Florida shifts focus from IT strategic planning to project assurance

Florida is focused on making sure its projects are on track, Chief Planning Officer Tara Kyvik told StateScoop at the National Association of State Chief Information Officers annual conference in September.

Last year it was IT strategic planning, but this year it’s project assurance, she explained.

“It’s kind of my life mantra is to always to do better,” she said. “There’s always opportunities to do that. We want to bring a little more of a lean approach into our project management standards, also bring in flavors of agile methodologies. So while right now our standards are compatible with agile methodologies, you won’t see any of the agile vernacular in there. So we want to start moving the state more in that direction.”

Innovation in Florida takes the form of streamlining processes, she said, a task that can take many forms.

“I never want to be seen as just a bureaucrat,” Kyvik said. “I want to be seen as somebody who is always working to make things better, surrounded by a team of folks I think who share that commitment to make things as good for the agencies and for the state citizenry as possible. It can take a variety of shapes and forms. It can be as simple as tweaking a dial here and there to make things more efficient, or if it’s to reinvent a process altogether.”