Homeland Security tries new approach to IT collaboration

Williamsburg, Va. -- The Homeland Security Department is trying a new management model to encourage its component agencies to work more harmoniously on information technology projects, the department's chief information officer said on Monday.

The approach, called enterprise governance, involves bringing together DHS agencies with similar responsibilities and having them collaborate on IT systems, according to CIO Richard Spires. For instance, right now there are nearly 50 systems for screening people coming to and leaving the United States. Under the new setup, agencies involved in screening, including the Transportation Security Administration, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and Customs and Border Protection, would work together on streamlining technology.

"You need [to be] where everybody gets on the same page," Spires said during the 2010 American Council for Technology/Industry Advisory Council's Executive Leadership Conference. "If they get to know each other and they start to understand each other's issues, like in screening, they can come together in a way that's very powerful."

He added he is bringing together leaders of component agencies, including DHS headquarters, to work on consolidating human resources systems. The leaders are meeting regularly and have developed a full inventory of technology related to HR. Now the group is laying out where it wants to be in five years.

"They view this as a forum, as a way to . . . collaborate," Spires said.

Enterprise governance will help DHS improve its execution of technology projects and ensure "good decision-making mechanisms [are] in place so we know how to spend the next dollar efficiently," he said.

The department "just [does] not run programs very well," he noted. "We have systemic weaknesses on how we run programs; we don't have good best practices across the board," he added.

The problem dates back to the founding of Homeland Security, according to Spires. "We haven't been able to break down ... stovepipes" among the 22 entities that formed the department, he said.

"If I go in and build a community and [they] are meeting on a continuing basis and working on shared outcomes . . . people's behavior starts to change," he said. "It won't happen instantly, but over a year, two years, I've seen a fundamental change."