VanRoekel's choice of hosiery draws attention
The top CIO of the government shunned his Washingtonian apparel to meet the demands of a culture that doesn't wear slacks.
US CIO Steve VanRoekel is doing things differently these days, and he knows it takes more than fresh technology to be really fresh. It takes a change of clothes.
VanRoekel and US CTO Todd Park spoke May 23 to the new-age IT crowd at the TechCrunch Disrupt NYC Conference about President Barack Obama’s new digital strategy. In the strategy, the administration aims to make the government innovative and mobile to meet the demands of today’s citizenry.
Coming straight from Washington, VanRoekel has a persona to overcome. The crowd VanRoekel addressed in New York is very different from that in Washington. These people typically choose to wear a pair of jeans to work instead of stuffy dark suits. So for his presentation, VanRoekel dumped his tie, wore his shirt with the top buttons undone and put on white socks with pink stripes that contrasted against his dark slacks and shoes.
His reason for his fresh clothes:
“To change culture, you’ve got to switch things up, and this is about changing culture, in large part.”
He testifies on the digital strategy before the Senate committee May 24. Will he change culture on Capitol Hill with those white, striped socks?
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