Recap of 2011 NASCIO Midyear Conference

INPUT Analyst Erin Brady reports on last week’s NASCIO conference.

I had the opportunity to attend the 2011 National Association of State Chief Information Officers (NASCIO) Midyear Conference on May 5 and 6, 2011. It was a wonderful opportunity to meet with vendors and state chief information officers and hear their take on past, current, and future technology undertakings.

The keynote address was given by John O’Leary, a research fellow at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government and coauthor of “If We Can Put a Man on the Moon: Getting Big Things Done in Government.” O’Leary spoke of the challenges in achieving goals in government, specifically in the IT space. He addressed several problems that keep technology initiatives from succeeding, including the fact that government policies and practices have not kept pace with technology. He also noted the possibility of failure is not taken seriously. Following the keynote address was a general session titled “New Leadership Priorities: Moving Beyond the Magic 8 Ball.”

For the complete, go here.