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How a Modernized IT Environment Supports Digital Government

A strategic approach can help federal agencies operate more efficiently and carry out their missions more effectively.

IN THIS ARTICLE

Modernizing IT ecosystems has become crucial to mission success for federal agencies. Modernized applications and infrastructure enhance performance, improve the user experience and streamline compliance. However, existing systems, technical debt and budget constraints all pose formidable challenges. By working with trusted partners to modernize their computing, networking and storage environments, agencies can lay the foundation for technology environments that allow users to stay focused on their missions.

Often, this transformation will include significant migration of resources to the cloud. Merely making investments in new solutions is not enough to fuel government digital transformation. It is important for IT leaders to pursue modernization efforts guided by an overarching strategy that aligns with their long-term goals.

When done effectively, modernization can help agencies attract and retain talent, maximize their ROI, achieve new insights, and lengthen the life of their technology assets, establishing a nimble environment capable of adapting to a changing world.

How quickly can your agency adapt to IT changes? 

Modernizing IT ecosystems has become crucial to mission success for federal agencies. Modernized applications and infrastructure enhance performance, improve the user experience and streamline compliance. However, existing systems, technical debt and budget constraints all pose formidable challenges. By working with trusted partners to modernize their computing, networking and storage environments, agencies can lay the foundation for technology environments that allow users to stay focused on their missions.

Often, this transformation will include significant migration of resources to the cloud. Merely making investments in new solutions is not enough to fuel government digital transformation. It is important for IT leaders to pursue modernization efforts guided by an overarching strategy that aligns with their long-term goals.

When done effectively, modernization can help agencies attract and retain talent, maximize their ROI, achieve new insights, and lengthen the life of their technology assets, establishing a nimble environment capable of adapting to a changing world.

How quickly can your agency adapt to IT changes?

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Why Agencies Need to Modernize Federal IT

Digital transformation has taken IT departments in all sectors by storm in recent years, and with good reason. The potential to uncover new insights and improve operations using data has never been greater, yet existing systems can hamstring organizations as they seek to achieve these benefits.

This is especially true for federal agencies, which must contend with tight budget constraints and strict security requirements as they tackle IT modernization initiatives. Moreover, these challenges are exactly why agencies need modernized IT environments. Many agencies have a significant amount of technical debt, which can both increase IT costs and expose organizations to unacceptable levels of risk. An effective IT modernization effort can streamline regulatory compliance, boost security and increase automation to reduce human error. The federal government has an aging workforce, and agencies risk losing skills and institutional knowledge as longtime employees retire from the public sector. These agencies must embrace digital transformation to help them fill these gaps.

1,470

The number of data centers the federal government is operating as of January 2023, having closed 736 data centers from 2016 to 2022

Source: itdashboard.gov, “Data Center Information,” May 14, 2024



Broadly speaking, there are two key elements to IT modernization: applications and infrastructure. There is often a massive amount of duplication across different applications, which can serve as the basis for the adoption of microservices and containerization, both necessary for cloud-native apps that can run in practically any environment. Rather than pouring their scarce budget dollars into the maintenance of outdated systems, agencies that embrace application modernization can improve their user experience with an application environment that rivals those of the most innovative private sector companies. To update their app environments, most agencies will also need to embrace infrastructure modernization, seeking out the software-defined infrastructure solutions and cloud resources that will best support the needs of their unique workloads.

Beyond the technology itself, IT modernization requires agencies to update their procedures, practices and training. For instance, cyber resilience and effective incident response should be core tenets of IT modernization, but these outcomes are often largely the result of people and policies rather than new technology solutions.

While most federal IT leaders recognize the need to modernize, they may be unsure of where to start or how they can make transformative changes to their technology environments within their budgetary and regulatory frameworks. This is where a trusted third-party partner can help. A partner can assess the current environment, draft a blueprint for modernization and help implement the changes that will help agencies keep up with the ongoing evolution of technology.

What can your agency do to
keep pace with IT evolution?

The Need to Modernize Federal IT

Digital transformation has taken IT departments in all sectors by storm in recent years, and with good reason. The potential to uncover new insights and improve operations using data has never been greater, yet existing systems can hamstring organizations as they seek to achieve these benefits.

This is especially true for federal agencies, which must contend with tight budget constraints and strict security requirements as they tackle IT modernization initiatives. Moreover, these challenges are exactly why agencies need modernized IT environments. Many agencies have a significant amount of technical debt, which can both increase IT costs and expose organizations to unacceptable levels of risk. An effective IT modernization effort can streamline regulatory compliance, boost security and increase automation to reduce human error. The federal government has an aging workforce, and agencies risk losing skills and institutional knowledge as longtime employees retire from the public sector. These agencies must embrace digital transformation to help them fill these gaps.

1,470

The number of data centers the federal government is operating as of January 2023, having closed 736 data centers from 2016 to 2022

Source: itdashboard.gov, “Data Center Information,” May 14, 2024



Broadly speaking, there are two key elements to IT modernization: applications and infrastructure. There is often a massive amount of duplication across different applications, which can serve as the basis for the adoption of microservices and containerization, both necessary for cloud-native apps that can run in practically any environment. Rather than pouring their scarce budget dollars into the maintenance of outdated systems, agencies that embrace application modernization can improve their user experience with an application environment that rivals those of the most innovative private sector companies. To update their app environments, most agencies will also need to embrace infrastructure modernization, seeking out the software-defined infrastructure solutions and cloud resources that will best support the needs of their unique workloads.

Beyond the technology itself, IT modernization requires agencies to update their procedures, practices and training. For instance, cyber resilience and effective incident response should be core tenets of IT modernization, but these outcomes are often largely the result of people and policies rather than new technology solutions.

While most federal IT leaders recognize the need to modernize, they may be unsure of where to start or how they can make transformative changes to their technology environments within their budgetary and regulatory frameworks. This is where a trusted third-party partner can help. A partner can assess the current environment, draft a blueprint for modernization and help implement the changes that will help agencies keep up with the ongoing evolution of technology.

What can your agency do to
keep pace with IT evolution?

Federal IT Modernization: By the Numbers

$95B

The amount that federal agencies planned to spend on IT investments during the 2024 fiscal year (not counting $37 billion in planned Defense Department spending for unclassified national security systems, classified IT and classified cyberspace)

Source: Government Accountability Office, “Information Technology: Federal Agencies Are Making Progress in Implementing GAO Recommendations,” December 2023

34%

The percentage of government IT professionals who identified Software as a Service as the most frequently used purchasing method to procure new IT tools and services for their agencies

Source: CDW, “2024 CDW Cybersecurity Research Report,” May 2024

85%

The percentage of government IT professionals who said their agencies are somewhat or very prepared to respond to a cybersecurity incident

Source: CDW, “2024 CDW Cybersecurity Research Report,” May 2024

Federal IT Modernization: By the Numbers

$95B

The amount that federal agencies planned to spend on IT investments during the 2024 fiscal year (not counting $37 billion in planned Defense Department spending for unclassified national security systems, classified IT and classified cyberspace)

Source: Government Accountability Office, “Information Technology: Federal Agencies Are Making Progress in Implementing GAO Recommendations,” December 2023

34%

The percentage of government IT professionals who identified Software as a Service as the most frequently used purchasing method to procure new IT tools and services for their agencies

Source: CDW, “2024 CDW Cybersecurity Research Report,” May 2024

85%

The percentage of government IT professionals who said their agencies are somewhat or very prepared to respond to a cybersecurity incident

Source: CDW, “2024 CDW Cybersecurity Research Report,” May 2024

cdw

The Foundations of IT Modernization

Federal IT ecosystems are vast and complex, with numerous interdependencies. To truly modernize their approaches to technology, agencies must not only make targeted investments in new systems and applications but also assess and update their entire IT infrastructure.

NETWORKING: A fast, robust, reliable network is a prerequisite for nearly all modernization initiatives. To effectively leverage emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI) and the Internet of Things, agencies need network infrastructure that will guarantee superior performance to enable scalability over time. In addition to replacing aging switches, routers and wireless access points, federal IT leaders are exploring and implementing connectivity solutions such as software-defined WAN. This optimizes application performance through intelligent path selection. Visibility and management tools are also important, as they help ensure networks continue to perform as expected over time.

PROCESSING: As agencies expand their use of AI and advanced data analytics, they need to ensure their computing infrastructure can keep up. Servers have evolved significantly in recent years, implementing innovations such as new graphics processing units and multicore processors that are needed to handle complex tasks. Agencies running traditional computing infrastructure may find their server environments hamper overall modernization plans. Under the guidance of the Office of Management and Budget, the federal government has made remarkable progress in consolidating data centers, shuttering hundreds in recent years and generating billions of dollars in cost savings.

Click Below to Continue Reading

arrow

STORAGE: Effective data management is essential for mission-critical applications such as Big Data analytics, but for federal agencies, it also carries significant accountability and transparency implications. Depending on the use case, agencies may opt for high-performance all-flash arrays, public cloud storage or tiered options that allow the inexpensive storage of archival data. Federal IT leaders must seek out options that provide flexibility and accessibility and ensure compliance with stringent data security standards such as those established by the Federal Information Security Modernization Act and the Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program. In addition to supporting day-to-day operations, storage is a critical component of disaster recovery and business continuity planning.

SECURITY: Reducing cyber risk has long been a top priority in the federal space, as agencies safeguard citizens’ personal and financial data, law enforcement records, and top-secret information with direct national security implications. As the threat landscape grows in both size and sophistication, and as the physical IT perimeter becomes less relevant, government agencies are adopting zero-trust practices to keep their environments safe. Security and IT leaders should also continue to invest in vulnerability assessments, penetration testing and other services that can help them identify and shore up gaps in their environments.

CLOUD: Increasingly, agencies have embraced the public cloud, with some making moves toward a multicloud model. For instance, in 2022, the Department of Defense launched the Joint Warfighting Cloud Capability, a $9 billion effort to migrate on-premises resources to commercial cloud providers including Amazon Web Services, Azure, Google and Oracle. This approach avoids vendor lock-in, gives agencies access to a wider array of services, and enhances resilience and disaster recovery capabilities by distributing resources and dependencies across several platforms. Rather than conducting a simple changeover of existing resources, agencies looking to modernize must update their applications to make them cloud-native by incorporating containers and microservices.

cdw

Modernization Foundations

Federal IT ecosystems are vast and complex, with numerous interdependencies. To truly modernize their approaches to technology, agencies must not only make targeted investments in new systems and applications but also assess and update their entire IT infrastructure.

NETWORKING: A fast, robust, reliable network is a prerequisite for nearly all modernization initiatives. To effectively leverage emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI) and the Internet of Things, agencies need network infrastructure that will guarantee superior performance to enable scalability over time. In addition to replacing aging switches, routers and wireless access points, federal IT leaders are exploring and implementing connectivity solutions such as software-defined WAN. This optimizes application performance through intelligent path selection. Visibility and management tools are also important, as they help ensure networks continue to perform as expected over time.

PROCESSING: As agencies expand their use of AI and advanced data analytics, they need to ensure their computing infrastructure can keep up. Servers have evolved significantly in recent years, implementing innovations such as new graphics processing units and multicore processors that are needed to handle complex tasks. Agencies running traditional computing infrastructure may find their server environments hamper overall modernization plans. Under the guidance of the Office of Management and Budget, the federal government has made remarkable progress in consolidating data centers, shuttering hundreds in recent years and generating billions of dollars in cost savings.

Click Below to Continue Reading

arrow

STORAGE: Effective data management is essential for mission-critical applications such as Big Data analytics, but for federal agencies, it also carries significant accountability and transparency implications. Depending on the use case, agencies may opt for high-performance all-flash arrays, public cloud storage or tiered options that allow the inexpensive storage of archival data. Federal IT leaders must seek out options that provide flexibility and accessibility and ensure compliance with stringent data security standards such as those established by the Federal Information Security Modernization Act and the Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program. In addition to supporting day-to-day operations, storage is a critical component of disaster recovery and business continuity planning.

SECURITY: Reducing cyber risk has long been a top priority in the federal space, as agencies safeguard citizens’ personal and financial data, law enforcement records, and top-secret information with direct national security implications. As the threat landscape grows in both size and sophistication, and as the physical IT perimeter becomes less relevant, government agencies are adopting zero-trust practices to keep their environments safe. Security and IT leaders should also continue to invest in vulnerability assessments, penetration testing and other services that can help them identify and shore up gaps in their environments.

CLOUD: Increasingly, agencies have embraced the public cloud, with some making moves toward a multicloud model. For instance, in 2022, the Department of Defense launched the Joint Warfighting Cloud Capability, a $9 billion effort to migrate on-premises resources to commercial cloud providers including Amazon Web Services, Azure, Google and Oracle. This approach avoids vendor lock-in, gives agencies access to a wider array of services, and enhances resilience and disaster recovery capabilities by distributing resources and dependencies across several platforms. Rather than conducting a simple changeover of existing resources, agencies looking to modernize must update their applications to make them cloud-native by incorporating containers and microservices.

Where can an IT modernization
initiative take your agency?

Rick Anderson, Gary Arnce, Mike Farabakhshian, Jeff Grunewald, Brian McConnell, Greg Peters, Jon Mark Sano

CDW Experts
CDW Contributors