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OMB Launches Federal IT Shared Services Strategy
The Federal IT Shared Services Strategy was released by OMB today to provide Federal Agency Chief Information Officers and key stakeholders guidance on the implementation of shared IT services as a key part of their efforts to eliminate waste and duplication and reinvest in innovative mission systems. Federal CIO, Steven VanRoekel also issued a memorandum to agency CIOs laying out requirements for agencies that support the strategy.
This strategy is one of the actions identified in the December 2010 25-Point Implementation Plan to Reform Federal IT Management. The strategy covers the entire spectrum of IT shared service opportunities throughout the Federal Government and promotes the use of existing and new strategic sourcing methods where agencies can combine their buying power for similar IT needs and get lower prices and improved service leverage in the process. Accompanying this strategy is the Common Approach to Federal Enterprise Architecture, which provides agile, standardized methods and tools for designing the next generation of IT resources and shared services that agencies will need to successfully accomplish their missions in the face of tight resources and rising customer needs.
Driving Agencies to a “Shared First” Default
Referred to as “Shared-First”, the Federal IT Shared Services Strategy will improve the return on investment for IT spending, close productivity gaps, increase communications with the managing partners and customers of shared services, and support agencies in implementing their PortfolioStat process per M-12-10. Shared-First principles and the Common Approach to making agencies future-ready creates new opportunities for industry to provide shared IT services to agencies that are more agile in delivery and more responsive to a wide variety of evolving mission, support, and commodity IT requirements. The strategy recognizes the need for agencies to gain proficiency in managing or consuming shared IT services and therefore provides an initial focus on commodity IT consolidation opportunities, as called for in the August 2011 OMB memo (M-11-29) to Chief Information Officers.
Click here to access the Federal IT Shared Services Strategy
Click here to access the Common Approach to Federal Enterprise Architecture
