Hobbins will reorganize CIO functions
Connecting state and local government leaders
Acting Air Force secretary Michael Dominguez and Lt. Gen. William "Tom" Hobbins yesterday wielded a giant pair of scissors, grinning for the cameras while they cut a symbolic piece of ribbon to signal a single organization for IT management.
Acting Air Force secretary Michael Dominguez and Lt. Gen. William "Tom" Hobbins yesterday wielded a giant pair of scissors, grinning for the cameras while they cut a symbolic piece of ribbon to signal a single organization for IT management.
That marked the official creation of the Office of Warfighting Integration and Chief Information Officer, reuniting the functions of the CIO, warfighting integration, and installations and logistics. The three offices had been split in 1996.
Dominguez praised the work of Hobbins, departing CIO John Gilligan and the team that worked to form the new organization.
Quoting 15th-century strategist Niccolo Machiavelli, he said, "'There is nothing more difficult to take in hand, more perilous to conduct or more uncertain in success than to take the lead in the introduction of a new order of things.' We need you to do great things."
At a press briefing after the ceremony, Hobbins said the mission of the new office is to combine business processes with warfighting to streamline the organization and improve Air Force information superiority.
The review leading to the reorganization, Hobbins said, identified 233 functions that were carried out by the three offices, and about 20 percent were covered by all three organizations. He aims to reduce that redundancy, he said, but it is premature to make any assumptions about the impact of the reorganization on staffing.
"When they took the one organization and broke it into three, they didn't give us any more people, so I think I've got the right amount of people now," he said.
Hobbins said he would like to see any financial savings from the streamlining reinvested in the Air Force's national security systems. "We get a direct vote in the Air Force process on what the warfighter needs," he said.
Hobbins identified several new staff:
- Rob Thomas II, who served as assistant deputy chief of staff to Hobbins in the warfighting integration office, as his deputy in the new office
- Maj. Gen. Charles Croom, who was director of command, control, computers, communications, surveillance, intelligence and reconnaissance in the warfighting integration office, as director of information, services and integration, reporting to Hobbins
- Maj. Gen. Gregory Power, who was director of C4ISR and deputy chief of staff for Hobbins, as director of operations and support integration
- David Tillotson III, who served as director of architecture and operational support modernization and deputy chief of staff in the warfighting integration office, as director of policy, planning and resources.
NEXT STORY: Kennedy, Murphy to introduce health IT bill