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CIO Perspective: When the agency CIO heads to Silicon Valley – FCW

I am very pleased Mr. Hyde agreed to join to my growing Board of Advisors.  His decades of experience in the defense and intelligence community, plus his interest in cyber, access control and technical innovation make him a perfect fit.  Mr. Hyde previously w

Excerpt below is from the article “When the agency CIO heads to Silicon Valley” by Richard Spires, available at:http://fcw.com/articles/2015/05/15/cio-heads-to-silicon-valley.aspx

(Abridged)

A little over a year ago, I took the helm of Resilient Network Systems, an early-stage software company that has its headquarters in San Francisco. Since then, I have been living a bicoastal life, spending about a third of my time out West and the remainder in the Washington, D.C., area or traveling as needed to visit potential clients.

Given my years of work in federal IT (both in and out of government), I understand this business and its culture. So I am finding it fascinating to face a new set of experiences and culture as I work in Silicon Valley and deal with venture capitalists, angel investors, other IT companies (small and large) and potential customers.

My observations reflect my personal experiences, and I appreciate that there are examples that one can cite that would not align with my observations. Still, I think it is instructive to reflect on some significant differences I have observed between West and East. There are important perspectives worth noting as all of us in government IT work to better capitalize on new, innovative technologies and solutions, and many of those innovations do indeed come from Silicon Valley.