DOD's Takai honors IT excellence

Defense Department CIO Teri Takai on Dec. 6 recognized some of the best in Pentagon IT and management, bestowing honors as part of the annual DOD CIO awards.

Enterprise email was a stand-out honoree, with the migration team behind the Army's transition to enterprise email winning first-place team recognition and John Howell, Army enterprise email product director, winning second place in the individual category.

"Email has become the major communication mechanism … that is extremely important in our overall communications," Takai said, according to a DOD release. She noted that enterprise e-mail "lays the infrastructure" for broader identity management, "and the teams have established a way for the DOD to do enterprise services."

Gen. Keith Alexander, National Security Agency director and commander of U.S. Cyber Command, also spoke at the ceremony, highlighting achievements in cybersecurity and innovation.

"You see things that are different than industry sees them – in every other area of our government, those that operate networks don't have to defend the nation like you do," Alexander said. "Our innovation is far different than anybody else’s in the world; you bring innovation to the table."

Among the winners were:

Individual winners -- First place: Charles (Dean) Corpman, command and control section chief, U.S. Strategic Command, J864; Second place: Howell; Third place: Richard Ford, Defense Manpower Data Center, Identity Services Division.

Team winners -- First place: Army Enterprise Email Migrations Team, U.S. Army NETCOM G-3; Second place: Enterprise Mission Assurance, Support Service Team, Defense Information Systems Agency; Third: Enterprise Infrastructure Team, Joint Task Force-Capital Medical, Military Health System.