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FBI CIO Chad Fulgham: Delivering Real Capability

May 20, 2010 By

The FBI has some critically important missions. They have always been sent to address the big crimes, the hard challenges that required the most advanced training and skills.   And they have always had roles in counter espionage and counter terror (with both those roles growing in the last several years).  They have long been active in making the world a much much safer place.

Consider some of the topics in the weekly top news stories release of 14 May:

  • They helped catch a Dutch bank in a scheme where they bank tried to defraud the US of over $500M.
  • They rolled up another big mortgage fraud scheme.
  • They provided warning to citizens on new seedy phone fraud tricks
  • Vast drug operations were shut down in upstate NY
  • A fraud scheme involving financing of independent movies was uncovered and the perp busted.
  • Several Texas murderers were brought to justice
  • Hate crimes were investigated and arrests made
  • Art theft conspiracy was investiaged and arrests made.

These are just highlights from one week.  Far far more is being done by the FBI.  These guys really help protect us.  And they help protect our kids.  And it goes without saying that there is so much trouble in the country we need more help like this.

But this is a blog that tries to focus on technology and a key point I want to make is that the job of the CIO at the FBI is to help the mission.  If a CIO does a good job, the mission is supported.  If a CIO does an incredible job, the mission is not just supported, but mission accomplishment is aided and more bad guys get caught and more crime gets deterred and so on and so on.

I have known for quite a while that Chad Fulgham is one of those world-class CIOs that is doing wonders for the mission at FBI (see his bio here).  I’m glad to see more discussion of his accomplishments in the press.

For a good recap of some of his work see: FBI CIO Unveils Next-Gen IT Strategy

This Information Week article captures some of the agency-wide upgrades underway at the FBI, including:

An upgrade of network infrastructure, including replacing their old ATM/Frame Relay network with new Cisco-based IP systems that use Multiprotocol Lable Switching (this is called the FBI’s Next Gen network, it provides the backbone for FBI UNet, FBINet and SCION, and reaches over 800 FBI locations).  This Next Gen Network provides 45 times mroe capacity over the old one.

A deployment of the latest Microsoft Office-based PC environments that provide dramatically enhanced capabilities including more collaboration tools, to all agents and employees.  This includes PC based voice and video and chat and other productivity apps.

Testing of new capabilities in the FBI case-management system, Sentinel.

Providing more awareness of capabilities to the entire FBI workforce

Enhancing the security and performance of the entire system by use of advanced identity management and infrastructure management tools including Oracle’s Identity Manager, Cisco’s NAC, and a suite of HP tools.

There are so many positive things going on at FBI’s CIO office.  There is a great team in place there with a tremendous mix of seasoned professional IT experts, FBI agents and world class industry leading technologists like Chad.  I think we are all better off because of the efforts underway there.

Filed Under: CTO, Gov2.0 Tagged With: ,
About BobGourley

Bob Gourley is Crucial Point LLC’s founder and editor of CTOvision.com. Bob has received industry recognition including Infoworld top CTO award, AFCEA’s meritorious service award, and recognition as one of the top 100 “Tech Titans” in DC by Washingtonian magazine. He was named one of the “Top 25 Most Fascinating Communicators in Government IT.”

  • Jeremy H.

    This is a somewhat better article than most. Shows results and the fact that the CIO isn't the only guy making the difference. It takes a team. Too many of these articles tout a CIO saving the world, and ignore the contributions of the team.

    • http://crucialpointllc.com Bob Gourley

      Thanks Jeremy. I agree with you about the team focus. Great CIOs, in my experience, are really great team leaders who focus more on helping others and making sure the mission is served by getting credit to where it belongs. I think Chad is that way. He is a good guy who doesn't seem to need glory or credit.

  • Bob Hoffman

    Very good article on Chad. I worked with Chad at IBM on the World Wide CERT Team. I must say that he is the best manager and boss that I have had in my long career. What made it different was his ability to surround himself with a Team, a real team not just a name for the group. He rises above individuality and self promotion. For him it is about his people, his Team and he shows it in every way possible. The difference we made was measurable and significant in a short time. In a company that had 320,000 employees, and not known for any remarkable change he was willing to go to the limit and beyond to fight corporate bureaucracy to accomplish this. When I found out that he was going to the FBI as CIO I knew that he would be up to the challenge and would make the moves to provide the very best that anyone could even hope for. Now we see the remarkable results of his work, his Team work and we will all be, in the long term, directly or in directly beneficiaries of these endeavors.

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