Federal CIO Clare Martorana: Government Should Serve as Blueprint for Diverse, Equitable Service
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Federal CIO Clare Martorana: Government Should Serve as Blueprint for Diverse, Equitable Service

Clare Martorana, federal chief information officer, said the government must serve as the blueprint for a diverse, equitable and accessible service that treats employees with dignity and respect, NextGov reported Wednesday.

Speaking during an event of the American Council for Technology & Industry Advisory Council, the federal CIO said it is the job of the information technology team to ensure a seamless and secure customer experience for the citizens. 

“When we don’t meet their expectations, it actually undermines their trust in government. We undermine trust both in our competence and the extent to which we understand and care about those in need of our service,” she said.

The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) has recently updated its Circular A-11 Section 280, which guides agencies on the implementation of the federal government’s customer experience framework. 

Earlier in May, OMB sought input from various stakeholders on how the agency’s policies, programs and services can provide equitable services to all individuals, particularly the historically underserved communities. 

This move came after President Biden on his first day at the White House signed an executive order aimed at advancing racial equity and assisting underserved communities through the federal government.

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Boeing Names Ziad Ojakli to EVP, Government Operations; CEO David Calhoun Quoted
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Boeing Names Ziad Ojakli to EVP, Government Operations; CEO David Calhoun Quoted

The Boeing Company announced Thursday that Ziad S. Ojakli, former principal deputy for legislative affairs under President George W. Bush, has been named as the company’s executive vice president of government operations.

In his new role, effective October 1, 2021, Ojakli will serve as chief lobbyist for the global enterprise and oversee the company’s philanthropic organization, Boeing Global Engagement. Ojakli will serve on Boeing’s Executive Council and report to President and CEO, David Calhoun.

Calhoun welcomed Ojakli to the new role and said the new executive’s proven track record in public policy and government relations will be an asset to the company’s mission.

“His broad experience serving in executive roles in government and the private sector will contribute to our engagement with our stakeholders as we continue our focus on safety, quality and transparency, and transforming our company for the future,” Calhoun continued.

In addition, Calhoun thanked Marc Allen for his service and “impactful leadership” as interim executive vice president of government operations.

Ojakli brings over 25 years of diverse experience in global government relations roles to his new position at Boeing. He previously served as managing partner and senior vice president of Softbank, where he created the investment company’s first global government affairs operation, and as group vice president at Ford Motor Company, where he led global business efforts and directed the company’s philanthropic efforts.

Prior to that, Ojakli held chief of staff and policy director roles for U.S. Senator Paul Coverdell. 

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Deltek Expands GovWin IQ Coverage to Canada, Offers Centralized GovCon Platform; Dan Duguay Quoted
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Deltek Expands GovWin IQ Coverage to Canada, Offers Centralized GovCon Platform; Dan Duguay Quoted

Deltek’s government contracting marketing intelligence platform, GovWin IQ, has expanded its coverage to include the Canadian government, allowing contractors to centralize business development and marketing research across the U.S. and Canada into one platform.

Canadian public sector procurement is valued at $200 billion annually, and GovWin IQ will leverage data sets, sources, market analysts and industry experts to create an accurate view of all government procurement opportunities.

“Businesses have been historically challenged to maximize growth when serving Canada’s public sector market – largely due to the fragmented nature of public sector spending across federal, provincial and municipal levels of government,” said Dan Duguay, senior associate & Government Procurement Team member for Tactix Government Relations.

Findings from Deltek’s recent customer survey concluded that government contractors working with Canada’s public sector are dissatisfied by the segmentation of data across multiple channels. 

Duguay explained that GovWin IQ’s expansion will boost growth for companies that work with or are looking to work with Canada’s public sector markets by providing previously unavailable insights and market intelligence on the new centralized platform.

GovWin IQ now provides coverage of bids, tenders and amendments for crown corporations, provincial governments, federal government departments and agencies, territories and municipal governments, academic institutes, schools and health & social entities (MASH).

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Lori Ortega and Matt Kittrell Named to CGI Knoxville Center Leadership Team
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Lori Ortega and Matt Kittrell Named to CGI Knoxville Center Leadership Team

Lori Ortega and Matt Kittrell have been selected to lead the federal and commercial operations, respectively, of CGI’s newly opened technology center in Knoxville, Tennessee.

Vice President of CGI’s U.S. Centers, Will LaBar, expressed his excitement in welcoming the two industry leaders to the center’s team.

“Their experience and leadership, along with their Knoxville ties, puts us in a strong position to reach our goals for the Knoxville Center and maximize the impact of our partnerships across the community,” LaBar added.

CGI veteran Lori Ortega brings three decades of leadership experience to her new role, including 12 years at CGI Federal working in program and IT portfolio management, strategy development and business operations for space and government health agency clients.

“I value the success CGI has had in other communities where we’ve established technology centers and I’m committed to replicating that success in Knoxville, providing opportunities for the community’s students, graduates and professionals,” said Ortega.

In Kittrell’s new role, he will focus on service delivery for CGI’s Commercial and State Government clients and will build community development partnerships in the Knoxville area. He brings over 20 years of experience in business services and management consulting to CGI and holds an MBA from the University of Tennessee.

Kittrell looks forward to collaborating with local talent and said his Knoxville team has already “hit the ground running” with community engagement and work through the company’s STEM@CGI program.

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House Committee Votes to Pass $865M Funding Boost for CISA; Rep. Jim Langevin Quoted
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House Committee Votes to Pass $865M Funding Boost for CISA; Rep. Jim Langevin Quoted

The House of Representatives' committee on homeland security has voted to approve an amendment that adds $865 million to the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency's funds, Nextgov reported Wednesday.

Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., presented the amendment to a $3.5 trillion reconciliation bill, which would boost CISA's cybersecurity funds if passed.

“Thanks to President Biden and Chairman Thompson’s visionary leadership, the Homeland Security Committee is proactively equipping the experts at CISA with the tools they need to strengthen our cyber defenses and continue to Build Back Better," said Rep. Jim Langevin, D-R.I.

The proposed amendment responds to a number of cybersecurity attacks witnessed by the country over the past years. The vote also follows the appointment of  Kiersten Todt, formerly executive director of a cybersecurity commission under Barack Obama, as CISA's chief of staff.

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Charles River Analytics Wins $16M DARPA Contract for Protective Biosystems Research
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Charles River Analytics Wins $16M DARPA Contract for Protective Biosystems Research

Charles River Analytics announced Thursday that the company has secured a potential five-year $16 million contract with the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) to lead research efforts focused on developing a biosystem solution to protect warfighters from biological and chemical threats.

The contract will allow Charles River Analytics to lead a team of partners in collaboration on DARPA’s Personalized Protective Biosystem (PPB) program to develop technology that will reduce the need for cumbersome protective equipment and neutralize threats at vulnerable internal tissue barriers while bolstering individual protection against biological attacks.

Charles River Analytics President, Karen Harper, noted that this milestone award is the company’s first with DARPA’s Biological Technologies Office.

The company’s work with the PPB program will explore the use of new transgenic commensal organisms, such as hookworms and schistosomes, to secrete neurotoxins which will target and help neutralize chemical and biological threats.

Dr. Bethany Bracken, principal scientist at Charles River Analytics and contract project lead, said these organisms “have sophisticated secretory systems that can be manipulated to provide immunotherapies to protect our women and men on the battlefield.”

“Our goal is to insert a genetic sequence that provides the managed protection that the human body needs to counter these biological threats,” Dr. Bracken continued.

The team of subtractors on this project will include Baylor College of Medicine, George Washington University, James Cook University, Leiden University Medical Center, University of California, Irvine and Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis.

“Our team spans four countries and 14 time zones to include the world’s foremost experts on hookworms and schistosomes,” said Vice President and Principal Scientist at Charles River Analytics and Program Manager for the PPB effort, Rich Wronski.

Wronski expressed his enthusiasm about the collaboration, noting that the project’s findings will bring innovative protective measures to warfighters and the larger medical community.

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Labor Department Announces Minimum Wage Rate Change for Federal Contract Workers
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Labor Department Announces Minimum Wage Rate Change for Federal Contract Workers

The Department of Labor has announced that the minimum wage of employees working on federal contracts covered by an executive order signed in 2014 will increase from $10.95 to $11.25 per hour starting Jan. 1, 2022.

The department said in a Federal Register notice posted Wednesday that tipped workers will get a minimum wage of $7.90 per hour starting January in compliance with the Obama administration’s executive order.

For federal contracts that are entered into, extended or renewed on or after Jan. 30, 2022, contractors will be required to pay employees working on such contracts a minimum wage of $15 per hour in accordance with President Biden’s executive order signed in April.

In July, DOL proposed rules to implement the current administration’s order, which will extend the new minimum pay to federal contract employees with disabilities and phase out the tipped minimum wage by 2024.

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Gen. Paul Nakasone on Cybersecurity, Foreign Election Interference
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Gen. Paul Nakasone on Cybersecurity, Foreign Election Interference

Gen. Paul Nakasone, head of U.S. Cyber Command and a 2021 Wash100 Award recipient, said cybersecurity is national security and opens up a “new strategic environment of competition,” Signal Magazine reported Wednesday. 

“Competition in the sense of our adversaries, near-peer adversaries, that are looking at being able to operate below the level of armed conflict to do a number of different activities, conducting strategic campaigns against our nation in areas such as cyber security or influence or other areas that impact our economy,” Nakasone said Tuesday at an event.

Cybercom is now preparing to ensure the security of the 2022 midterm elections and Nakasone discussed how the command works to counter cyber threats as more countries attempt to interfere with U.S. democratic processes.

“What has changed with influence in regard to the elections, first of all, there is more than one adversary,” he said. “It began with just the Russians, and now it is the Russians, the Chinese, the Iranians, it is a number of different actors.

Nakasone said the command is working to gather information on threat actors and facilitate data sharing with partner agencies.

“In terms of 2022, our focus right now is obviously being able to generate the insights of what adversaries are doing and who might be doing that. [That focus] will move very, very quickly to being able to share that information with a broad range of partners,” he noted.

Cybersecurity in National Security Summit

Puesh Kumar of the Department of Energy (DOE), MG Maria Barrett of the U.S. Army Cyber Command and CISA Director Lt. Gen. Robert Skinner will serve as keynote speakers during GovCon Wire Events' Cybersecurity in National Security Summit on Tuesday, Sept. 21st to address the threats to our critical IT infrastructure, the major initiatives bolstering the DOD’s cybersecurity and the opportunities for private industry to support the federal government’s cybersecurity objectives.

Visit the GovCon Wire Events page to register for the Cybersecurity in National Security Summit on Sept. 21st.

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Ram Iyer on AI as Part of FDA’s Data Strategy
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Ram Iyer on AI as Part of FDA’s Data Strategy

Ram Iyer, chief data officer at the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), said FDA embeds artificial intelligence into its overall data strategy as the agency sees opportunities to use AI and data in its core operations.

Iyer told Beena Ammanath, executive director of the Deloitte AI Institute, in an interview published Wednesday on The Wall Street Journal about the factors FDA considers when it comes to building an AI-ready workforce.

“When it comes to developing an AI-ready workforce, we want people who keep user needs in front of the design, not as an afterthought. We will even train people on how to ask good questions,” Iyer said.

He also highlighted the importance of establishing trust and emphasizing ease of use when it comes to AI.

“AI relies on the readiness of data, the feature selection, the user experience, and the operationalization of the entire function. Keeping these factors in mind, at the FDA we run experiments and constantly improve,” he noted.

Iyer also discussed the agency’s Data Modernization Action Plan and its three pillars: driver projects, data practices and the right talent.

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Amentum Selected for GSA’s ASTRO IDIQ; CEO John Vollmer Quoted
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Amentum Selected for GSA’s ASTRO IDIQ; CEO John Vollmer Quoted

Amentum, a leading federal defense contractor, announced Wednesday that the company has been selected for nine pools on the General Service Administration’s multiagency, multiple-award, indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity ASTRO contract to provide mission support for the Department of Defense and other federal agencies.

“We look forward to offering our technological services to help maintain and sustain our nation’s manned, unmanned, and optionally manned systems,” said Amentum CEO and six-time Wash100 Award recipient, John Vollmer. 

The ASTRO IDIQ is a master contract umbrella consisting of individual, multiple-award IDIQ contracts, or pools, administered through GSA, covering a scope of products and services focused on the development, integration, operation, maintenance and support of various platforms including unmanned systems and robotics.

Under the potential ten-year, multi-billion dollar IDIQ contract, Amentum’s work will span nine ASTRO pools including Data Operations, Mission Operations, Aviation, Ground, Space, Maritime, Development and Systems Integration, Support and Training. 

Amentum’s Executive Vice President of Strategic Growth, Ron Hahn, commented, “Amentum’s extensive experience in robotics and unmanned vehicles combined with our expertise in data operations, systems integration, training, and systems modernization/sustainment make ASTRO a perfect fit for us to continue to support the warfighter.”

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