New Federal Chief Information Officer Steven VanRoekel has pledged to continue the policies of his predecessor, Vivek Kundra - and to extend them even further in driving innovation in government IT. In Silicon Valley for his first public speech earlier this week, VanRoekel outlined a vision that includes continuation of Kundra's "Cloud First" policy, while also emphasizing utilization of the latest innovations in mobile devices and collaboration tools to create what he called a "Future First" agenda. This is precisely the agenda that Appian has been advocating to our government (and commercial) customers through our Cloud BPM, Mobile BPM and Social BPM.
"As it did [in the 1980s], America's future now depends on our capacity to innovate and harness technology," he said. "That's even more true of the federal government. The American people expect us to use technology to provide the same level of service they experience in their everyday lives. They pay bills online and buy plane tickets on smartphones. And it's not just the millennial generation ñ with 80-year olds now using Facebook to keep in touch with grandchildren across the country - expectations have reached a critical point even faster than anticipated."
Those expectations boil down to building "a government that works better for the American people."
This means reducing cost and waste and maximizing return on IT investments. It means increasing the use of shared services across federal IT. It means closing the productivity gap and enhancing citizen and business interaction with government.
These are all areas where Appian's BPM software excels, and where our technology innovations are driving unprecedented value. Putting a fine point on it, VanRoekel said, "Technologies like cloud, mobile, web platforms, and servers have matured to the point where they can now play a key role in transforming every aspect of government. And we've learned how to adapt our business models to take advantage of new technologies ñ agility, flexibility, scalability, and openness help even the largest organizations thrive despite the ever quickening pace of change."
This is Appian's value proposition, almost to the letter.
Addressing the sentiment that this is not the fiscal environment for investment and innovation, VanReokel said, "[I]f anyone doubts that now is the time to invest, consider the fact that more than half of the Fortune 500 companies were founded during an economic downturn. When forced to do more with less ñ when there is no alternative but to create a better way to get things done ñ that is when the real breakthroughs occur. In tough times, visionaries and risk-takers can tap into underutilized human capital, technology, information and other resources, picking up the pieces to reassemble them into something completely new."
Amen, brother. And godspeed.
-Ben Farrell, Director, Corporate Communications
