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Weathering Transitions

"People who are careerists are running a marathon. The folks coming in are running a sprint, and the orientation of those two groups is very different"

New Yorkers, along with voters from more than 30 other states, will elect a new governor in November. CIO Michael Mittleman and others, who attended the CIO Leadership Summit September 25 in Albany, N.Y., are acutely aware of what that can mean to the best laid plans of IT.

Dr. Michael Mittleman
But Mittleman was upbeat, saying the New York CIO council had addressed fundamentals in its work, and was not based on personality. Mittleman was proud of the CIO council's work product, saying it was a "smashing, Hall-of-Fame effort" and joked that California CIO Clark Kelso had read the resulting plan and was "ready to take the test."

New York -- unlike most of the 35 other states with November gubernatorial races -- is assured of change, as Gov. George Pataki has said he will not run again. Pataki has budgeted for transition and already assembled a transition team, so in some respects the state has the advantage of time to plan. A show of hands in the Summit gave evidence that many CIO council members and others are preparing their own transition plans.

Monday's CIO Leadership Summit panelists -- Kelso; former New York City CIO Gino Menchini; Nancy Mulholland, former deputy executive secretary of the NY State Workers Compensation Board; and former Kentucky CIO and NASCIO president Aldona Valicenti -- have all survived transitions of one kind or another, and they shared their war stories.

Living in a Fish Bowl
Aldona Valicenti said major issues that won't go away include Medicaid, a growing prison population and retirement funding issues. In addition, the Real ID act that was passed, will cost an estimated $11 billion, according to a recently released report from the National Governors' Association, the National Conference of State Legislatures and the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators. "These are the challenges," she said, "and they won't go away. Most governors do believe that technology implementations will help mitigate some of the budget issues."

Valicenti said her transition from the private to public sectors was quite a shock. "I came from the private sector, then moved to Kentucky," she said. She thought she had the "moxie" to handle almost any job, but had never experienced dealing with a legislature, with the press, with the judicial branch and, within the first few weeks, she was expected to do just that.

"In the private sector you are shielded from the press, the press office handles that," she said. "I thought nobody was going to be interested in IT stuff, and I couldn't have been more wrong. They were interested in failures, what we were going to do next, etc. You have to remind yourself you are spending tax dollars." To remind herself, she kept a fish bowl in her office.

And finally, she said, new administrations bring young bright people, that are not necessarily long on experience. "The governor's son had an IT company, and was wiring the Governor's Office and deciding what IT systems should be there," she said. There was nothing improper, she said, as he was doing it for a dollar a year. But what could have turned into a nightmare didn't. "He was a reasonable fellow, but had no experience in managing systems in child support, etc. We got to be friends, and we are still friends today," she said.

Don't Hide Problems
Nancy Mulholland said she was involved in the change of administration in New York in 1995. "I was at the Workers Compensation Board, on senior staff, working on a large modernization program that got some bad press." Worried that the new administration might have some preconceived ideas about what directions they should be taking, she began trying to

educate the new administration, and the Board. "We needed to understand the new administration's goals, reorient our thinking, and give them a program they could support."

One problem with the transition, she said, was that transition activities were almost exclusively conducted at the appointee level -- the civil service people were not included in the discussions. "We put together briefings, got on their calendars on day one or two and briefed them on IT services, ongoing programs and projects."

An important point, she said was not trying to hide problems. That established credibility, and presented solutions and options. "Within three months," she said, "we had the go ahead getting key decisions, and delivered the results before the next election cycle.

"People who are careerists are running a marathon," she said. "The folks coming in are running a sprint, and the orientation of those two groups is very different."

Basic Principles
"I was the only senior advisor to Governor Gray Davis that was retained by Governor Schwarzenegger in 2003," said California CIO Clark Kelso, who survived the transition from a Democratic governor to a Republican.

The principles of managing transitions apply to any transition, Kelso said. "The basic rule is the Darwinian principle: 'adapt or die.' You can't avoid transitions, but you can influence them. Treat them like any other change management process. Your job is to lead the organization to something new."

Kelso pointed out that key steps include understanding the likely changes, where they new administration might be trying to go. Once you understand the change, exercise your own leadership skills to prepare yourself and your staff for change. "Be active, be engaged," he said. "Think about how you can engage key stakeholders and handle opposition. Spread the change message, bring all your humor, etc. into the change.

"You have to deliver bad news as bad news," said Kelso to a question from the audience. "Real ID is coming at you, deadlines are totally unrealistic, if it blows up, it's on their watch, so they need to know the good and bad, and they are coming in wanting to add to the good, but they need to know what needs to be managed.

"In my transition document," he said, "I listed out serious problem areas." Kelso said a child-support project had problems, with heavy penalties on the state for non-compliance. "You certainly don't want to hide that from the new administration.

"New governors bring advisors," said Kelso, "and one of those will claim IT as their issue." You may end up working with a mid-level staffer who thinks they know more about IT than you do, and they are closer to the incoming governor than you are, and so they have authority. That can be very challenging," said Kelso. "Remain open and respectful, be as helpful as you can." Even so, he said, you may be replaced. "Professional life is not about us," he said, "it's about the organization, and whether the momentum of progress can be maintained."

Concerns, Concerns
To end off the Summit, the audience was polled on a number of questions. "What gives you the most concern about the upcoming transition?" was answered "Having to start all over again with new leadership (46 percent). Second was "Lack of focus by the administration at the end" (24 percent.)

The question "What should the number one priority be for the new administration?" was answered by: "Stronger connection between program and technology (55 percent); Collaboration (16 percent) and enterprise projects (12 percent).

The CIO Leadership Summit was held in conjunction with GTC East and sponsored by CA, IBM, Oracle and SAS.
Wayne E. Hanson served as a writer and editor with e.Republic from 1989 to 2013, having worked for several business units including Government Technology magazine, the Center for Digital Government, Governing, and Digital Communities. Hanson was a juror from 1999 to 2004 with the Stockholm Challenge and Global Junior Challenge competitions in information technology and education.