Georgia IT Leaders: ‘Cloud Is the Direction We’re Going In’

Dmitry Kagansky is relatively new to the role of chief technology officer for the state of Georgia, having been named just last month to replace Steve Nichols, who held the position for two decades. But before taking over as CTO, Kagansky was the state’s cloud architect.

However, Kagansky revealed to GovTech at the NASCIO conference earlier this month that the Georgia Technology Authority (GTA) does not plan to backfill his former position. Rather, the whole organization is joining in on the journey to the cloud.

“[State CIO] Shawnzia [Thomas] and I both wanted to convey the message to everyone, other agencies, to our partners, that cloud is the direction we’re going in,” Kagansky said.

And though that trajectory brings with it some significant technical work, what’s even more pressing for Kagansky is to equip the state’s IT workforce with the necessary skills to support that direction.



And the state’s progress in developing in-house cloud expertise supports Kagansky’s desire to foster even more forward momentum by establishing a cloud center of excellence in 2023. Technical staff at GTA as well as the agencies will convene to discuss lessons learned and advance good practices for future cloud migrations.



“This is where we would go and start grouping all those people together … and talk about what a statewide group of standards looks like for running things in the cloud,” he said.