Steven VanRoekel
Steven VanRoekel, the Federal Chief Information Officer in the White House Office of Management and Budget (OBM), wrote an opinion piece for Politico about the government’s goal of cutting waste in technology. VanRoekel says that the government has done a significant job in the last two years but “is not nearly finished.”
VanRoekel identifies the big questions as “How do we achieve the seemingly disparate goals of reducing costs yet investing to achieve more?” He answer that question with four simple words, investing in IT spending. VanRoekel explains how the private sector has yielded huge gains in productivity while reducing costs by making investments in IT spending.
VanRoekel’s Bottom Line: “IT is a tool by which you can save other costs. Investing in IT can bring you productivity gains and offset other costs. This allows organizations — private and public — to do what we need most in challenging environments, to do more with less,” said VanRoekel.
According to VanRoekel the older ways of investing will not work. He explains that to succeed we need to change the ways we purchase IT and to do this Congress will need to tear down some older walls that restricts IT investments. “Only by doing this can we deliver the government that the public deserves,” said VanRoekel.
