Oklahoma’s Pettit to be new Oregon CIO

In a rare state-to-state move, Oklahoma Chief Information Officer Alex Pettit will head to Oregon to be the state’s new CIO, a position that has been vacant now for more than a year.

Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin announced Thursday that Pettit will officially step down Jan. 4 to take his new post in Oregon.

Pettit was the first CIO in Oklahoma’s history. He was appointed in April of 2010 by then-Gov. Brad Henry after the state’s legislature passed a law authorizing the position to oversee Oklahoma’s information and technology operations.

Fallin, who retained Pettit as state CIO upon her election in 2011, praised Pettit for his work, saying the state’s information technology services were an “eight-track player in an iPod world” when he was hired. Pettit has since led the state on a massive IT consolidation project.

Pettit discussed the consolidation project earlier this year in an interview with StateScoop Radio.

Oregon’s CIO position has been vacant since November 2012 when Dugan Petty, one of the state CIO community’s most respected leaders, retired following more than six years on the job. At the time, Petty was the longest-standing state CIO in the country, but since his departure the position has only been filled on an interim basis.

The move is also believed to be only the second time in the past decade where a state CIO moved from one state to another. Teri Takai, now the CIO at the Defense Department, moved from Michigan to California in 2007.

Pettit’s bio:

Mr. Pettit was re-appointed Oklahoma’s State Chief Information Officer by Gov. Mary Fallin in January 2011. He was appointed as Oklahoma’s first State CIO by Gov. Brad Henry in April 2010. The Information Services Act created the State CIO position gave the CIO authority over the ISD Division. He has jurisdictional responsibility related to information and telecommunications systems of all state agencies as provided in the Oklahoma Information Services Act.

Previously, Mr. Pettit served at Brown University in 2009, as an independent consultant responsible for project management of the planning, coordination and execution of the rapid development of a fully functional and tested disaster recovery plan and the coordination of the renovation of Brown University’s sole data center. Prior to that, Mr. Pettit worked for Marsh McLennan in the areas of business continuity planning (BCP) strategy and vision, disaster recovery and business resumption planning focusing on the proactive preparation of people to effectively survive through and recover from a major crisis event.

For a decade, Mr. Pettit has been actively involved in continuity of operations planning, crisis leadership, emergency operations center design, civil defense planning in Texas, and has personally managed and supported teams through major crisis events.

Mr. Pettit has global industry, government and Big 4 consulting experience, and is a recognized leader in Enterprise Architecture. He has directed both industry and consulting organizations in diverse roles as a chief technology officer, vice president and BCP service line leader, senior manager and regional director of technology and telecommunications. Mr. Pettit has received the Best of Texas Award for IT Leadership, the Public Technology Institute IT Leadership Award and the Society for Information Management IT Executive of the Year Award for his leadership.

In addition, Mr. Pettit is a published author on IT Leadership in Studies in E-Government, Government Technology Magazine, Texas Technology Magazine, the Journal for Enterprise Architecture and most recently, the SIM Guide to Enterprise Architecture (2009).

Mr. Pettit completed undergraduate coursework at the University of Wisconsin at Parkside and received an MBA from Loyola University of Chicago. He is currently working toward completion of a PhD in Interdisciplinary Information Sciences at the University of North Texas. He is a member of the Beta Gamma Sigma International Honor Society and teaches classes at the University of Phoenix in the areas of Technology Survival Planning, Enterprise Architecture, and E-Business. He is certified by the Disaster Recovery Institute International as a Certified Business Continuity Professional (CBCP). In addition, he holds certifications with Novell, Filenet, Sun Systems and IBM.

Mr. Pettit is a member of the following professional organizations: the Disaster Recovery Institute International, the International City Managers Association, the Texas City Managers Association, the Society for Information Management, the Society of Information Managers and the American Institute of Technology Professionals.