This blog post was originally posted on the White House blog on December 13, 2017.
Today we delivered the final Federal IT Modernization Report (in response to EO 13800).
The report is a key piece in this Administration’s efforts to modernize Federal IT. The actions articulated in the report will compliment Agency efforts to modernize citizen facing services – by moving to a more secure, agile, and cost effective infrastructure, much of which will be provided by shared services.
We utilized an open and transparent process in developing the IT Modernization plan in order to maximize feedback from industry. For example, EO 13800 informed questions that we posed to industry in the cybersecurity breakout session from the June CEO listening session that we held with a number of leading technology companies. The thought-provoking ideas shared by these CEOs helped us to look at the problem more broadly, and this helped to drive the decision to release the report for broad public feedback.
More than 100 companies and individuals submitted comments during the three week public comment period. The comments offered diverse (and at times conflicting) suggestions, and ranged from strategic thoughts to detailed implementation guidance. Changes were made throughout the report, and a high-level summary of major areas touched on by comments received has been added to the report as appendix G. All comments received along with the final version of the Federal IT Modernization Report are publicly posted at https://itmodernization.cio.gov. 1 January, 2018 will be used as the start date for the report’s action plan.
Both the report and our modernization efforts themselves have benefited significantly from the great feedback that we have received. Overall, the comments reaffirmed the importance of modernizing Federal IT, and validated that the proposed approach is on the right track.
We look forward to continued engagement with industry as agencies accelerate their modernization activities, and would like to thank industry participants for their willingness to contribute to this critical issue for our country.
Chris Liddell is the Director of the White House’s American Technology Council and Jack Wilmer is a Senior Policy Advisor with OSTP.
