Gilligan is new Air Force CIO

John Gilligan, former chief information officer at the Energy Department and most recently deputy CIO for the Air Force, last month was promoted to CIO of the service.

Gilligan took over as CIO on Nov. 16, according to his office, but there has been no public announcement of the move. Gilligan was unavailable to comment for this story.

The Air Force created a new position — principal deputy assistant secretary for business and information management and deputy chief CIO — for Gilligan in September 2000, partly because the Air Force CIO at the time, Lawrence Delaney, and his deputy were wearing too many hats to sufficiently focus on the CIO job.

When accepting that new position, Gilligan became responsible for fulfilling the day-to-day CIO duties and had control of the Air Force's multibillion-dollar information technology budget. Gilligan had previous Air Force experience, having been the program executive officer for battle management; deputy chief of staff for command, control, communications and computers; director of C4; and director of studies and analysis, among other positions within the service.

He has received numerous accolades during his government tenure, including the Joint Chiefs of Staff Distinguished Civilian Service Medal and the Presidential Distinguished Executive Rank Award.