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 As "Mc-Intel" offers a side of security with every order, seems fusion food is today's IT nouveau cuisine. With the master chefs at Gartner predicting salad days ahead for enterprise tech budgets, you can almost hear the IT giants' stomachs rumbling. If it's consolidation cannibalism ahead, then what hybrids are on the menu? Databases that do the dishes? Telephones that take out the trash? Computers that cut calories? Probably not, but tie down your gums for spicy new IT vendor value propositions as they swallow one another to serve the street's insatiable appetite for top-line growth. The first wave of IT consolidation - dog eat dog, buying like vendors to grow in-category share of wallet - is almost over. There are no more Compaqs and Digitals on the platter - although as Dell pushes out Michael, it may become too tasty for HP to resist. The second wave is upon us - dog eat cat - see HP/EDS and Intel/McAfee. We can all predict the survivors in each category - excepting what happens to SAP. Fat and happy, the big guys are mostly tired of eating from their own tables and are now eyeing their neighbors' plates. And, with depressed earnings - and many IT vendors holding significant cash reserves - it seems almost every bite is within fork's reach. So let's get down to brass tacks - what does this mean for the market and Uncle Sam? First, we'll see continued escalation in acquisition PE ratios - as the feeding frenzy drives up purchase prices. The proof of the pudding? HP vs. Dell fight over 3Par. Bloomberg reports that global M&A is up 23 percent over last year - so it's not just an IT eating disorder. Buyer beware. Acquisition integration is not easy - and dog-cat is harder than dog-dog. At some point, somebody always pays too much. Second, the buys should get us out of those hideous open standards meetings - at least for now. We'll see complex platform integration recipes turn into instant noodles - as vendors are financially incented to blend newly acquired ingredients into their existing recipes. The up and the downside here is that integration issues among cookbooks will likely become more pronounced. Finally, negotiating enterprise license agreements and volume discounts will require more chewing. As vendors get bigger, the who-needs-whom tipping point between customer and supplier is moving away from Uncle Sam. The question for Feds as enterprise IT consumers and food safety police for good competitive hygiene is how to define reasonable business practices versus crowding the table. If the consolidation binge drives bad investments that hurt margin, we'll see a cramping in R&D investment and a slowdown in innovation. That's not good for anybody. The worst case scenario, a draw down in the number of IT vendors raises the specter of collusive practices - frequently a product of consolidation. An IT OPEC would be tough for Uncle Sam to stomach. Cloud - plop, plop, fizz, fizz? |
 Please and thank you, ladies first, give up your seat for the elderly, honesty is the best policy. Are we now so sophisticated that manners don't matter? Web 2.0's impact seems to have pushed our society into a civility coma - there's a positive paucity of polite. So, where do I sign up for the lobotomy that separates my virtual persona from the real me? Here's how the etiquette epidemic presents. We talk face to face, good eye contact. We seem to agree. But your Facebook page betrays what you really think. Do you think that I can't see your Facebook page? Is there an unwritten escalation code with Twitter - 5,000 followers - no reason to source your micro rants, 10,000+ followers - you can insult anybody's mother scot-free? As Mel Gibson learned twice of late, popularity does not give anybody a free pass. You see, the root cause is that many of today's Webizens fear conflict. "I'll tell you what you want to hear, but I'll say what I think in my personal space." That's nothing new - see Shakespeare's soliloquies. But you're not Hamlet - and Facebook and Twitter are not your personal space. Let me go out on a limb here, I would put it to you that conflict is not a bad thing. It forces us to focus, prioritize, and negotiate - to get what we really need. Too many people think that Web 2.0 is a way to slip the conflict - to maintain mutually-exclusive realities. It's not. And, breaking, really scary news - seems the digital decorum disease is bleeding over into the real world. At a recent industry dinner, I sat one seat over from a woman who was relating apocryphal stories about my exploits - talk about being hard up for dinner conversation. Anyhow, I had to repeatedly ask her to desist. First the stories were not true, and second - well, "I'm sitting right here for goodness sake. At least wait until I'm out of ear shot." It wouldn't be polite to name names...so I won't. I'd like to be clear. I have nothing against Facebook - can't say the same about Twitter. I don't agree with everybody. I don't enjoy conflict. But, I do take pride in the fact that people know where I stand - and that they hear it from me directly. If all the world's a stage, let's remind ourselves that each player only gets to play one role - unless of course it's Shakespeare. Andy Rooney out... |
 I’d like to get my mitts on that bloody Osama bloody Bin bloody Laden. Have you suffered business travel lately? It’s over priced, over sold, and over rated. Anybody remember the good ol’ days – jumbo jets, ambling through airports, the upgrade utopia? Today, it’s sardine seating, bye-bye bags, and connection chaos. And yes, we’re literally shoeless... A tip for govies – don’t buy changeable tickets. Buy the regular tickets and throw them away if you change your plans. The difference between the changeable and regular roundtrip ticket from D.C. to Ft. Hood Texas is $1,418 vs. $216. Daylight robbery. Yes, I understand that I don’t have a seat assignment and that’s why I’m getting a center seat, again – but how did everybody else on the flight get a seat assignment? If you sent my bag to Killeen, Texas from Dulles, how is it that I don’t have a confirmed seat on the flight from Dallas to Killeen? How ever did you manage to lose my bag when I had to check it at the gate? I heard that John Foster Dulles’ family is actively petitioning Congress to have its family name chemically removed from the airport. I beg your pardon? No please, please don’t threaten to route me through O’Hare – I’ll work on my attitude. And, it’s not just the airlines. No I don’t want a car that I have to pedal. Hertz, how do you justify charging $8.95 per gallon if I don’t have time to fill up the car? That’s extortion. I’ve half a mind to take the full insurance and crash the thing into a wall to get my money’s worth. What’s this got to do with IT you ask? You takin’ up travel writing? This cup’s an open plea to the videoconferencing guys – Cisco, Polycom, HP, Apple, not to mention the telcos. Make it work, make it easy, and make it cheap. Get us off the road. This flight is long overdue. Oh, and when we catch Mr. Bin Laden, might I suggest a flying fatwa – a life sentence served in center seats.
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 Sent spinning up into the air by freak weather, the house comes down on the Wicked Witch of the East. Looking in on the passage of the new Telework Improvements Act on the Hill, it occurred to me that the Wizard of Oz is really about telework. Far from home, Dorothy travels down the long yellow brick road to meet the wizard, just to ask to go back home. Have to say, skipping on a yellow brick road is probably faster than your trip to the office these days - the average Fed commutes more than 50 miles roundtrip. With the House passing Telework Improvements Act of 2010 - HR.1722 - Congress has really squashed the life out of mean, spiteful Federal managers, who for years have cast their wicked spells on telework. Second time proved to be the charm for the "no-place-like-home" legislation. HR.1722 passed 290-131 on July 14. More support this time - 22 more votes to be exact. So what does it mean for Feds? Is this real change or just empty rhetoric from the "all-powerful wizard?" What do agencies need to do to make a difference? First, Feds need to get telework courage - dare to embrace telework and expand existing programs. Second, agencies need to get a telework brain - set benchmarks, monitor performance, and guarantee that eligible employees can telework. Third, Feds need to get a telework heart - provide training for confused and recalcitrant managers as well as appoint a telework-managing officer to manage the operations. Last, but by no means least, HR.1722 requires all agencies to integrate telework into continuity of operations programs. So, for the chance that freak weather hits your agency - remember the D.C. snowpocalypse - you'll know you can always go home. Agencies will be required to implement more robust programs and report progress. But, we're not in Kansas yet. HR.1722 is not law today. The next step is to reconcile the House legislation with its counterpart, the Senate telework bill (S.707). The House and Senate will host a pow wow to resolve the differences between the two bills. The idea is, let's get this through - the sooner, the better. The administration recently directed agencies to "reduce your real estate" and "get your employees off the road" - so there's pressure coming at agencies from all angles. If you listen closely, 1.2 million telework-eligible Feds are smiling, clicking their heels, and muttering there's no place like home. Want to get involved in the telework dialogue? Attend the Fall Telework Exchange Town Hall Meeting on October 7th. Ruby slippers optional... |
 As the Vuvuzelas' din fades, fans are asking who's the new superstar from the 2010 World Cup? Dynamic Donovan, Vicious Villa, Mighty Mueller - nah. Paul the Psychic Octopus has to get the golden boot(s). From qualifying rounds to the final, this magnificent mollusk hit the mark with every prediction. And, taking a tentacle out of his tank, it seems the spooks want to improve their grip on the future. The Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity recently announced that it will let a series of four-year contracts to better understand the future and make smarter decisions. So, what's the game? The Intel community calls this "Aggregative Contingent Estimation." It wants a "quantitative method for weighing forecasters' judgments according to their level of risk aversion, cognitive style, variance in judgment, past performance, and predications of other forecasters' knowledge." Figure eight heads are better than one. I'll pass on the horse-tipping opportunity, but can you say, do they have WMD? With all the variables, doesn't this seem like the mother-of-all-number-crunching apps? Progressive contractors take note. But if you're thinking about subbing Paul the Mystic Octopus onto your team, you may need to think again. Rumor has it that the German zoo keepers gave him das boot after he picked Spain to beat Germany in the semi final - so don't order the calamari in Oberhausen. |
 The only thing hotter and steamier than the weather in D.C. right now is the conversation about cloud. And, it's both tiring and confusing. There are more flavors of cloud than of coffee at Starbucks - private, community, public - not to mention IaaS, PaaS, and SaaS. Venti, double-caramel macchiato, skim-milk latte @ 190°... Isn't it time we cut the steam and put some hard numbers into the recipe? The analysts are cooking up huge growth projections - Gartner says global cloud services will rise from $58.6 billion last year to $148.8 billion in 2014. IDC tells us the public cloud market will soufflé from $16 billion in 2009 to $55.5 billion in 2014. So, as we sweat over the security, who's making the business case for the Federal cloud transition - how much can Uncle Sam save by putting cloud on the menu? Well, we've got an app for that. MeriTalk collaborated with the Feds - DISA, Commerce, Energy, GSA, Interior's National Business Center, NASA - to build the first Federal Cloud Computing Savings Calculator. More than 100 Feds have run their IT budgets through our gizmo - so we have real numbers on projected government-wide cloud savings. Tune in to the Inside the Cloud Megacast at 2 p.m. EDT on Tuesday, July 20 to hear from Tom Soderstrom, CTO at NASA JPL, about current cloud initiatives, learn how the calculator works, and see how much you can save. Oh, and make sure that you're in an air conditioned room - 'cause this stuff is hot. Starbucks optional. |
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Tags: Project Management, Workforce
 The Ice House on Pennsylvania Avenue is asking agencies to cut budgets by at least 5 percent. Agencies are looking at pay freezes. Summer or not, right now it's cold in D.C. And, look around the globe - little evidence of global warming anywhere. The Germans just launched an $80 billion fiscal frost that will cut 15,000 civil servants. Even the balmy Greeks are catching the chill. So, what does this mean for Federal IT and OMB? Well, as we enter the "Kundra Tundra" the hunt for waste, new efficiency, and savings has gotta get hotta. To be sure, cloud - it wouldn't be a Cup of IT without some mention of that word - and data center consolidation promise significant savings. But, today, the hard number savings associated with these programs are, well, somewhat nebulous ... And, of course, the impact of these new IT approaches is limited to delivering savings within the $78.44 billion 2010 IT budget. But, here's a crazy idea - what if agencies could see the 5 percent savings ante and raise the bet to 30 percent savings? And, what if IT could lead the way for delivering savings not just against IT budgets, but against the total Federal contracts budget - $527.5 billion in FY 2008? A new MeriTalk study, "Federal Procurement Reform: Change Takes More Than Words," provides new insight on the Federal management opportunity. The study asserts that the Federal government could save some $158 billion by implementing management practices that are already mandated, but not practiced. Forty-five percent of Federal procurement pros surveyed for the study gave their agency a "C" grade or lower for process maturity - only 12 percent give their agency an "A" grade. To be sure, managing large, multi-year government programs is complex. Things often change midstream. It stands to reason that a proven management approach is critical to success. Against this backdrop, just 17 percent of Federal procurement pros said that their agencies have implemented and consistently use Earned Value Management (EVM). Just 14 percent said that their agencies have implemented and consistently use Capital Planning and Investment Control (CPIC). And, you can't implement what you don't know - 56 percent assert that they lack program management training. And, while shocking, the study results are nothing new. Just last October, GAO released a study on agencies' management performance focused on 16 IT programs funded in total at $1 billion. GAO found more than $2 billion in cost overruns and significant schedule slips and slides. The report points to agencies' failure to implement EVM as a systemic cause for management failure. And, GAO is paired with a powerful partner in shining a light on Feds' program management challenges. Senator Thomas Carper (D-Del.) introduced S.920, the IT Investment Oversight Enhancement and Waste Prevention Act in April of last year. The bill passed in the Senate last month and awaits a vote in the House. This pending legislation focuses on using EVM to provide more structure, accountability, and transparency for Uncle Sam's IT spend. I'd recommend that you take a closer look and do everything you can to support this good-sense and good-governance legislation. This is not about freezing out Federal program managers - in fact, quite the opposite. The Federal Procurement Reform study reveals that 55 percent of Federal procurement professionals lack EVM training. We need to provide more support and training for overworked Federal program managers. According to Steve Kelman and Steve Schooner, the Federal acquisition workforce's workload has increased by 140 percent in the past decade. Let's face it, program management, EVM, and CPIC aren't the sexiest concepts in IT and government management today. However, the flash and sizzle of open government, dashboards, even the finances for the cloud transition, all depend on a solid data foundation - and that's program management. The challenge today - GIGO. If it's garbage into the decision-making process, then it's garbage out. To really change our government's performance, we need to focus on the fundamentals - that's visibility, management, and measurement. This is not just about saving money, it's also about better government - and investing in program management tools and training pays dividends on all fronts. To be clear, government will need to invest to realize these savings - but before you ask, that investment is significantly less than $158 billion... I'll leave you with a cool concept for the future of Federal IT and management. Why should OMB and the Hill need to ask CIOs for data on their agencies' programs? Why shouldn't Vivek Kundra tap straight into their standardized, EVM- and CPIC-based systems to roll up the current state of play across the Federal government? And, by moving aggressively on better management, IT can set an example for the whole government. Complete transparency and accountability, the ability to quickly see when programs start to slide on black ice, as well as data normalization to enable trend mapping and cross-pollination of successes. Wouldn't that combination warm the heart of each and every tax payer? |
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Tags: Data Center Management, Database Management, Document Management, Mobile Computing, Security, Services, Storage, Web 2.0, Workforce
 There's an establishment next door to our office in Old Town Alexandria called the Sacred Circle. Tarot-card reading, crystal balls, hair-ball divining, hocus pocus, that sort of carry on. Guess I'm not much on jiggery or pokery. Seems to me if that stuff really worked, nobody would much bother with having a flutter on the ponies. But, let's say that you could get inside Vivek Kundra's head - understand OMB's direction for the upcoming years. My there'd be a line of contractors up and down King Street waiting to stare into the gypsy's eyes...right? Well, step up to my ouija board. Here are the magic numbers - 321-329. You may want to jot those down. And, with those numbers, we can prognosticate what's in Mr. Kundra's magic bag of IT. But, for my first trick, let's answer the eternal question - how big's the Fed IT budget and where's it headed? I've heard numbers from $70 to $80 billion - but what's $10 billion among friends? The 2010 budget is $78.44 billion - that's up from $71.227 billion in 2009. And, the number is projected to grow by 1.2 percent next year to $79.375 billion. Yes, we've all heard the "doing-more-with-less" mantra. But, if the numbers are growing, aren't we talking about doing more with more? Perhaps today, but the path forward - beyond 2011 - does not look so magical. The wizards at Gartner tell us that Federal IT spending will start to decline in 2012 or 2013. Agencies need to take a hard look at their priorities today - and work out where to start proactive rationalization. Failure to do so will mean radical "gun-to-the-head" cuts as budgets start to contract. And so, Mr. Kundra wants Feds to tighten up IT spend starting today. The Federal CIO's spell book is all about centralization, green, consolidation, procurement reform, cyber security, hiring the right IT people into government, and transparency - it's about affecting real change today to prepare for tomorrow. So here's my read on the Federal civilian IT tea leaves - the top 10 priorities for 2010:
Okay, so that's the top 10 prognostications for the coming two years. So, Dope, where'd you get this dope you may ask? Séances with the CIO Council? Digital divining? Remember the magic numbers you jotted down earlier - 321-329? Those are the page numbers in the Analytical Perspectives of the Budget of the U.S. Government for Federal Year 2011 where OMB lays out its plans. No magic here. The mystery is that more people don't read this public document. It's much cheaper than a session with a fortune teller - but please don't tell the fellas at the Sacred Circle. But if they're really psychic, figure they already know... |
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Tags: Data Center Management, Green IT
 What you talkin' 'bout, fool? Does anybody else remember the "A-Team" - Murdock, B.A. Baracus, Hannibal, and Faceman? When planning a mission, George Peppard - the one-time-"Banacek" star - and the "A-Team's" Hannibal, coined the line, "I love it when a plan comes together..." Well, we've been working with a group of Fed IT pros to put together a little caper of our own. An operational dialogue on Data Center Consolidation - DCC - called MeriTalk 1,100 on May 20 at the Reagan Building in D.C. We started the planning knee-deep in the "snowpocalypse," when OMB released its Federal DCC Initiative memo on February 26. To net it out, data centers are like rabbits, and the population is out of control - it's skyrocketed from 432 in 1999 to more than 1,100 today. And, they're expensive little bunnies, and many of them aren't working that hard - so OMB wants fewer rabbits working harder. DCC is myxomatosis. OMB's directive does point to the green opportunity. Federal data centers are hungry - in 2006, they consumed over 6 billion kWh and are projected to eat 12 kWh by 2011. And, who wouldn't want to save some lettuce, or carrots as the case may be? We chatted with Feds about the DCC directive. Feedback - this is big stuff. A significant part of Uncle Sam's IT spend goes on bunnies. We ran into a DCC lead from one agency and learned that each agency has a "bunny killer" lead - I'll do my best to avoid the "Monty Python and the Holy Grail" jokes. We asked if they knew their peers in other agencies? Nope. Interesting that the Feds should push out a program focused on consolidation and better workload optimization without providing the leads with a list of their peers in other agencies. We scampered about trying to identify the bunny killers in other agencies. Within a week, we hosted a conference call with 45 participants - the DCC leads from many agencies. Real progress. We extended an invitation to the two lead execs from the CIO Council - Richard Spires, CIO, DHS, and Michael Duffy, CIO, Treasury. Richard Spires signed up and will keynote alongside Bob Otto, the former CIO at USPS - they'll share the vision and the operational reality. Regret Michael Duffy had a conflict and could not make it. Neil Wright from Treasury will share his private-sector perspective on how a major DCC initiative delivered at UPS. Fifteen Federal DCC experts signed up to speak in the program. More than 400 DCC experts and operators signed up to attend. Great stuff. But, let's go back to the A-Team's Hannibal - throughout the planning calls, Feds nibbled at the disconnect between the DCC and green IT mandates. While the DCC stuff talks green, there was no connection between the DCC goals and the green IT goals as established in E.O. 13423 - requiring agencies to reduce energy intensity by 3 percent annually - and in E.O. 13514 - focused on reducing green house gas and sustainability. Considering the overlap between the green mandates, why not combine agencies' green IT planning and reporting? Further, why shouldn't agencies map their green IT initiatives into DCC planning? Mike Howell of OMB released a Modification to 2011 Passback Language for Green IT Plans on Thursday, April 29 that brings the green IT and DCC plans together. Now we need to identify and share the relevant agency points of contact and enable real operational dialogue - conversations among stakeholders where we discuss successes and challenges, and work together to map a high-value path forward. To be sure, the path ahead is not easy. Like an A-Team assignment, the mission is difficult. We are greatly encouraged by OMB's good-sense decision to level stove pipes and lighten the redundant reporting streams - as George Peppard would say, "I love it when a plan comes together..." |
 Sniping at Starbucks. Latte foam on the street. From Federal Triangle to McPherson Square to Dupont Circle - the shape of our government is changing. And, it's getting ugly in Uncle Sam's gang land. Civil servants are no longer civil. The tone in and around the Beltway changed when the iPhone bust onto the streets. The BlackBerry-iPhone feud is setting a new vibe, pitting cube mate against cube mate, fracturing departments - even dividing families. Who'da guessed fruit could be so divisive? So, who are your homies and what does your gang connection say about you? Well, BlackBerry means business. The Apple means pleasure - hasn't it always? If your boss sees you fooling with your BlackBerry, you're a workaholic. If they see you with your iPhone, you're goofing off. Did you know you can program your DVR at home from an iPhone? Yeah, there's an app for that. The iPhone screams hip and devil-may-care. The BlackBerry whispers stodgy and uptight. Even the iPhone app names say cool - "Urban Spoon" would be "Restaurant Guide" if it were a BlackBerry app. The BlackBerry says muscle. The iPhone says bling. If signal quality, battery life, and durability matter most, bite the Berry. The iPhone leaves the BlackBerry in the dust as an Internet browser. If fast, pretty, and intuitive matter to you, chew on the Apple. In the movies, the piece you pack speaks volumes about you - from Dirty Harry to Bond to Kermit the Frog. The phone is our weapon of choice. And, most of us only have room for one heater in our purse. But, hold the phone - newsflash. There's a special group of renegades who think they can play both sides of the street. Yep, I'm talking 'bout the "two-phoner" crew - double-fist gang sign. These schizos think it's cool to wear a BlackBerry on one hip and pack an iPhone in a pocket - and that never works the other way around. They're lawless types. Don't believe me? Heard one Federal CIO say "I'm married to my BlackBerry, but I'm having an affair with my iPhone." Approach two-phoners with extreme caution. Typical of gang cultures - the feud has created its own language. The "crackberry" - we need to shake America's drug dependence. The BlackBerry "yawn" - when one person checks their phone, so does everybody else. BlackBerry "chin" - aging eyes confront poor font settings. Set to "stun" - new approach to silencing. Do you think people are really laughing out loud when they write LOL? And, what, I hear you ask, about people that opt out of the feud - those that don't like fruit? What about Droiders? The Google gang is new to our 'hood. The Droid says nonconformist. It's too early to tell how these anarchists will fare. Oh, and what about people whose phones aren't smart? Time to hang it up, homie - and shame on you if you bring a knife to a gun fight... |
 Running sprints in the gym. Thought I'd been shot. Achilles' tendon. Snap. Surgery. Six weeks in plaster. Upside. Chance to walk a mile in another person's shoes - or shoe. What's it like to have a disability? No fun. Stairs are not your friend. Curbs are a nuisance. Oh, and wet floors in the bathroom - you might as well stock the pond with piranhas. People mixed. Nearly all have good intentions. More than you'd think are too self absorbed to hold the door. Timing interesting. Telework Exchange, MeriTalk's sister organization, and the Federal Managers Association have a new study on Uncle Sam's performance in hiring Americans with disabilities. Why the focus on such a narrow audience? How many Americans do you think have disabilities? More than I thought. 54.4 million, that's more than one in six of us. In October last year, President Obama asked agencies to lead in hiring and supporting employees with disabilities. So what does the study tell us? Top line, our government needs to do a better job taking its own medicine... Let's look at the numbers. First, 71 percent of Feds say their agencies are committed to hiring employees with disabilities. Eighty-four percent say their agencies offer "reasonable accommodations" to employees with disabilities. But, here comes the failure to hold the door. Half Feds say their agencies lack the tools and training to employ Americans with disabilities. Only half say their agencies offer telework or technical-support options. Less than one quarter offer job share or personal-care assistance. Here's the curb stone. Thirty-six percent of Feds involved in approving new hires or promotions aren't familiar with Schedule A - the hiring waiver that empowers Feds to hire Americans with disabilities. Shockingly, 58 percent aren't familiar with Executive Order 13163 - President Clinton's 2000 executive order which committed the Federal government to hiring 100,000 disabled employees in five years. Forty percent haven't received adequate training to effectively manage employees with disabilities. And, worst of all, here's the wet floor. Forty percent say their agencies aren't monitoring, or they're unsure if they're monitoring progress related to hiring, advancement, and/or retention of employees with disabilities. Forty-four percent don't know who is responsible for hiring, advancement, and/or retention of employees with disabilities in their agency. The bottom line is that today, disabled employees hold just 1 percent of Federal positions - and these employees are leaving Federal service at twice the rate of their hire. According to OPM, there are 2.8 million Federal civilian employees. More than a decade after President Clinton's Executive Order 13163, we have less than 28,000 disabled employees - what happened to the goal of getting to 100,000 in five years? We applaud OPM's recent initiatives in this area. But we need to move beyond behaviors to see a real change in outcomes. If you're interested in hearing what the White House thinks about this topic - and importantly, its plans to get it right - stop by the Telework Exchange Spring Town Hall Meeting on April 8. Kareem Dale, special assistant to the president for disability policy at the White House, will deliver a keynote speech "Reducing Unemployment for People with Disabilities." Mr. Dale will review the study and talk about how Federal telework initiatives can open new doors for Americans with disabilities. And, President Obama certainly has religion about telework and the "flexibility revolution." Wednesday's Forum on Workplace Flexibility at the White House underscored that this administration will not tolerate yesterday's outdated personnel management excuses. The time is now for Federal telework. Register at www.teleworkexchange.com/townhallmeeting. And, if I see you there, thanks in advance for holding the door. |
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Tags: Application Development, Collaboration, Data Center Management, Document Management, Green IT, Health IT, Project Management, Security, Services, Web 2.0, Workforce
 Let’s be honest – if Uncle Sam were in retail, he’d be the DMV – long lines, uncomfortable chairs, “soviet” customer service. Just take a number, pay your money, and shut up. And, here comes “open government,” – Ogov – a learner driver crashing into the Fed service emporium. Yep, President Obama’s “naked-government” sounds sexy – but is the new transparency flattering? You know how people say something nice about folks right before rubbishing them – “Bob could be the world’s best tweeter, but his breath makes his flatulence smell like a rose...?” Well here it goes. Who could fault the notion of Ogov? Sunlight into dark bureaucracy. Transparency to accountability. Monologue to dialogue. Crowdsourcing. Government as a platform. The slogans make me giddy. Now, let’s take a look at the driver’s record. If we take tonnage as our measure of success – as did GM’s drive-train operation in the ‘90s – then Ogov is rockin’. Agencies have been pushing out data like Oldsmobiles off the production line for much of the last year. And production is accelerating. Challenge is, there ain’t no rhyme nor reason to agency emissions. No common format/standards for publishing that allows citizens and businesses to map the data to achieve new insight – this lies at the heart of the government as a platform proposition. And, when you look around, nobody seems to understand the road ahead – we’re dizzy with data without direction. Let’s consider a couple of high-profile Ogov fender benders. First, recovery.gov, the site established by the Stimulus Act that, among other things, promised to publish the compensation of the top five execs from all companies that received ARRA contracts. MeriTalk tried to get to this data late last year. It appears that the information is there. That said, it would take more than 100 hours of programming to extract the data. Less government data at your fingertips – more government data under your fingernails. Second up, OMB’s IT Dashboard – the “evidence-based” performance management system designed to rein in Feds’ spiraling $76 billion IT habit. Scratch the surface, and evidence on this whiz-bang tool is, well, not so whiz bang. When we took a look last year, just 56 percent of the data on IT contracts linked to usaspending.gov. That means almost half of the program data didn’t map back to a government purchase/contract. That made us raise an eyebrow. As we looked at building apps on top of the dashboard – allowing people to pull data by prime contractor, by red program, by sole source, etc. – we soon realized this was a dead end. The net on these programs is the data, or organization of the data, simply is not there to support the Ogov promise – like the Library of Congress without a card catalog. It’s not about pushing out data, nor about the government developing Ogov apps of its own. To win, Uncle Sam needs to consider customer requirements, establish common data formats, and push all of the – legal – data to the public. Empower industry – we’re talking iTunes to OMB’s DMV – to build the apps and turn government into the platform. So, how do we get back on the road? Rather than pile in the car with technocrat drivers, how about we put the experienced drivers behind the wheel – it’s supposed to be about citizen engagement, right? You tell us where Ogov should go. How? Take five minutes to complete the Ogov Survey. Then, in the real spirit of Ogov – you know, collaboration that actually drives outcomes – the results of the survey will power MeriTalk’s testimony at the Senate Open Government hearing on March 23. Your voice alongside testimonies from Vivek Kundra and Aneesh Chopra in front of Senator Carper (D-Del.) and the Subcommittee on Federal Financial Management, Government Information, Federal Services, and International Security. After all, you can’t complain about where we end up if you don’t take the opportunity to drive. Why, you might ask, should you care? This Ogov stuff is your digital emancipation. Let’s build a more perfect union.
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 Moderating an IT working group focused on IT consolidation is like trying to reconcile the Palestinians and the Israelis or negotiate nukes with Nikita Khrushchev. Carrying the scars from moderating a major agency IT consolidation offsite, I know something of how contentious this can get. Everybody wants a better future, but nobody is interested in giving an inch of ground – nor in stopping their build out. You see, while this data center consolidation and cloud stuff all sounds great – and it's in the common good – this is not simply about cutting IT cost. It's about jobs, careers, and prestige. Everybody wants to consolidate other people's resources into their data centers. Nobody's stepping forward to be consolidated. This is truly "out-of-my-cold-dead-hand" stuff ... Now, let's fast forward to OMB's IT Dashboard and ambitious cloud, consolidation, and virtualization plans – the holy trinity of Vivek Kundra's vision for the future. Let's go with this automotive metaphor, dashboards are nice – if they deliver real insight. But at some point we need to lift the hood to unplug excess horsepower – and that means getting your hands dirty dealing with cutting jobs and taking away budget. I refer you back to the disputed territories and the Cold War. Okay, so this consolidation is hard – but how do we know where we are today, and, importantly, if we are making progress? How many data centers does Uncle Sam currently operate? Well, if you listen to OMB, nobody really knows ... this is a tale of data centers multiplying like rabbits. Last fall, Vivek Kundra pegged the population at 932. In the new budget, February 1st, the data center census jumped to 1,100. In his industry 2010 IT budget briefing at NVTC, the Fed CIO raised the stakes again to 1,200 – see page four – Federal data centers. The cynics might say that if your job is to consolidate, the higher the number the easier it is to claim victory – right? Is it just me, or does anybody else think that the Office of Management and Budget should be better at accounting? Just last Friday, OMB announced its new Federal Data Center Consolidation Initiative. It pegs the number of Federal data centers at north of 1,100, but does not give a precise count – so we'll keep on guessing. Interestingly, the memo notes that the number of Federal data centers has increased from 432 in 1998 – rabbits indeed … The memo to the CIO Council designates Richard Spires, DHS CIO, and Michael Duffy, Treasury CIO, as leads for this ambitious program. OMB is right on track with the proposed five-step approach – initial audit, plan, baseline, consolidate, monitor progress. Perhaps you'd like to help OMB with the data center initial audit? Check out the total population of data centers in the United States on this global map of data centers – www.datacentermap.com/. To be clear, this shows all data centers, not Federal data centers. You'll quickly see that there are a lot of them. And, look how many are concentrated in the Mid-Atlantic region ... the drill-down capability is both impressive and overwhelming. Let's applaud OMB for the Federal Data Center Consolidation Initiative – but remember that we were very upbeat about the IT Dashboard at first. It's indisputable that data center consolidation is the real battleground for the war on out of control IT costs. Here's my prescription for cutting IT cost – and at once setting the table for the transition to the cloud: First, OMB needs to get the IT Dashboard in some order. Launched in May of last year, it's still a beta product. There is a clear need to rebuild credibility here. The data sources feeding the dashboard are not good. Even Toyota would have recalled this product by now. It was interesting to see Vivek Kundra focus on the IT Dashboard in this week's Economist the Data Deluge – I would caution against leading with your chin. There are rumors of a 2.0 version – we have high hopes. Second, we should establish a data-rich Federal Data Center Map, beyond a static page – see page four – so that we can get real transparency into the current state of play. This application must show more than geographical location and tech infrastructure. To be effective, it must show budget ownership to drive real change. Third, and critically, we need to establish incentives for consolidation and real penalties for dragging of heels. Experience has demonstrated that mandates alone do not move mountains. Kundra, Spires, and Duffy have a tough road ahead in data center consolidation. Consider the Federal data center owners as Charlton Heston. It's going to take more than buzz phrases and gimmicks to get these weathered veterans to loose their iron grip. - Got an opinion on data center consolidation? Jump into the MeriTalk Data Center Management and Cloud Computing groups and make your voice heard - The solution providers circling the double-headed data center consolidation and cloud opportunity can and should help the Feds out. Collaboration on the development of the Federal Cloud Computing Savings Calculator is an important first step in the required public-private collaboration. Now Feds have a common tool to calculate their potential cloud savings. Next, we need to establish a forum for government and real cloud programs established in the private sector to exchange information – what works and what doesn't. This forum could and should include the data center consolidation dialogue - This is such an important area that MeriTalk is working with industry and government to host two upcoming conferences to stimulate dialogue: - The New IT Economics – 2010 Federal IT Cost Optimization: April 21st at the Newseum - 1,100 – How Many Data Centers Does It Take ...: May 20 at the Reagan Building - Data center consolidation, cloud, and the new IT economics are also on the menu at the MeriTalk Innovation Nation Forum this Thursday at the Reagan Building – register today |
 Is cloud a bubble expectation? Let's be honest, as CIOs circle the jump zone, they are not exactly trampling each other to get to the exit. In fact, if it wasn't for the push from OMB, many agencies would likely skip the "Geronimo experience" and come back down to earth in the enterprise plane.
And, if the sources of information on the last round of OMB passbacks are to be believed – and they should be – the timing for the launch of the calculator may prove serendipitous. Word is that agencies must make an earnest effort to investigate the cloud option before receiving funding, possibly as soon as this October and for certain by FY 2012. To net it out, it's time to cut through the cloud hype. If cloud is really to take off, agencies need to see the business value and weigh the risks. A push strategy is not enough. The calculator allows agencies to better understand the consequences before jumping. The king’s horses and king’s men are both relieved and excited.
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 Who Says Fed IT Ain’t Sexy? |
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Tags: Web 2.0
Time to Flip Twitter the Bird?
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Tags: Web 2.0
Too Many Events, Too Little Time – Stop the Madness As the founder of a series of organizations that put on conferences and events, let me just call it like it is – there are far too many events in Federal IT. Believe it or not, there are more than 500 Fed IT conferences, symposia, forums, colloquia, and plain old fashion boondoggles each year. It’s really no exaggeration to say that you could attend an event every day – and likely eat breakfast, lunch, and dinner free, if you can digest all the side-order sales pitches. One might wonder, if government IT pros are really attending so many events, who’s actually running our nation’s technology infrastructure? Is this why the Chinese have been so effective at penetrating our cyber defenses? So, why are there so many events, how do you work out which events to skip, and how can we cut the fat – figuratively and literally? In fairness, our community has radically changed its communications habits in the last two or three years. The influence of once all-powerful publications has declined – their challenges accelerated by consolidation, Web 2.0, and a little extra “puckish” push from the likes of Dorobek. Other traditional centers of gravity, such as FOSE and IPIC, are ready to heave their last – most of the major IT companies have abandoned these platforms. So, with the old ways of communication in retreat – and Web 2.0 still nascent – that leaves market research and events as the two primary public-private communication conduits. And, so the avalanche of events continues – and I regret that this trend is pointed in only one direction in the short term. Facing this reality, what makes an event worthwhile? First, government IT pros are primarily interested in hearing from their peers. So, more gov speakers means more gov attendees. Point of increasing contention, more govies are asking if it’s right for organizations to charge them to attend events where they listen to other govies speak? Aren’t these organizations effectively making Uncle Sam pay twice? Free for government is the new model. Oh, and don’t discount govies interest in hearing from commercial IT pros that have already confronted parallel challenges/opportunities – read Fortune 500 cloud and cyber security case studies. Last, but not least, don’t forget that govies are people too – a little levity and entertainment goes a long way. Please hold the “more with less” language and photographs of the Capitol building, flag, and bald eagle – they are both dull and patronizing. Okay, here’s the part where you get to stop the madness. Go to http://www.meritalk.com/calendar.php to view hundreds, and potentially thousands, of gov IT events. Point and click to find the events that really interest you – sort by date, segment of government, tech topic, geographic location, programs that offer government training credits, and physical vs. online. You can also buy your airline tickets and book your hotel. While your boss doesn’t need to know, you can even see which conferences have golf tournaments or wine tastings. And, most important, you can rate the events – one star to five stars – and submit your comments. So now you can really differentiate the good, the bad, and the ugly. Oh, and it’s all open to you, so you can submit your own events for free if you’re prepared to see how they measure up. Take a stand against the Fed IT conference epidemic – vote with your cursor and stop the madness. |
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Tags: Security
On October 29th, Senator Tom Carper’s (D-Del.) Subcommittee on Federal Financial Management, Government Information, Federal Services and International Security held a hearing on FISMA reform. The panel of speakers included:
MeriTalk provided the following report to the committee. The report reveals that of the $6.2 billion that the Federal government spent on cyber defense in 2008, it spent some $1.31 billion on FISMA Certification and Accreditation (C&A) paperwork. In addition, it details the results of a Federal CISO survey regarding FISMA C&A paperwork. To read Steve O’Keeffe's blog on FISMA go to http://meritalk.com/blog.php?user=SteveOKeeffe&blogentry_id=1520.
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Tags: Security
As schoolboys, growing up in London in the ‘80s, we’d sing “I’d like to teach the PTA to blow up all the schools” to the tune of the Coca-Cola advertisement “I’d like to teach the world to sing.” We’d skulk and smoke behind the bicycle sheds and kick the can down the road in the rain. It was the worst day of the year – report cards. So Federal CISOs, I think many of us can sympathize with you about the FISMA thing. The bickering over FISMA has persisted since it was introduced in the E-Gov Act of 2002. Do the grades really provide any insight into the actual security of agencies’ information? Is the grading process fair? Does the IG properly understand the IT function? Is there any relationship between agencies’ security grades and their security budget – or for that matter between their FISMA grades and their overall IT budget? To net it out, is this a paper exercise that has no impact on agencies’ security and would the time and funding dedicated to FISMA be better spent elsewhere? All good questions, but despite numerous studies based on interviews with Federal CISOs that have shown that the process is significantly flawed – www.merlin-intl.com/IAstudy.asp – FISMA continues to limp onward. Agencies are required to complete the testing even though Capitol Hill – the primary audience – has long since lost interest in the results. In fact, Tom Davis was the last public official to pay any attention to the FISMA grades – and that was more than two years ago. In 2007, the last time Davis announced the grades, it did not even warrant a house hearing – he called a press conference at the Center for Innovative Technology in Virginia – http://pcworld.about.com/od/researchreports/Survey-Gov-t-CISOs-say-FISMA.htm. Certainly, all of this is interesting bar-room conversation – and, to be sure, many of us have adopted pro and con FISMA positions over pints – but, how do you get to an up or down decision? What if you heard that of the $6.2 billion that the Federal government spent on cyber defense in 2008, it spent some $1.31 billion on FISMA Certification and Accreditation – C&A – paperwork? Would that cost epiphany make you see the light? Let’s put that number in some additional context, that’s more than the GDP of Samoa, Tonga, and East Timor combined, or put another way 21.1 percent of our nation’s cyber security spending. To clarify, we are not saying that it’s not important to establish metrics for measuring performance, but does it make sense to spend almost one quarter of your cyber security budget on generating FISMA paperwork? And, does the paperwork make us any safer? By all reports, the temperature of the cyber security “inferno” keeps getting hotter. So, that would be like fireman devoting 15 minutes out of every hour to reporting while the Capitol building is ablaze – even Nero would shake his head… Here’s the rationale for the calculation of the cost of FISMA across the Federal government: According to OMB’s Fiscal Year 2008 Report to Congress on Implementation of the Federal Information Security Management Act of 2002 – http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/assets/reports/fy2008_fisma.pdf – the population of Federal systems is 10,257. The breakdown against the three FISMA system C&A categories is 1,143, high; 3,924, moderate; 4,507, low; with 683 “not categorized.” Based on interaction with Federal CISOs on cost associated with executing each C&A against these specific FISMA system categories, the prices are as follows: $193,205, high; $167,643, moderate; $74,057, low. We took an average across the three FISMA system categories’ C&A costs and applied it to the population of “not categorized” systems to monetize the dangling element. And, for those of you scoring at home, here’s the math, or maths as we said at school: High 1,143 x $193,205 = $220,833,315 Moderate 3,924 x $167,643 = $657,831,132 Low 4,507 x $74,057 = $333,774,899 Other 683 x $144,968 = $99,013,144 Total: 10,257 $1,311,452,490 Consistent with President Obama’s transparency mantra, isn’t it time to show the cost of the process? While there have been various discussions about FISMA reform, none to date have come to much. Next week, on October 29th, Senator Tom Carper’s (D-Del.) Subcommittee on Federal Financial Management, Government Information, Federal Services and International Security will hold a hearing on FISMA reform. The panel of speakers includes Vivek Kundra, the Federal CIO at OMB; John Streufert, Deputy CIO and CISO at the State Department; Greg Wilshusen, Director of Information Security Issues at GAO; and Tom Davis, former Congressman, long-time Federal IT and cyber security advocate, now with Deloitte. Word on the street is that Streufert will talk about how State Department has moved to a more proactive posture at next week’s hearing – shifting funding from C&A to automated continuous monitoring. The government IT community is keenly interested in next week’s testimony – and more importantly in the potential for change. Clearly it’s time to wrestle this paper tiger to the ground – to reinvent Federal cyber security as a proactive discipline. How about establishing an automated security managed services program across the Federal government that provides common defenses and automatically reports penetration incidents and data loss? Or perhaps taking a spoonful of the medicine that the Hill is feeding to the private sector by establishing government liability for security breaches and making the agency CEO – the cabinet secretary – accountable? Let me be clear, CISOs we hear you loud and clear, it’s time for the FISMA beatings to stop. Oh, and off the record, I’ll let you in on a little secret of my own – those questionable report cards of mine in the ‘80s didn’t have any bearing on my performance in the real world either.
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Back in college, ballroom dancing was the largest club on campus – but, ask as I might, I could never find a single student who’d admit even a passing interest in the rumba. Let’s cha-cha forward some 20 years and government managers who oppose telework are like the ballroom dancing aficionados in college – we know there are a lot of you, but nobody wants to raise their hand. Telework is certainly not a new craze in government. In fact, Uncle Sam has spent decades trying to get his distributed workforce groove on – yes, that’s telework in leg warmers for those scoring at home. And, despite hill legislation, the $4 gallon, bird flu, piggy flu, hurricane planning, green imperatives, cloud enablement, traffic gridlock, and plagues of frogs – please excuse the artistic license – many agencies still have two left feet in telework. Considering its mission, how can EPA continue to sit out at the dance? When will wall flowers like SSA, HHS, State, and DHS pluck up the courage to unleash their moves? Against this awkward backdrop, is there any hope that regular Feds will get to dance cheek to cheek with telework? Despite the false starts, and the slander of the Department of Veterans Affairs laptop going missing – the employee was not a teleworker – there is new fight in this ‘80s glam gal. In fact, a series of agencies are getting hip to workforce empowerment. DoD, with DISA keeping time, is marching with a telework cadence. BRAC relocation, and pointedly, its impact on the civilian workforce, is turning all branches of the military into telework swingers. PTO, FDIC, and GAO have the telework jitterbug – in fact, PTO may have invented the dance. And, let’s not forget GSA. While GSA OGP kept the telework flame alive through the dark years, it was the late, great Lurita Doan who reignited the fire two years ago – establishing the GSA Telework Challenge. Today, 43 percent of eligible GSA workers do the telework jig. GSA is now tangoing with OPM in the middle of the Federal telework dance floor. The recent arrival of new OPM director John Berry – the man who pledged to put the “giddy-yap” into Federal telework – has sent the topic to the top of the Federal HR hit parade. The Hill and agencies are a buzz with praise for the new cats at OPM. And, outside the Beltway, states are clicking their fingers to the telework beat. Earlier this month, Virginia’s Governor, Tim Kaine, announced the results of the Commonwealth’s first annual statewide Telework Day initiative. Based on the Virginia Telework Day study figures, if all U.S. white-collar workers teleworked just one day per week for a year, we'd avoid driving some 134 billion miles, cut 120 million tons of pollutants, and save a staggering $161.5 billion – yes, that’s American money. Oh, and support for telework comes all the way from the band leader himself. In addition to being the world's highest profile teleworker, President Obama pledged his support for remote work practices across government in writing to the AFGE – “I believe that it’s time we stopped talking about family values and start pursuing policies that truly value families, such as paid family leave, flexible work schedules, and telework, with the Federal government leading by example.” And, more than lip service, more than 400 Feds gathered to listen to OPM’s John Berry, and Aneesh Chopra, CTO OSTP at EOP – long-time telework advocate – cut a rug together at the recent Telework Exchange Town Hall Meeting www.teleworkexchange.com/townhallmeeting.
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