EITaaS Panel Discusses the Way Forward

The chapter was pleased to welcome a distinguished panel of Enterprise Information Technology-as-a-Service (EITaaS) professionals. Larry Shade, Air Force Chief Information Office (SAF/CN) representative to the Tri-Chaired Enterprise Information Technology-as-a-Service (EITaaS) Integrated Program Office (IPO); Col. Brenda Oppel, USAF, Air Combat Command's representative to the Tri-Chaired EITaaS IPO; and Col. Bobby King, USAF, senior materiel leader for the Enterprise Information Technology (IT) and Cyber Infrastructure Division, Hanscom Air Force Base, Massachusetts, met up virtually with the chapter's members and attendees to offer a glimpse into methodologies, pain points and the way forward for EITaaS.

The challenge has been to ensure the total force has access to information that can be understood and transmitted quickly to the consumer to shorten the decision cycles and produce correct and coordinated warfighting effects, explained Shade. The strategy of EITaaS is readiness and enhanced agility for our personnel and the warfighter. To fall in line with the "accelerate, change or lose" action orders from the chief of staff of the Air Force, the EITaaS risk reduction effort, or RRE, began in 2017 for commercial concepts of IT-as-a-Service. "Although we wanted to get this out there as fast as possible, the senior leaders felt it was more prudent to use a test case," Col. Oppel explained. The risk reduction effort was a way forward through the learning curve as the government worked to understand this new process. Governance and policy varied greatly from what the commercial sector was doing and what the government was doing. Colonel Oppel responded that partnering with our commercial counterparts was the best way to advocate to the Air Force corporate structure that these commercially provided services were needed to allow for more flexibility in a rapidly changing environment and mission needs. With regard to the RRE milestones and checks and balances, there have been both positive and negative remarks. However, the transition from the Base Area network to the vendor partner has allowed for never-before-seen configuration control, knowledge, visibility and transparency across the base infrastructures, reaching a positive outlook for that area. Gathering data has allowed for the production strategy in a "wave" approach, explained Col. King. "We hope that this will reduce the risk and complexity that we have as we bring these other pieces into the future."

The EITaaS Integrated Program Office continues to push the Department of the Air Force closer to reaching the optimal level of commercial best practices.

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