undersecretary for management at Homeland Security.

Hale was assistant secretary for budget, technology and finance at the Department of Health and Human Services, where she served as chief financial officer and chief information officer simultaneously for about a year. She spearheaded the Unified Financial Management System project at HHS and visited eight disparate agencies with a "road show" to build enthusiasm for the effort in October and November 2002.

At Homeland Security, she will have a similar portfolio and will be responsible for human resources as well. Sculpting a Homeland Security workforce from the 22 agencies that are coming together in the new department likely will be as much of a challenge as pulling their accounting practices into a coherent system.Before joining HHS in early 2002, Hale had worked for the House of Representatives as the associate administrator for finance and had been associate director for economics and government at the Office of Management and Budget. There she oversaw budget and policy development, regulatory reform, and financial management for the Treasury, Transportation, Commerce and Justice departments and 25 smaller agencies. Hale served earlier as the assistant secretary of Transportation for budget and programs and as acting assistant secretary of housing at the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

She has private sector and academic experience as well. She was vice president of the U.S. Telephone Association (now the U.S. Telecom Association), a trade organization in Washington, and executive vice president of the University of Pennsylvania.