What's hot at FOSE 2013
Connecting state and local government leaders
The annual conference and expo kicks off Tuesday, tackling the key challenges facing the public-sector IT community.
Public-sector agencies face a raft of IT challenges these days: dealing with ever-more insidious cyber threats, migrating to the cloud, implementing big data and analytics technologies -- and doing it all with static or shrinking budgets. FOSE is here to help.
The annual gathering of the public-sector IT community kicks off in Washington May 14, featuring forward-looking keynotes, deep-diving conference sessions, free educational programs and abundant displays of new technology.
The conference and exposition will take place May 14-16 at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center in D.C., overlapping with the GovSec conference, May 13-15, which focuses on homeland security and law enforcement. Both events are staged by 1105 Media, parent company of GCN.
FOSE’s conference schedule will run on five tracks, reflecting key current trends in the public sector: cloud and virtualization, cybersecurity, mobile government, big data and business intelligence, and project management. Each track offers sessions throughout each day of FOSE, covering topics ranging from BYOD (on the mobile track) to combatting advanced threats (cybersecurity). Attendees who want to see what goes on during a cyberattack, for example, can attend an interactive demonstration at 10:30 a.m. Tuesday where cybersecurity experts will demonstrate how they respond. A track separate from the cybersecurity track will focus on cybercrime and cyberterrorism.
FOSE also features a steady stream of free Solution Sessions, Government Tech Talks and free workshops on a range of hot topics, from transparent records management to mobile learning to building a Windows 8 app for your agency. And if apps are your thing, you can get a rundown on agency apps built by DOD, TSA, the Agriculture Department and others at the App Arcade.
And, of course, about 200 IT companies and agencies will man booths on the show floor.
Gen. Stan McChrystal, former commander of U.S. and International Forces in Afghanistan and author of the memoir My Share of the Task, will kick off the conference with a keynote at 8:45 a.m. Tuesday. McChrystal’s talk will focus on the state of international affairs, national security and the challenges of leadership in the IT age.
At noon on Tuesday, attendees get a rare, three-person keynote on “Doing More with Less: Efficient Government Through Project Management.” On the stage will be Jan Frye, deputy assistant secretary for the Veterans Affairs Department’s Office of Acquisition and Logistics; Craig Kilough, vice president of organization markets for the Project Management Institute; and Emily Murphy, senior counsel for the House Small Business Committee.
At 9 a.m. Wednesday, former NFL and Washington Redskins quarterback Joe Theismann will talk about management, effective leadership and the importance of trusting the people you work with.
Federal CIO Steven VanRoekel, who has been leading the federal government’s IT agenda since 2011, will hold forth at 1 p.m. Wednesday.
The show’s final day, Thursday, starts with back-to-back keynotes from Sen. Tom Carper of Delaware at 8 a.m. and futurist Daniel Burris at 8:45. Carper, who also was Delaware’s governor from 1993 to 2001, will discuss building a 21st century government. Burris, author of the New York Times bestseller Flash Foresight, will talk about how government can apply existing trends to anticipate the evolution of advanced cloud services, virtualization, mobility, big data, high-speed analytics and other key technologies.
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