A bad idea: CTO for cloud computing

Some ideas pop up just too early. And the Obama administration recently found out that the timing was just bad for one of its ideas, too soon to implement, even as the new administration is rushing ahead with many others.

The General Services Administration had planned to create a new position--the chief technology officer for cloud computing. It sounded like a good idea because cloud computing is a top priority of federal CIO Vivek Kundra. It saves money. It saves time. It's efficient. The administration even selected a person for the job--Patrick Stingley, the CTO of the Bureau of Land Management--according to an article in Information Week.

Less than a month and a half after being named the federal cloud CTO, however, Stingley returned to his role as CTO of the Bureau of Land Management. The GSA said the creation of the job was just too soon.

"It just wasn't the right time to have any formalized roles and responsibilities because this is still kind of in the analysis stage," GSA CIO Casey Coleman told Information Week. "Once it becomes an ongoing initiative, it might be a suitable time to look at roles such as a federal cloud CTO, but it's just a little premature."

Having said all that, it's clear that the administration is no less committed to cloud computing. And as cloud computing takes off in government, the GSA may change its mind when the timing is finally right.

For more on the cloud computing CTO:
- see this Information Week article