Aditi Phadnis: First CIO

Vivek Kundra was born in New Delhi in 1975, migrated with his parents to Tanzania where he lived till he was 11 and then moved to the US. The 34-year-old was appointed the first ever Federal Chief Information Officer by President Barack Obama last week. His favourite book is Great Expectations, comfort food is the lowly plum, favourite movie is Sholay and he can speak Swahili. How cool is that?

What exactly does a CIO do and why did the need to appoint the first one arise in the US?

The Federal chief information officer directs the policy and strategic planning of federal information technology investments and is responsible for oversight of federal technology spending. He establishes and oversees enterprise architecture to ensure system interoperability and information sharing and ensure information security and privacy across the federal government.

Kundra himself sees his job as the following: The United States is engaged in two wars, the economy and healthcare where technology can make a real difference. He pointed out at his first press interaction that the National Institutes of Health — which coordinated a global effort to share data on the human genome, encouraging the development of about 500 drugs — can be an example of how government’s use of technology can promote problem-solving. Kundra will also develop and support the website data.gov that will encourage massive public participation and transparency. What the Right to Information Act has done for India, Kundra will do for the US. He will also pare government expenditure by encouraging the use of IT applications to the widest possible degree.

It is in the fitness of things that a person of Indian origin should be appointed to the top IT policy job in the US. There could be some debate whether IT applications could have foreseen the current economic meltdown. There are many who believe it could have: If eXtensible Business Reporting Language or XBRL, as it is called, had been pressed into service. XBRL could have increased the speed of handling financial data, controlled mistakes and misreporting and generally made financial information more verifiable. So the subprime crisis, that led to the release of toxic financial acids into the system, could have been prevented.

What is refreshing about Kundra is his clear-eyed commitment to putting technology to the greater good. He says he admires Mahatma Gandhi because “he held no formal office, title, or property, yet was one of the most potent political forces in the last century.” He says the best advice he ever got was: “Free yourself to do the right thing.”

For a person who has a marked preference for Google Apps, Kundra says if there was one person he would like to have dinner with, it would be Bill Gates because “in 30 years he not only created a whole new industry, but is transforming public health and education. From global health to education, he is successfully tackling some of the world’s toughest problems.”

The Washington Post noted in its profile that when Kundra moved to the US, one of the biggest changes for him was the dog-food commercials on television. “I was shocked,” he said. “I was used to seeing people starve in Africa. It was mind-boggling to me that people could afford to feed their dogs!” With values like these, American Indians say, he will do the community proud.