Make your Federal 100 nominations today!

FCW has always maintained that people are what matter in federal IT. The technology specifics change constantly, but every change of any significance can always be tracked back to the individual women and men who are moving mountains to make government work better.

All too often, however, those individuals get no recognition for their efforts -- or, if they're in the upper agency ranks, they get "rewarded" with invitations to congressional oversight hearings. Great individuals get lumped in with "broken government" when what they really deserve are praise and public thanks for the repairs they're making.

FCW's Rising Star awards are one attempt to address the problem, and profiles of those two dozen early-career overachievers are available here. But the Federal 100 offers the best opportunity to honor all of federal IT's top performers -- and nominations are now being accepted for the 2015 awards.

So please go to FCW.com/2015fed100 and get started today on your nominations because no matter how accomplished a candidate is, he or she can't win without being nominated.

Not sure what it takes to make the Federal 100? Here are four points to remember:

1. Anyone in the federal IT community is eligible. That means agency employees, members of the federal contracting sector, academics, members of Congress, independent watchdogs and anyone else who's had a real impact in 2014.
2. The award is for individual accomplishments in 2014.
3. Federal 100 winners go above and beyond — whatever their level or rank. A fancy job title is not required, and just doing one's job well is not enough.
4. Impact matters. The judges need to know not only what a nominee did, but also what all that work accomplished.

Additional guidelines are available here. So identify the people you think should be among this year's Federal 100, and make sure we know about them as well!