Top CIOs to Watch in 2020

Vasili Ikonomidis

Vice President & Chief Information Officer, NCI Information Systems, Inc.

Vasili Ikonomidis was less than a year into his role as chief information officer with NCI when the first wave of COVID-19 hit the U.S. The pandemic required swift action to shift NCI employees, both customer facing and corporate, as well as some customer programs to a remote workforce. A lot of work had to be done in a short period of time, including rolling out newer technology tools and implementing tighter security controls to combat the increase in cyberthreats targeting teleworkers.

While that approach required a realignment in resources initially, Ikonomidis and his team knew what it takes to securely and efficiently transition networks and migrate systems — having shut down and relocated two unique networks NCI manages (the company’s internal network and one it hosts for a government agency) within the past year.

In addition, the CIO team stayed on track to implement an enterprisewide service management solution. Leveraging ServiceNow across NCI’s finance, HR, IT and business development teams will facilitate cross-enterprise functions, removing siloed applications while modernizing systems, tools and processes. And later this year, the CIO organization will migrate NCI’s internal network from a physical data center to Microsoft Azure.

What Ikonomidis said he finds most significant about all of these changes is the cost savings of about $3 million yearly as well as the continual service improvement and efficiencies.

“We’re already seeing tremendous benefits and efficiencies as a direct result of moving from a manual process approach to a digital/automation process through ServiceNow, which is coupled with our own robust artificial intelligence offerings and capabilities,” he added. “It’s truly exciting to watch first-hand the enabling and game-changing technology that AI is when combined with human power.”

Why Watch

For the rest of 2020 and into 2021, a major priority for Ikonomidis and his team will be boosting the company’s security posture and readiness for its Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification.

“Our CIO organization has done an exceptional job of evaluating the best solutions, implementing new tools, educating our users about cyber risks and updating processes and policies — all of which demonstrate NCI’s integrity and commitment to the Department of Defense and other government agencies that we have the right cybersecurity controls in place and can be valued as a trusted partner,” he added.